12 Improvements to the Next Windows 7 Release Candidate

The Windows 7 beta, which has been undergoing public testing for several months now, is fairly good indicator of what the finished product will look like. Nevertheless, after months of sifting through the feedback, Microsoft’s Windows Live Engineering Group announced certain improvements that will be made in the interim between the current Windows 7 release candidate and the next Windows 7 release candidate, with other improvements and additional features to be announced later.



So, if you missed the announcement in the Windows 7 Engineering Blog, here are 12 improvements and changes you will see in the next release candidate:

The improvements and changes, as relayed by Senior Program Manager on the Core User Experience team Chaaitanya Sareena, include:

1. Aero Peek now works when you're Alt + Tabbing

Aero Peek enables you to preview windows by dynamically bringing them to the top of the pile. But now it's been added to Alt + Tab so you can preview full content of each window when cycling through them. This is triggered by a time delay if you pause while cycling through the windows.

2. The Windows Logo key becomes properly useful

"Enthusiasts often ask us for more keyboard shortcuts to simplify their common tasks. Efficiency is key," explains Sareena. The shortcut could already start Quick Launch apps in Vista (pressing Windows Logo + # according to its position in the Quick Launch taskbar, now it can both launch and switch, so you can also move straight to apps. If it's an app that has several Windows open, you can also cycle through the windows using the same keypress combo.

3. Changes to needy windows

You know when windows flash at you from the taskbar? According to Microsoft, these are called 'needy windows'. No, we didn't know that either. In the final Windows 7, Sareena says that they'll be more prominent: "With the new taskbar, we received feedback that Outlook reminders or a Messenger chat sometimes went unnoticed because needy windows were too subtle." So the team has made changes. "First, we changed the flashing animation curve to make it more noticeable (from a sine to a sawtooth wave). Second, we used a bolder orange color. Finally, we wanted to double the number of flashes which is currently set to three. As a nod to Windows 7, we decided to go with seven flashes instead."

4. Fitting in more taskbar icons

The Windows 7 taskbar is all about saving space. But the team wanted more. "Some have asked for even more room to pin the programs they use regularly," comments Sareena. "We've made a change to squeeze in 24-39 per cent more icons before the taskbar scrolls; depending upon your resolution, icon size and assuming the default notification area." So at 800x600, you can have 10 large icons and 15 small, an increase of up to 36 per cent. The increase is as much as 39 per cent at 1,600x1,200 with the ability to have 26 icons.

5. Newly installed programs more obvious

"'Customer in control' is so strong a mantra for Windows 7 we don't even allow programs to pin themselves to the taskbar when they are installed," says Sareena. Now when a program is installed, it is "automatically and temporarily surfaced at the bottom of the Start Menu."

6. Pin anything to Jump Lists

Only 10 items can be automatically suggested for jump lists now (though you can still customize this) as some complained they could get too long. In the beta, files could only be pinned to the Jump List of programs registered to handle that file type. This is no longer the case, as Sareena explains. "For example, one can pin an HTML file to Notepad's Jump List and when clicked on from the menu, the file will always open in Notepad even though IE by default handles the file type."

7. Multi-touch on-screen keyboard

"A funny thing happens when one uses touch to interact with a software keyboard for the first time. The natural instinct is to press multiple buttons simultaneously like they do with a real keyboard," explains Sareena. "It's quite reasonable to try to use Shift + <letter> to capitalize, for example." So the final version of Windows 7 will incorporate the ability to do this.

8. Locking a machine without a screensaver

Corporate machines often automatically lock up after a certain period, but until now this has always needed a screensaver to be set up. Now, machines can be locked without having to set up a screensaver.

9. Faster access to High Performance power plan

If you're a gamer or regular laptop traveller, this will appeal. It's a bit of a pain at the moment to toggle between the Balanced and High Performance power plans as the latter hasn't been on the flyout menu from the system tray. It is now.

10. Filtering content that cannot be played

Because Windows Media Player has been designed to showcase whatever content you have on your PC, it displayed stuff that it couldn't play, like Apple's lossless .m4a or H.263 MPEG-4 content. This stuff will no longer appear.

11. Resume from sleep when watching downloads

You're used to resuming a CD or DVD, but now you can resume video files as well. "In beta, it was not possible to resume playback on such content after a laptop goes to sleep," explains Sareena. "Customers assume the experience should match that of physical media, so we fixed the experience to meet this expectation."

12. Better camcorder support

Windows Media Player will be able to natively support .mov files as used by many digital cameras to capture video. You can also seek for specific spots in video for imported AVCHD content. There's also support for more devices out-of-the-box.

We're obviously more excited about some of these changes than we are about others, but some of these tweaks could be genuinely useful. We're really enjoying this new idea of listening to customer input (new to Microsoft anyway). Dare we allow ourselves to be excited about Windows 7?

See the review of the Windows 7 Beta for more information. For more tech news, check out the TTR Tech News Blog:

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