you've ever right-clicked an application icon, you've probably seen the context-menu option 'Pin to Start Menu'. It's designed to make frequently used programs more easily accessible.

What about folders? Wouldn't it be nice to have that same kind of quick access to all the folders you use every day? Alas, right-clicking a folder produces no "pinning" option. Fortunately, pinning folders to the Start menu is simple. Here's the step-by-step.

1.Right-click a folder to be pinned and choose Create Shortcut.

2.Click and drag that shortcut to the Start button, waiting a second or two for the menu to appear.

3. While holding the mouse button down, drag the folder to any spot near the top of the menu (above the gray line, which delineates pinned programs from frequently used ones).

4. Drop the folder, and you're done.

Easy, huh? I recommend keeping pinned folders to a manageable minimum (no more than five or six); otherwise, you'll start to overload the Start menu and diminish its convenience.

If you want, right-click the newly pinned folder and choose Rename to edit out the "shortcut" suffix.