Follow-up: Managing Windows windows

Article
10/04/2008

There’s a lot of great discussion from the window arranging post. This really shows how important these details are to people. Being able to arrange how apps are shown on screen is key for productivity because it impacts almost every task. It’s also very personal – people want to be in control of their work environment and have it set up the way that feels right.

One thing that should be clear is that it would not be possible for us to provide solutions to all the different ways people would like to work and all of the different tools and affordances people have suggested--I think everyone can see how overloaded we would be with options and UI absorbing all the suggestions! At first this might seem to be a bit of a bummer, but one thing we loved was hearing about all the tools and utilities you use (and you write!) to make a Windows PC your PC. Our goal is not to provide the solution to every conceivable way of potentially managing your desktop, but rather to provide an amazing way to manage your desktop along with customizations and personalizations plus a platform where people can develop tools that further enhance the desktop in unique and innovative ways. And as we have talked about, even that is a huge challenge as we cannot provide infinite customization and hooks—that really isn’t technically possible. But with this approach Windows provides a high degree (but not infinite) flexibility, developers provide additional tools, computer makers can differentiate their PCs, and you can tune the UI to be highly personalized and productive for the way you want to work using a combination of thos elements and your own preferences.

One other thing worth noting is that a lot of the comments referred to oft discussed elements in Windows, such as stealing the focus of windows, the registry, or managing the z-order of windows—a great source of history and witticisms about Windows APIs is from Raymond Chen’s blog. Raymond is a long-time developer on the Windows team and author of Old New Thing, The: Practical Development Throughout the Evolution of Windows . This is also a good source to read where the boundaries are between what Windows does and what developers of applications can choose to be responsible for doing (and what they are capable of customizing).

With that intro, Dave wanted to follow up with some additional insights the team has taken away from the discussion. --Steven

We saw several pieces of feedback popping up consistently throughout the comments. Paraphrasing the feedback (more details below), it sounds like there’s strong sentiment on these points:

The size of windows matters, but wasting time resizing windows is annoying.
Just let me decide where the windows go – I know best where my windows belong.
Dragging files around is cumbersome because the target window (or desktop) is often buried.
Desire for better ways to peek at the running windows in order to find what we’re trying to switch to.
Want a predictable way to make the window fit the content (not necessarily maximized).
Want to keep my personalized glass color, even when a window is maximized.

For each of these needs, there’s a lot of great discussion around possible solutions – both features from other products, and totally novel approaches. It’s clear from these comments that there’s a desire for improvement, and that you’ve been thinking about this area long enough to have come up with some fairly detailed recommendations! Below are a excerpts from some of the conversations ongoing in the comments.

Put the windows where I want them

It’s super interesting to see people discussing the existing features, and where they work or don’t work.

For example, @d_e is a fan of the existing tiling options in the taskbar:

Arranging windows in a split-window fashion is actually quite easy: While pressing CTRL select multiple windows in the taskbar. Then right-click them and select one of the tiling options...

But that approach doesn’t quite meet the goal for @Xepol:

As for the window reorder buttons on the taskbar -> I've known they were there since Win95, but I never use them. They never do what I want. If they even get close to the right layout, its the wrong window order. Since I have to drag stuff around anyways, its just easier to get exactly what I want the first time.

@Aengeln suggests taking the basic idea of tiled windows to the next level in order to make them really useful:

A very useful feature would be the ability to split the deskotop into separate portions, especially on larger screens. For example, I might want to maximize my Messenger window to a small part on the right hand side of the desktop and still have the ability to maximize other windows into the remaing space. Non-maximized windows would be able to float across both (all) parts of the desktop.

It sounds like there’s agreement that optimizing the screen space for more than one window would be super useful, if it would only let you stay in control of where windows ended up, and was easy and quick to use every day. The current tiling features in the taskbar give hints at how this could be valuable, but aren’t quite fast and easy enough to be habit forming.

Open at the right size

We saw a lot of comments on the “default size” of windows, and questions about how that’s decided. Applications get to choose what size they open at, and generally use whichever size they were at the last time they were closed (or they can choose not to honor those settings). One of the cases that can trip people up is when IE opens a small window (websites will do this sometimes), because once you close it that will be the new “last size”.

@magicalclick suggested a solution:

I wish I have one more caption button, FIXED SIZE. Actually it is a checkbox. When I check the box, it will save the window state for this application. After that, I can resize/move around. When I close window, it will not save the later changes.

@steven_sinofsky offered this advanced user tip that you can use to start being more click-efficient right away:

@magicalclick I dislike when that one happens! Rather than add another button or space to click, I do the same thing in one click with a "power user" trick which is when you see the small window open don't close it until you first open up another copy of the application with the "normal" window size. Then close the small one and then the normal one.

Of course this is a pain and close to impossible for anyone to find, but likely a better solution than adding a fourth UI affordance on the title bar.

–steven

Finding the right window

The word being used is “Expose”:

@Joey_j: Windows needs an Exposé-like feature. I want to see all of my windows at once.

@Dan.F: one word - expose. copy it.

@GRiNSER : Expose has its own set of drawbacks: Like having 30 windows on a macbook pro 1400x1050 screen is really not that helpful. Though its way more helpful than Crap Flip 3D. Expose would be even more useful with keyboard window search...

Regardless of the name, there’s a desire to visually find the window you’re looking for. Something more random-access than the timeline approach of Alt-Tab or Flip-3d, and something that lets you pick the window visually from a set of thumbnails. This is very useful for switching when there are a lot of windows open – but some current approaches don’t scale well and it is likely scaling will become an even more difficult problem as people run even more programs.

Dragging files

There were several comments (and several different suggestions) on making it easier to drag between windows:

@Manicmarc: I would love to see something like Mac OS's Springloaded folders. Drag something over a folder and hover, it pops up, drag over to the next folder, drop it.

@Juan Antonio: It would be useful that when I´m dragging an object I could to open a list or thumbnail of the windows ( maybe a right- click )to select what window use to drop the object.

On this topic, I loved @Kosher’s comment on the difference between being able to do something, and it feeling right.

The UI could be enhanced quite a bit to make it much easier to do things. It's not just about how easy it is but it's also about how smoothly the user transitions between common UI workflows and tasks. This is a bit like explaining the difference between a Ferrari and a Toyota to someone that has never driven a Ferrari though, so I don't know if it will ever happen.

In designing Windows 7, we’ve really been taking the spirit of this comment to heart. I can’t wait to hear what car Windows 7 is compared to once it’s available for a test drive.

- Dave

Comments

Anonymous
October 05, 2008
This all is fine, but I cannot shake the feeling that it's a little late for this sort of thing. Isn't "Engineering" Windows 7 an anachronism, when the feature set is (most likely) finalized ages ago, the implementations done, and testing-fixing the stuff is (most likely!) going on? Could someone please shade some light on this? Are the discussions on this blog actually going to lead you to modify Windows 7? I find it hard to believe. Some tweaks maybe, but not major rewrites. Don't get me wrong. I have huge expectations from 7 and I believe that it'll be a great update, solely because Steven Sinofsky is the man in charge! Office is THE thing that has NO competitor. You could say that there are better OSs around, but there's nothing that even comes close to Office. You guys have certainly put a lot of thought into making this Windows, and it looks like you have had your priorities set right. But, With all that said, isn't this blog an attempt to nudge us in "proper" direction? To give us a background on changes, and why they are done and the complexities involved and all that?
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
just bring back the items, that i mentioned, that were removed or made harder to get to in vista than they were in xp. that should be your first goal.
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
While I develop software under Win32 at work using XP and Vista, at home I use Linux. The biggest difference for me is that at home, I can use wmii, a tiling window manager. Wmii manages windows by dividing each screen into columns, and then subdividing the columns into rows. The first program run fills the primary screen. Any subsequent window subdivides the currently-selected column into rows. One set of keyboard shortcuts may be used to move a window between adjacent columns, into a newly-created column, to a different physical screen, or into invisible screen pages. A different set of keyboard shortcuts may be used to shift focus between windows and physical screens, and to flip an invisible screen page to the foreground. It took some getting used to, but I've grown sufficiently attached to it that I've been considering writing my own tiling window manager for Windows. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like anybody has really done this since the late 90s, and I expect that was for the Win95/98/ME lineage.
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
On an Alt+Tab replacement, holding down a key to make all windows transparent except the active window would be cool. Better than Flip 3D because you can see all the windows you've got open. Of course, the problem with this is when you get a tonne of windows sitting on top of each other. Then it just looks ugly.
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
The concept of a "window search" sounds like it may be a useful way to switch through a large number of windows by title just as the search on the start menu. I never knew I could select multiple windows in the taskbar and tile/stack them! It would never be clear that that functionality is available if you didn't know about it. Something just important as functionality and usability is for the people to know that it exists.
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
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Anonymous
October 05, 2008
It will be more user friendly , if you implement feature like in Mac osx (Spaces). Through which user can easily classify their task in diff spaces and easily switch-over to one-anonther. I also like a feature that when user mouse-hover on icon of audio, video file a short clip should to play without actually opens up the application associated with them. Give the Live Preview of each application running on and ability to maintain their state for future. Give us some more improvement in the Grouping up of application in taskbar.
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
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Anonymous
October 05, 2008
@nikhiljain Windows Vista already contains a live preview feature. When you open an Explorer window such as Documents or Music or Pictures or any folder infact there is an option for a live preview of the document or file without opening it. When in the folder click on the ORGANISE tab, go down to the layout option and select the PREVIEW PANE option this gives you the live preview that you are asking for. In reality MAC OSX copied their live preview from Vista because it was long announced before LEOPARD was realesd or even was under development. But because of the 2004 longhorn reset Vista was not realesed until 2006/2007 thus OSX was first to market with that feature.
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
If we are here. Everything should have keyboard shortcut. And that shortcut should be displayed on the right side the context menus. Also in the help file. All the time. Switching on and off preview plane with shortcuts is important. Most of the time it is annoying but when you need it it takes 3 click to get it. Preview plane is not very useful in Vista. The location of the preview plane has to be configurable. Should be possible to put to the bottom or top or to a separate window. In addition to the shortcuts there should be visual toggle buttons (1 click way) to show and hide preview and navigation plane. Also there is a need to manage the file selection and clipboard management better. Someone had the idea for a "clipboard plane" before. A place where you can drag and drop files and what represents the clipboard. I found the idea very useful. Also shortcuts for adding and removing files to the clipboard. (Ctrl+C not adds files but resets the clipboard) In general in windows it is a mayor drawback that the user has to use the mouse all the time. EVERYTHING should accessible via shortcuts. Just a quick question. How can you rename a file without touching the mouse?
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
About document previews: I think there should be a floating preview thingy when the user hovers the mouse over an item like in Windows Photo Gallery. I think Quicklook in Mac OS X is broken because it acts as a preview application. If the user hits Space to preview a document then Quicklook window opens and the user can't stand using it as a self-contained application. For instance it's too easy to use Quicklook instead of iTunes to listen to music and when the user switches to another window then Quicklook stops playing. Plus Quicklook is not fast enough. About Exposé: In fact it's not copying because Microsoft Research worked on a project called Task Gallery way before Mac OS X. They made some demos in 1998: http://research.microsoft.com/adapt/taskgallery/images/anim_gifs/window_ops.gif About drag&drop: It's uncomfortable to drag an item onto the taskbar and wait for the window to get focus then continue dragging the item onto the window and drop it. The taskbar and the alt+tab and Flip 3D switchers should be able to accept drag&drops without giving focus to the window. There's another annoyance in Windows that it easily forgets window placements. When the user's desktop is full with windows and wants to drag and item from the desktop then all windows have to be minimized (as Raymond Chen described on his blog) with Win+D (show desktop) or Win+M (minimize all). If the user clicking on any window then it's not possible to restore all windows to their original state. In my opinion the windows shouldn't change at all when the user wants to switch to the desktop. Maybe this could be borrowed from Exposé (show desktop with F12).
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
Exposè not work fine! the management of the desktop OS X from Dock and 'illogical and irrational, for me and 'irritating that if I have two or more' open windows of the same application must go to attempts to find what I try, or should know in advance if what I try and 'minimized or not . Windows Vista in this and 'simple, clean, rational and consistent.
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
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Anonymous
October 05, 2008
Their should be a Folder structure preview of their sub-folder by just a mouse-hover on that folder in a Gridview Format. Its really help full for user to see the content within folder without acctualy opens it up..
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
next thing about windows sizes is resolution change. it's extremally annoying for the ones which uses the projector. after changing the resolution all window sizes are made small to fit it. then you need to resize all the window to your size... more over - windows sometimes forgets that you disconnected the device and changes resoultion for some test or something... grrr and the solution is so simple: keep the window sizes as percentage. layouts are well known in java and .net languages - so it's dynamic and auto-adjustable for the screen size. y don't give such a possibilty for system windows? another idea is to keep few window sizes so each resolution has it parameter. ...at last the easies way would be some option to disable auto-window-resize - easy and effective.
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
there used to be a feature (in betas) where you could rotate windows 360° and dock them;I hope you put the dock feature on the desktop like the one in visual studio.
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
I'm one of the many who has complained about focus stealing. In this follow-up article you make an oblique reference to Raymond Chen's blog and application responsibilities in the same breath as focus-stealing, from which I get the idea, even without reading back issues of Raymond Chen's excellent blog, that you believe focus-stealing is the responsibility of apps and not Windows. However this doesn't mean you guys can't do anything about it. You are the focal point for the overall user experience so you can do a lot about focus stealing, in the same way you've worked towards a consistent user experience in other areas. Some suggestions:

Make a strong statement in the UI guide that focus stealing is bad unless WW III is about to break out and you are serious about it.
Change Microsoft internal development guidelines to look for poor focus stealing and other non-UI-experience-conformant apps, just like you now review all apps for security (most of the software I use that does focus stealing is Microsoft software - for example IE).
Change the Windows 7 logo guidelines so an app can't get the logo if it's caught doing focus stealing.
If necessary, change the Windows API so certain calls from bad apps to jump their windows to the foreground are ignored (ie a Windows 7 app-specific compatibility setting). I know you guys love to focus on coding up cool new features, but a big reason people feel good or bad about an OS release is how predictable the UI is. Windows XP was very consistent and people liked it for that reason at a subconcious level - I give the XP UI team a lot of credit. Now in Vista with the top menus gone, it's really hard to figure out how to do something sometimes - Organize menu? Right click? Hold down a key to make the legacy menus come back? There are important features hidden in all those places. I think Vista makes people feel dumb because they can never remember how to find something even after they've spent time working with Vista. So this is a pitch for you to take the somewhat squishy subject of UI consistency and predictability seriously. Your users will be a lot happier. And if you can somewhat improve focus stealing while you are at it, that would be great too!

Anonymous
October 05, 2008
Hi again! I don't know if this has been said before but it would be really nice to incorporate shading for winodws (take a look at WinRoll - http://www.palma.com.au/winroll/ - I use it but under Windows 2008 and Vista it's somewhat broken, 'cause some windows don't shade preperly, mostly Windows Explorer). I'm guessing it wouldn't be that difficult. Best regards!
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
Hi, Got an adea about icon management on windows desktop. The general opinion is that Desktop cleanup wizard is bad and annoyng and it should be disabled ASAP. I propse another solution to a problem of having old icons on the desktop: Why not fade them so that they become semi-transparent or some other way show their irrelevance to the user. This way a user can decide if that icon must remain on the desktop or not. Even more, the user will clearly see other 5-6 icons that are regularly used. I believe that even users who have some 30-40 icons on the desktop, only 5-6 are used daily. It would be excellent for them if the icons would fade and it is easier for them to find those used icons more easily. The idea of moving those unused icons to another folder is quite scary. I don't like if computer shifts mu stuff around. But marking icons as unused is a nice and polite way to notify me about the low usage of that particular icon.
Anonymous
October 05, 2008
Another input idea about windows placement. Current Windows stacks new windows on top of older windows but if for example there is on explrer window open and user opens another and if there is room to place new window so that it does not cover existing window, then it should be done so. This way the user has full access to old window as well as a new window without moving them around. It might be complex to work the algorithm out as such a simple solution would work on ly on clean desktop, but something along the lines of improved usage of screen estate on windows placement should be doable.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
@ion Thx for Gif from Microsoft Research PS. you have see a video Microsoft Directions and Culture ? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7dpyPpbGv0 See the video and Stop 1:37 min. See Folder Animation ;) Microsoft Research is GREAT!
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
The MS research already has some ideas how to make the window management and taskbar better.. GroupBar http://research.microsoft.com/vibe/videos/GROUPBARV0_1.MPG. I really hope that at least SOME of these features will be in W7.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
I'm hoping it will be compared to a Mercedes. Beautiful design, but unlike a Ferrari (cough Mac) practical for day to day use by the masses. And I speak as a PC user who switched to Mac, and then switched back 2 years later.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
@ITP That's a good idea to change the task bar but instead of "study and choose" the best bar prototype, they better pet them all in Windows. More possibilities = more liberty
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
...and one more. isn't customization important? so please explain to me, y there is no way to customize mmc snapins look in vista/w2k8? one could open snapin in author mode, set the view and save it. in vista - someone decided that it is too dangerous and msc files are system protected! LOL! the only workaroud is to create your own msc files, put it in some directory and put it's path to %path% variable. but why customisation is treated as denger?
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
Positioning, managing, create effect, create differents taskbars, isn't it something everybody must be able to do? Customization is a great idea for common users because it's not too much complex, but for ones that want to go further, like me, we want to code our bars, our window designs and effects, and offer them to everyone who want to change the apparence of Windows. More possibilities = more liberty : Windows 98 was great because there was plenty of themes and screensaver, there was a lot of possibilities for everyone. That's a base idea. Why imposing something that someone don't like? It's better to give possibility to change it. That will be a card that Windows 7 team must use because everybody like liberty, to have more possibilities, to be able to control what they see. And if they don't like possibilities they have, there is somebody that can create another one. More possibilities = more liberty
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
I have a tip about switching windows, and I signed in just to post this. The live window previews in the taskbar is a great addition, but it still doesn't feel like I'm in complete control, like I'm not having a complete overview of all opened windows. What about, instead of the previews, the actual window temporarily shows up on top of all other windows? Also, the taskbar grouping introduced in Windows XP is useful, but if there are many open windows in one group, it becomes rather annoying. Wouldn't it be better if you click on a group, all windows of that group appear side to side, something like what I said about the live window previews? When you click one of the windows, the selected window will become active, and all other windows will go back to their original state.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
>>there used to be a feature (in betas) where you could rotate windows 360° and dock them... If I'm following you correctly, this is entirely useless. ...The general opinion is that Desktop cleanup wizard is bad and annoyng and it should be disabled ASAP. >> I don't think its in Vista. I've been running Vista for almost ten months now and have never seen it. Of course, my desktop is kinda clean... >>I propse another solution to a problem of having old icons on the desktop: Why not fade them... Microsoft should continue to leave peoples' desktops alone. People don't need Microsoft butting their heads into their computers to tell them their desktop is too cluttered. >>I'm hoping it will be compared to a Mercedes. Beautiful design, but unlike a Ferrari (cough Mac) practical for day to day use by the masses. Macs aren't practical for day-to-day use? I have a VFX class these days that is run in a room filled exclusively with Mac computers, so I've been getting some good exposure to them, and I disagree with that statement entirely. They're just as usable, if not more usable, than any version of Windows for the general computing. OSX for daily computing is leagues faster than Vista and provides just as sleek an interface. One that's slightly more understandable in places, too. People noting othat customization = good are 100% correct. I'm hoping W7 is nothing like Vista in this respect. In the M3 screenshot of the Personalization menu there is a link to "Get more themes online," whether or not that is removed at launch I don't know but, at least for now, it's an indicator MS has the idea to make W7 more customizable than Vista. It could always be like XP's themes though... nly MS made themes unless you patch/modify your install and resort to 3rd parties. I believe they online released two themes for XP, Media Center and Zune.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
Will you guys be supporting custom themes this time around? I know I can get them on Vista by installing a modified uxtheme.dll but will Windows 7 support the option for people to create and distribute Windows 7 themes through maybe a Microsoft ran and supported website like how the current Gadget site is?I think it has to deal a large amount with the customization and personalization of your workspace if you can not only change the UI options as you like but change the look and theme of the UI as well. You're making a lot of very important points about how you won't be able to change the UI options to suit everyone but I think personally that everyone would benefit from a theme scheme as i suggested above. not only does it allow you to moniter the quality of themes and their contents but it gives us peace of mind when installing themes due to your processing of the content.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
Hallo, i like the points the user who are listet in this post...but i have some more points...

The LivePreview should be open and close by filetype...a sample: if i am selected a mp3 File...the LivePreview Panel will slide in from the side(maybe with an animation ;) but if i am going to a folder the LivePreview Panel will disapear...so i dont need to enable or disable the Panel self.
In Vista(i like Vista but the are some problems) i loose a lot of times the settings i made in my folders...a sample: I open Computer in the Explorer...normaly i habe Tiles + Group by Type...but sometimes the drives are not in groups and i have details and not Tiles..so please fix that...Windows should not decide how the folders need to look...its something the User will do.
App Switching...put away Flip 3D and do something in like the old Alt+Tab but improve that and add search if i have many apps open. Thats all...i have seen some Screenshots from the M3 and i looks great for a Milestone..so go on and show us the best Windows(OS) we ever seen...

Anonymous
October 06, 2008
About dropping files on the desktop covered by other windows, why not make it like this: when the user drags the file(s) to a side of the screen and hovers there for a configurable period of time (say, 1 sec), all windows get minimized and the user can drop his/her files on the desktop. Or, make a hide-able panel that has the thumbnails of currently open windows on it, including the desktop. When there are too many windows to show on the panel, it becomes scrollable, so the user can hover the files over a thumbnail and drop them into it. About the explorer itself: it happened to me many times already - i open a folder, set the view, leave it, come back and it resets itself to one of the pre-defined views. Also, when a picture/mp3 picture tag changes, the folder will still show the old version until you leave and re-open the folder, F5 suprisingly doesn't do anything. Oh and another one, if you have a long filename that barely fits into the default explorer window size, there will be no scrollbar. Now, if you rename the file and leave the length the same, explorer sometimes changes to the imaginary 2nd column of the folder - w/o displaying the scrollbar, so all you see is the end of the long filename. Fixes itself after re-opening the folder. Overall the explorer seems kinda unfinished, even though it should have been. It's the basic PC browsing tool after all... One important point about the taskbar; In Vista, you can't display the icon for power options if you are running Vista on a normal PC. This means every time you want to change your power options, you have to go to the control panel/type it in the startmenu. I think it should be possible to activate that icon on a normal PC too, less hassle to activate the power plan you need atm and saves the user money.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
I'll stop after this comment. I glanced at Raymond Chen's blog. It seems to have nothing whatsoever to do with the user experience. It talks only about function calls and legacy. I certainly hope that you don't have engineers designing Windows 7.

Blaming application authors is not a mitigation for the bug. You can blame driver authors all you want for Vista and 64-bit problems, but no amount of blame will help Vista or 64-bit OS'es have more drivers. The OS should be able to control this issue.
Blaming legacy is a cop-out. I fully understand the legacy issues of Windows and the pain involved. But just like blaming ISV's, it's not a solution or even a mitigation.
You discuss above that Windows is a platform that people can extend to solve their window management issues. I don't think I can control focus theft.
Keyboard focus and foreground are system-wide transient settings. As such, they should be considered to be a part of the OS. If I am running an application in Windows Vista, I expect that if that application is going to alter a system-wide setting or part of the OS, it will request elevated permissions. Can my app change display settings or swap the left and right mouse buttons without UAC? These focus-related OS settings were somehow made to be exceptions to UAC.
No one in Windows ever seems to accept that this is a problem. I'm not referring to these blog entries. I'm referring to many bugs and conversations I've had over recent years. No one seems to understand that my lack of trust for Windows is a valid concern. That's all on this topic. #4 sums up my opinion of how Windows should properly handle focus. #5 sums up my opinion of the status of this issue.

Anonymous
October 06, 2008
The comment has been removed
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
I think sidebar should have more usability like minimize window tiles (with stacksgroups) to it instead of taskbar, while windows that floating on desktop are as usual available in taskbar. Also, there should be settings like adjusting size of tiles, number of visible tiles and size of tile that in focus. here an example sketch: http://flickr.com/photos/29024658@N05/2918455901/ Hope you can imagine how tiles should be animated, while navigating trough stacks with hovering cursor (or touch flicks, for touch-screens)
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
One thing I don't like in Vista is, when I click the "Show Desktop" icon in the quicklaunch bar or switch to desktop via Flip 3D, the Vista Sidebar get's hidden. I have to click onto one window in the taskbar to show the sidebar again. The sidebar should always be visible when I switch to the desktop. And please include a "Save Icons Positions" function for the desktop. Whenever I update my graphic card driver the screen resolution get's very low during the setup and afterwards all my icons are misplaced. Or when a game crashed this can happen. Such a restore icons function is missing since Windows 95 and it's not hard to implement.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
One feature that I use tremendously (well, add-on) is the moving of a window from one monitor to another. All the discussions about having multiple windows resized at once related to that exactly. I'm constantly trying to have two windows open at once and then working between them. For me this being added to the core OS in an easy to use way (didn't know about the CTRL-taskbar trick until today) is massively useful.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
I strongly disagree with the requests for an expose-like feature. In my opinion, aside from the iPod (which Microsoft topped with the Zune), Apple has not released a single decent UI in the past 10 years or so. The Dock is annoying, pops up when you don't need it and are trying to mouse to something else, it's impossible to tell what programs are actually running and what programs just have shortcuts, and in general managin what's open and closed is a nightmare; expose is very pretty and works wonderfully, assuming you have ~3 applications open: the instant you get over 6 or 7 it suddenly gets really hard to find what you're looking for; the central menu is annoying at best; and the fact that in 2008 there still isn't a central place to go for all your programs is just obscene. I'd have to say that the current alt+tab implementation (with Aero enabled) is the most logical, however I do have some suggestions to offer:

Allow me to drag around the order of applications and lock it down (I know it's dependent on the order of which you focused-windowed it last, but it's not very convenient to have to focus windows in a particular order just to get alt-tab orders sorted out)
Create an option to group by program type in the alt+tab: I often have 4-5 instances of Word open; it makes a lot more sense if they're all one after another as opposed to all over the place.
Zoom in on the highlighted application in alt+tab: it's really hard to tell Word documents apart. If you have a bunch of them with just a bunch of text and no heading it gets to be nigh-impossible without at least being able to see the shapes of the paragraphs
Not really task-managing, but make Windows Explorer tabbed. It's ridiculous that I often have 10 windows open and 4 of them are explorer.

Anonymous
October 06, 2008
MS is not aware of where and what the its OS is lacking. Just search for example: search.live.com/results.aspx?q=Vista+Explorer+size+status+bar&FORM=STABAR&src=IE-SearchBox to get a glimpse of the countless issues users are having with the most minor "features". You can find many such issues at aerotaskforce and "Features removed from Windows Vista".
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
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Anonymous
October 06, 2008
@ITP That left GroupBar is exactly what I wanted in taskbar. MS already has the prototype. I hate it when they drop it.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
About finding the right window: One of the things I love the most about Windows Vista is the Start Menu feature where you can hit the windows button and immediately type the program you want. Maybe some shortcut that would pop up a list of open windows and filter them out as you type would work too.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
What about coloring tasks on the taskbar. You need to recognize fast enough a task, just change the color and it's more visible.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
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Anonymous
October 06, 2008
Would be really nice if Windows 7 includes the Instant Viewer application. I am not sure why this is not given much importance and people rarely get to know unless they purchase Microsoft Hardware. [I also think it shouldnt be hard to improve the Instant Viewer a bit to fit the Windows 7 theme :)]
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
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Anonymous
October 06, 2008
@mogi I find KDE to be bloated while Gnome seems to be organised, but that doesn't mean Windows should copy from them :)
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
I have a laptop which I sometimes use with multiple monitors. I often run into a problem where I have an application on the external monitor and then close windows. I later restart without the external monitor connected but when I start some apps, they wind up off the screen and I can't easily get them to appear on my laptop screen. Windows needs to be smart enough to detect when this situation occurs and force windows to not open off screen when not using multiple monitors even if it was the last position the app remembered.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
I always like to have my explorers open at 7 across by 3 down large tiles. This some times resents though, even though I make sure to close all of them at that size. Another thing that doesn't remember it's state correctly is when choosing the view and type of folder. My music folders keep being reset to picture and video folders and visa versa. Sometimes folder views of two folders in completely different areas become linked. For example if I change a specific folder under pictures to pictures and videos it changes a specific folder on my desktop to the same view state. When I go to change the one on my desktop the pictures folder then mirrors the one on the desktop.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
Glad to hear that people are bringing up the issue of applications forcefully taking the focus away from the selected window, and that the Windows 7 team is (hopefully) listening. Let me just add myself to the list of people who think that that's anoying & it should be fixed. It is most annoying when I'm typing up something and all of a sudden some window pops up asking me something and since I was in the middle of typing, I accidentally hit some shortcut key that I didn't mean to press. GRRR!!!
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
Please make Windows 7 the OS X killer. Let it better than OS X in every aspect.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
There should be more basic themes for Windows 7. Windows Vista's basic theme looks so sick. Aero is awesome but would be better if Windows 7 will provide more basic themes. Thanks
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
One of the things I would like to see is that when I use the task bar to put two windows side by side it would be nice if I could resize both of them at once by clicking and dragging their common edge. For example I often have say a spread sheet and a document open at once (my screen is 1920 X 1200) and it would be nice if I could easily give the spread sheet more of the space as it is wider than the document needs to be on the screen.
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
@chakkaradeep: I did not mean the whole environment of course :). I meant the good old workspaces feature only: http://library.gnome.org/users/user-guide/latest/overview-workspaces.html It's really simple. You can create new workspaces, see the status in the panel, drag windows from one to another workspace, switch with a nice default alt+left/right arrow and that's it basically. So far, no one has combined these three features into one product for windows:

a view in the taskbar
easy dragging
works without annoyances (some windows do not get restored properly sometimes, instant messaging windows open on wrong workspace, etc.) Maybe it's not possible to fully fix the third point, because apps are not aware of workspaces?

Anonymous
October 06, 2008
Mega quote Asesh even if we already VISTA is Killer 100% OSX, have done much fud initially when there were problems with drivers , The fud was fueled by microblog and incompetent journalists who in the past have dealt only with agriculture
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
Hallo, let us make groups of windows...a sample...i put ie and VS 2008 togehter to 1 windows and it will show up as 1 programm on the taskbar...that will help o organice programms who should work together very easy...
Anonymous
October 06, 2008
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Anonymous
October 07, 2008
From what I've read in the comments and from these posts is that there are just too many cases to handle, even when delegating UI variations to configuration options! The solution I see is to allow users to change their window manager. There are already many, many WMs for linux, each catering to its own niche and many of them have been mentioned in this thread. Why not expose hooks for a replacement WM to partially or completely override the default? The possibility of this sort of modular extensibility is the reason I've been dieing to hear more about the MinWin kernel, whose implementation as I understand it could allow such cutomization.
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
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Anonymous
October 07, 2008
I read about your ideas of Multimonitoring Support in 7...you say that you have 2 options:

The Taskbar over all Screens
1 Taskbar for each screen I think the 2 will be the best option. Every Taskbar is somethink like a single OS GUI...if you open a programm it will just apear on this screen and only on this taskbar...if you move now the window from this screen to an other, the programm will disapear from the taskbar and show up on the screen you move the window on...also you do this with try icons...

Anonymous
October 07, 2008
"There’s a lot of great discussion from the window arranging post. This really shows how important these details are to people." Please open a topic about WHAT the contence of an operating system should be. THAT would realy show how important THAT is ;-) Or better ask us what we DON'T want in an operating system (things like: mailprogram, Browser, Mediaplayer, Paint ;-) etc) Regards Knipoog
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
First, thanks for the great blog! It's great to have a place to rant and rave. I just want to throw my vote in with mikejng and Ted Howard. Focus stealing is the single most annoying glitch I've come across, and it's the quickest way to take me from productive work to raging frustration. A few seconds of repeated focus stealing, capped with a mis-click, completely interrupts my thought process. Remember how bad pop-ups used to be? MS blocked those through IE, how is focus stealing any different? The windows should adapt to the user's way of doing things, what they are intending or attempting to accomplish. If they switch applications, surely they have a reason.
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
Here's a simple solution for Microsoft: Bundle StarDock's ObjectDock.
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
Some people most likely already had some exposure to Microsoft's own product - Visual Studio. It already has a great mechanism for managing many windows at the same time. The key features there are: docking (with docking placeholders), pinning and auto-hiding. I wonder if Microsoft is considering implementing this mechanism in Windows. A virtual desktop can be the hosting window with its own task bar. And, the task bar can contain a Windows menu icon (e.g. tile, stack, minimize or hide all, reset, allow/disable docking). The reset should disable docking and restore default positions and sizes of windows, if these have been persisted through Windows (may be necessary to troubleshoot issues). All the windows will need a pin button when they are docked, and a pin menu (e.g. hide, show). There would be no need to display window shortcut in the task bar as it should be always visible in the docking bar. However, a few questions arise. How docked and non-docked windows should behave? Shall Windows disallow having non-docking windows in the docking mode? How about windows that have minimum and/or maximum size enforced? Currently, there are probably many applications that would not be fully capable of being docked, but if the docking become standard, this would change with time. I would be glad if this idea became true. It would make me want to have such OS just because of the increase in productivity it may offer.
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
What would be cool would be features that are found in the Xneat Windows Manager (http://www.xneat.com/). One I absolutely cannot do without is the "Always on top" option, which, as the name suggests, keeps a particular window on top of other windows at all times.
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
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Anonymous
October 07, 2008
I'm looking into all these comments and I can agree with people writing, that WIndows 7 will be another Vista. I started to create own blog (see URL), which will comment some things put here by Microsoft and people...simply because we don't have here more "problematic" topics.
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
URL is http://www.gammu.org/wiki/index.php?title=HydePark:Thinking_about_Windows_7
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
I agree Windows 7 will be another Vista, like XP is like 2000, like 98 is like... well it doesn't mean anything, new cars still have 4 wheels and an engine... My opinion is the next Windows will be better than Vista, and even more if there is more API for customizing the desktop. The lack of customization will make Windows 7 one of worst OS because everyone want to design their desktop how they want. There is a lot of propositions about how the taskbar and windows (and focus) supposed to react. With APIs, YOU decide how it react, that's all.
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
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Anonymous
October 07, 2008
I think Expose is amazing. The usefulness does decrease after a certain number of windows open, but flip 3D is even more unuseful. Alt tab is better because you can bring up the menu and then click on an application, you don't have to go in any particular order. You can do this with Flip 3D as well but not w/ a large set of windows. I prefer to see all three options on the computer and let me choose which ones is best at the moment.
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
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Anonymous
October 07, 2008
Virtual desktops again are a good idea. I recently started using VirtuaWin v4.0. While it doesn't do everything as I want or how I want (and I haven't had time to write my own mod to fix these issues) it has made life a lot easier when managing several projects at once. Building the windows management with virtual desktops and the ability for 3rd parties to create their own solutions would be a win-win situation from my perspective.
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
i just want my windows media center become gadget.. run in small window on the right playing music and slideShow btw...when we will move to 3D space ? maybe Managing Windows On 3D Space
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
@VistaLover IE and Mediaplayer should NOT be part of the operating system, and can therefore remain outside this discussion ;-)
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
@Knipoog Yes i hope for a Windows Live Browser and Windows Live Media Player or somehing...and a remove of the browser and the media player from the os...every software should be Live and not in the OS
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
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Anonymous
October 07, 2008
"IE and Mediaplayer should NOT be part of the operating system, and can therefore remain outside this discussion ;-)" How will you download Firefox if there is no browser in the package at the first place?
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
Enhancements to Window Management should also be made in the dev division for libraries like .NET and all the others because stuff like multimonitor support has to be done mostly by the dev instead of a standardized framework...
Anonymous
October 07, 2008
Add an easy way for work with glass to the .NET Freamwork so we can build apps they look bether on Vista and will look better on 7
Anonymous
October 08, 2008
@lyesmith You don't download Firefox, you just install Opera from you're memory stick ;-)
Anonymous
October 08, 2008
@bluefisch200 "every software should be Live and not in the OS" As long as it is not in the OS its OK. Then you have a choice, you will probably choose Live, I might choose something else ;-)
Anonymous
October 08, 2008
The trouble with removing media player from the OS is that things like live preview of files depend on it, so that functionality would have to be removed. I have to say though, that I've found media center is the most impressive part of Vista for me, as I'd never seen it in action before.
Anonymous
October 08, 2008
@yeehaamcgee Its OK if the functionality of preview of files depends on another piece of software. You can't vieuw movies if you don't have the program for it :-) If that other piece of software is no part of the OS, other parties will perhaps make things you like. That can be onde program like for example medioplayer, but that can also be two programs. One for playing movies and one with wich you can Preview-files. imo thos programs can easily be different programs. But I hope that Microsoft will write an separate article about what to put in W7, and than we can blog and discuss there? Regards Knipoog
Anonymous
October 08, 2008
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Anonymous
October 08, 2008
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Anonymous
October 08, 2008
Another thing I'd like to see in Windows 7; Please allow changing the color of the taskbar and start menu glass and the windows start orb. Different colors like a black start orb and white taskbar and start menu and so on would look real nice. (I posted this before but it never got posted so I'm posting again.)
Anonymous
October 08, 2008
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Anonymous
October 08, 2008
I tried a few of the virtual desktop programs mentioned in this blog. With all of them I get the idea that it is some kind of trick and not properly supported by the OS. Many programs pops up windows on other desktops than they reside on. If you launch a program , you have to wait for it to fully open before switching to another desktop, otherwise it ends up on the wrong desktop etc. But I must say, I liked the concept and is using it now, it is great. Hopefully better API will be added in 7 to help 3d party tools do a better job, or even better, it will be part of the 7.
Anonymous
October 08, 2008
Try this link. Microsoft Research has already studied ways to improve the experience when working with large displays and multi-monitor configurations. Most of our suggestions get a mention here. http://research.microsoft.com/users/dcr/work/publications/2005-Robertson-CGA-LargeDisplayUserExperience.pdf
Anonymous
October 09, 2008
"@Aengeln suggests taking the basic idea of tiled windows to the next level in order to make them really useful: A very useful feature would be the ability to split the deskotop into separate portions, especially on larger screens. For example, I might want to maximize my Messenger window to a small part on the right hand side of the desktop and still have the ability to maximize other windows into the remaing space. Non-maximized windows would be able to float across both (all) parts of the desktop." I would like to support this feature. While widescreens are getting more common, I still consider them unfriendly since they don't provide a good working area for maximized windows (text becomes to wide to read).
Anonymous
October 09, 2008
I wish I had seen these blog posts sooner, I have some great feedback about how I work and about a new feature idea for focusing on the window(s) you are currently using. First about window management: It would be nice if Windows had a configurable cascading direction when new windows open. When I work, I typically arrange my windows so that the upper left corner of a window is always visible. For e.g. while doing web development work, Explorer is in the bottom left of the screen, to the right are various browsers cascaded up and to the right, and on the far right of the screen filling the whole height is Eclipse where I do most of my work. This means that in a small target area of the top left quadrant of the screen I can single click on any open application to switch to it quickly and easily. When windows open and cascade down and to the right I always have to move the window so that part of it will be visible behind other windows, because the right edge or bottom edge of the window is useless to me! Cascading up and to the right is much more effective :) (Though I have to be honest, it's usually Windows Explorer and Internet Explorer that I'm pushing around because I'm more likely to have multiples of them open - sometimes on different desktops, but I'll get to that below). /split
Anonymous
October 09, 2008
Second, about virtual desktops: we really need a solution to manage groups of applications. At the moment I use DeskSpace for virtual desktop management, and while it has a few small bugs occasionally it works great on the whole - I can't live without it now. I simply use 2 virtual desktops, the first for email and general browsing and other tasks (shortcut key: Win+Q) and the second desktop for development work (shortcut key: Win+W). I can quickly switch between desktops and have a clutter free work environment (otherwise I'd constantly have 12+ windows open all on the one desktop - not cool!). Windows 7 definitely needs to address virtual desktops. Lastly, but most importantly is an idea I had on focusing on the task or window(s) that you are currently working in. I actually wrote a blog post on it yesterday, which seems like convenient timing :) /split
Anonymous
October 09, 2008
www.madfellas.com/blog/index.cfm/2008/10/8/Focus-on-the-window-at-hand-Shroudy The basic idea is that you could have a "window shroud" that uses a dark transparency to mask the parts of the screen that you aren't using at the time, letting you focus more clearly on the task at hand. This is a similar effect to Lightbox.JS (and others), or the Vista Secure Desktop. Maximising windows isn't a good solution for "focusing" because sometimes you need to change windows quickly, and moving the mouse all the way down to the taskbar sometimes isn't feasible - windowed applications can be managed much more easily. The post goes into a good amount of detail about how it would work, including some configuration options for the opacity level and a dynamic opacity level based on mouse events, as well as support for having multiple windows above the shroud and stuff like that. I've given this a test with a "dumb" AIR app and it was refreshing to work with such clarity, but obviously without all the necessary smarts built-in to the product it requires an extra click every time you change windows, and I'm all for productivity gains not losses! I'd really like to hear what people think about the idea, because it's a feature I'd really like to have. Feel free to make comments on my blog :) (That includes you, MSFT'ies!) Or comment here, I don't mind checking back. Anyway, I also wanted to say it's great seeing things like this somewhat open to discussion. I really hope it makes a difference so that Windows 7 rocks. cheers, Justin
Anonymous
October 09, 2008
One thing about managing windows I've found out is that it's great to have two screens. However on say my laptop I simply don't have that option and with a lot of people they simply don't have two monitors to hook up to the same computer to begin with. I've noticed in certain linux distros they have the ability to have to desktop spaces that you can use a hotkey to switch back and forth between and it's almost like having twice the desktop space. I really like that feature because I can have two things open and not worry about alt tabing to the right window when I know i have it up on my other workspace. I'd love to see something like that adopted to windows in some way.
Anonymous
October 10, 2008
In Vista, the right click context menu breaks. A lot. When it does, you find yourself keeping a lot more windows open than you should. For example, I have nine explorer windows open right now, one solely for dragging and dropping music, as right click > add to media playlist doesn't work in many cases. I keep several program setting windows open because it's easier just to always keep the explorer window open then go up one directory, right click, send to desktop as shortcut, then wait for Vista to hang while it tries to show the desktop. I keep several downloaded file directories open because I frequently need access to those directories. Again, it's faster for my workflow to just keep the folders open and switch back and forth through the course of my day. I keep one window open for the program I'm working on, and several other windows for source directories related to that program. Generally, I'll copy the location, use the Computer shortcut to open a new instance, then paste the location in. It's faster for me to switch via the taskbar than it is to remember all the history in back/forward, or repeatedly switch directories manually. I love the new windows explorer in Vista (my favorite part of the OS). I hate not being able to expand groups in the taskbar. There are times when I only have two windows grouped together and it's frustrating to try to remember what has focus and what doesn't; the extra click feels very unnecessary, especially when I need to view both programs/directories side by side for easy switching (note that I like the grouping feature and don't want to disable it. I just want to have better control over how I manage my taskbar programs). I hate how some folders have a "new folder" icon and some don't. This inconsistency is always jarring. I hate even more how difficult it is to move files between folders. The Vista copy/paste options are great (have been loving them in firefox for years) but there is very right clickable space in folders now, particularly for the detailed list view, which is the one I use most. Oftentimes, both when dragging or right click copy/pasting, I'll inadvertently send a folder to the wrong directory. Likewise, I hate having to drag multiple windows around when I want to view content in more than one window at once. I can't use tile or since I generally have many windows open, and cascade ruins my window positions, which are usually assigned to a specific area of screenspace while I multitask. I would love more than anything to have a tabbed windows explorer, with the tabs functioning much as they do in Google Chrome (draggable into new windows).
Anonymous
October 10, 2008
"I would love more than anything to have a tabbed windows explorer, with the tabs functioning much as they do in Google Chrome (draggable into new windows)." I think we do that all...i hope that also the taskbar will work like tabs...
Anonymous
October 10, 2008
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Anonymous
October 12, 2008
Windows could be more friendlier when I need to attach files to an e-mail message, to a sharepoint server, to a website... Imagine I have just finished working on an Excel file, and it is still open. Normally, I need to save it somewhere to a filesystem, and then I need to go to my e-mail message, sharepoint site or a website and click browse, browse tiringly to a place where I saved my file, and then attach. Wouldn't be much easier in Excel to press a "similar to save" button, which asks which open window I want to choose my file to go to. If I chose an e-mail message window, it would attach to it, if I chose an internet browser window, it would try attaching to it - no need for that file system.
Anonymous
October 12, 2008
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Anonymous
October 12, 2008
When installing Vista, we Vista's Aero like interface but rather bitmaps. It's much better than Vista's sick basic theme. So it would be better if basic themes were like that.
Anonymous
October 12, 2008
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Anonymous
October 13, 2008
Well yes, vista home basic has aero with out transparency, that should be the aero basic. Also whats the deal with the windows 98 theme being in vista? Hope this is removed. the 2000 one is all you really need. Better yet, ditch the 2000 theme and develop a new modern them that doesn't have all the eye candy for pro users.
Anonymous
October 14, 2008
One of the things that I really like about *nix, is the multiple workspace options.. OS X has done a great job of nicking this feature and making it work.. I'd really like to be able to compartmentalize my windows desktop, into email and browser (workspace 1), coding, compiling and testing output (workspace 2) and whatever else I wanted with the additional workspaces, maybe chat (workspace 3) and whatever else.. I personally have an issue with concentration when all these things are open and operating on my single/linear windows desktop.. If I'm trying to concentrate and get some work done, I'd prefer to wait till I check in with workspace 1 to reply to that urgent email as it alerts me in the taskbar :) The rotating workspace experience could potentially be great through Aero!
Anonymous
October 15, 2008
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Anonymous
October 16, 2008
The killer feature for me would be a Mac OS X Spaces like feature. Maybe brand it like Windows Scenes or something. A cool 3D cube effect would make it shine. Also, if you dragged an application to an edge of the screen, the cube would appear and you could drag it where ever you want it. That would be awesome!
Anonymous
October 16, 2008
@RyGuy12: You should give DeskSpace a try, it works pretty much exactly like that! Though I agree an OS-integrated virtual desktop environment would be nicer / more reliable.
Anonymous
October 16, 2008
Don't really know if this is the proper place to make a request for Windows 7, but if I read the blog, it seems you really want to make an effort ;-) this is what I would really like to see in the next version of windows. It's an enhancement to the copy dialogue. If for example I need to copy 2 big files from 2 different folders to the same destination folder, I would like it to be possible to start copy of the first file and then go to the next folder, and drag the second file on top of the copy dialog which would then queue that file to the copy process with the same destination. Am I making any sence? Hope you know what I mean. I just hate it that I see the speed of both copy commands fall down, because I have 2 copy commands running at the same time. Both files have to go to the same destination folder so why isn't it possible to just drop extra files on an already in progress copy dialog window and just have those files also copied to the same destination folder as the first selected file...? should be that hard I think... thanks for concidering it though! DicE
Anonymous
October 17, 2008
I really hope the team will consider these three VERY simple things which would make my life with Windows much easier. 1/ SCROLL WHEEL ACTIVATES WINDOW I'm often working on two documents at once, in different windows. For example, Word in one window, and my research material in another (IE7, or whatever). I frequently want to scroll these windows up and down. At the moment I have to: a/ move the mouse over the window I want to scroll; b/ click on it, TAKING CARE to avoid any active areas, such as buttons, icons, etc; c/ roll the mouse wheel It would be so much better if I could just: a/ move the mouse over the window b/ roll the mouse wheel The first "step" of the wheel would activate the window, the subsequent ones would scroll it. This would be BRILLIANT. (I've tried the "activate on hover" option hidden away in Vista, but it leads to complete chaos in normal use.) 2/ OPEN TWO EXPLORER WINDOWS AT ONCE When I open Explorer, I nearly always intend to move or copy some files around, so I want a source window and a destination window. It's such a drag having to use the start menu twice to open two windows. ESPECIALLY when try to open two Explorer windows on 'Documents' (say) and find you can't! Please give us single click way of opening two windows at once (or perhaps an optional two-pane view in Explorer). 3/ DOUBLE CLICK ON THE DESKTOP OPENS EXPLORER This is a shameless steal from Directory Opus. I'd like double clicking anywhere on the desktop to open up Explorer. If you haven't tried Directory Opus you probably won't appreciate what I'm talking about. If you have, you will realise it's simply brilliant. If you have two monitors, Directory Opus opens in the one you double-clicked in. Directory Opus is far too scary for the average user, though, whereas Explorer is beautifully simple. This request would allow an ultra-fast way of opening Explorer. (Combined with 2/ above, so you get a double Explorer window if you choose, would be perfect). Is there any chance the team would consider these three suggestions? I've deliberately chosen three which I believe would be fairly straightforward to program. Cheers, Thack
Anonymous
October 21, 2008
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Anonymous
October 27, 2008
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Anonymous
October 31, 2008
I have a specific gripe with Windows Explorer. There needs to be a way to set a default window size for all explorer windows. Vista's default explorer window size is abominable -- it's simply too small to use for browsing folders that contain lots of objects (particularly with Vista's defualt view using largish icons), so I end up wasting my time resizing lots of folders. I'm not saying folders shouldn't remember their size from when they were closed -- I want my folders to remember their previously used size. I just also want the option to reset all folders to open at the same size, the same way I can reset the view on all folders by using the "Apply to Folders" button in the View tab of the Folder Options dialog. Resizing folders is a only little thing, but it can be truly annoying. It frustrates my experience and interrupts my workflow.
Anonymous
January 11, 2009
Wow it is great to see all the feedback has been taken to heart. I am try Widows 7 now and as a photographer the improvments really help my workflow!
Anonymous
February 20, 2009
At home, my notebook is connected to two external displays: A desktop TFT and a tv set. I use to extend the desktop to the TV. One feature I really really miss is something like "Send to display X". Since I do not always have the second display in sight. (Either because it's turned of or because it's not in my field of view.) Right-clicking a window thumbnail and selecting "Send to Display 1" would have helped me so many times. Instead, I have to either try to grab the Window from the second display "blindly". (Firefox uses to open maximized on the 2nd screen.) Or I select "Move" from the window context menu. For that to work I have to first use the keyboard cursor keys to move it a bit. THEN finally I am able to move the window over by mouse motion. For some reason, move by mouse is initially disabled.
Anonymous
April 08, 2009
Hi there, people...first I'd like to thank you all for the fine piece of software you are putting together, I admit I was one of the BIG mass of concerned people around various lapses and not-so-good expressions judging MS products and the company as a whole, I used to say "sorry to be Microsoft,cause there's nothing better out there"...I'm simply impressed on what you did so far with Win 7. Good work, people (finally:o)). Now, for the actual little "comment". I couldn't find a suitable blog post to put it in, so I picked this one, flagged "Shell". Already on Vista I have noticed that the desktop icon size jumped up considerably, and I have a hard time getting used to that, actually I didn't ever get used to it completely. I would like you to include something like "icon size settings" into the display customizations, I know it is possible, I got my Win XP desktop "vistaized" with icons XP size, but looking Vista. I posted a wish on http://www.windowsvienna.com/forums/appearance-settings-t259.html (Windows Vienna forums, wishlist topic) describing it a bit in-depth. Didn't get a "valid" response from a MS Developer on it, just a "good idea" response...and would like to know how this idea stands now :-)). Keep up the good work,people...and change that icon size, it really annoys me =)))
Anonymous
May 12, 2009
@ faramond Two thumbs up to your suggestion. It would really be very convenient if the Windows would provide keyboard shortcuts especially for those who uses laptop and who travels. Less usage of mouse, less hassle while travelling, less chances of getting carpal tunnel syndrome (althought i have read an article that say there is a little clinical data to prove this one). And also provide guides for these shortcuts that everyone would know about it. I know many people who uses windows for so many years but have no idea about the present keyboard shorcuts. @ lyesmith shortcut for renaming is F2 :)
Anonymous
May 13, 2009
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Anonymous
May 14, 2009
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Anonymous
August 15, 2009
it's extremally annoying for the ones which uses the projector. after changing the resolution all window sizes are made small to fit it. then you need to resize all the window to your size... more over - windows sometimes forgets that you disconnected the device and changes resoultion for some test or something... grrr and the solution is so simple: keep the window sizes as percentage. layouts are well known in java and .net languages - so it's dynamic and auto-adjustable for the screen size. y don't give such a possibilty for system windows? another idea is to keep few window sizes so each resolution has it parameter. ...at last the easies way would be some option to disable auto-window-resize - easy and effective.
Anonymous
August 20, 2011
The comment has been removed
Anonymous
February 26, 2012
ARE YOU PEOPLE EVER GOING TO FIX THE BUG WHERE THE ACTIVE TITLEBAR COLOR SETTINGS ARE NOT APPLIED WHEN A WINDOW IS MAXIMIZED?????????? WHEN THE WINDOW IS VIEWED IN NON-MAXIMIZED FORM THE COLORS I CHOSE ARE APPLIED SUCCESSFULLY TO THE TITLEBAR TEXT, HOWEVER WHEN IT'S MAXIMIZED THEY'RE COMPLETELY IGNORED!!!!!!!! FIX THIS!!!!!!!!!!!
Anonymous
February 26, 2012
The comment has been removed

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