German Eee PC site Eee PC News has released Easy Mode XP, an application launcher designed for Eee PCs running Windows XP. The application looks nearly identical to the Easy Mode interface Asus designed for the Eee PC. But the Asus software runs on Xandros Linux and is kind of tricky to customize (unless you use some third party software). Easy Mode XP, on the other hand is incredibly easy to customize.

You'll need Microsoft's .net Framework 2.0 in order to run Easy Mode XP. The first time you run the application you'll be presented with a series of tabs, but each will be empty. You can add applications and icons by clicking on the icon editor. Just select the location of the file you want to run, give it a name, and choose an icon. The developers have been kind enough to create a group of icons for common Windows applications.

And it's also much easier to switch between Easy Mode and "full desktop mode" in XP, because Easy Mode is basically just an application running on top of Windows XP. Clicking the full desktop mode button just minimizes the interface.

Honestly, I'm not quite sure why anyone would want this utility. It's pretty cool that you can mimic the Eee PC's Linux interface in Windows. But if you're running Windows on your Eee PC right now, it's safe to assume you installed it yourself, which means you're probably pretty comfortable with a start menu, taskbar, and other Windows XP doohickeys. Easy Mode was really designed for people who didn't have a lot of experience with computers and people who didn't want to learn about Linux. Neither is true of the folks who are installing XP on the Eee PC.

Now, I did read something about Asus preparing their own Easy Mode for Windows XP that may be included with future Eee PC models that will ship with Windows preloaded. But again, I would assume the goal is to create an attractive interface for people who don't have a lot of experience with traditional computers.

Of course, I could be wrong. Maybe the appeal of the easy mode is the large icons which are easy to read on a small screen. But as simple as Easy Mode XP is, I just don't see a reason to use it.

The Asus Eee PC's unique interface is designed to make it feel less like a computer and more like a consumer electronics device like a PDA or phone. But if you actually want to use your Eee PC like a computer (which after all, is what it is), it can be a bit of a hassle. For example, if you install programs that aren't supported by Asus the icons won't show up in the Easy Mode interface. Or if you want to rearrange or rename your program launcher icons, you'll need to muck around with a bunch of configuration files.

Luckily a member of the EeeUser forums has designed a utility that takes a lot of the hard work out of tweaking your Eee PC's easy mode interface. The appropriately titled Easy Mode Editor lets you add or remove programs to your program launcher, rearrange the icons, or rename application shortcuts.

[via EeeUser]

While the first thing I did when I got my Eee PC was figure out how to enable a full KDE desktop, there is something appealing about the "easy mode" interface that ships with the unit. Asus has designed the Eee PC to be easy to use even if you don't know a thing about computers. Sure, it's a bit silly that you have to click a button marked "web" to launch Firefox, but honestly, does it matter what the name of the tools that you use to browse the internet is, as long as it works?

But if you want to add programs that didn't come with the Eee PC without enabling the advanced desktop, you're going to have to muck around a bit. First of all, you need to pull up a terminal to use apt-get or launch the Synaptic Package Manager. And then once you install your applications, the shortcuts won't show up on your desktop. You could start playing with your configuration files, or you could run Asus Launcher Tools.

The application makes it easy to add icons to your Asus Launcher tabs. You can also refresh the Launcher without closing your programs. Asus Launcher Tools version 0.2 doesn't do much more than that at the moment, but it could make life a whole lot simpler for anyone who wants to add a few programs to their Eee PC but doesn't want to seriously modify their desktop environment.

[via eeeUser forums]

One of the best and worst things about the Eee PC is its "easy mode" user interface. In easy mode, you have no start menu, and little ability to access some of the Eee PC's more advanced features (unless you know your way around a terminal, which you can pull up by hitting Ctrl+Alt+T).

If you like to customize your desktop, easy mode can be pretty frustrating. On the other hand, everything is well designed to fit on the Eee PC's 800 x 480 pixel monitor. (Well, almost everything. Every now and again a menu will pop up that you just can't edit properly because it extends below the screen. But we'll get to that in another post). And restricting access to some of the more advanced features is probably a good thing for many users who aren't familiar with Linux.

It turns out there is a pretty simple way to enable a full KDE desktop, but if you want the best of both worlds, you can also add customizable start menu to your easy mode interface. Somewhat ironically, this might be harder than enabling the full desktop.

Following the tips at Notebook Review I was able to create a start menu by doing the following:

• Open a terminal by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T
• Type "sudo bash" to get root access
• Create a hidden folder by typing "mkdir /home/user/.icewm"
• Copy a config file to it by typing cp /etc/X11/icewm/preferences /home/user/.icewm/"
• Type "nano /home/user/.icewm/preferences" to open an editor
• Scroll down until you find "TaskBarShowStartMenu," and change the 0 to 1
• Hit Ctrl+x to exit
• Next time you reboot or restart your X server by hitting Ctrl+Alt+Backspace you will have a shiny new start menu

There's just one problem. It's mostly empty. Fortunately the folks at EeeUser have some suggestions for populating it by editing the menu file.

First, you need to copy "menu" from /etc/X11/icewm/ to /home/user/.icewm/. You can either do this using the method above, or using the File Manager. But in order to see all the directories and files in file manager, you'll have to select "Show Hidden Files" and "Show All File Systems" from the View tab.

Now go ahead and open menu using the nano command, or by clicking it in the file manager. Now you can edit the menu by adding programs you've installed and removing applications you don't use or which aren't actually available.

In general, the format for a new entry is: prog "title" icon_name program_options

For example: prog Audacity audacity

If you want more examples and tips, I highly recommend checking out the frequently updated EeeUser wiki.