We’re less likely to make merely cosmetic changes, although we acknowledge that modifying one’s desktop could possibly induce a rosy state of mind and untold increases in productivity. We imagine a lot of people are going to be doing just that, with the continual delay of the next version of Windows – codenamed Longhorn. Having read about its new features, they’re justifiably impatient to try out its new features.

One likely contributor to this phenomenon – in addition to the wincustomize.com Website - is the June edition of APC magazine – isn’t it fascinating that the June edition arrives at the beginning of May? - which suggests that Windows XP users can add some of Longhorn’s new graphics features, including the Sidebar, ObjectDock, and the Aero look, by adding programs like Desktop Sidebar, ObjectDock and the Windows Longhorn Transformation Pack.

ObjectDock lets you organize your short-cuts and running tasks onto “an extremely customisable dock” that sits on your desktop. The same company also produces WindowBlinds, which is certified and recommended by Microsoft. It allows users to add thousands of new visual styles to Windows. Another member of its stable, RightClick, adds additional functionality.

Those programs are probably worth experimenting with, but we’re not quite so comfortable with APC Magazine even mentioning the Windows Longhorn Transformation pack. It might well cause considerable grief if you use it to tinker with system files to replace the desktop shell and experiment with different skins.

Our advice is to be very careful of any of these things. It can take you down a path that can cause considerable pain.

Take the experience of one of our friends as a cautionary tale. He’s a normally sober individual who regards the addition of wi-fi networking as a potential catastrophe, and agonises over worthwhile improvements to his system.

He cannot, however, resist customizing his desktop, which is what he did a couple of weeks ago. He installed ObjectDock, and delighted in its selection of program icons, which have the elegantly rendered, three-dimensional look of Mac OS X icons.

Once he’d installed that, he moved the Windows task bar to the top of the screen and set it to Autohide by right clicking on the Start button, choosing Properties. And selecting the Autohide check box under the Taskbar tab. You can unhide it by pointing to the area of the screen where it’s located.

Gripped by inspiration, he went to Konfabulator, and downloaded its JavaScript runtime engine which allows users to run things called “widgets”. It’s available for both Windows XP and Mac OS X, although Tiger has stolen much of its thunder on the Mac platform.

He installed some quite handy widgets, including a weather watch that keeps track of the weather in Melbourne Australia (as distinct from Melbourne, Florida), and a station clock. There are many more available - more than 550 of them at last count.

By this time, he had the bit firmly between his teeth. He downloaded the MSN Quick Search Toolbar suite, dragged the icon onto the ObjectDock, and was, for a brief time, contented.

At that point he also downloaded DesktopX, which allowed him to change his graphical user interface with a single click. You can find the themes here.

Even that went well. The point where it suddenly went awry, however, was when he thought he might do some fine tuning, and began to tinker with the desktop’s Display Properties box. He clicked on Themes, and tried out various offerings until he clicked, rather fatefully, on one called Eclipse.

As it happened, it was a particular apt name, because when it installed itself, he was unable to see anything on his screen. The background and the text were all in black. Clearly, this was a total eclipse.

We won’t go into the emotional pain and stress he suffered recovering from this disaster. It might have been a lot worse than it was, and eventually he emerged with a very nice, and much more functional desktop. But just remember. If you must customize, customize with care.