blog: xplorer2 for windows 7
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blog: xplorer2 for windows 7
here's the comment area for today's blog article found here:
http://zabkat.com/blog/07Jun09-windows7-explorer.htm
http://zabkat.com/blog/07Jun09-windows7-explorer.htm
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Windows 7 Explorer does have a menu
I prefer xplorer² Pro to Windows Explorer for Windows 7, Vista or XP.
However, you stated that W7's Explorer is without a menu. This is not quite correct. It does have a menu bar. Microsoft decided to hide it by default.
The menu bar can be exposed if you press the Alt key while Windows Explorer has the focus. (This also works with IE7/8.)
One can also make the menu display permanently by selecting the Organize button on Windows Explorer and selecting Layout > Menu bar.
I don't understand Microsoft's UI choices for Windows Explorer. Hiding important navigational elements seems counterproductive.
Your comparison chart is great. I would have featured it at the top of your blog post rather than the bottom. BTW, what are the question marks for in the chart?
However, you stated that W7's Explorer is without a menu. This is not quite correct. It does have a menu bar. Microsoft decided to hide it by default.
The menu bar can be exposed if you press the Alt key while Windows Explorer has the focus. (This also works with IE7/8.)
One can also make the menu display permanently by selecting the Organize button on Windows Explorer and selecting Layout > Menu bar.
I don't understand Microsoft's UI choices for Windows Explorer. Hiding important navigational elements seems counterproductive.
Your comparison chart is great. I would have featured it at the top of your blog post rather than the bottom. BTW, what are the question marks for in the chart?
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Meh... Nikos, you can do better than that.
E7 does have virtual folders -- Libraries, which blow X2's virtual folders by being accessible to everyone, not just to E. And you are wrong by comparing Junctions to Libraries -- Libraries is a fully virtual thing and you won't delete your stuff accidentally by deleting a folder from Library, as opposite to the Junction.
Breadcrumbs are way better in EV/E7.
"Keyword search" is way better in visualizing search results in E7, and, by utilizing WDS power is way faster (although WDS is limited to file types known to WDS).
Enhanced usability -- it's very arguable. X2 definitely blows EXP, but EV/E7 is way better than EXP and much more visually pleasant than X2. If I were you, I would definitely spent some time by enhancing X2's UI look and feel. Functionality is a king, but you cannot discount the looks when trying to compete with something that is already is a part of Windows.
E7 does have virtual folders -- Libraries, which blow X2's virtual folders by being accessible to everyone, not just to E. And you are wrong by comparing Junctions to Libraries -- Libraries is a fully virtual thing and you won't delete your stuff accidentally by deleting a folder from Library, as opposite to the Junction.
Breadcrumbs are way better in EV/E7.
"Keyword search" is way better in visualizing search results in E7, and, by utilizing WDS power is way faster (although WDS is limited to file types known to WDS).
Enhanced usability -- it's very arguable. X2 definitely blows EXP, but EV/E7 is way better than EXP and much more visually pleasant than X2. If I were you, I would definitely spent some time by enhancing X2's UI look and feel. Functionality is a king, but you cannot discount the looks when trying to compete with something that is already is a part of Windows.
I'm using Xplorer2 - the only file manager that does not suck. Actually, it rocks!
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Re: Windows 7 Explorer does have a menu
Which command that is in menu is not accessible by some other mean and used very often? The hid the menu, because there're none.RickyF wrote:I don't understand Microsoft's UI choices for Windows Explorer. Hiding important navigational elements seems counterproductive.
I'm using Xplorer2 - the only file manager that does not suck. Actually, it rocks!
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As Nikos pointed out in the blog:
Windows 7 is technically not Windows 7, it is Windows 6.1 - or in other words: It is Vista 2.
When MS said, that the next version of Windows will again have simply a version number as name - something, that didn't happen since Windows 3.11 - I wondered - without having seen anything from W7 - why this conspicuous fall back to old naming convention? Today we know the answer: MS feels the very need, to make people after the release of W7 forget as quickly as possible the unfortunate Vista thing. That OS, that Steve Ballmer (MS' CEO) had said to be the most important development since Windows 95 in the months before the final Vista release, had been a disaster and even a Moloch as MS cannot survive with repeatedly disasters. The General Motors story tells, how short the way from hero to zero can be, if you permanently produce the wrong products.
Looking what this wrongly labeled Vista 2 aka Windows 7 brings, shows the OS, that Vista should have been. In my eyes Windows 7 is the really final release of Vista, which never really left the beta or RC-state. So far so good.
But how does W7 compare with XP? Surely there are new features, some better support for new hardware (which can get be added to XP). But a really interesting thing is the fact, that at least the higher versions of W7 will ship with an ready to use XP-mode, in fact a virtual machine with XP already inside. That means at first, the customer gets in fact 2 licenses (1 W7 & 1 XP). The second point is, that MS seems to have great fear, that again important customers might refuse to switch to the new OS because of compatibility problems. But the customers shall get convinced by adding XP into W7 and telling them, you can use XP inside W7. Frankly speaking they could with the same result stay with XP - with the advantage, that XP uses less resources.
I think XP will be a far sufficient OS for a long time. Saying that I wonder, if MS will really stop serving XP with security updates after 2014, because in this case all W7 systems will have inevitably security holes after that time. The netbook question is another point. MS promises, that a starter edition of W7 will be usable with that, but I have heard much promises (as said, e.g. in conjunction with Vista), which where not beheld afterwards. And Linux gets more and more propagated with the distribution of the netbooks. I would not be surprised, if the lifetime of XP should get longer, than MS will like and if XP should get something like a virus inside MS, which they cannot get rid of.
After all, I had started to evaluate the beta and RC-versions of W7 to find out more details. I did so, until I found this message from the well reputated German c't magazine, which says, that Windows Update installs without knowledge and asking the user a Firefox add-on; this add-on has not the least to do with security, but with promoting .NET Framework! (Sorry, I did not find an English version of the article; you may auto-translate it with Google or Bablefish and you will find also info in this blog by Brad Abrams, an MS Program Manager.) This behaviour reminds me (although less obstructive) with the Sony Rootkit attack about 5 years ago. There is an old general advice, that you should only install software from trusted sources. MS is not a trusted source after that. (This was by far not the first problem in conjunction with .NET). After the some hundred million Euro punishment by the European committee some people asked, if this punishment was too high. My conclusion is now: it was far too low, because a powerful punishment should prevent the offender to repeat his deed.
My personal conclusion is, that I stopped the evaluation of W7; why should I care about a software from an untrusted source? I think, that XP will be enough for some more years for my needs (I am not a gamer) and will use the time for a slow and well prepared move to Linux. Multi-platform software as OpenOffice.org, Mozilla products and more will make this approach easier.
My personal wish is, that x2 will make this move also.
Windows 7 is technically not Windows 7, it is Windows 6.1 - or in other words: It is Vista 2.
When MS said, that the next version of Windows will again have simply a version number as name - something, that didn't happen since Windows 3.11 - I wondered - without having seen anything from W7 - why this conspicuous fall back to old naming convention? Today we know the answer: MS feels the very need, to make people after the release of W7 forget as quickly as possible the unfortunate Vista thing. That OS, that Steve Ballmer (MS' CEO) had said to be the most important development since Windows 95 in the months before the final Vista release, had been a disaster and even a Moloch as MS cannot survive with repeatedly disasters. The General Motors story tells, how short the way from hero to zero can be, if you permanently produce the wrong products.
Looking what this wrongly labeled Vista 2 aka Windows 7 brings, shows the OS, that Vista should have been. In my eyes Windows 7 is the really final release of Vista, which never really left the beta or RC-state. So far so good.
But how does W7 compare with XP? Surely there are new features, some better support for new hardware (which can get be added to XP). But a really interesting thing is the fact, that at least the higher versions of W7 will ship with an ready to use XP-mode, in fact a virtual machine with XP already inside. That means at first, the customer gets in fact 2 licenses (1 W7 & 1 XP). The second point is, that MS seems to have great fear, that again important customers might refuse to switch to the new OS because of compatibility problems. But the customers shall get convinced by adding XP into W7 and telling them, you can use XP inside W7. Frankly speaking they could with the same result stay with XP - with the advantage, that XP uses less resources.
I think XP will be a far sufficient OS for a long time. Saying that I wonder, if MS will really stop serving XP with security updates after 2014, because in this case all W7 systems will have inevitably security holes after that time. The netbook question is another point. MS promises, that a starter edition of W7 will be usable with that, but I have heard much promises (as said, e.g. in conjunction with Vista), which where not beheld afterwards. And Linux gets more and more propagated with the distribution of the netbooks. I would not be surprised, if the lifetime of XP should get longer, than MS will like and if XP should get something like a virus inside MS, which they cannot get rid of.
After all, I had started to evaluate the beta and RC-versions of W7 to find out more details. I did so, until I found this message from the well reputated German c't magazine, which says, that Windows Update installs without knowledge and asking the user a Firefox add-on; this add-on has not the least to do with security, but with promoting .NET Framework! (Sorry, I did not find an English version of the article; you may auto-translate it with Google or Bablefish and you will find also info in this blog by Brad Abrams, an MS Program Manager.) This behaviour reminds me (although less obstructive) with the Sony Rootkit attack about 5 years ago. There is an old general advice, that you should only install software from trusted sources. MS is not a trusted source after that. (This was by far not the first problem in conjunction with .NET). After the some hundred million Euro punishment by the European committee some people asked, if this punishment was too high. My conclusion is now: it was far too low, because a powerful punishment should prevent the offender to repeat his deed.
My personal conclusion is, that I stopped the evaluation of W7; why should I care about a software from an untrusted source? I think, that XP will be enough for some more years for my needs (I am not a gamer) and will use the time for a slow and well prepared move to Linux. Multi-platform software as OpenOffice.org, Mozilla products and more will make this approach easier.
My personal wish is, that x2 will make this move also.
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wasker - not quite right
wasker wrote
How about easily performing Windows 7's File > Share with... without the menu?
I believe that there are other menu items not accessible any other way in Windows Explorer.
If something is not often used and is hidden, it is unlikely to be ever used. Why include it at all? I stand by my statement, "I don't understand Microsoft's UI choices for Windows Explorer. Hiding important navigational elements seems counterproductive."
Please show me Tools > Folder Options without the menu.Which command that is in menu is not accessible by some other mean and used very often? The hid the menu, because there're none. [sic]
How about easily performing Windows 7's File > Share with... without the menu?
I believe that there are other menu items not accessible any other way in Windows Explorer.
If something is not often used and is hidden, it is unlikely to be ever used. Why include it at all? I stand by my statement, "I don't understand Microsoft's UI choices for Windows Explorer. Hiding important navigational elements seems counterproductive."
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Windows 7 is the best Windows ever
@Cosmo
I understand your statements about XP but my own experiences supporting XP in my daily life is that it is time to shoot it.
Windows 7 does not use a lot of resources. I run it on my ASUS Eee PC 1000HE and it runs better than the XP that came with it.
I am running a newly built i7, 12GB RAM machine with Windows 7 RC 64 bit version. It is super, not perfect but better than XP or Vista. I am eagerly awaiting the RTM version.
I understand your statements about XP but my own experiences supporting XP in my daily life is that it is time to shoot it.
Windows 7 does not use a lot of resources. I run it on my ASUS Eee PC 1000HE and it runs better than the XP that came with it.
I am running a newly built i7, 12GB RAM machine with Windows 7 RC 64 bit version. It is super, not perfect but better than XP or Vista. I am eagerly awaiting the RTM version.
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Re: wasker - not quite right
The keyword here is "very often". Neither Folder Options, nor Share With are the commands that are likely to be used on daily basis.RickyF wrote:wasker wrotePlease show me Tools > Folder Options without the menu.Which command that is in menu is not accessible by some other mean and used very often? The hid the menu, because there're none. [sic]
How about easily performing Windows 7's File > Share with... without the menu?
Because they may still be used at some point of time.RickyF wrote:If something is not often used and is hidden, it is unlikely to be ever used. Why include it at all?
I'm using Xplorer2 - the only file manager that does not suck. Actually, it rocks!
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Re: Windows 7 is the best Windows ever
I spoke about NetBooks. A 12 GB RAM Machine is far from a typical Netbook away (end even until today far above the average desktop pc). And typical Netbooks are the place, where the OS has to work.RickyF wrote:my own experiences ...
I run it on my ASUS Eee PC 1000HE ...
12GB RAM machine with Windows 7 RC 64 bit version.
BTW The Asus 1000 HE comes AFAIK with 1 GB RAM built-in. It would be useless, if it would be shipped with an 64 bit OS - and slower, as the CPU has to do more work for the memory-allocation without the smallest advantage, if there is not more than 4GB installed. I have read some first benchmarks, which clearly show that W7 runs quicker than the Vista-beta(IMHO)-thingy, but not quicker than XP.
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Re: blog: xplorer2 for windows 7
I have around 20,000+ files in one of my W7 library pulled from multiple hard drives and network locations. Without tree folders and correct drag and drop support libraries are totally unusable for me in this build of X2. I hate to switch to windows explorer just to use libraries.
My answer to your above question is neither. I think you have reached a point in your life where you have started to resist change. Compared to early years of X2, in past few years Xplorer2 development has really slowed down and most of releases are just bug fixes. You require lot of convincing to add anything new or resist any X2 code rewrite. For any new feature request you suggest workarounds. You blame MS for change but MS is not going to stop innovating. As MS moves ahead some old things will break and its up to the old apps to do the catch up to stay current.
You may have your personal reasons and I may be wrong in my assumptions but as a long time X2 user this is what I feel and wanted to speak out.
Nikos, I am your big fan and I am pretty impressed with your past accomplishments.nikos wrote:There are two kinds of people in the world, those that like change imposed from the outside and those that find it pointless at best and annoying at worst. Guess which camp I am in?
My answer to your above question is neither. I think you have reached a point in your life where you have started to resist change. Compared to early years of X2, in past few years Xplorer2 development has really slowed down and most of releases are just bug fixes. You require lot of convincing to add anything new or resist any X2 code rewrite. For any new feature request you suggest workarounds. You blame MS for change but MS is not going to stop innovating. As MS moves ahead some old things will break and its up to the old apps to do the catch up to stay current.
You may have your personal reasons and I may be wrong in my assumptions but as a long time X2 user this is what I feel and wanted to speak out.
Help! I'm an AI running around in someone's universe simulator.
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Re: blog: xplorer2 for windows 7
Bravo, Snakebyte!snakebyte wrote:I think you have reached a point in your life where you have started to resist change. Compared to early years of X2, in past few years Xplorer2 development has really slowed down and most of releases are just bug fixes. You require lot of convincing to add anything new or resist any X2 code rewrite. For any new feature request you suggest workarounds. You blame MS for change but MS is not going to stop innovating. As MS moves ahead some old things will break and its up to the old apps to do the catch up to stay current.
You may have your personal reasons and I may be wrong in my assumptions but as a long time X2 user this is what I feel and wanted to speak out.

I'm using Xplorer2 - the only file manager that does not suck. Actually, it rocks!
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wasker, i understand xplorer2 may offend your style when you are in the caffeteria showing off your thinest sony vaio
but if you really think that E7 is comparable to xplorer2 then you are hardly using any of the features. I recommend you had another look at all the videos with question marks in the table of this article to see what you're missing
as for snake's comments, i agree that x2's development has been slower than usual but that has been forced by harsh realities. xplorer2 isn't enough to make a living so i'm diversifying. I am writing other stuff right now. There is going to be a sizeable x2 update in the near future but not for libraries, surely!
i don't understand how you don't see through this "revolutionary" feature: it's just folder junctions for grannies that haven't got a clue what they are or how to set one up. Create a folder c:\songs and throw in there junctions to whatever you need, that's your "library". You can add as many levels of hierarchy you want with a combination of real folders and junctions. See this demo to get an idea:
www.zabkat.com/blog/07Oct07.htm
yes, junctions are a bit harder to setup compared to drag/drop libraries but as all setup tasks you do it once and you're over with it
from the first steps of xplorer2 i was more than happy to accommodate everything that played by the desktop shell rules. So zipfolders are in. RAR are not. Likewise it looks MS didn't provide good tree support for libraries. I don't intend to fix their omissions -- i don't think i can even if i wanted to

as for snake's comments, i agree that x2's development has been slower than usual but that has been forced by harsh realities. xplorer2 isn't enough to make a living so i'm diversifying. I am writing other stuff right now. There is going to be a sizeable x2 update in the near future but not for libraries, surely!
i don't understand how you don't see through this "revolutionary" feature: it's just folder junctions for grannies that haven't got a clue what they are or how to set one up. Create a folder c:\songs and throw in there junctions to whatever you need, that's your "library". You can add as many levels of hierarchy you want with a combination of real folders and junctions. See this demo to get an idea:
www.zabkat.com/blog/07Oct07.htm
yes, junctions are a bit harder to setup compared to drag/drop libraries but as all setup tasks you do it once and you're over with it
from the first steps of xplorer2 i was more than happy to accommodate everything that played by the desktop shell rules. So zipfolders are in. RAR are not. Likewise it looks MS didn't provide good tree support for libraries. I don't intend to fix their omissions -- i don't think i can even if i wanted to