Extra large, large, medium and small icon view modes, as well as the list, extended tiles and content view modes are not showing the header when they are selected.

Only the details mode is showing headers. Why are headers considered important by some users? Because they can be used to sort files, for instance by name, size or file extension.

If you switch to another mode you will notice that the headers are not available so that files cannot be sorted by clicking on the header bar in Windows Explorer.

It is still possible to sort files with a right-click and the selection of a sort option under Sort by but that is not nearly as comfortable as clicking on one of the header columns in details view.

Vishal over at Ask VG has developed a solution that enables the header bar in all view modes of Windows Explorer.

The small program consists of a bat file and a dll that is registered on the system. This dll enables the header bar in all view modes.

A click on install.bat after download and unpacking runs a small batch file that registers the dll on the system. The program supports both 32-bit and 64-bit editions of Windows 7 and Windows 7 SP1.

You may need to log off and on again or restart your PC before the changes become visible. You can alternatively kill and restart the explorer.exe process for the same effect.

If you do not want the header bar anymore in Windows Explorer, you can run uninstall.bat from the same directory to unregister the dll and revert Windows Explorer to its default state.

Please note that you need to run the batch file with administrative privileges, the dll cannot be registered otherwise. Windows Explorer looks like the following after registration.

You can use the header bar to sort files in Windows Explorer, regardless of the active view mode.

The alphabetical view is only one of four to chose from: You can also sort by size (zero, tiny..), type (applications, Avi File..) and Modified Date (Today, Last Week..). Thanks Rarst for pointing that out.

Not every view mode in Windows Explorer offers this setting on the other hand. The popular list view mode does not offer it, all other modes do.

The new mode can be activated easily by clicking on View in the top bar of Windows Explorer. That menu displays the current view mode with a bullet. Make sure it is not the List mode.

Scroll down to the Arrange Icons By submenu and click on the Show in Groups entry. This should activate group mode in Windows Explorer as seen above. The view depends of course on the selected view mode, what you see above is the Tiles view mode.