This is not a Win/Linux/Mac dispute, rather pointing out a few minor things that I find really annoying in Windows OS and I'd rather change if I had the chance/knowledge (disclaimer: I mainly refer to winxp but I've used almost all other versions, I have some experience with Linux and almost never used a Mac OS)

• copying/moving files: ever tried to copy a folder containing one or more corrupted files? if I were the OS I'd just skip those and copy the good ones, then prompt a message "file x, y, z were not copied we're sorry for the inconvenience caused"... but no, instead we're left with a "copy file aborted" message and the torture of handpicking files to copy trying to spot the bad ones...
• overwrite existing files?: I think that "Yes to all" button is very useful and time saving but what about a "No to all" button??
• (ok this is maybe not entirely windows' fault but rather depending on the software you are running) when running an application that takes a few seconds to load it keeps popping up from the background although it's not fully loaded instead of letting you work on other windows you have open
• (this is really a picky one but) wouldn't it be nice to be able to reorder the tabs on the toolbar at the bottom of the screen instead of being stuck with the same configuration once the applications are run in a certain sequence?

I think I had a few more "complaints" but I can't recall them... anyway enough for now

please correct me if a simple solution exists for some of those issues or if I've improperly described things, also I'd like to know if any of those "bugs" were fixed in Vista (which I've only used a handful of times) and what's the situation like in Linux/Mac regarding those points

tkx

I would say find a way to get rid of the registry and the use of DLL's especially now that the winsxs folder in vista is talking up most of the hard drive space. I would say that they need to optimize every file that runs windows in order to optimize on sucking up all the resources windows is running so there be no need to run 4GB of RAM in order to run an operating system. I would say another one would be to add more windows applications that can be turned on and off through the add/remove folder or maybe set up a way to do partitions like linux does, I think that would really help out in trying to save documents from getting lost and what not.

This post has been edited by Saint_Michael: Jul 9 2008, 10:17 AM

yes, these are the major things! those that really matter for the overall performance, mine was more like a (un)usability list... yeah Linux distributions can squeeze all sort of softwares/tools in their installation CD and also offer a better memory and disk management, let alone the chance of actually getting to know a bit of what's going on behind the scenes (provided you want to, but if you don't you probably won't even install linux in the first place...)

I think KDE does exactly what you want. It carries on copying, then displays a list of files which didn't work, or just copies the damaged files anyway. It makes a lot more sense than just cancelling it, and leaving you to pick through thousands of files one by one to see which ones are damaged.



Try holding Shift, then clicking No



It is very annoying, but I think it is up to the application to decide if it is going to "focus steal" as it's called. In KDE you can set which applications can and can't steal your focus, so you can get annoying applications to sit in the background if they have a habit of leaping in front of your work. It's hidden in the Advanced Settings though, and I can't see why.



I don't know of any OS/window manager that lets you do that, but it is a cool idea, and I have wanted to do it a few times in the past. The closest I can get is moving windows onto different virtual desktops, then they reorder themselves in the order of the desktops.

thanks a lot rvalkass, that's great!! at least one of them solved for the others, well i suppose I'll either live with them or start using Linux more

Windows is a very very old operating system.

To Fix many of the performance issues, and particularly the way it manages memory, Windows would need to be re-written.
Thankfully Microsoft is developing one such OS.
It will borrow heavily from Microsoft's Singularity research project which is absolutely great.

However this operating system wont be out for a few years. It is expected to debut around the same time as Windows 8/9 (Vista is 6). It will be more or less incompatible with most current Windows applications (virtualization is gonna get really good by then so u can run your apps on it).

In the mean time we can hope the best for Windows 7. My only wish-list for it is a brand new UI to play with esp. the old longhorn concepts.