I have been a Linux user for around 9 – 10 years (Red Hat 5 anyone). We have had an exclusive relationship since last 5 years. I did run Vista for a while on my laptop because the Broadcom card did not seem to like Linux. The issue got fixed in Jaunty so I switched immediately. My laptop has been running Karmic since alpha 4.
I have been using Windows 7 rc for around 3 months now, a little before it started getting all the good press. Installation was easy, mostly because I installed it on a separate disk so there was no issue of it wanting to be on the first primary partition of the disk. I had that trouble with Vista which kept on giving the very helpful message “Your disk does not meet the prerequisites” without giving any kind of hint as to what those prerequisites were. I had nothing to backup and restore so I side stepped that landmine.
I must admit that my experience with this brand new Microsoft OS has been pretty good. It is definitely slicker and faster than Vista. There are fewer application compatibility issues.
Here are some of the things that I like, they may not be the big killer features or major technological breakthroughs but I find them very useful.
- New taskbar: The new taskbar has got a good amount of media attention. I hate having too many windows on my taskbar, it causes searching for a particular one take that much longer. This is one of the reasons I absolutely love the multiple desktops that are available in Gnome and others. This feature in itself might be a copy of the Mac Dock but it is, undoubtedly, immensely useful. One more thing that I love about it is the fact that when you have multiple windows of the same application, hovering the mouse pointer over now square enclosed icon on the toolbar, shows all the instance windows and you can then click on a particular instance to bring it to top. You can, also, close a particular instance right from there and hovering the mouse on one of the instances brings it forward for as long as the mouse pointer is on it, great for checking score on cricinfo or some such thing. This has become a feature that I have started missing whenever I am on Linux.
- New Start menu: The start menu has received a face lift. The search box there, although not an original idea again, is pretty useful. When the mouse is hovered over one of the applications in the list the right panel of the menu changes to a list of files recently opened using that application. Another feature which cuts down time and clicks required to do mundane and repetitive tasks.
- Another feature that I have started using a lot is maximizing a window to cover half of the screen horizontally. This is done by dragging the title bar of the window out of either sides of the screen. This causes the window to cover exactly the left or the right half of the screen. This becomes very useful while copying stuff from one window to another or comparing some stuff etc. For people whose text editors don’t have vertical split this can be a really useful substitute.
- The system bar has been now been minimised and converted to an upwards pointing arrow. More space on the task bar, Very good.
- Internet is definitely faster than on Ubuntu. Perhaps an upgraded network stack. I have tried disabling IPv6, using OpenDNS, dns caching and multiple configuration changes on Ubuntu. While they have helped, the speed is still a good amount less than what I get on windows. There was a bug on bind which seems to have been patched but the problem persists.
- Microsoft Office: This is a _huge_ difference. Open Office is not even in the same zip code. Trust me, I have been doing documentation for past 6 months
. I have tried crossover, while it works reasonably well, it still can’t provide the integration that one gets with almost every thing when running office natively. - The new version of MS Paint is pretty useful. Lots of changes and Microsoft did not make a mistake hiring the guys that wrote it.
Now for the gripes
- Lack of multiple desktops: I have absolutely no idea why this is not there. I find it incredibly useful and time saving, productivity increasing etc. Just throw all your IM clients etc in one window, mail clients in another etc. and only keep one group of work related windows on one desktop, so that when you are working you don’t get any popup notifications and Alt Tabbing just becomes incredibly easier.
- Synaptic: This is a killer, although underrated, feature of Ubuntu. All applications in one place. Don’t have to worry about updating individual applications, drivers etc. Microsoft definitely should look at something like the Windows Marketplace implementation for this purpose.
- Mouse copy: This is the feature that I start miss most. In X selecting some text using the mouse automatically copies and can be pasted using the middle click. I now have to do every copy operation twice on windows, when the middle click paste fails then I realise I am on windows, I curse, and then go back and use Ctrl-C Ctrl-V.
All in all a pretty good offering from the Microsoft stable, I have already placed a bet on it capturing 40% market share in 6 – 8 months.
