Web review

As I stated some days ago, I’m testing Windows 7 beta 1. Honestly, I’m very satisfied by the new operating system of Microsoft, that seems to be “What Vista wasn’t”. Because of my satisfaction, I’m trying to give my little help sending feedbacks to Microsoft when I encounter some bug or when I find that usability/user experience is not optimal.
I’m saving my feedbacks locally to keep a trace of what I suggested… and maybe to check if these things will be corrected in the final version.

I will also paste them here to make others know… and to collect some comments from readers of Web Review.

• Command line (cmd.exe) is the same since Windows XP (or 2000). It should be nice see some improvement. For example, there isn’t no hotkey for paste text in the clipboard: you’re obliged to right-click and select “paste” from the drop down box.
• When I try to create an homegroup, Windows says that it can be created only on home network… but my network is still flagged as “home”.
• “Parent folder” button in Windows Explorer is missing!
• Generally, mouse wheel click close a tab: the same action on applications in the application bar opens a new window of the app clicked, this appears as strange to the final user. It should be better if wheel click CLOSE the application.
• I tought about a new feature: it would be nice if Windows give us a restart option to “skip entering password on next boot” (e.g. keeping a key pressed while clicking on “restart”).I keep my desktop password-protected, but sometimes I need to reboot it to complete some operations (e.g. the installation of an antivirus and its initial complete scan, etc.) and I’d like to go away and then return to find my desktop ready to operate. Activating a one-time “no-password-boot” mode would fill this need.
• Linux (Gnome) users are able to use their mouse wheel to adjust main sound volume when the pointer is above the speaker icon in the systray. In Windows 7 you can do the same thing, but only after clicking the icon itself. Can we have the same behavior on Windows 7? This is very comfortable.
• “Recent documents” option, as seen in Windows XP, was very useful. Now the same feature is spread in other parts of the OS, but it would be nice to restore also the old one: Start menu is huge, there will be place also for it.
• The ability to natively mount a SSH filesystem as drive would be a great feature to add for web developers (and in general for people that works with Linux systems), in addiction of FTP mount (that is already present). Linux users are able to do this from mists of time, but other systems seem to ignore SSH protocol. It would be also an important feature by comparison with Mac, that also needs additional applications to do this.
• Windows Internet Explorer is slowly loosing the Browser war. Please – a least – replace Trident with another render engine. There are open source platforms as Gecko or Webkit that work like a charm… why continue to waste time and money to mantain a proprietary solution that is worse than them… while web developers from all over the World curse Microsoft?
• Right-click on the desktop now allows access only to “screen resoluton” and “personalize” control panels. It would be better to restore the old, single “screen properties” (maybe with an enhanced or easier layout), to get every option about the screen and the monitor.
• NEW: Live TV playback from a DVB-T USB Key connected to my desktop is fine on the monitor, but it’s deinterlaced to 25fps (half rate) when watching it streamed to my Xbox 360 extender.

… and now a couple of “personal problems”

• I’ve a Dell SP2009W Monitor, with integrated webcam and microphone. The Webcam works very well with Vista drivers, but mic don’t: it is listed in recording devices as “Microphone Array” (Monitor Webcam), but if I try to set it up as default recording device and configure it, Windows 7 says:
  “The Wizard could not start – Make sure your audio hardware is working properly and check your audio configuration in the Audio Devices and Sound Themes control panel.”
• Printers and file sharing doesn’t work with a Mac Mini connected to my LAN.
  [PROBLEM SOLVED!] See first comment in http://www.raneri.it/blog/eng/index.php/2009/01/15/avast-antivirus-causes-bsod-on-windows-7-beta/
  Network Error Windows cannot access \\MAC-MINI
  Check the spelling of the name. Otherwise, there might be a problem with your network. To try to identify and resolve network problems, click Diagnose.
  Error code: 0×80070035
  The network path was not found.
  

Tag: 2cents, windows 7

This content was posted Wednesday 4 February 2009 on 2:27 am in category Operating Systems. You can follow the comments in this article with its dedicated feed in RSS 2.0. Here you can leave an answer. Pinging is not enabled.