I need a better way to organize some directory ('folder' - ugh) content.

There seems to be an important need at my current contract to keep ANYTHING that comes into us by month/year, so stuff coming electronically gets put into a directory structure of:

2001 <-dir.
 |--October <-sub-dir.
 |----|--- Aaaa Aaa Aaaaaa <-sub-dir.
 |----|--- Bbbbbbb Bbbb Bb <-sub-dir.
 |----|--- Cc Cccccccc Ccc <-sub-dir.
 |--November <-sub-dir.
 |----|--- Aaaa Aaa Aaaaaa <-sub-dir.
 |----|--- Bbbbbbb Bbbb Bb <-sub-dir.
 |----|--- Cc Cccccccc Ccc <-sub-dir.
 |----|--- Dddddddd Ddddd <-sub-dir.
 |----|--- Eee Eeeeee Ee Ee <-sub-dir.

etc
This makes it real cumbersome to find something, even when you have the name, and it also leads to duplication of names, compounding the finding problem.

It occurred to me that it would be nice if there was a way to leave this directory structure intact but also have an 'alternate' "virtual" directory structure so that stuff could be LOGICALLY organized. Maybe along the lines of the way the "Component Gallery" works (if I have its workings right in my mind) or even the Project Manager display.

I tried to use SHORTCUTs, but it was a dismal failure. First everything had "Shortcut to " apppended to its name, but worse, shortcuts to directories only appear as files within a directory. So they don't show up on clicking the directory's plus sign, and they don't show up at the top with other directories.

Anyone have a way to skin this cat in a Win2K environment?

Any help appreciated

Jim Nelson