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Way to hide a desktop icon temporarily?

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jshare:
I use my Win8.1 desktop as an informal todo list - icons to things to read, programs to install and trial, etc., and this is mainly driven by the fact that I like having a clean desktop, so I'm always motivated to do those tasks and get rid of the icons.

Sometimes I'm tempted to put too much stuff on my desktop though. With that in mind, I'd like a way to hide desktop icons and schedule when they should reappear, signaling that I should take care of them.

Anyone know of a lightweight tool that does this? Or maybe even a registry hack?

skwire:
At the bottom of this page, you'll find a download for a tiny app that toggles the desktop's icons.  That, coupled with a few entries in the built-in Windows Task Scheduler applet, should be able to accomplish what you want.  Or, were you looking for something more custom?

jshare:
No, thanks but that's not it. That hack is all or nothing. I would like to be able to schedule any individual icon to reappear later as a visual alarm (albeit on the desktop, not 'always on top') and theoretically at completely different times each.

skwire:
No, thanks but that's not it. That hack is all or nothing. I would like to be able to schedule any individual icon to reappear later as a visual alarm (albeit on the desktop, not 'always on top') and theoretically at completely different times each.-jshare (September 03, 2014, 01:34 PM)
--- End quote ---

Desktop icons can be either actual files or shortcuts (which are actually LNK files).  So, short of moving particualr files to, say, a temp folder and back to the desktop on a schedule, which seems a bit hackish, I don't think what you want is elegantly possible.

MilesAhead:
If the "icon" is indeed a shortcut it will "disappear" if the Hidden attribute is set.  As an experiment I made a shortcut to cmd.exe and checked the Hidden attribute.  It winked out when I hit the Apply Button.  :)

The only thing is I'm no fan of using the Task Scheduler to do much of anything.  Has anyone found an easy to use replacement Daemon that doesn't have all the baggage and instabilities/quirks of Task Scheduler?

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