18 Features Windows Should Have (but Doesn't)

PC World ^ | 28 July 2008 | Robert Strohmeyer

[ShadowAce]

Some of the coolest OS features are nowhere to be found in Windows XP or Vista. Here are 18 brilliant features that Microsoft should beg for, borrow, or steal--plus tips on how you can add many of them to your PC now.

Love it or hate it, Microsoft Windows is the world's most dominant operating system. But when you look at some of the hot features found in competitors such as Linux and Mac OS X, both XP and Vista can seem a little incomplete.

From intuitive interface features like Apple's application dock and Cover Flow to basic media capabilities such as ISO burning, Windows often falls short on built-in goodies. And some features that other operating systems offer by default-- such as 64-bit processing and business-networking tools--require a premium-version license in Windows.

We took a good look at a variety of OSs, from the Mac to Linux to PC-BSD and beyond, and we rounded up a list of our favorite features--few of which come standard in any version of Windows. We even considered some operating systems of yore, and recalled a couple of cool features that Microsoft still hasn't caught on to. Some of these features simply aren't available for Windows at all, owing to the way the OS is designed. But you can add most of them to XP or Vista with the help of third-party applications, and we'll show you how to get them.

1. Expose

Available on: Mac

With a single keystroke, Mac OS X's Expose feature brings all of your program windows into view.

[aft_lizard]

That is what I got out of it as well.

[raygunfan]

indeed, windows bashing, like republican bashing....from BDS to WDS

[N3WBI3]

1) It can save a second or two switching between apps rather than alt-tab, alt tab, ...., .... oh there it is! I use a corner of the screen to bring it up..

2) Right because physical real-estate is cheap, thats why cubicle sizes have been shrinking... not to mention power..

3) I agree here, best to configure ssh correctly and use sftp to get things from home, if needed.

4) ‘not everyone’ needs any feature but screen sharing is critical to the growing trend of telecommuting, Id much rather look at a developers screen than have him read me a java error.

5) And this helps traveling laptop users how? yes you can configure shadow copy but if someone is on a business trip and connectivity of the office is limited any work they do while out of the office is at risk.

6) Many companies have parts of their DR plan which includes cd’s of critical software and information mailed to key personnel. Sandy in Accounting might need some information about her validators phone numbers in the event their data center burns down and the IT team is bringing up a second site.

7) agreed

8) unless of course your like me and record important meetings and want to store and distribute them to people who were out of the office. This is still more for the home user though.

9) Yes, you might request the 30,000$ piece of software and the IT staff might find something that does the job off of a reputable site like sourceforge.com for free thus decreasing cost and increasing productivity.

10) Agreed

11) Most users have allot more than that!

12) Agreed

13) Gestures are not about mouse buttons, my apple mouse has two buttons, yet the diea of just moving the mouse to perform a semi complicated task is appealing and has been used in the Linux community for quite some time.

14) The example they show is bad but where it useful is going through docs, it gives a quick thumbnail of the doc so if you have forgotten a name finding it becomes much easier

15) For people who need to share files this is huge! I have always had a second box with Linux apache for making sure I could have over a doc to someone were they a newer employee whos permissions were not set up correctly

16) anyone who had the majority of their environment on the *nix side loves to have posix (developers, sys-admins, security folks, ...)

17) saving several seconds here or there adds up..

18) right because the complexity of installing and uninstalling an app *never* hurts productivity... When you have to update apps, repair apps, .... People can lose their PC a whole day while an admin finds libraries to remove and registry entries to chance..

—

Productivity is not only gained by giving users a better experience but the admins who maintain their computers as well..

[murron]

I think this had some very useful information.

[chuckles]

Biased article. Most of these things can be gotten if needed.....free. He has the same problem I do when evaluating OS's. I no NOTHING about Linux or Mac, so I wouldn't even know what XYZ program does if I didn't know what it does.

Just like burning an ISO, You just don't use Media Player. A google search will get you 20 programs in a minute for free. An argument could be made that Windows should do it, but they get sued every time they do. I have several programs that I have found over the years to do what I want.

I needed a print screen program to send charts to a friend to show the stock pattern I was looking at and found "Gadwin Print Screen" for free and it does a good job.

I have wanted to learn Linux for years, but the learning curve for me would be terrible. If all I wanted was to surf and email, anything would do. All of the work arounds I have learned over the years on Windows would mean nothing though. That is the main reason I haven't gone to Vista yet. I've heard there are many older programs that won't work with it. I don't even want to explore if my programs will transfer as I have so many now. I use certain programs for video, audio, and backup and many smaller programs for specialized things that probably only I would want.

[Mr. Blonde]

Of the ones I use on my Mac,

1. Expose is hugely useful. Probably the first thing that I really liked a lot better when I made the switch. I use it enough that I get frustrated when on a PC and I try to activate it and nothing happens.

4. I have only used screen sharing a little bit, but it has been helpful to help my friends out with some little problems they had.

5. Thankfully I haven’t had a need for Time Machine, but I am glad it is there. And not everyone who has a PC is using it at work, but still doesn’t want to use a document.

7. I use the stickies from my dashboard more, but they are handy.

11. I love the dock. So much more useful to me than the task bar. Especially when used in conjunction with Expose.

14. I actually don’t get coverflow either.

17. I love that the menus are standardized across applications. Everything is in the same place no matter the program. Especially helpful for preferences.

Expose and standardized menus are probably the two that make me more productive. Screen sharing at the least has saved me long phone calls or driving to a friends house.

[Liberty2007]

keep in mind I am in the DOD world and my FIL is in the banking world so we swap stories.
2)I actually think this one is the best one but I havent seen it on my networks.
6) I may be missing something, do people normally bundle their data into iso’s I thought that was mainly for os’s but then I dont know everything :p

9)yes sometimes freeware product is better but it isnt going to fly on a DOD or banking network, I am sure there are a few exceptions, they dont mind paying a little more just so they have someone’s ass to nail for having a backdoor in their software.

[Still Thinking]

I’m still waiting for the “25 Things Windows Shouldn’t Do But Does Anyway” column.

[Liberty2007]

I am going to try to get it to Vote for Mccain for me.lol

[zeugma]

2. Virtual Workspaces

This should have long ago become a standard part of windows. 

It's one of the things I love about linux (and most X window managers). Every program has it's place. I can organize my applications in whatever way makes sense to me to enable me to quickly switch from one to the other.

I guess one reason Microsoft has resisted making this a standard part of windows, is because too many folks don't use more than one application at a time when running MS-Windows due to resource constraints.

[Still Thinking]

I don’t see where it’s bashing to point out features that appear to be achievable and that are useful. Frankly, it seems to me that unless customers make vendors aware of their perceived shortcomings and make suggestions for improvement, the vendors will suffer as a result. These writers are doing Microsoft a favor.

Well, bashing MicroSlop would be fine if they had a point. In fact, most of the functionality they want built into the OS is already available in ten different versions as shareware and low cost utilities for Windows. It seems to me that's a much better way to go than trying to talk Microsoft into adding further feature bloat and CPU theft into all the rest of our machines who may not care about 16 of these 18 "killer" features. Microsoft's operating systems already have a reputation for being too top heavy. What they need to do is jettison some of the stuff that's already in there and let people who want a given feature add it back in. Except for the desktop management stuff and maybe the ability to burn ISO's, none of this is OS level business anyway.

[js1138]

Odd. If I click the center wheel of my mouse (Win XP) I get all the open windows displayed. What is it I’m not understanding about this?

[N3WBI3]

6) Ive seen it done for speed of distribution... Its not an enormously important feature but I have needed it a few times in my career (I used Linux)

9) Are you serious? Freeware wont cut it on a dod machine?

nevermind the fact selinux is open-source, free and from the NSA there is plenty of evidence that the government is using opensource software... Apache, Tomcat, OpenOffice and others get used... Not to mention

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use_of_Free_and_Open_Source_Software_(FOSS)_in_the_U.S._Department_of_Defense

“as measured by speed of closures of CERT reports in comparison to closed-source alternatives. Initial applications for consideration would include, but not be limited to, the set of 115 already-used applications identified by the survey in Table 2, plus other widely used tools such as Python ([1]) that did not appear in this first set of results. In formulating the list, quick consideration should be given in particular to high value, heavily used infrastructure and development tools such as Linux, OpenBSD, NetBSD, FreeBSD, Samba, Apache, Perl, GCC, GNAT, XFree86, OpenSSH, bind, and sendmail.”

http://www.gcn.com/print/22_15/22425-1.html#

“Already in use at DOD

Stenbit’s memo followed a report by Mitre Corp. of Bedford, Mass. The report used responses to an e-mail survey, which located 115 open-source applications within DOD and 251 examples of their use. “

http://www.screaming-penguin.com/node/4761

“In a significant win for open source desktop productivity suites, Sun Microsystems Monday announced that the U.S. Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) would implement up to 25,000 units of its StarOffice 5.2 software.”

—

[js1138]

I don’t know how many Mac users have had to restore a system from a backup, but I’ve done it dozens of time with the default Windows backup program. Entire systems, including servers, and individual files.

There’s even a quick system state backup option that saves the registry and all the critical files that get attacked by viruses. takes about a minute, and can be set to a schedule.

I’ve used a number of backup programs, including some very expensive server programs, but the freebie supplied with Windows has never failed to restore correctly. I can’t say that about some of the purchased ones.

[N3WBI3]

The mac system is far better at handling open files, and performance..

BTW you ever want ot see a windows restore fail do it on a different set of hardware..

[js1138]

BTW you ever want ot see a windows restore fail do it on a different set of hardware..

I do it all the time. I even move boot drives to new systems. All it takes is running repair from the Windows CD, followed by installing the motherboard drivers. I've even switched boot systems from Intel to AMD with no problems.

[Oztrich Boy]

With a single keystroke, Mac OS X's Expose feature brings all of your program windows into view.

I can do that on Win2000. I don't know how it happens. It annoys when it does. I never want to do it.

[HAL9000]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2009997/posts?q=1&;page=51

[ShadowAce]

Are you serious? Freeware wont cut it on a dod machine?

I don't know about desktop space, but I've installed, configured and used plenty of freeware on DOD machines--Top500 class supercomputers.

[ShadowAce]

Sorry about that. I didn’t find it.