Windows Vista: Just a few tidbits

I had a chance to attend a Microsoft Dog & Pony show about a week ago to get a look at Windows Vista and Internet Explorer 7 in action. The first thing I noticed was Vista was nothing more than an all in one version of Stardock's Object Desktop. Using many of the same features, Vista is now more customizable than ever before. Beginning with the start menu, we were shown just how different it really is. Gone were the trail of submenus popping up all over your desktop, replaced by a Quick Search bar on the bottom of the Start menu. This feature is much more convenient, allowing easy access to files and folders. Noticable the "run" feature was missing, but can easily be dropped into the menu for you old schoolers.

Another nice feature is the Explorer window itself. You can still use the file tree method as before, but within the window itself, you can access your documents in many other ways. Let's say you have a Word document you want to see. Instead of opening Word you can just select the document and with a scroll tab, just zoom into the document from the window itself, giving a crystal clear view of the text. Also added are what Microsoft is calling Virtual Folders. Imagine you have all sorts of files scattered all over your PC but each has a common link, for instance they all have to do with Jessica Alba. Create a Virtual Folder with that subject, and every single file will pull into that Virtual folder (jpegs, text, etc.), even if the subject is within the body of the document. Very cool. Another nice feature is the ability to jump between folders without clicking the back button fifteen times. Before this is what you saw in the address bar: C:\Program Files\Music\Kraftwerk\Computer World. Now each folder can be clicked on within the address bar, sending you right back to that folder.

Apparently after the lackluster build of Internet Explorer 5 and 6, Microsoft learned their lesson. Taking their cue from user created Firefox and to a lesser extent Opera, IE 7 can do many of the same things. Tabbed windows, RSS feeds, as well as beefed up security measures while searching the web.

These are just a few of the features I thought were worth mentioning. There were so many more (Transluscent windows, 3d mapping, a sidebar similar to Sysmetrix) that to list them all here this blog would go on for days. I was impressed with what Microsoft is doing, but it sure took them a long time to get there. With a street date of Holiday 2006, the next few months will give Microsoft the time to work out all the bugs. I belive that some of the 3D features is going to need DirectX 10 to work, so for some of you this may be a good time to start thinking about upgrading. More on Vista later as I delve a bit deeper.