What is the Charms Bar?

Question

I've seen a number of references to the "Charms Bar" in discussion about Windows 8. What is it, and how is it accessed?

Answer 1

What is it?

The Charms Bar is the name for the bar that can be made to appear on the right-hand side of the screen:

It is designed to allow a common way of accessing search, sharing, devices and settings for the Start screen and Modern UI apps.

How do I access it?

It can be accessed in a number of ways:

• Swiping in from the right-hand side of the screen on a touchscreen device
• Swiping in from the right-hand side of the trackpad on a laptop, where supported by the drivers
• Moving your mouse to the very top-right or bottom-right of the screen
• Pressing Windows+C

Answer 2

The Charm Bar is a new feature in Windows 8, you can access it through anywhere no matter if you are in desktop UI or Modern UI.

You will see two boxes on the screen. A small box just above the taskbar on the left. It displays the current date and time along with the battery and connectivity strength.

The seconds vertical bar will appear at the right side of the screen which have five buttons **Search, Share, Devices, Settings.

For accessing it you can use these ways

• Press the Win+C

• Dragging your mouse pointer to the top/bottom corner at right side.

What are the features of the Charm Bar

Search

The search feature is basically hte same as we have in old Windows but with new feature's

• You can search for any file
• You can search any application
• You can search the settings

Share

You can share the information via mail or social network. You can't share anything in the desktop mode. Only specific metro apps can share who have necessary permission.

Start

This button will let you access the start menu. While you can access start screen through Win key easily.

Devices

Here you can change settings of the various peripheral devices connected to your computer, like a projector.

Settings

You can control all the settings of your computer from here. The directly accessible controls are Audio, Brightness, Wi-Fi, Power, Notifications and Language. Click on the link more settings to launch the metro control panel.