Microsoft Corp. says vast new Vistas of
enjoyment and productivity await those of us who toil between the chair and the keyboard.
On Tuesday (30 January 2007), the world’s largest
software company unveiled for the public perhaps the worst-kept secret in the history of
technology - the new Windows Vista operating system.
Windows Vista Operating System
So-called beta or trial versions of this huge new product
have been circulating among computer professionals, journalists and hard-core hobbyists
for nearly a year. The whole Magilla was given to Microsoft’s big corporate customers
late last year.
Now it’s the turn for those folks in the dens and
drawing rooms of planet Earth. On Tuesday, Vista went on sale both as a box of upgrade
discs and installed as the core software on virtually every home computer on the store
shelves of America. Upgrade prices start at $99 for a stripped-down Basic version, $159
for the mainstream Premium and $259 for Vista Ultimate. (Microsoft.com/vista)
You need to have a powerful computer with strong graphics
capabilities to enjoy a worthwhile Vista upgrade, and many experts are telling their
clients (correctly, I think) to stick with Windows XP until their next machine. This is
because much of Vista focuses on ease of use and beautiful displays one can get by without
for a while.
For example, when open programs and Web sites are minimized
and consigned to the taskbar at the bottom of the Windows screen, running the cursor over
each one creates a pop-up image a couple of inches square showing even more contents of a
file or Web page.
Additionally, there is a new icon near the Start button
(now a round ball called the “orb") that summons a display worthy of the
Eyewitness News graphics department. In this display, a large representation of each open
program cascades like a deck of cards, showing even more detail of what each contains.
The entire display is rendered in a semitransparent style
called Aero in which one can see shadows of what lies behind each open Window.
Some of this stuff appeals more to us propeller heads than
to sane folks, but everybody benefits because this scheme greatly reduces the frustration
of finding stuff that is opened but tucked away in some lost corner of the screen or hard
drive.
The next dramatic addition, the Sidebar, is a string of
small but legible programs running down the side of the screen and designed to put
optional things at one’s fingertips, including a big clock, news headlines and stock
tickers.
These too are rendered in a motif of transparent edges and
crisp type.
A little-heralded addition to Vista is that it uses Clear
Type fonts designed for reading electronic books instead of the slightly blurry dot-pixel
pattern on other computers. This sharp display promises that there will be millions fewer
squinting-induced headaches among computer users.
One’s first encounter with the Vista desktop just
after the computer boots up can be unsettling because things like the familiar My
Documents folder have disappeared. Instead, one gets a Windows Vista folder in the upper
left of the screen that opens to a display of subfolders that includes Documents,
Pictures, Contacts, Favorites, Videos and Searches.
This layout goes a long way toward forcing a user to keep
all of the documents, images and other files accumulated over time in an orderly storage
system that promises to ease another cause of headaches - desktops covered with a rash of
scattered icons.
But the most potent organizational addition is an automatic
indexing of the content of all files that get created on the computer, making it possible
to find just about anything one wants by typing keywords into a search box.
This tool results in turning one’s entire computer
into a random access database that instantly delivers a needed phone number, an old
letter, an e-mail message from last year or all the chapter files in one’s novel in
progress.
On the downside is an upside. You get bombarded with
warnings and cautionary pop-ups to an annoying degree as the collection of Vista security
tools do their stuff to deflect viruses, warn of phishing Web sites, deflect spyware and
block firewall breaches.
Vista, for now, appears far safer than Windows XP.
Another upside/downside is the serious load - probably
overload - of information that comes with all those jumping icons, flashing warnings and
see-through windows to remind you of work undone. Yet another comes in the parental
controls that one can use to monitor and restrict offspring lured by MySpace, YouTube,
bloggers, instant messages, chat boxes, mash-ups and other treats/terrors.
You can log each e-mail and text message a youngster
receives (attachments included). You can block specific sites or set up a list of only the
sites you want them to visit. Maybe best of all, access to the PC during the current day
can be shut off at any designated time.
Of course one spouse can turn this Big Brother scrutiny on
the other spouse, and bosses can eavesdrop as never before, but hey, that’s the vista
that awaits us all.
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