Danj’s Blog

So I got in on the Windows 7 beta (not that that’s terribly hard, now that they opened it to world+dog for 2 weeks instead of that silly 2.5 million limit) and I’m trying out Windows Live Writer, which contrary to its name actually does support third party blogs as well as MSN Live Spaces or whatever Microsoft is calling their blog site this week.

I’m quite favourably inclined towards Windows 7 so far; UAC is not gone but is far less annoying and intrusive and in fact I’ve only seen actual UAC popups a couple of times (both when trying to install software). I still see a variant version of the UAC shield, with a yellow-and-blue pattern, on some icons, but no popup appears if I click on it. Maybe that indicates it’s only restricted for limited user accounts or something? Anyway it’s a definite improvement.

The new taskbar with its large program icons feels more like something I’d expect to find in Linux (or, of course, on a Mac). Not sure whether I like it yet but it doesn’t seem bad so far.

There’s already 3 beta antivirus apps available for Windows 7, which you can get hold of by clicking the “Find a program” when the Action Centre whinges at you. Unfortunately, of the 3, one is pay-only and one is Norton, leaving the only sensible choice as Kaspersky 8 beta. It’s a little bit on the feature-packed side for my liking, but it seems decent and it stopped Windows complaining.

Windows Update is pretty much the same as Vista, with the exception that if you chose not to configure Automatic Updates during setup, you get forced to configure it here. I guess this is a good thing for regular end users, but it kind of annoyed me a bit.

The bundled accessories apps have received some upgrades; Wordpad and Paint have received an Office 2007-style facelift, and Wordpad can now open Word 2007 documents and OpenDocuments. Notepad is still the same as before, but Calculator sports new Unit Conversions and Programmer modes. Additions include Sticky Notes (which does what it says on the tin, but only in a rather basic way; I guess Microsoft don’t want to cut in on sales of OneNote) and Snipping Tool, which is a screen capture utility (though you can still use PrtSc and paste into Paint if you want to).

The sidebar is gone, but only because the entire desktop is now gadget-enabled. I’m undecided yet as to whether that’s a good thing; my problem is that any gadgets I might have on the desktop are going to get covered up by applications, and I don’t particularly want them always-on-top either. If there’s a keyboard shortcut which would toggle between bringing them to the front and sending them to the back, that might be a good compromise; I’ll have to investigate further.

Printers and Faxes has morphed into Devices and Printers; as well as printers it also currently lists my PC as a Device. I’m guessing that stuff like scanners and cameras will turn up in here as well. It claims to have some sort of method for downloading a realistic-appearing image of known devices for display in there, but I guess the list is small at the moment since it didn’t do that for the LaserJet on the network here.

I’ll post some more later if I think of anything else I want to say about the beta.