Features you wish would have been added to 7

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FoxhoundOp

[H]ard|Gawd
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Apr 26, 2003
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This isn't a thread to bitch about the shortcomings of Windows 7. I've been using it since build 7000 came out and it's by far my favorite version of Windows. I believe it's covered a long distance on the road to the perfect home OS.

There are a couple of things that I wish they would have added or changed.

First of all, I would have loved to see flip3d turned into an Expose (I know there's an accented e but I really don't know how to type it) type setup. As it is, it's cool to use every now and then for the fun of it but it fails because it's just better to use alt tab especially with aero enabled.

Secondly, I want virtual desktops. This is a feature I have grown quite fond since I started playing around with Linux. I often times have multiple programs and tabs open and I feel like flipping through windows slows m down. Virtual desktops would undoubtedly increase productivity and bring Windows 7 closer to being the ultimate OS in my eyes.

Sorry for my longwinded post, I'm feeling talkative. What do you wish would have been added to Windows 7, [H]ers?
 
Long winded? My god, most of my posts have that much content in just the first 30 seconds of typing... ;)

Honestly, since I've been using Windows 7 (last August with the first milestone leak), I haven't found anything lacking. The items you mentioned are of absolutely no use to me whatsoever (never use them when I run OSX and Linux, sure as hell don't need 'em in Windows), and I can't think of anything else that I really need in Windows.

Windows 7 does everything I require, and it does it better than any previous version of Windows. If I think of something useful I'll probably mention it at some point, but so far, it just works.
 
I really hope Windows 8 switches out some older Windows "features" (such as the registry) for newer/better/more efficient ideas. 7 is an awesome OS, everyone will be happy to hold on to it for a while, so take your time Microsoft and really work on Windows 8.
 
I whished they added a mail and messenger client :D:D
 
I wondered what happened to that new file system that was supposed to ship with Vista to replace NTFS, but then got put on hold - apparently for a very long time since it didn't come with 7 either.
 
GotNoRice said:
I wondered what happened to that new file system that was supposed to ship with Vista to replace NTFS, but then got put on hold - apparently for a very long time since it didn't come with 7 either.
Click to expand...

In a word, compatibility. Replacing a file system is HARD work while maintaining backwards compatibility.
 
I concur with the Expose idea. I don't even care if they blatantly rip it off from Apple. It is the single most productive tool I have ever used.

It is so intuitive to just throw my mouse cursor up to one of the corners of the screen and see all the open windows right in front of me to choose from. Ctrl+Tab and Win+Tab in Windows doesn't even come close. Also, being able to access stuff on the desktop, grab something, then get right back to the window you had open is amazingly useful. In Windows, the hide all open windows thing is useless because you have to click to bring the windows back. AeroPeek us just a gimmick. It has no real use.
 
GotNoRice said:
I wondered what happened to that new file system that was supposed to ship with Vista to replace NTFS, but then got put on hold - apparently for a very long time since it didn't come with 7 either.
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WinFS was never supposed to be a file system. It was supposed to become a large metadata database engine. It's what became the Indexing service in Vista.
I really hope Windows 8 switches out some older Windows "features" (such as the registry) for newer/better/more efficient ideas.
Click to expand...
Do you even have any idea what you're talking about? What alternative to the registry would you propose? A bunch of .conf files everywhere? To say nothing of compatibility issues.
 
My top 3 atm:

  1. Admins that are admins, and users that are users - no more of this half assed hand holding
  2. Allow the use of real custom themes - this is fisher price stuff here Micro$oft
  3. Virtual Desktops - Welcome to 1999
 
I'd like to see a new filesystem with an open license, or NTFS opened up. As the defacto filesystem for USB keys, flash media and so much more, FAT32 is starting to become limiting.

Virtual desktops would be nice as well.

That's about it for me.
 
bonsai said:
My top 3 atm:

Admins that are admins, and users that are users - no more of this half assed hand holding
Click to expand...
Hand holding? You're still admin. You're handed an administrative token. Processes shouldn't be handed one by default. Welcome to secure computing.
Allow the use of real custom themes - this is fisher price stuff here Micro$oft
Click to expand...
Old namecalling is old.
Virtual Desktops - Welcome to 1999
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Are you comfortable using the Desktops tool from the Sysinternals suite?
 
actually pretty good suggestions listed already, so i'll just reiterate the ones I like the most + others

expose clone
official support for custom theming
virtual desktops (holy crap they need to get with the times with this one)
integrated MS security essentials, or at least a shortcut on the desktop to download them
API cleanup/break legacy support (virtualization for older programs, clean slate moving forward)
 
MKV will never have native support out-of-the-box in Windows. Windows Media will always be Microsoft's preferred format, regardless of end user desires. Hell, the only reason they still include support for AVI is because they created that too so long ago. But if you think for one second that MKV - an open source audio/video container format - is ever going to have Microsoft's nod and become natively decoded...

Well I got this bridge in Brooklyn you might be interested in... <hint, hint> :D
 
Joe Average said:
MKV will never have native support out-of-the-box in Windows. Windows Media will always be Microsoft's preferred format, regardless of end user desires. Hell, the only reason they still include support for AVI is because they created that too so long ago. But if you think for one second that MKV - an open source audio/video container format - is ever going to have Microsoft's nod and become natively decoded...

Well I got this bridge in Brooklyn you might be interested in... <hint, hint> :D
Click to expand...

Isn't Quicktime now in the box in 7?
 
criccio said:
I concur with the Expose idea. I don't even care if they blatantly rip it off from Apple. It is the single most productive tool I have ever used.

It is so intuitive to just throw my mouse cursor up to one of the corners of the screen and see all the open windows right in front of me to choose from. Ctrl+Tab and Win+Tab in Windows doesn't even come close. Also, being able to access stuff on the desktop, grab something, then get right back to the window you had open is amazingly useful. In Windows, the hide all open windows thing is useless because you have to click to bring the windows back. AeroPeek us just a gimmick. It has no real use.
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Try this: http://insentient.net/ Pretty much does just what you described. This is a fantastic little free tool. The guy seems to have not touched it in two years unfortunately, he did a good job. I need to see if he's willing to get out the code.
 
You know I tried that one, and there is another one IIRC. They just didn't feel as fluid and seemless as it is in OS X, for obvious reason's of course. Thanks though.

heatlesssun said:
QT decoding... Isn't that in the box?
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Well that would be just H264, so yes, essentially.
 
criccio said:
You know I tried that one, and there is another one IIRC. They just didn't feel as fluid and seemless as it is in OS X, for obvious reason's of course. Thanks though.



Well that would be just H264, so yes, essentially.
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Switcher is no Expose but if you want one button or click or mouse over to pop up open Windows it works VERY well. Don't know if you've tried it on Windows 7 RTM but it actually runs a LOT better on my sig rig with RTM than even the RC. And thanks for the info.
 
So you got me to try it again, and it seems to run a bit better then I remember. Deal breaker is no hot-corners though. I wouldn't ever use even Expose if It didn't have hot-corners.
 
Hot coners are there. You have to go in and enable them they aren't on by default.
 
Jon55 said:
I really hope Windows 8 switches out some older Windows "features" (such as the registry) for newer/better/more efficient ideas. 7 is an awesome OS, everyone will be happy to hold on to it for a while, so take your time Microsoft and really work on Windows 8.
Click to expand...

Never. The registry won't go away in the next 20 years.
 
Remember the compatibility problems Vista had with the re-write of the hardware driver layer. Yea, any major innovation comes with growing pains.

I'm speaking of the file system and registry suggestions.

I'd like more modularity, more options when installing to strip things out, to install a leaner OS, like an official vLite that doesn't break things. These multi gig installs are getting ridiculous. Many features I don't even care about. Win7 took it a bit further with the features you can disable, but it's all still there on the harddrive, you can go from home basic to ultimate without inserting a disc from what I've heard because everything is installed up front, just not accessible.

Bit of a problem for people with low capacity but high speed OS/App drives. e.g. raptors/SSDs. It's doable, and it works now, but it could be better.

I'd also like to see better multi-tasking, multi-processing. Explorer can still way to easily get hung waiting on a cdrom drive to spin up, a flash drive to respond, that freaks out all explorer windows and the OS in general.

Hrmmmm. I miss the fancy visual de-fragmentor =(
 
criccio said:
Installing one 702KB file is to hard?
Click to expand...

What 702KB would that be?

I tried:

1. VLC - first two mkvs I tried it on had no video or no video and no audio
2. MPC-HT (I think) 64-bit Matroska_splitter.ax, registered it, installed ffdshow, .mkvs wont add to WMP library, some .mkvs, such as flac or pcm audio ones, had no sound.
3. Shark's win 7 codecs + 64bit package, movies played but only from explorer, not from wmp library.
4. Divx7mkv beta thing, did not function at all as far as I could tell.
5. Tried remuxing the .mkv files to .ts, but .ts in wmp would not play dts audio, probably not flac or pcm either but I gave up there.

So I'd love to know what 702KB file I can download that will make win 7 play all my mpeg2/mpeg4/vc1 + dts/ac3/pcm/flac .mkvs that all (about 105 of them) play flawlessly in Vista.

Would be 0 problems if win 7 had the ability to read .mkv natively...
 
Menelmarar said:
Remember the compatibility problems Vista had with the re-write of the hardware driver layer. Yea, any major innovation comes with growing pains.

I'm speaking of the file system and registry suggestions.

I'd like more modularity, more options when installing to strip things out, to install a leaner OS, like an official vLite that doesn't break things. These multi gig installs are getting ridiculous. Many features I don't even care about. Win7 took it a bit further with the features you can disable, but it's all still there on the harddrive, you can go from home basic to ultimate without inserting a disc from what I've heard because everything is installed up front, just not accessible.

Bit of a problem for people with low capacity but high speed OS/App drives. e.g. raptors/SSDs. It's doable, and it works now, but it could be better.

I'd also like to see better multi-tasking, multi-processing. Explorer can still way to easily get hung waiting on a cdrom drive to spin up, a flash drive to respond, that freaks out all explorer windows and the OS in general.

Hrmmmm. I miss the fancy visual de-fragmentor =(
Click to expand...

I'm not sure why replacing the registry would be seen as an innovation. The registry is a database of application and system data. Yes, that's all it is. Data. You can store strings, integers, anything. It's like a conf file, except there is an API to access it and query keys, rather than writing a dumb file parser. At the high level, that's what the registry is. At the lower levels there are probably many many details I don't know. The only thing I can think would make the registry more resilient would be whatever else they can do to form a cleaner line between application data and system data, since that's really the only thing that causes system instability. Application data that is not properly cleared out or kept track of, is mainly developer incompetence, so whatever you would do wrong with the registry, you would do wrong with a conf file anyways.
 
criccio said:
Install 7, install Haalis or Gabest media splitter. Done...
Click to expand...

Oh yea did that (first thing I did), installed haali, movies have extreme stuttering when played from wmp library, but play fine in Vista.

edit: nvm, gabest did not work either.
 
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devil22 said:
Oh yea did that (first thing I did), installed haali, movies have extreme stuttering when played from wmp library, but play fine in Vista.

edit: nvm, gabest did not work either.
Click to expand...

Failing pretty hard then. Done a few HTPC installs with 7 now and all MKV's play fine in 7MC with just a Haalis install...
 
Theming will never happen. It would drive corporate users mad - any user customization causes tech support hell. If you can't say "look for the Start Button - it should be HERE and look like THIS", you're doomed.
 
Bbq said:
1. folder sizes in explorer
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That would be pretty nice actually, if you could always see exact folder sizes for every folder. I think the reason why they don't have such a thing is performance. Allowing folder sizes to always be dynamically updated would cause major performance implications. Every write a file would cause another calculation to be performed. Also, know that if you update a file deep within a folder hierarchy, you're going to have to update every single folder along the chain. As you can see, this may not be a good idea, and is probably why folder sizes are done on-demand (currently). Not only that, but update granularity would be an issue. You can write to a few kilobytes at a time with buffered I/O. Now what if you're writing a 10 MB file? 10000 / 4 = 2500, which would mean that if you update eagerly, then you have some 2500 additional sets of computations. There may be better ways of doing this, though.
 
One could counter argue that point by saying that a side-effect of the indexing service could be to keep a small database in RAM that keeps track of the folder contents and total sizes... but the explanation just given is the primary reason for it not being something Windows has ever really bothered with.

If I need to know I right click on a folder and take a peek at it, takes 2 seconds longer if that much.
 
Ah, I forgot some other things I wish had made it,

- definitely support for MKV. I know it's easy to do myself but I was hoping it would get more recognition with native support.

- a little more oomph with the event viewer. I LOVE the instrumentation that's available in W7 but the sheer volume of logs encourages a better packaging and management tool. It's the same sort of thing with the registry - the concept and technical architecture are pretty sound, but the management tools (regedit?!) are primitive to the extreme and give the whole thing a bad name. Same with the event viewer... heck, how am I supposed to purge all events in the system, in total?

- I was hoping for a few more, innovative gadgets. I'm also disappointed that the CPU gadget is still ugly and prone to drive up the load.
 
Arainach said:
Theming will never happen. It would drive corporate users mad - any user customization causes tech support hell.
Click to expand...

Yes, I agree, Microsoft is far too incompetent to implement the ability to allow a corporate admin to disable a feature like that. Hell, as referenced in my previous post, they can't even get the definition of admin right.
 
bonsai said:
Yes, I agree, Microsoft is far too incompetent to implement the ability to allow a corporate admin to disable a feature like that. Hell, as referenced in my previous post, they can't even get the definition of admin right.
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It's not just corporate users, however - theming is a bane to all tech support everywhere. Having an option to disable it isn't enough.

And actually, MS is the first group to get the definition right; applications shouldn't run as Admin unless absolutely necessary. The concept of minimum privilege is a core tenet of security, and one that they're the first to truly implement. Having a "root" user is a terrible idea, period.
 
Arainach said:
The concept of minimum privilege is a core tenet of security, and one that they were finally able to implement when other OSes have been doing it for decades.
Click to expand...

fixed.

Having a "root" user is a core principle of operating systems, and one that is necessary in order to have real control over the system.
Click to expand...

and fixed.
 
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bonsai said:
Yes, I agree, Microsoft is far too incompetent to implement the ability to allow a corporate admin to disable a feature like that. Hell, as referenced in my previous post, they can't even get the definition of admin right.
Click to expand...

That's your silly point of view. I see nothing wrong and a lot of things right about UAC working the way it does, I wish win 7 had continued the Vista way of doing it, but in the end whiny users will get their way if you want to not lose sales.

The concept of minimum privilege is a core tenet of security, and one that they were finally able to implement when other OSes have been doing it for decades.
fixed.
Having a "root" user is a core principle of operating systems, and one that is necessary in order to have real control over the system.
and fixed.
Click to expand...

Why blame MS though? It's IBM that chose the 8086 chip that had no security features, that MS had to remain compatible with, that caused the lack of security in earlier MS-DOS/windows OSes. It's easy for the anti-MS fanboys to forget that, with IBM helping apple and funding linux these days, it seems...

And you have "root" in Windows, you just have to elevate programs or turn off uac.

Windows users are not unix users, unix users are geeks that know about technology, windows is for every day people who may not know computers well enough to stay safe, so it needs extra hand holding. That's just the reality of the world, though I suppose you can use it as ammo in your asinine OS holy wars to irritate people in this forum who are trying to have a good time and help each other.... :rolleyes:
 
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