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Piecing together Windows Vista
November 8, 2006 -
Gates shows off Vista in CES keynote
January 4, 2006
The new operating system offers a pretty complete overhaul of the way digital photos are managed. But some of Vista's nuances have drawn ire from the hard-core enthusiasts who have been putting it through its paces.
In particular, testers have complained that the photo import wizard that pops up when a digital camera or a memory card with photos is connected to Vista only gives the option of importing all the photos or none. Windows XP allowed users to either import all the photos or manually choose which ones to add, a boon for people who don't clear their camera card between outings.
One of those testers, Brandon LeBlanc, praised some of Vista's new tools, including the wizard that allows for easier automatic naming of photos. "Unfortunately I'm forced to quickly exit this tool and go to manually grab my photos from my camera and put them into a specific folder of my choosing," LeBlanc wrote on his blog last week.
Microsoft counters that it made that decision consciously, to make it easier for novices to get their photos into the computer. By default, duplicate photos, at least those already part of the photo album, are ignored.
Piecing together Vista
"We wanted to err on the side of making it easier for consumers to get their pictures in," said JP Wollersheim, a senior product manager in the Vista imaging group.
Critics note, however, that photos that aren't necessarily duplicates, but are digital duds, would still all get added, a challenge given that those who take a lot of photos might fill a 2GB card in a single shoot, quickly overflowing a typical notebook computer's hard drive.
Wollersheim said that there are lots of new features designed to make it not just easier to import photos, but to give users more options once the pictures are on their PC.
At the center of photo handling in Vista is a new photo library program called Photo Gallery, which puts all the photos into one library and adds the ability to do basic photo editing without need for a separate program. Similar in many respects to Apple Computer's iPhoto, the new tool was demoed by Bill Gates at January's Consumer Electronics Show.
For starters, the software is designed to allow users to easily add keyword tags and rate their photos, something that takes time but makes it easier to later pick out photos from a library that might have tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of images.
On the photo-sharing side, Wollersheim said that Microsoft wanted to give users more options.
"The challenge is that with digital photos, they are all locked up into your computers," Wollersheim said.
Pictures can be shown in a slide show on the PC, tapping Vista's improved built-in graphics. Images can also be burned onto a DVD, sent to an Xbox 360 or special digital photo frame, or e-mailed to others. For e-mailing photos, Microsoft said it has improved the ability to easily scale down the photo to a more manageable size. Vista will offer one more size option than XP (1280 x 1024) and show the estimated size of the final set of images, it said.
"It's kind of a challenge when you mail 3MB pictures across the pipe," Wollersheim said.
As for printing, Microsoft tried to simplify the process of printing at home, as well as expand the range of other options. Microsoft added an online printing option with Windows XP, a move that was somewhat controversial at the time. However, it turned out that research showed only 0.2 percent of users even knew the feature was there. With Vista, online printing options are more prominent, and Microsoft is adding the ability to send the photos to a nearby retailer where they can be picked up after as little as an hour's processing time.
"From our perspective, it's all about choice," Wollersheim said. "How do I get the pictures to my mom?"
See more CNET content tagged:
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Perhaps you don't actually care to know this, but the process of getting a job as a developer at MS is extremely difficult, and coveted by tens of thousands of IT professionals world wide. IF your resume is shiny enough to land you an interview you are still competing against a swarm of other bright individuals looking to get the job.
The developers at MS are far from incompetent and far from brain dead. But I'll let you get back to running your multi-billion dollar conglomerate organization.
/P
The version in XP was MUCH, MUCH, MUCH better!!! It allowed on-the-fly selection of which content items and which destinations -- as well as a preview of items ON the camera itself!
As a supported of their innovations, this 'advancement' reminds me of Win98SE .......
I think I like the file system as it is. This new photo program will be one of the first programs I either uninstall or disable. If I remember right there was this sort of metal looking dooflachie that hovered on the XP desktop that tried to do something similar... I disabled that too.
Listen you Redmond rubes: Knock it off. We don't want this garbage, we just want an operating system we can use the way we want to use it.
Microsoft has yet to learn that their "MS knows best" attitude is tolerated by the clueless masses and few others.
This attitude, coupled with things like Vista's draconian licensing (upgrade twice and you have to buy another copy of Windows) will have a lot of Windows users looking at alternatives.
And today, more than ever before, there are real alternatives to Windows.
As far as this being like iphoto, and trying to make a simple program that noobs will use, well, that's what they did. I hear people rave left and right about how great iphoto is. Sorry, it's not that special. Picasso is just as good, if not better. This new program is just the same. If you know your way around a computer at all, all of these programs are a waste of time, and there are better ways.
Microsoft,
We do not want to run on lives on your terms. If you want to keep customers, then you have to allow us to use your products as we want.
>>Images can also be burned onto a DVD, sent to an Xbox 360 or special digital photo frame, or e-mailed to others.<<
Gee. I didn't know I couldn't burn my photos to a DVD in XP. And I didn't know I could email photos either. I'm a lowly XP user and can't email my photos at all... Geeze Louis micromud, I hope there's a wizard that explains exactly why I would want to send my photos to my XBOX.
Sounds like a candidate for disabling. I can hear is screaming now, "turn me off, turn me off, turn me off".
This is why windows costs so much, they are discouraging average people from buying it. They want you to keep the PC industry alive by buying another machine, just to upgrade your OS.
Anyways, If your camera has wireless capabilities than you dont even have to plug it into the system, another great plus that really makes Vista's expandability into future tech open, check the people around me settings, the system even deteced my pocket pc.
With Vista you can change an array of settings and configurations, almost to the point where it may be too much for the average user. I see rage in the future of those who are not patient & take the approach of not knowing what there changing before they change it. What a crap shoot. One thing that does aid with though is by simply hovering over the icon with arrow a little pop up will display what the item does or changes.
Anyway you look at it, people, they dont like change as it is. Vista goes about that change smoothly so as long as you pay attention during the install. First time I installed Vista it installed on my storage drive and not onto my dedicated C: drive. Well after literally destroying those files by forcing it with a
I am Microsoft partner and have been using Vista for 4 months now. I have Vista installed only my Media comp just so I could become familier with the OS. As for my laptop's, & pc's I will eventually install Vista on all but am going to ease into that transition.
Gods speed with Corp America and Vista's arrival. I think alot of people will need tutorials or navigational training to aid in the process, that's just my opinion.
HEY MICROSOFT, MIGHT WANT TO LOOK INTO PROVIDING AN OPTIONAL VERSION OF THE OS THATS SO SIMPLICIT THAT...WELL, MY GRANMOTHER COULD USE IT. THE RETIRED DEMOGRAPHIC COULD GIVE SOME GREAT FEEDBACK IN USER INTERACTION.
To make matters worse, the newsgrout monitors appear disinterested in simple suggestions which IMHO would make it top-notch!
PajamaGal
I hate that XP requires a hack so that double clicking an image opens it in the photo editor you chose rather than what MS engineers developed.
I hate that MS engineers think that I store files together by type and not by project (let me make this clear: a report on a backpacking trip and images from that trip go in the same folder; I don't want images from that trip in the same folder as images from my church's 50th anniversary service).
And now I hate that MS engineers think I'm so inept with my computer that I don't know how to drag and drop the images I want onto my hard drive, that I don't know how to reduce the size of an image to e-mail it, that I don't know how to burn a DVD with images, and that I don't know how to prepare a slideshow in Windows Explorer, PowerPoint, or several other programs.
mark d.
Also, even though I have thousands of digital pictures on my computer, I've never bothered with any of the Windows built in features. I use Google Picasa to view them or the aforementioned PSP. The default programs may be good enough for simple environments, but it looks you and I need something more. I guess the high variety of apps (many free) and Web 2.0 sites to manage photos should make this a non-issue.
"MS did X? I'll whine and say Y is better. What, they did Y? I'll whine and argue for X"
Its nice to have arguments of convenience, that can be changed at the drop of a hat.
If you don't like the way Windows handles it, there are lots of other choices. Some free, some come with the equipment you buy, some you can buy.
Find what works best for you. At least you have choices.
Perhaps you don't actually care to know this, but the process of getting a job as a developer at MS is extremely difficult, and coveted by tens of thousands of IT professionals world wide. IF your resume is shiny enough to land you an interview you are still competing against a swarm of other bright individuals looking to get the job.
The developers at MS are far from incompetent and far from brain dead. But I'll let you get back to running your multi-billion dollar conglomerate organization.
Everyone seems to be up in arms about a feature that is convenient (or not), yet it is a tiny part of the overall OS. If you don't like it, then just use the software that came with your digital camera or any of the other countless Windows apps that are out there for importing and editing photos!
No, that feature has always been a part of XP. If you select the Email option in the task pane, it will ask you if you want to reduce/compress the pictures.
And why is everything a comparison with Apple? "Similar in many respects to Apple Computer's iPhoto...." This program is similar in many respects to A LOT of photo management programs, not just iPhoto. In fact, it's even similar to Microsoft's own software (Digital Image Suite and its predecessors). There's a deeply-rooted mindset here that if they're doing anything new in Vista, it must be copying Apple....
They don't think the general public is capable of drop and drag.
I was going to buy a copy for my new Mac Pro, but then I realised
howcrap it's going to be, will stick with XP, at least that almost
works.
Also to Windows users who are very upset with Microsoft's products. Why are you still using an obsolete product? Linux, BSD & even Mac are far ahead on the issues you bring up.
If you use Linux or BSD you will get a free, secure & stable OS. If you insist on paying for it then Mac is pretty much the same as BSD with a simpler sheel.
As for the newbie. If all a person does is check email, surf the web and write a letter, oh yes and do photography then a base install of Ubuntu Linux would be all they ever needed.
Also to Windows users who are very upset with Microsoft's products. Why are you still using an obsolete product? Linux, BSD & even Mac are far ahead on the issues you bring up.
If you use Linux or BSD you will get a free, secure & stable OS. If you insist on paying for it then Mac is pretty much the same as BSD with a simpler sheel.
As for the newbie. If all a person does is check email, surf the web and write a letter, oh yes and do photography then a base install of Ubuntu Linux would be all they ever needed.
REALLY pushing its monopolistic weight around to force users to
"adopt" standards like this.
To all folks, consumer or IT, forget the FUD about training,
expense, etc. Do some serious due diligence and start pursuing
alternatives to the MS gorilla. It will be short term pain for very long
term gain.
Microsoft should fork it's product. Give us the version with the animated wall paper and singing clowns for home users to do there stuff, and the minimalistic version for business.
- Inaccurate Statement
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by gdmaclew
October 24, 2006 10:21 AM PDT
- For e-mailing photos, Microsoft added an ability to easily scale down the photo to a more manageable size, a feature that was part of the Mac OS, but lacking in Windows XP.
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Reply to this comment
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Showing 1 of 2 pages (99 Comments)Not true...get your facts straight. Check it out before you say it.