IE7 Question

I want to swtich to IE7 for my default brorwser, because im tired of how no coder takes opera into account when coding anything, and was curious on two questions for IE.

One: How do I get my favorites into a BAR under or abouve the browser (Opera and FF Can do it, I cant quite seem to figure out how IE does it)

and Two, does IE have any plugin or anything for GMAIL so I can check my mail via IE via Gmail?