If you read my earlier post on RocketDock, this is a related “rave” on ObjectDock (v. 1.90). Both programs try to bring the main feature of the Dock in Mac OS X to the Windows world.

Although I’m still a big fan of RocketDock, I wanted to customize the look and behavior of my dock. So I tried ObjectDock Plus and I was impressed! Besides being able to download over 1000 different skins and icons from the WinCustomize site, ObjectDock Plus also has Tabbed Docks and Docklets like weather info that fly out to display 5 day forecasts.

But the feature that made me switch was “auto hiding”. For example, if I maximize a window, the dock hides itself, but if I move the mouse to the edge of the screen or resize the window, the dock re-appears. This might not seem like much, but without it, I was constantly minimizing all my windows in RocketDock so that I could see the dock.

Anyways, here’s what my customized ObjectDock looks like:

In case you’re interested, I’m using the OS X Leopard Dock Pack, which you can download from WinCustomize.

As for the icons, I couldn’t find a consistent look so I created my own set with reflections. Since I’m not much of an artist, I used IcoFX to extract the icons from the program executables and saved them as transparent PNGs. Then I opened them in GIMP and used a plugin called gimp-reflection to create some cool looking icons to match the 3-D Leopard dock. I probably went a little overboard because I created over 120 icons from all the programs I have installed!

So if you’re looking for the next step up from RocketDock, check out ObjectDock — there’s a free version and a Plus version for $19.95.

I consider myself a bit of a “cross-trainer” when it comes to operating systems — I’ll happily switch between different distros of Linux and Windows, but I’d also like to be able to switch to Mac OS X as well for its Dock feature. As a Windows user, all you have is the basic Quick Launch toolbar — boring!

Thankfully, there is a free program for Windows called RocketDock (v.1.3.5), which is a smoothly animated, alpha-blended application launcher. It provides a nice clean interface to drop shortcuts on for easy access and organization.

Here’s a screenshot from my system:

But unlike other launchers, RocketDock has Taskbar support so your minimized windows can appear as icons on the dock. I’m hoping this feature will be improved in a future version so that if I minimize a movie, it will continue playing from the dock.

This application is fairly customizable. It comes with 30 different styles (or skins). The default is something called “CrystalXP.net”, but I prefer the “VistaBlack” and “Blank” styles. Another option you might want to change (if you want to be more Mac like) is switching the “Screen Position” from the “Top” to the “Bottom”, and moving the “Edge Offset” to 35px. There’s many other settings as well like monitor, layering, icon quality, animated effects, etc.

Don’t be fooled by the term “application launcher” because you can also drag your favorite files or add URLs on it as well.

A few features that I’m hoping to see in future versions are:

• An option to allow minimized movies to keep playing from the dock.
• The ability to drag URLs on to the dock.
• A collapse button to slide the dock out of the way so I can see what’s under it.
• Also, the ability to stack icons into groups.

Despite my wish list, I think this app still deserves a 5/5 rating.

Hopefully, this application will cure some of my Mac envy until I can afford the new MacBook Air.