Our favourite site for downloading iPhone apps is down due to server overload . Over to them:

Here’s the scoop: Appulous can’t run on one server anymore. We need three to bring the site back up. And not only do we need to pay for (and upgrade) 3 to start off with, we need the funds to continue paying for it month after month. And that’s crazy expensive. And we’re six different kinds of broke

Once we buy the servers and upgrade them, it’ll cost around $500 a month just for the hardware and bandwidth to run the site. Do the math, and that gets pretty expensive after a few months. Up to this point, we’ve completely emptied our savings accounts to run this site. Appulous will be pulled offline forever if we don’t turn to donations!

If everyone who uses this site would donate $1, we’d have enough money to keep it running for YEARS. But of course, on a site like this, we’d never be able to get that. So any little bit you ARE able to give to your most favorite website (<3) would help it stay alive for everyone!

We did this yesterday and got nearly 3 months’ worth of funds. I’d love to see 6 months before we launch into this, which is just over $3,000. The Appulous you all know and love can’t be run until we get those new servers, so you’ll be seeing this page until we can get that all figured out. Thanks to everyone who donated so far!

For more details, as always, please see Hackulous

iPhone 3.0 OS, the next generation operating system for the iPhone, iPod touch, and whatever Apple device comes next. New features, new apps, here you will find all the information you need.

This just in: a hands on tour, impressions and gallery of screenshots of the new OSdonated by our helpful readers.

NEW IPHONE OS 3.0 FEATURES

The new iPhone OS 3.0 adds over 100 new features including—at friggin’ last—cut and paste.

• Copy & Paste text. When you double-tap over text, you will get a “cut, copy, and paste” bubble dialog. Double-tap again and a “paste” bubble will appear if there’s anything stored in your clipboard.

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This works across applications. You can expand your selection points using your thumbs and, if you accidentally paste something you didn’t want to paste, just shake your iPhone to undo it.

• Copy & Paste photos. You can also copy and paste photos. Now you will be able to select multiple photos by tapping the action button, copy some of them, and paste them in an email, ready to send.

• New Spotlight. iPhone OS 3.0 will allow you to search across the entire information contained in your device, no matter where, as soon as the information is supported it. If an application is written to support the new Spotlight, its data will also be available in the search.

In this screenshot you can see Spotlight bringing results from your address book, maps, your iPod, and apps in your springboard.

• Search in Mail, Calendar, and iPod. These Apple applications have specific search interfaces. The search in Mail doesn’t support the message content yet, but it supports searching in IMAP servers—that will save a lot of time logging into Gmail.

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• 3G Tethering. This feature will allow you to connect your iPhone 3G to a laptop, to use it as a modem to access the internet. Carriers still have to sign-off on it, and probably charge more for it. None have announced it yet.

• Landscape keyboard. Apple has added the landscape keyboard mode to other applications, like Mail, SMS, and Notes.

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• Multimedia messaging. A big one to send rich content to people without mail-enabled telephones: The new MMS function will allow you to include everything, from images to sound to vcards (no word on video, however.) Personally, I find these usesless having email, but some people seem to want it.

• Support for new calendar types. In iPhone OS 3.0 you will be able to subscribe to calendars on the web using two protocols: CalDAV—supported by Google and Yahoo—and subscriptions via the .ics format—which is what Apple uses in iCal.

• Improved stocks application. The stocks application now allows you to read related news, so you can enjoy yourself learning about the latest market scandals, stock crashes, and executives getting bonus packages from government aid while their companies sink into hell. Thank you, Apple.

• Stereo Bluetooth A2DP audio. You will be able to pair your iPhone 3.0 with a stereo Bluetooth A2DP device, like headphones or speakers.

• Note syncing with iTunes.

• Automatic login in Safari. The new version of Safari will remember login credentials, so you won’t need to introduce your username and password again while accessing Scoreland your work intranet.

• Shake to shuffle music. If you are in your iPod application, you just need to shake it to start the shuffling mode. Hopefully this will be optional for sports people out there.

• Wi-Fi auto-login. In case you have a subscription to a paid hotspot, your iPhone or iPod touch will autolog into it.

• Anti-phishing. Mobile Safari now can warn you against malicious sites trying to scam you.

• Extended parental controls. Adult content filters can now be applied to movies, TV shows, and applications, in addition to web sites and music (porn apps, here we come).

NEW APPLE APPLICATIONS

Apple will include new widgets in the new version of the iPhone operating system:

• Voice memo application. Obviously, allows you to record voice or any other sound, so you don’t forget any idea or want to play FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper.

• Send and receive files. A dedicated application to exchange files between iPhones or iPods touch.

NEW THIRD PARTY APPLICATIONS FEATURES IN IPHONE OS 3.0

The new iPhone OS 3.0 adds 1,000 new APIs to extend the capabilities of new applications.

• Peer-to-peer Wi-Fi Bluetooth connectivity. A new API will allow for two iPhones to connect directly—peer-to-peer—via Bluetooth Wi-Fi, without needing any Wi-Fi network.

They will be able to discover each other using Bluetooth, and then start a Wi-Fi connection transparently.

This opens a lot of possibilities. I doubt they will allow you to pass music, but you would probably be able to pass any other information, as well as directly communicating between applications in the two devices. One example: A pets game that allows two dogs to play with each other.

This feature could be combined with push notification, so your iPhone may receive a note from another iPhone, inviting you to play a game one-on-one.

• Browse remote content. While the built-in iPod application doesn’t allow you to browse songs in other people’s iPhones or iPod touch, third-party applications will allow you to do that, according to Apple’s Forstall.

• Use your iPhone/touch to control peripherals. A new API will let you use your iPhone or iPod touch as a control to your accessories. In this example, the iPhone is being used to equalize the sound in a loudspeaker.

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However, the applications are endless. Johnson and Johnson is releasing LifeScan, an app that connects to a glucose monitoring device. The application can even alert other people automatically, in case something is wrong.

There other less serious apps, like creating the most perfect sex device ever (NSFW).

• Maps inside other applications. New applications will be able to use Maps directly, which is now an API.

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• Turn-by-turn directions. Developers will also be able to create turn-by-turn applications using the GPS information from the iPhone and combining it with their own maps, without depending on 3G connectivity or Google.

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• Push notification finally coming. Hopefully this time it will be true. Push notification means that your iPhone OS 3.0 applications will finally be able to receive messages from the intarwebs automagically, so you can have an Instant Message application and have your iPhone vibrate or make a sound when a new message comes in, even if the application is not running.

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• Voice communication in applications. iPhone 3.0 applications will also be able to access a Voice over IP service. This means that you will be able to chat with other users while playing against them in a game, for example. This won’t use the telephone, but the internet over a Wi-Fi connection.

• Rumbling. Games—or any other application—will also be able to rumble, like your console joystick.

• Audio recording. Audio recording will also be possible from third-party applications using a standardized API, instead of custom workarounds.

• Access your music from applications. Future applications will also be able to access the iPhone/iPod music library. This means that applications will be able to play your own music while they run.

NEW FEATURES IN THE APP STORE

The new OS will also offer an enhanced App Store, opening new possibilities for developers and consumers.

• Subcriptions to apps.
• Purchase additional content for apps, like new cities for a city guide application.
• Purchase additional levels for games.

Basically, this will allow developers to sell more things on top of their apps, and to consumers to expand their experience with those apps.

• This will work straight from the applications, so you can purchase new things through the software itself, even while it still goes through the App Store internally.

PRICE

iPhone OS 3.0 will be a free upgrade to all iPhone users, including the first generation (not all features will be supported in the first generation, like Stereo Bluetooth support). iPod touch users will be able to but it for $US9.95.

If you dare, you can sign up for the beta here.

After all these posts borrowed from other sites and blogs, I Know this is going to seem ridiculous, however, here is my review, as a normal person, adventurous enough to dual boot Windows 7 along with Vista. I’m only going to include the pros and no cons, as all the cons will only be the remainder from Vista.

The taskbar is the apparent change, and extremely useful. I’m not going to go over any details in this post as I’m quite sure the other posts explain it well. The fact that there is no sidebar does not make much of a difference. instead of an icon you need a right-click to access gadgets, thats all.

Shutting down is much easier, search results are good, and they now take up the whole start menu. Dragging windows to size them is a very neat and useful feature. Aero Peek , which lets you see your desktop is real eye candy, though it also helps in viewing gadgets.

Action Center, UAC Control, and control over security prompts make life a whole lot simpler. Also the appearance can be customized using themes quite neatly.

Speed has increased greatly, as has battery life, startup time, and lesser crashes.

Media Player now plays many more formats, and libraries help manage all your media together, even if they are in different folders.

Some other upgraded features are:

New Calculator.

Internet Explorer 8 is integrated by default.

XPS Viewer integrated.

New versions of Paint and Wordpad with the “Ribbon” interface.

Revamped Windows Backup.

New “Home Groups” for sharing files and folders.

New, easier Wireless connections tray icon.

Media Center is Updated with new features.

Redesigned Games

Other stuff.

I’ve been using the beta for a couple of weeks, and yesterday I got my hands on the official Beta 1 release, which is good enough to use on a regular basis if it wasn’t for the hard cut-off date… yes, the beta release has an expiration date on August 1st 2009, after which it will stop working.

If you wanted to sum up Windows 7 in a few words: it’s Windows Vista with a few new features and almost all the annoyances and bugs removed… and a really shiny coat of paint. It’s impressive, so we’ll hop straight into the screenshots.

The Screenshot Tour

The default desktop for Windows 7 is clean and simple, and like almost everything in this release, is really quite impressive.

The first thing that you can’t miss is the new taskbar, which uses large icons instead of taskbar buttons and integrates Quick Launch functionality at the same time. You’ll notice in this screenshot that the Windows Media Player icon isn’t “active”, because I don’t have an instance open…  but it’s been Pinned to the taskbar.

The popup preview thumbnails have been enhanced to show multiple windows side by side, which is much more useful than the Vista way, especially since Windows 7 combines windows by default: even if you have only two windows open, they will be combined into a single taskbar button.

When hovering over one of the previews, Windows 7 will automatically flip to that window so you can see in a larger view which window it is. Very useful for Word documents, I think.

The new taskbar buttons also have a new right-click menu, which gives you access to special folders or recent documents. There’s a new API that allows applications to add items to this list, so expect in the future for this to become a big deal.

If you don’t like the taskbar functionality, you can revert back to the Windows Vista method by opening up Taskbar and Start Menu Properties (right click \ Properties). The “Taskbar buttons” setting will let you turn off the single icon mode, and you can choose “Use small icons” to turn off the big icons.

The next thing you might notice is that there is no longer a “Sidebar” for the Gadgets… you’ll have to right-click on the desktop and choose Gadgets to add more, which can be dragged to the desktop anywhere you’d like. You’ll also notice you can get quick access to your resolution from here.

If you want to dock the gadgets to the side like you used to, you still can: If you drag the desktops to the side of the screen, they will dock there:

The Start Menu is roughly the same as before, although you’ll notice the Shut Down button is much simpler, and can be configured to a different action right in the Taskbar and Start menu properties screen.

You’ll notice the arrow next to Getting Started… whenever you see an arrow on a pinned item, you can hover over it to see a list of tasks on the right-hand side, with a rather fun “slide out” effect that I can’t really show in a screenshot.

In fact, it’s tough to show off the real “slickness” of the UI in these screenshots… you have to try it for yourself to understand: things are just smooth.

When you search, the taskbar “morphs” into a full-size search screen – a huge improvement from Vista, and the search results are pretty good, although still not perfect.

Another really slick new feature lets you maximize or tile windows by dragging them to one of the sides of the screen… for instance, you drag the current window to the left side of the screen and you’ll see a glass window effect…

And once you let go of the mouse, the window will take up exactly half of the screen. Very useful for tiling windows.

This also works for maximizing by dragging to the top of the screen… letting go of the mouse at this point would maximize the current window:

This also works if you drag a window corner to one of the edges of the screen, Windows 7 will let you make the window fill the whole space from top to bottom.

You might have noticed a little unused area on the taskbar right next to the clock… this is the new “Show Desktop” icon, with an added twist: if you hover your mouse over it, it will turn all of the open windows to glass, letting you see what is beneath. This would maybe be useful if you have desktop gadgets on the screen, or just want to see your wallpaper.

The system tray is also changed, with all extra icons being hidden behind a little arrow. You’ll also note that the current date is shown on the screen now, since the taskbar is taller.

One of the default items is important: the Action Center icon now consolidates all of the Windows Security error or notification messages into a single icon…

And even better, you get to choose which errors you want to hear about, and which ones you don’t. HUGE improvement over Vista.

By clicking on the wrench icon you can choose which notifications appear on the taskbar:

You can also change which security messages show up:

The Action Center is your new “hub” to review all of the messages and notifications… more on that in a future article, but one of the biggest changes in Windows 7 is hidden behind it… click on the User Account Control settings:

And you’ll see a new “Slider”, which lets you change the amount of UAC notifications, and by default UAC is nearly disabled for users with administrative rights. The only time you will see UAC messages is during a new application install.

Continuing through the Control Panel, there is a completely new panel for customizing your desktop using themes, with easy access to all the relevant settings from a single window.

Many of the windows that used to be separate dialogs are now integrated directly into the regular Control Panel, like this one for changing your display appearance:

A smaller thing to note… the Windows Experience score maximum has been increased to 7.9 instead of 5.9 in Vista.

One important thing to note is that when you go to your user folder, you will see a bunch of “Libraries”, which are essentially search folders banded together so you can find all your pictures, documents, or music in a single place. This feature is quite useful, but is going to take some time to get used to.

You’ll notice in the screenshot above there’s a new “Homegroup” item in the list, and yes, they’ve completely revamped network sharing in Windows 7 with a much simpler interface that we’ll cover in future articles.

Other Features

There’s a whole bunch of other features in Windows 7 that we don’t really have time to cover today…

• New Calculator.
• Internet Explorer 8 is integrated by default.
• XPS Viewer integrated.
• New versions of Paint and Wordpad with the “Ribbon” interface.
• Revamped Windows Backup.
• New “Home Groups” for sharing files and folders.
• New, easier Wireless connections tray icon.
• Media Center is Updated with new features.
• Faster bootup and installation times.
• Other stuff.

The other thing to note is that Windows Mail, Calendar, Photo Gallery, Movie Maker and Contacts have been removed from Windows 7 and are now part of the downloadableWindows Live Essentials.

Installing Windows 7

I realize it’s illogical, but now we’ll skip to installing it (the other screenshots were more interesting). The startup installation screen is pretty familiar looking…

Should I Install Windows 7?

If you don’t mind the fact that it will stop working on August 1st, Windows 7 beta 1 is very stable and usable.

Do I Need a License?

Windows 7 works just like Windows Vista did… you can install it and run it in “Trial mode” for 30 days. Yes, this does mean that you can borrow the disc from a friend, or download it “illegally” and use it, at least for a trial period. (I’m not advocating piracy here).

It’s Only a Download?

That’s right, you will need to download the ISO image file and then burn it to a DVD in order to do an installation… I recommend ImgBurn.

What About Drivers?

Windows 7 uses the exact same drivers as Windows Vista, and by this point the majority of devices have drivers. You most likely won’t even need to install drivers, since Windows 7 has a lot more drivers included by default.

Important Installation Notes

When you get to the screen which recommends upgrading vs custom installation, I would recommend installing a new installation into a completely blank partition. If you want to test it on the same machine as Vista, you should dual-boot. I would recommend against using the upgrade feature unless you are very brave (also note that it only supports upgrading from Vista SP1)

If you don’t have a second hard drive or partition already, you can use the Shrink Volume feature in Vista to resize your current partition. If that doesn’t work, you can work around Vista’s shrink volume problems as well. If none of that works, you can use GParted to resize the partition.

Once it installs (which doesn’t take that long), you’ll be prompted for a computer name and user name:

You’ll be prompted for what your default homegroup settings are (personally I’d probably turn most of them off, but I’m security-conscious). Make sure to write down this homegroup password and save it somewhere!

From this point you will be able to get to your desktop, and start actually using Windows 7.

Windows 7 Bug

There is a known bug in Windows 7 that will potentially damage some mp3 files if you load them into Windows Media Player. You’ll want to make sure to install this patch, or turn on automatic updates once you have Windows 7 installed… it should update automatically.

For more information and the download links check out this ArsTechnica post.

What Should We Cover?

One of my recent articles asked what exactly we should cover in 2009, and Windows 7 is definitely going to be on that list. The question is: What do YOU want to see about Windows 7? What is the most important topic when it comes to learning a new operating system?

Source:How-To-Geek

My colleague Jason Perlow has been playing with Windows 7, and he hates it. The sad thing is, all the things he hates are improvements, in my opinion, which just goes to show that you really can’t please everyone. But what’s sad to see is that every setting Jason describes as broken is in fact easily customizable so it works the way he wants it.

The crux of Jason’s complaint is simple: “I learned how to use Windows in 1998. Don’t change a thing.” Here’s his main argument in a nutshell:

I find it difficult to believe that Windows 7 was created to be easier to use than Vista — if anything, they’ve introduced a number of UI changes that make the system much harder to navigate, particularly if you’ve never used Vista and are going direct to Windows 7 from Windows XP, which is the path that many users will experience.

Yes, there’s a learning curve. And if you insist on using those techniques you learned back in the last millennium with software that was designed differently, you will be frustrated. But I believe that an open-minded XP user who actually takes a few minutes to learn how the new UI works will be more productive very quickly. The secret is breaking old habits and developing new ones. Let’s take all three of Jason’s examples and work through them.

Jason: “The ‘Run’ option is no longer directly accessible from the Start Menu, you have to get to it via a Search.”

Where do I begin? First of all, the Search box at the bottom of the Start menu does nearly everything the Run box did, and much more. If you begin typing a command, it appears in the Start menu, where you can click or press Enter to run it. With the Run box, I have to type a command in full and possibly even include its path. If I mistype the name, I get an error message. Want to play Solitaire? With the Search box, you can begin typingsol and the first choice on the list will be Solitaire, ready to run when you press Enter:

But the worst part of the Run box is that it requires you to learn the names of executable files. In XP, if you open the Run box, type solitaire, and press Enter you’ll get a cryptic error message. You need to know that the name of the executable is sol.exe. Want to play Minesweeper? You’re SOL with the Run box until you learn that the executable is named Winmine.exe. The Vista/Win7 Search box, by contrast, works with program names and executable files.

Still not convinced? You want the old- school Run box? So just press Windows key+R. That shortcut has been around since the mid-1990s and still works in Windows Vista and Win7.

Not good enough? Fine. Customize the Vista/Win7 Start menu to add the Run command and you can party like it’s 1998. Right-click Start, choose Properties, click Customize, and select this check box.

Jason: “Another thing that greatly frustrated me was the fact that a fresh install of Windows 7 gives the end-user a blank slate on the Desktop, removing the familiar ‘Computer’, ‘Network’, ‘Control Panel’ and ‘My Documents’ icons, requiring users to get to those functions and folders via the Start Menu.”

Jason thinks this is “change for the sake of change.” I disagree. I’ve been talking to Windows UI designers and usability testers for years, and I can tell you that moving this stuff off the desktop is a huge usability win for novices and experts alike. If you rely on desktop icons, you have to minimize all open windows first before you can even see the icons on the desktop, then you have to click them. That adds unnecessary steps to every navigation option, and adds still more steps to get back to the windows you were working with previously. Once you wean yourself from desktop icons, all you have to do is tap the Windows key or click the Start button and you are one click away from any common file storage location. You can also press Windows key+E to open Explorer, where common locations are neatly arranged in the navigation pane.

Jason thinks the option to restore those desktop icons is “not intuitive.” Well, if you open the Start menu and type “desktop icons” in the Search box, the very first result is “Show or hide common icons on the desktop.” There’s another shortcut that’s even easier to discover. Every Windows user quickly learns how to right-click the desktop and choose Personalize, so they can adjust the desktop background (you old-timers remember it as wallpaper). When you do, you’ll see a very prominent “Change desktop icons” option at the top left. It leads here:

Jason: “I also find the Windows 7 Control Panel to be less intuitive than XP’s […] you now need one additional mouse click to see all the Control Panel options — of which there are now approximately double than which existed in XP. Clearly, they could have done a better job at consolidating functions, or at the very least, provided a better UI for navigating such a long list of stuff.”

The Windows XP Control Panel intuitive? A folder filled with icons, many with cryptic/technical names, doesn’t seem intuitive to me. I think familiar might be a more accurate word to describe the reaction of someone who learned where everything is the hard way. Meanwhile, if you want “a better UI for navigating such a long list of stuff” it’s right there already. See that search box in the upper right corner? It’s a huge improvement on the old folder full of Control Panel icons. If you don’t believe me, try changing your screen saver from the Windows XP Control Panel. Does it make sense that you have to click the Display icon and then choose the Screen Saver tab to get there? You know those steps because you’ve been doing it that way for 14 years, but it’s hardly intuitive.

By contrast, in Windows Vista and Windows 7, you type the word screeninto the search box, and the list automatically filters as you type. I think this result list is pretty helpful:

For an even better example, try finding the option to show hidden files in Windows Explorer. With XP, you have to open Control Panel, double-click Folder Options, and then click the View tab. Now, would the average person know that file settings are under Folder Options? That hardly seems intuitive.

By contrast, type hidden in the Control Panel search box and here’s what you see:

The very first option on the list takes you to the correct tab on the correct dialog box, with exactly one click. That’s a huge improvement over the XP solution; in fact, when I open Control Panel in Windows XP I am enormously frustrated over the inability to do anything except drill down into icons to find the right one.

The real problem most XP users will have when migrating to the Windows 7 interface is that they need to unlearn those old navigation models. The longer you’ve been using PCs, the more likely you are to reflexively assume that the solution is to pull down a menu or double-click an icon. Those techniques worked fine back in the 1990s, but today, with instant search available just about everywhere in the Windows UI, those old techniques are as dated as a pair of Dockers.

If you’re an XP veteran, take some time to learn why the new interface was designed the way it was. Believe me, those designers and  usability professionals didn’t just make this stuff up. If you’re willing to learn a few new techniques, I guarantee your productivity will increase over time.

One of the things our articles have always focused on is how to remove annoyances from your computer, and after installing the Windows 7 Beta we noticed the ugly Send Feedback link in the upper right-hand corner of every window, and found out how to disable it.

Note: before we get into how to disable this, you should think about whether you really want to do it. Keep in mind that this is a Beta version of Windows, and it’s only YOUR feedback that is going to make Microsoft change or fix anything before the release, so you should be submitting as much feedback as you can.

For those that aren’t sure what we’re talking about, this screenshot should explain it:

Manual Registry Hack

The first thing you’ll want to do is open up regedit.exe through the start menu search box, and then browse down to the following key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop

Once there, find the FeedbackToolEnabled key on the right-hand side, and change the value to 0.

To revert it back, change the value to 3 again.

Downloadable Registry Hack

Instead of bothering with manual registry hacking, you can simply download, extract, and double-click on the included registry file to turn the link off.

Download RemoveFeedbackLink Registry Hack

You’ll have to log off and back on for the change to take effect.

Sending Feedback Alternately

There are a number of ways to launch the feedback tool even after disabling the link… the most obvious is the big icon right on the desktop… but you might have deleted that already.

You can just type “feedback” into the search box, and launch the tool from there…

Or you can find it in the control panel.

What annoyances have you found and reported back to Microsoft? Care to share them with the rest of us? Maybe the community can help with a workaround.

Source:How-To-Geek

Even though Windows 7 is a beta, which means there are a lot of bugs still present—some of which have angered us quite a bit during our time testing the OS. The good news is there are actually some things you can do on your own to avoid them or prevent other nastiness from occurring.

PROBLEM SOLVING AND EASY FIXES
Use Windows 7’s Troubleshooting Tool
There’s actually a tool, in Control Panel, called Troubleshooting. Open it up and you’ll see various options like configuring devices, connecting to a network and checking to make sure your sound card works correctly. We won’t go through each individual options here, but it’s a very good place to start when you’ve hit a problem, before you turn to Googling.

Make Older Programs Work With Windows 7
This doesn’t work 100%, but if you type “Program Compatibility” into the search bar in the Start menu, you’ll find a compatibility wizard that helps make older apps work with Windows 7. (Sometimes, you can get to it by right-clicking an application that is having trouble launching.) Once you find your app—which may take a little bit of disk browsing if it’s not displaying under the list—you’ll choose one of potential issues and which version of Windows it previously worked for. In at least one case, we found that running through this made a non-starting app start up under Win 7, so it’s good to know about.

Use Windows 7 Problem Steps Recorder to document your problems
And if you’re having any sort of problems with Windows 7 you need a tech-savvy friend or family member to walk you through, try the problem steps recorder. It’s an app built into Windows 7 that, when activated, records the button presses and mouse clicks you make in order to generate an HTML-based report of the steps you took to cause a problem. Sending this to your friend who also has Windows 7 will let him diagnose where you’ve screwed up, so you can STOP DOING THAT.

Diagnose performance issues with the Windows Experience Index
If you feel Windows 7 is running slower than it should, take a look at the Windows Experience Index. With those scores you can tell whether it’s your RAM that’s making your machine chunk, or your graphics card, or your slow hard drive. Then, replace each part as necessary.

Fix the Installer Bug
If you’ve been running Windows 7 for a few days and found that you’re suddenly unable to install programs, here’s how to fix it. It’s an MSI installer issue, and all you have to do is open up a command prompt in Administrator mode and type:
reg delete HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\SQMClient\Windows\DisabledSessions /va /f and press enter.

Fix User Account Control-Gadget Conflict
UAC may be decent enough in warning and protecting you of intrusions, but it can also get in the way. One bug in the beta actually turns off your desktop Gadgets if you disable UAC. Here’s how you re-enable it.

1. Open the Registry Editor, or regedit.exe. You can search for regedit in the Start Menu.
2. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Sidebar\Settings
3. Right-click and create a new DWORD (32-Bit) Value called AllowElevatedProcess.
4. Right-click AllowElevatedProcess and click Modify. Set the value to 1. Close the registry editor. Your gadgets should work with UAC off now.

PREVENTATIVE MEASURES
Install Antivirus Software
Although Windows 7 is at least as secure as Vista, you’re still going to want to install antivirus software on it. The easiest Win 7-compatible one we like is AVG, which runs just fine, protects decently enough and is free.

Turn Off Sleep Mode
It doesn’t look like sleep mode has been optimized for all the millions of types of hardware configurations out there now—it is a beta after all. We’d suggest turning it off entirely instead of trying to find out whether or not your machine supports sleep/hibernate 100%. If you don’t, you’ll have to wake your machine up the hard way.

Tweak settings before they get in the way
SetteMaxer is a utility that’s able to to tweak a few settings not easily accessible to the normal user, like disabling auto-reboot on a crash, disabling Windows Defender or disabling UAC. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you shouldn’t tinker.

WARNING
Unfixable: User Account Control Security Hole
Unlike in Vista, there’s no warning message when the User Account Control is changed. Someone made a proof-of-conceptthat exploits this into switching your UAC off and taking control of your machine. There’s no workaround for this one unless you raise UAC to MAXIMUM (which is annoying), so be careful.

Source:Gizmodo

I sometimes wonder how Microsoft’s interface designers find the strength to go to work every day. It certainly isn’t for the external validation. In the past two-plus years, I’ve read countless complaints about the Windows Vista user interface. It has too many options for ordinary users. It doesn’t offer enough options for advanced users. It’s dumbed down and overcomplicated, sometimes all at the same time. To listen to the critics, Vista’s designers succeeded in making every feature worse than XP. In fact, the latest complaint is that Vista and the upcoming Windows 7 are even worse than Windows 98.

Or maybe not. I’ve been using Windows Vista full time for more than three years, and I’ve been running various builds of Windows 7 on a daily basis for the last couple months. Maybe Microsoft’s software designers have learned something from all that criticism, because I see plenty of small but significant improvements in Windows 7.

In this post, I’ll show you six specific annoyances from Windows Vista that are fixed in Windows 7. Each one represents an easier, more efficient way to accomplish a common task. Collectively, they constitute some pretty persuasive evidence that “have it our way” is no longer the controlling design principle among Windows’ designers.

Vista Annoyance #1: That awkward Preview pane In Vista, it takes at least three mouse clicks, plus a selection from a cascading menu, to show the Preview pane, and you have to repeat the process to hide it again. With Windows 7 you can preview a file with one quick click.

Vista Annoyance #2: The overcomplicated Shutdown button Vista’s Shutdown menu has been roundly criticized for its cryptic icons and unintuitive options. In Windows 7, it’s been simplified dramatically to an easy-to-read, easy-to-customize text menu.

Vista Annoyance #3: Arranging windows, awkwardly Ever try to arrange two windows side by side in Windows Vista (or XP, or Windows 98, for that matter)? Windows 7 makes it dead simple with some genuinely innovative new window management gestures.

Vista Annoyance #4: Unpleasant User Account Control UAC is the Vista feature everyone loves to hate. Security always involves trade-offs with convenience, but with Windows 7, there’s a lot less to dislike about UAC.

Vista Annoyance #5: The ultra-minimalist Defrag utility The colorful, almost mesmerizing progress display from the XP-and-earlier Defrag utility is gone and never coming back. But Windows 7 does restore some much-needed progress indicators and offer more control than the stark Vista version.

Vista Annoyance #6: The no-options backup program In Windows Vista, every edition has a file backup program, but you can’t choose individual files or folders to back up. Windows 7 restores that option, courtesy of a “Let me choose” option that indicates a refreshing change of attitude for Microsoft’s UI designers.

Source:ZDNet Blogs

Before he retired, Bill Gates said that “natural” interfaces would be the next big thing in computing. True to the master’s prediction, Microsoft is integrating more gesture and writing controls into their OS than ever before, including—for the first time—genuine multitouch.

TOUCH AND MULTITOUCH
In order to make use of the touch interface in Windows 7, you need a compatible PC with a touch monitor and the right drivers. We used an HP TouchSmart PC, which Microsoft has also been using in demonstrations.

In the video below, you can see the basic gestures associated with Win 7 touch:
Tap: A single click with an accompanying droplet-ripple effect
Tap and hold: The equivalent of right-clicking, indicated by a swirling circle around your finger
Flick: Inertial menu or window scrolling set in motion by a quick flick of your finger (there’s also a related inertial “toss” behavior for flinging photos and other objects around the screen, where they bounce to a halt)
Type: A pop-up keyboard lets you type for real
You’ll also see the multitouch gestures:
Zoom: Spreading or tweezing two fingers to make a picture zoom in or out
Rotate: Swirling those two fingers around to make the photo move
Draw: In Paint, you can even draw with two fingers
As applications harness the multitouch capabilities of the OS, more behaviors (like air hockey) will become apparent.

[More on touch and multitouch (including a virtual Air Hockey demo)]

PEN INTERFACE AND WRITING RECOGNITION
The Pen interface is similar to the touch interface, with inertial gestures and other new behavior. Though Microsoft’s Tablet PC interface has been around for a long time, there are three key additions to the writing software: Custom dictionaries, math recognition and shape recognition.

Custom Dictionaries
This may not sound like much, but custom dictionaries make it easy for people who use Tablet PCs at work to get their weird job-specific terminology across. Think of a doctor and a prescription pad—how many tries does it take for handwriting recognition to tell a hastily written “fexofenadine” from a similarly scrawled “fenofibrate”? In this case, the doc would be able to add the terms, so they become at least slightly more distinct.

Math Recognition
I love this idea, since in all the years that I actually did math, I could never use a computer to do it, because I didn’t want to figure out how to use all those symbols and keyboard shortcuts. (Mind you, I haven’t done math in centuries, but still, I have painful memories of how confusing it was.) Now you just write the equation, with finger or pen, and you get the equation you want. Most of the time. The Math Input Panel (above) is a stand-alone Windows accessory that will paste into any math-aware application, but there’s also a Math Input Control API for integrating into software.

Shape Recognition
Tired of your triangles turned into A’s, or your boxy rectangles guessed as D’s or E’s? Now that the OS actually recognizes shapes, you can draw a flow chart or some kind of diagram and not worry that all your beautiful brainstorming will be converted to the bloody Roman alphabet. Note: We did not test this feature, mostly for an utter lack of need of any kind of flow chart, but it does sound business groovy.

WHAT MACHINES?
While there aren’t that many multitouch computers on the market just yet, there are a few. HP has both the TouchSmart PC and the tx2 touch laptop, while Dell has an impressive multitouch-capable laptop too, the XT2. (If you’re wondering about the embarrassingly similar names, Dell thought of theirs first.) There are new monitors cropping up all over, too, and as long as they have Windows 7 drivers, they’re in business.

Most single-finger touch gestures—including all that fun with inertia—are also pen gestures, meaning most newer Tablet PCs will be able to run Windows 7 and look sharp doing it. If you’ve already put Win 7 on a Tablet PC and have something to share, please do. We have not had the pleasure.

Source:Gizmodo

For the average person, networking and security are two of the biggest causes of OS-related headaches, with so many settings, devices, alerts and threats to stay on top of. With Windows 7, Microsoft attempts a more useful approach to family networking with HomeGroup. It expands its security options, too, but does it with more concern for user-friendliness than during Vista development.

NETWORKING
Microsoft has tried simplifying its networking solutions overall in Windows 7, added more home-user features, and redesigned certain basic networking interfaces so that they actually kinda make sense.

Wireless Networking
Connecting to new wireless networks is something that has been made significantly easier in Windows 7. In the taskbar’s notifications tray, there is a wireless signal icon just like in past Windows versions. But clicking on it now brings up a list of available networks around you. You can connect to an unsecure network, or enter in your security code on a secure network and hit the Connect button. Disconnecting is just as easy.

HomeGroup
HomeGroup is intended as an easy way for multiple computers on the same network to share their files, folders and smart content clusters known as libraries. Properly implemented, HomeGroup could be a step closer to brainless networking, and it makes sense for families.

If you access the HomeGroup tab in the Control Panel, you will be presented with the option (in theory) to create a new homegroup or join a currently existing homegroup. After creating a new homegroup, Windows asks you what libraries you want to share, and gives you a password for other computers on the network who want to join your homegroup. When the new PCs jump on the network, they get prompted to join the homegroup, and are asked for the password.

The strange thing is, other devices will still show up under the general network even if they are not necessarily connected to your homegroup. So while the tool does seem to simplify things, it may not be the last word when it comes to security. We experienced some hiccups in our trials of HomeGroup in Win 7 beta, so we have to see it in the final release to really identify whether it’s going to work as billed or not.
[More HomeGroup details and images]

SECURITY
Windows 7 ramps up security options. Vista users will still identify the mostly painless Windows Firewall and Windows Defender mainstays, but Microsoft threw in some new security features—native biometric support and enhanced BitLocker protection, for example—and by letting people pick their level of User Account Control alert messages, Windows 7 aims for a safe but more user-friendly experience. However, by attempting to be more user-friendly, they may have inadvertently compromised some security.

User Account Control (UAC) Settings
Many complained in Windows Vista that User Account Control settings was an annoying feature, especially for people who were used to Administrator status and Administrator-type work. It was a necessary but evil feature. In Windows 7, Microsoft now gives you four different options for User Account Control, which you can access in the Control Panel. You can set the alerts to alert you when programs and you make a change, when only programs make a change, when only programs make a change but never dim the screen, or to never alert you at all. On the user end, it has become more convenient but seems to have compromised in security, since the Windows community has become recently aware that the new UAC is open to malicious scripts. It’d just be a shame to go back to constant UAC alerts in the name of security.

Action Center
Previously, you could access most of your security configurations in the Security Center. In Windows 7, everything from security to maintenance has been corralled into the new Action Center. It’s accessible from the notification tray on your taskbar, or from the Control Panel. Here you can manage your network firewall, virus and spyware protection, UAC settings and more, along with basic troubleshooting and recovery. By being able to see everything in one place, Microsoft made it easier to identify potential problems at once. It may sound like your local news channel’s 5 o’clock team of do-gooders, but this Action Center is certainly an improvement, and a better way to reach users than previous “centers,” like Vista’s Welcome Center.

Biometric Devices
Windows 7 comes with in-built support for biometric devices. In the Control Panel, you can set this feature to be turned off or turned on, and you can register fingerprints to act as your log-in password for Windows and other programs—so long as your drivers are working. In beta testing, Windows 7 didn’t recognize my laptop’s biometric scanner, even after I installed the proper drivers for it. Assuming you’ve got it working, Internet Explorer gives you the option of logging into sites with a registered fingerprint. This security feature is useful when logging into sites that require sensitive data, such as your bank, especially if you’re afraid someone is snooping on you with a keystroke-logger.

BitLocker Drive Encryption
Windows 7 has revamped BitLocker to make it easier to encrypt hard drives. In Vista, BitLocker required you to set up a partition. Now, the BitLocker partition has already been set up. In addition, there is added support for encrypting removable drives such as flash drives. (Yes, they’re calling it “BitLocker To Go.”) Even if encrypting your desktop drives doesn’t make much sense, it makes oodles of sense to lock down easily stolen portable devices such as your laptop and your USB drive. The encrypting process overall also has been simplified, which is great for people who aren’t as familiar with BitLocker and general encryption. As was the case with Vista, BitLocker will only be available to Enterprise and Ultimate users.

Source:Gizmodo