B
Brian Shapiro
Since I've installed the beta of Vista I've noticed a lot of ways it could
be improved, some things are more like bugs that need to be worked out, but
others need to be brought to attention---
: you should be able to drag a file to a folder name thats present in the
breadcrumb bar. instead of copying, changing the folder, and pasting (or
using the navigation pane if its open) i want to be able to easily drag to
folders using the breadcrumb navigation. this would include both the names
displayed on the bar (the parent folders) and those that are on the
dropdowns. so for instance, if i drag a file over the arrow on the
breadcrumb bar, it should drop down, letting me drop it on a folder in the
list.
: windows explorer needs to remember the width that the user gave to the
different layout panes. i find myself having to to resize the navigation
pane's width and the different sizes i set to the favorites and tree
sections every time i restart explorer.
: the reading pane is not part of the folder view options but the general
windows explorer layout options, so it doesn't have a setting per folder. i
sort of would like it if i could have it appear for folders i've set it to
open for in the past; so certain folders that are image or document
libraries would have a reading pane and it would automatically disappear for
other folders. i'm thinking the reading pane should be collapsable, in order
to be nicer to use, like the folder tree is collapsable within the
navigation pane. it would also be nice if the favorite places section were
collapsable like the folder section.
: the tray icon for the sidebar, if its there, really needs to change from a
picture of a desktop with a sidebar (which is a mirror copy of what you see
on the screen) to some other type of representation. it would also be nice
that clicking on the tray icon opened and closed the sidebar, instead of
bringing up a menu and requiring you to double click--and if the sidebar
isn't on top, then instead of closing the sidebar, clicking on the tray icon
would merely bring the sidebar to the top. this would allow quicker and
easier access to the sidebar when you're using other programs, and if you
don't want it to take up space by having it set to be always on top.
: one thing i didn't like about the sidebar even in the first incarnation,
when it was different, was that it simply looked awkward and ugly as another
bar sitting on top of the tasbar. the fade to black style however is very
nice and elegant. thie old sidebar had an auto-hide feature, as i
understand, and some people didn't like it because the area where the cursor
would lead the sidebar to show up was next to scroll bars. the solution i
mentioned regarding changing how the tray icon works would do something like
auto-hide but it still isn't that good of a way to do it. i wouldn't mind if
you could set there to be a narrow band on the right hand side, where if you
clicked it, it would expand the sidebar (overlaying it on top of the other
windows instead of taking up space).
ne thing i didn't like about the sidebar even in the first incarnation,
when it was different, was that it simply looked awkward and ugly as another
bar sitting on top of the tasbar. the fade to black style however is very
nice and elegant. thie old sidebar had an auto-hide feature, as i
understand, and some people didn't like it because the area where the cursor
would lead the sidebar to show up was next to scroll bars. the solution i
mentioned regarding changing how the tray icon works would do something like
auto-hide but it still isn't that good of a way to do it. i wouldn't mind if
you could set there to be a narrow band on the right hand side, where if you
clicked it, it would expand the sidebar (overlaying it on top of the other
windows instead of taking up space).
the ideal Notes gadget would work like a OneNote SideNote, though
: opening a music file while WMP is opened but minimized shouldn't force WMP
to come out of a minimized state. i know you can drag the file to the
taskbar minimization and it wont force WMP to restore to a window, but it
doesnt make sense that you should have to take that step.
: i'm wondering why vista isn't getting thumbnails for me for my mpeg files
or my html or mhtml files, though; and while 'show file icon on thumbnails'
apparently doesn't apply to image thumbnails. maybe this has to do something
with the fact that the 'associate file type or protocol' control panel is
spotty and unfinished. theres no icon for type 1 fonts and the way icons
appear in the fonts folder is strange (and strangely i cant seem to use
paste in the fonts folder)
: i still don't understand why a clipboard viewer has been removed. is the
default way to figure out whats in your clipboard to paste it (a clipbook
Sidebar gadget maybe, please?).... btw, why did they remove the ability to
drag from a document to explorer to create a 'scrap' file on your computer?
i realize probably not many people used this feature, but im not sure why it
was disabled. a security hazard?
: there are a bunch of bugs i've noticed, like the rotate text in the
context menu for pictures not appearing, the hover preview in photo gallery
stopping to work after a while, etc, but i expect these are known about and
will be fixed, i'm more interested in making sure that ui problems are
smoothed out.
be improved, some things are more like bugs that need to be worked out, but
others need to be brought to attention---
: you should be able to drag a file to a folder name thats present in the
breadcrumb bar. instead of copying, changing the folder, and pasting (or
using the navigation pane if its open) i want to be able to easily drag to
folders using the breadcrumb navigation. this would include both the names
displayed on the bar (the parent folders) and those that are on the
dropdowns. so for instance, if i drag a file over the arrow on the
breadcrumb bar, it should drop down, letting me drop it on a folder in the
list.
: windows explorer needs to remember the width that the user gave to the
different layout panes. i find myself having to to resize the navigation
pane's width and the different sizes i set to the favorites and tree
sections every time i restart explorer.
: the reading pane is not part of the folder view options but the general
windows explorer layout options, so it doesn't have a setting per folder. i
sort of would like it if i could have it appear for folders i've set it to
open for in the past; so certain folders that are image or document
libraries would have a reading pane and it would automatically disappear for
other folders. i'm thinking the reading pane should be collapsable, in order
to be nicer to use, like the folder tree is collapsable within the
navigation pane. it would also be nice if the favorite places section were
collapsable like the folder section.
: the tray icon for the sidebar, if its there, really needs to change from a
picture of a desktop with a sidebar (which is a mirror copy of what you see
on the screen) to some other type of representation. it would also be nice
that clicking on the tray icon opened and closed the sidebar, instead of
bringing up a menu and requiring you to double click--and if the sidebar
isn't on top, then instead of closing the sidebar, clicking on the tray icon
would merely bring the sidebar to the top. this would allow quicker and
easier access to the sidebar when you're using other programs, and if you
don't want it to take up space by having it set to be always on top.
: one thing i didn't like about the sidebar even in the first incarnation,
when it was different, was that it simply looked awkward and ugly as another
bar sitting on top of the tasbar. the fade to black style however is very
nice and elegant. thie old sidebar had an auto-hide feature, as i
understand, and some people didn't like it because the area where the cursor
would lead the sidebar to show up was next to scroll bars. the solution i
mentioned regarding changing how the tray icon works would do something like
auto-hide but it still isn't that good of a way to do it. i wouldn't mind if
you could set there to be a narrow band on the right hand side, where if you
clicked it, it would expand the sidebar (overlaying it on top of the other
windows instead of taking up space).
ne thing i didn't like about the sidebar even in the first incarnation,when it was different, was that it simply looked awkward and ugly as another
bar sitting on top of the tasbar. the fade to black style however is very
nice and elegant. thie old sidebar had an auto-hide feature, as i
understand, and some people didn't like it because the area where the cursor
would lead the sidebar to show up was next to scroll bars. the solution i
mentioned regarding changing how the tray icon works would do something like
auto-hide but it still isn't that good of a way to do it. i wouldn't mind if
you could set there to be a narrow band on the right hand side, where if you
clicked it, it would expand the sidebar (overlaying it on top of the other
windows instead of taking up space).
the ideal Notes gadget would work like a OneNote SideNote, though
: opening a music file while WMP is opened but minimized shouldn't force WMP
to come out of a minimized state. i know you can drag the file to the
taskbar minimization and it wont force WMP to restore to a window, but it
doesnt make sense that you should have to take that step.
: i'm wondering why vista isn't getting thumbnails for me for my mpeg files
or my html or mhtml files, though; and while 'show file icon on thumbnails'
apparently doesn't apply to image thumbnails. maybe this has to do something
with the fact that the 'associate file type or protocol' control panel is
spotty and unfinished. theres no icon for type 1 fonts and the way icons
appear in the fonts folder is strange (and strangely i cant seem to use
paste in the fonts folder)
: i still don't understand why a clipboard viewer has been removed. is the
default way to figure out whats in your clipboard to paste it (a clipbook
Sidebar gadget maybe, please?).... btw, why did they remove the ability to
drag from a document to explorer to create a 'scrap' file on your computer?
i realize probably not many people used this feature, but im not sure why it
was disabled. a security hazard?
: there are a bunch of bugs i've noticed, like the rotate text in the
context menu for pictures not appearing, the hover preview in photo gallery
stopping to work after a while, etc, but i expect these are known about and
will be fixed, i'm more interested in making sure that ui problems are
smoothed out.