Lost desktop shortcut

at the bottom task bar and right click your mouse. Go to "toolbar" and make sure the "quick launch" is checked. The show desktop icon should be back on the quick launch area next to the start icon. If not, there should be a double arrow down there. Click on it and see if it shows up. You can either rearrange the order of the icons or stretch the quick launch area so all icons are visible.

Jtal,

Nino above pointed out the possibilities of the whole quick launch area switched off or being too narrow.

That are viable possibilities, but it's possible also that there's ample space and other icons (like IE or WMP or Outlook Express) are visible and the show desktop icon disappeared. In that case, read on.

First the shortcut keys to show the desktop. There are 2, even: windows-key + D = show desktop, windows-key + M = minimize all windows (thus showing the desktop). But you might prefer the icon.

In fact, this icon is a shortcut to a small command file Show Desktop.scf in windows\system (details might vary with OS).
It could be that the .scf-file is still present. Then all you've got to do is make a new shortcut to it. If the .scf-file disappeared you can easily create a new one with Notepad: it's a command file with 2 lines only.

All necessary details in http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=190355

Hope this helps.


Kees