A couple days ago, I stumbled upon some screen shots from an internal Milestone release of Windows 7 (Link). It doesn’t look like much given the fact that these are just screenshots of an OS build that looks like Vista. While looking at the images some gears started moving within my head and I decided to come up with a short list of my own desires:
- For the love of god, please go back to a simpler licensing model. The number of different versions that Vista’s has drives people nuts. Please, at the most, only offer two different versions at very reasonable prices!
- How about a totally redesigned Windows Explorer! I know this is within the current feature list, but we all know how features tend to get cut. If a new explorer does stay, please include the following:
- A better file copy experience that allows me to move large amounts of data without fear of the network connection dying and having to start over.
- A really nice feature would be to build-in the ability to merge files and folders. This is a must, which would be aimed at dealing with proliferation of data that is stored on removable devices.
- There are rumors that the “Office Ribbon” team is working an updated interface. Please let them do their work, Explorer’s interface for the most part hasn’t changed in many years now.
- Here is a feature that should be released: MinWin. This is a really great idea. Windows Server 2008 Core was a good start, but it’s still 1.5GB of stuff that may or may not be needed. Having that ability to strip Windows down to its naked self has some real possibilities for making one purpose system deployments and… a very reduced attack surface. Please Microsoft… share…
- While I’m on the topic… please remove the bloat wear. I realize that you and Apple are in a race to develop the biggest installation DVDs. But, 4GB or more is a little extreme.
- What about WinFS? Don’t you think it is time to let this bad-boy out of its cage?
- Last but not least… please give me a true 3D desktop? I had to upgrade my video card for Aero. How about really putting to good use?
