Each of these shortcuts starts up one of the main window tasks for Tune Smithy (FTS). They are also all accessible from within the Tasks menu in FTS.
You can run any of the tasks at the same time as any of the others, and indeed you can also run several copies of the same task at once.
To copy the shorcut to the desktop, right click on the shortcut and with the right button held down, drag it over to the desktop. You get an option to copy it there - choose that.
To copy to the Quick Launch tool bar (usually along the bottom of your desktop) the process is similar. Right click and drag to the tool bar. A line will show between two of the items already on the menu. When it is in the right place, release the mouse button. Again you get an option to copy it there - choose that. To add it to the Start menu, follow a similar approach, drag it onto the start menu button - then the thing to do is to keep the right mouse button held down until the start menu pops up. Then you can move the mouse to wherever you want it to go. This time probably you probably won't asked what you what you want to do, it will just insert a copy.
The reason these shortcuts aren't put on your desktop right away is because there are rather many of them - you would suddenly find your desktop flooded with all these shortcuts :-).
You can also copy the Tasks for Tune Smithy folder shortcut as well in the same way, for instance to the quick launch tool bar. Actually it is a shortcut to a folder rather than a folder in its own right. So if you make copies of it, those also are all shortcuts to the same folder, so will all open the same folder.
Although all these shortcuts start up Tune Smithy, in practice they work pretty much like shortcuts to separate programs, because all the Tune Smithy settings for the shortcut are saved separately. So for instance if you start up Tune Smithy for the Metronome & Polyrhythms shortcut, and set it up as you please, this will have no effect on your settings for the Fractal Composer shortcut, and so on.
Each shortcut starts by running Tune Smithy for the correct task the first time you run it, but this can get changed. So for example, if you start the Metronome & Polyrhythms , then change task to the Composer in FTS (say to make a polyrhythm fractal tune) and then exit, then from then on that shortcut will show the Composer instead. But if this happens it is easy to correct. To set it back to the Metronome & Polyrhythms Task for instance, just start it up, and go to the Tasks menu in FTS and change the task back. It is an idea to reset to the standard settings for the task as well. Then from then on it will be back to the way it was before.
All copies of the same shortcut start FTS up in the same way. So if you have two copies of the Metronome & Polyrhythms shortcut for instance, one on the desktop and one on the task bar, then both start FTS up with the same settings.
To show particular windows every time you start FTS up with a particular shortcut then use F4 as usual. Start up FTS from the shortcut, and show all the windows you want to have every time it starts up. Then press F4. As with all the other Tune Smithy settings, those windows will only be shown when you start up Tune Smithy using that shortcut.
To summarise- it is pretty much like having separate programs for each shortcut. The main difference is that since they all share the same folder then they all access the same files, for instance they will all have the same drop lists of scales, of fractal tunes, chord progressions and so on - and if you browse for the polyrhythm and fractal tune scripts, and so on, you will find them all as well..
You can make other desktop shortcuts like this of your own, for any combination of task, layout of the windows, etc, and program settings. Just set everything up as you like in FTS, then in FTS, go to File | Make Desktop Shortcut. This always makes the shortcut on the desktop. However, you can then drag and drop it somewhere else, e.g. into the Tasks for Tune Smithy folder or Quick Launch tool bar or whatever..
You can change the icon for the Tasks for Tune Smithy folder - use right click then Properties, Shortcut, then Change Icon.. There is an alternative with a gray folder in FTS itself, also a yellow one. Or, to find one of the standard windows icons, enter "Shell32.dll" as the file name, and you will probably find some folder icons there.
Note - if you want to share your settings with someone else on another computer or want to back them up, save them as a project from the file menu, rather than as a desktop shortcut. In fact you can also save a project onto your desktop and the effect is very similar to the desktop shortcuts. Some differences are - that you will be asked if you want to save your changes when you exit - it shows the project name in the title bar, it is an actual file, not a shortcut.
For the tasks that come with the program, the easiest thing is to save them as part of a backup of the entire installation.
To backup your entire Tune Smithy installation, go to where you installed it, the one you choose at the first page of the installer such as Drive C | Program Files | Tune Smithy 3. Then just back up that folder. That backs up everything, including the shortcut settings, the Tasks folder itself, and the program itself too, apart of course for any files you save yourself in other folders from within FTS.
To restore it all onto another computer, run the normal installer first then copy your backup into that folder and you will be back the way you were before.
If you install into the standard location for programs, Drive C | Program Files then when you go to look for the FTS folder to back it up, you may get a message from Windows to ask if you really want to see its contents, which you would need to do temporarily to find the folder to back it up. Some people prefer to install FTS in their My Documents folder or just into Drive C to make it easier to find the folder and back it up.
If you want to backup just the configuration settings for the tasks that come with the program, then you only need to back up the Tasks Ini folder, usually at Drive C | Program Files | Tune Smithy 3 | Tasks Ini . The settings for the ones you make yourself are saved in the program location folder, and to back those up look for files of type .ini in that folder..
This Tasks folder itself is located in your Tune Smithy folder, usually at c:\Program Files\Tune Smithy 3\Tasks - What you see on the desktop as a purple folder icon with an FTS star on it, and is actually itself a shortcut to that folder.
The actual configuration settings for all the shortcuts are saved at Drive C | Program Files | Tune Smithy 3 | Tasks Ini .
This explains how the shortcuts work and how FTS is able to manage all those desktop shortcuts independently.
If you right click on one of the shortcuts and then choose Properties then you will see it says something like this:
Target
"C:\Program Files\Fractal Tune Smithy\Fractal Tune Smithy.exe" ::IniFile Tasks Ini\Chord Player.ini
The part ::IniFile Tasks Ini\Chord Player.ini tells FTS to use Tasks Ini\Chord Progression Player.ini for most of the settings, and to get a few other settings from Tasks Ini\start_up_etc-Chord Progression Player.ini (it works out the other file name by just prefixing start_up_etc).
These files also make the settings persist from one session to the next. So in this way each shortcut has its own settings and each one "remembers" the settings you had for it last time you used that shortcut.
The choice of main window task itself is recorded in start_up_etc-Chord Progression Player.ini and this file also records the positions of all the windows, and your choice of which ones to show when it starts up (the F4 option), amongst other things.
To make a new custom shorcut of your own with new settings, you could just copy one of these shortcuts and change the name for the .ini file in the target field. When you start FTS up using that shortcut it will make the new.ini file itself if it isn't present yet. So - just set everything up as you want it to be and exit from FTS and that is it done. That is all there is to it.
That's basically what Tune Smithy | File | Make Desktop Shortcut does, makes a new shortcut with the desired name as the name for the .ini file in the target field, except, it also saves the .ini files as well..