The little area at the far right end of the Windows taskbar with the clock and tiny icons was referred to officially by Microsoft as the "notification area". B

The little area at the far right end of the Windows taskbar with the clock and tiny icons was referred to officially by Microsoft as the "notification area". But enough people mashed Ctrl+Alt+Del in Windows 9x, saw a process called "Systray", and figured out that it controlled the notification area that eventually the area became known as the "system tray", even in non-Windows environments like Linux DEs. The "system tray" was supposed to be a pop-out thing that resembled a shallow drawer (hence the "tray" name) and have some of the functions of the taskbar, but it was abandoned early in Windows 95's development. The Systray.exe program which was repurposed was the last vestige of that name and it kind of stuck. I think even Microsoft have given up on getting people to say "notification area". The "system tray" terminology is official in other environments like XFCE. Relevant Raymond Chen article: https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20030910-00/?p=42583 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20030910-00/?p=42...