Posted on 07/29/2008 6:03:02 AM PDT by 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.
Available on: Mac
(Excerpt) Read more at pcworld.com ...
yes I do know some DOD uses linux. I really need to get back into it but I have downsized my house all I have are laptops, they are a little pricey to have me dedicate one to linux. Linux has made great strides that now even idiots can use it. I was using it back in the day when you had to compile your own kernel to have things like Sound and cdrom support. My work environment contains no linux or Unix boxes. we do have some tactical boxes that are SUNOs tho. That being said in a windblows environment you are not going to authorized to install just any old software you find off the internet.
I wonder if they are still doing this, I know a few years ago on MacOs X they had some compatibility to install debian packages, using apt-get. Does that work pretty good? I always thought that is a good feature since there are way more programs on the linux than the mac side. plus they are free.
I have only seen ethereal on our network.
Each environment has it's own rules and regulations they go by, and what's acceptable for one may not be acceptable for the other.
I believe I've even seen Macs on some desktops at the supercomputer locations, though I cannot be certain.
I tend not to mess around at that level, most of the sourceforge packages I might use have a mac release as well..
podcasts are productivity boosters? Letting people install whatever software they want? Allowing remote access to their files without controls? Burning ISO CDs so people can steal your licensed software?
You’d be tossed out on your ear for suggesting these in nearly every corporate environment I’ve seen.
everyone of these things is possible with add-ons to the Windows OS. So if people really need it they can add it with the proper controls.
Don’t be tempted to use stardock, it is a huge resource hog that causes any other video/gaming programs to jitter due to stardock’s constant background processes.
This article is pretty lame, PC World is accomplishing what here? This is a troll article from a “major” consumer electronics magazine. Written by an intern, or someone on a tight deadline and a flight to catch for the weekend vacation.
I’d agree to the point that there is no good end served by just piling up features, especially if they add to the memory footprint, new instabilities, and added security vulnerabilities. New features must make sense, first of all, but and must never be allowed to distract the software engineers from the task of designing a robust, fast, secure, trim underlying OS.
infact we disable windows burning altogether I found it flakey but it may also be a dod requirement that it is off. besides dells ship with a roxio license and that is much better IMHO
“I found it flakey but it may also be a dod requirement that it is off.”
allowing cd burning in a secure environment is risky.
“esides dells ship with a roxio license and that is much better IMHO”
I’m a firm believer in focus. A product that tries to do everything generally sucks at everything. A product that does one thing is usually better.
If MS wanted to include features with Windows as separate applications, that would be fine (much like Linux does). But an OS should *not* be everything to everyone.
Some of these are esoteric, special use to scratch a particular itch of the writer. But a few are just generally helpful to almost anybody.
Expose is useful enough that I sorely miss it whenever I'm using Windows. Expose is useful if you work with even a few documents or programs (Spaces is useful if you work with a LOT more).
Time Machine is useful to anybody. You don't think it adds much until you lose a file or suddenly realize you want that version from three days ago before you made the big changes. And setting it up is literally as easy as plugging in an external hard drive and clicking "Yes, I want to use this for backup." Restoring is as easy as finding any other file on your system. It's the ease of use above all that makes this the best backup system for the average user.
Cover Flow is useful if you've ever wanted to browse through your documents. Thumbnails are just sooo last decade.
One-file apps are useful to pretty much anybody. No installing/uninstalling anything, just drag the app file to your hard drive and use it. Delete it when you don't want it anymore.
The last one useful to everybody is the standardized menu. It's just a superior usability thing.
I think one of the issues isn't just what you implement, but how you implement it. OS X has very low-level support for all the gee-whiz UI stuff like Cover Flow and Expose, mainly the GPU-accelerated Core Image and Core Animation (which are available to any developer). The transparency isn't hacked, it's a natural use of the multi-layer compositing engine, also almost entirely done on the GPU (although it wasn't when it first came out, but the infrastructure was in place to support it when video cards got powerful enough).
Time Machine doesn't just make backups either. The way it does it without wasting space (a full backup every hour would fill up a backup drive fast) is integral to the mechanics of the file system, and the way it chooses how to backup files (hard link only or copy it if new or changed) flows from the system-wide indexing feature of Spotlight.
Controllable using group policy in that environment. At least it should be. It is in a Mac environment, that and USB key use, which applications can be installed or run, etc.
And they should be bashed. PC World is one of the rags that loves to bash on Windows for being bloated and for stealing ideas that put 3rd party companies out of business. Yet here they are insisting Windows needs still more features (bloat) and most of those features are available for Windows from 3rd parties.
There is a distinction between Linux/MS and Apple..
Apple sells whole systems, everything from the base hardware, to the OS, to the applications, all the way up to software support services. As an Operating Systems OSX would run just fine w/out iso burning or time machine apple includes them (and in a posix complaint manner) as software on their system.
So yes, I agree with you that an OS should be very minimalist but a computer system does not have to be, especially if your market wants otherwise.
But yes, the OS itself should be. Doing it that way would increase security (as there should be few entries into the OS), prevent code bloat, and increase the overall speed of the machine.
And that is how apple does it the actual OS behind Tiger (as you or I would understand it to be) is as minimalist as say AIX, but the rest of the add on software is called a part of the OS for the purposes of marketing..
Windows Genuine Advantage comes to mind as one candidate for inclusion.
Yeah, they could at least be honest and call it “Windows PITA Paranoia”
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