Features new to Windows Vista
Encyclopedia
Windows Vista
(formerly codenamed Longhorn) has many new features compared with previous Microsoft Windows
versions, covering most aspects of the operating system.
This article discusses the changes most likely to be of interest to non-technical users. The companion article, Technical features new to Windows Vista
, discusses the technical advancements in Windows Vista, while the article Security and safety features new to Windows Vista
discusses the security advancements. The article Management features new to Windows Vista
discusses the management and administrative improvements, which may be of interest to IT professionals.
) with a slightly larger size, a streamlined style for wizards
, and a change in the tone and phrasing of most of the dialogs and control panels.
In addition to the Windows Aero visual style, Windows Vista Home Basic exclusively includes a "Windows Vista Standard" theme which has the same hardware requirements as "Windows Aero", and therefore uses the Desktop Window Manager
for desktop composition, but does not include the ability to generate live thumbnails of running applications, nor does it allow transparency of the window frame. As a result, 3D effects and other features associated with live thumbnails are not included with this theme.
Included with all versions, there is a "Windows Vista Basic" theme which does not use desktop composition, and is geared towards lower-end machines that are not able to use the Desktop Window Manager
; this theme being comparable to the Luna XP theme. Finally Vista includes the "Windows Classic" and "Windows Standard" themes which are similar to the classic themes in Windows 2000 and Windows XP. Windows Aero
is not available in Windows Vista Home Basic and Starter editions, although the Desktop Window Manager
is included in Windows Vista Home Basic.
, the Start Menu has undergone major changes, with the taskbar icon no longer labeled "Start" but instead has the Windows pearl orb. At the top level, the Start Menu, as in Windows XP, has two columns of menu choices. Under the default configuration, the "Run," and "Printers" options do not appear. However, those items can be added to the Start Menu. One of the chief additions with Windows Vista is a Search pane or box, where users may begin typing immediately. The contents of the Start menu itself are indexed and searchable, besides the global search index. If indexing is turned on, the search box returns results on-the-fly as users type into it. This allows the Start menu to act as a fast and powerful application launcher. The Start menu search also doubles as the Run command from previous versions of Windows; simply typing any command will execute it. The Run command can also be added separately to the right column in the Start menu.
Another major change to the Start menu in Windows Vista is that it no longer presents the All programs menu as a horizontally expanding cascading list which utilizes the entire screen space, but instead as a nested folder view with a fixed size. The list of submenus and single items appears over the left column contents with a Back button below it. Subfolders expand and collapse vertically within the list when single-clicked, in a tree-like fashion similar to Windows Explorer. Single items appear at the top and folders appear at the bottom. Hovering the mouse over a folder does not open it; the folder needs to be clicked. A limitation of the new Start menu is that subfolders inside the All Programs menu cannot be opened simply by searching or double clicking. Also, as more programs are installed, a vertical scroll bar appears between the two columns. A dynamically changing icon showing the user's display picture by default is present at the top of the right column. It changes as users hover over any other item to reflect that item's icon. The Power button's action is configurable through Power options in the Control Panel, though the default setting is to put the computer into Sleep mode. Users can quickly lock their user account by pressing the Lock button. Additional power and account related actions are listed in a sub-menu which appears when the small arrow next to the Lock button is clicked.
Like Windows XP, Windows Vista allows users to switch back to the pre-Windows XP style "Classic" Start menu, however, the Search box is not present on the Classic Start menu.
is installed. Also, if an application installs Preview handlers (like Office 2007
does), then the documents can be edited in the preview pane itself.
Windows Explorer also contains modifications in the visualization of files on a computer. A new addition to Windows Explorer is the Details pane, which displays metadata and information relating to the currently selected file or folder. Windows Vista introduces a newer IThumbnailProvider interface that shows thumbnails in the Details pane as well as in large icon views. Furthermore, different imagery is overlaid on thumbnails to give more information about the file, such as a picture frame around the thumbnail of an image file, or a filmstrip on a video file. Thumbnails can be zoomed on. The preview panel allows you to see thumbnails of all sorts of files and view the contents of documents, similar to the way you can preview email messages in Outlook, without opening the files. There's a new intelligent algorithm for creation of Video thumbnails, which chooses a random frame inside the video and ensures the thumbnail is not black (XP showed the first frame, it was usually black).
The address bar has been modified to present a breadcrumbs
view, which shows the full path to the current location. Clicking any location in the path hierarchy takes the user to that level, instead of repeatedly pressing the Back button. This is roughly analogous to what is possible prior to Windows Vista by pressing the small down-arrow next to "Back" and selecting any folder from a list of previously accessed folders. It is also possible to navigate to any subfolder of the current folder using the arrow to the right of the last item, or to click in the space to the right of this to copy or edit the path manually. As with many other Microsoft-made Windows Vista applications, the menu bar is hidden by default. Pressing the Alt key makes the menu bar appear. Free and used space on all drives is shown in horizontal indicator bars. Check boxes allow the selection of multiple files. When items are grouped, clicking the group header selects all items under that group. Multiple groups of files can also be selected by clicking the group headers while holding down Ctrl.
in Windows Vista are visually more realistic than illustrative. Icons are scalable in size up to 256 × 256 pixels. Required icon sizes are 16 × 16, 32 × 32, and 256 × 256. Optional sizes are 24 × 24, 48 × 48, 64 × 64, 96 × 96, and 128 × 128. Document icons show the actual document contents and several media types are distinguished by icon overlays (video, audio, photos). The icons can be zoomed in and out using a gradual slider or by holding down the Ctrl key and using the mouse scroll wheel. To optimize and reduce the size of large icons, icons may be stored as compressed PNGs. To maintain backward compatibility with earlier versions of Windows, only larger sized icons can use lossless PNG
The Details pane also allows for the change of some textual metadata such as "Author" and "Title" in files that support them within Windows Explorer. A new type of metadata called tags allows users to add descriptive terms to documents for easier categorization and retrieval. Some files support open metadata, allowing users to define new types of metadata for their files. Out of the box, Windows Vista supports Microsoft Office documents and most audio files. Metadata support for other file types can however be added by writing Property handlers. Unlike previous versions of Windows, all metadata is stored inside the file, so that it will always travel with the file. However, initially, users will be able to add metadata to only a few file types.
When renaming a file, even when extensions are being displayed, Explorer highlights only the filename without selecting the extension. Renaming multiple files is quicker as pressing Tab automatically renames the existing file or folder and opens the file name text field for the next file for renaming. Shift+Tab allow renaming in the same manner upwards.
In case a file is in use or "locked" by another application, Windows Explorer informs users to close the application and retry the file operation. Also, a new interface
and protocol handlers can be set on a per-user basis using the new Default Programs API, meaning default programs for file types and tasks can be different for each individual user. There is an API for calling a common user interface so applications no longer need to maintain their own file association UI. The Default Programs API gives applications a programmatic way to check for and discover other default applications, restore a single or all registered defaults, query for the owner of a specific default file association/protocol, launch the Default Programs UI for a specific application or clear all per user associations. Applications only need to registered at install time to be part of Default Programs.
For all Windows Vista Premium Ready PCs, when using Alt+Tab to switch between open windows, a preview of each open window appears instead of just the program icon. In addition, Windows Flip 3D enables users to flip through a cascading stack of their open windows using the mouse scroll wheel. Windows can be stacked and rotated in 3D to provide views of all of them simultaneously. (The keyboard shortcuts are Win+Tab, which makes Flip 3D disappear after releasing, Ctrl+Win+Tab, which keeps Flip 3D visible after releasing, and Shift+Win+Tab to flip through open windows backward). The window buttons on the taskbar show a thumbnail image of the window, when the mouse hovers over the button.
Ultimate
, accessible from Windows Update
. They include Windows DreamScene
, a utility that allows videos to be used as desktop backgrounds, MUI packs, Windows Sound Schemes, games and BitLocker enhancements.
The search engine uses indexing to allow for a quick display of results for a given search. Advanced options allow the user to choose the file type, how it should be indexed, the properties only, or the properties and the file contents. The Start menu search also doubles as the Run command from previous versions of Windows; simply typing any command will execute it. The indexed search platform is based on Microsoft
's Windows Desktop Search 3.0 (Windows Search
version 4.0 in Vista SP2), allowing third-party applications (e.g. Microsoft Outlook
2007) to use the indexing platform to store metadata
and perform searches on Windows Vista or Windows XP (with the Windows Desktop Search redistributable installed). This is in contrast to the search engine of Windows XP, which takes some time to display results, and only after the user has finished typing the search string. The Windows Vista search allows users to add multiple filters to continually refine search results (Such as "File contains the word 'example'"). It is also possible to search across RSS and Atom
feeds, straight from Windows Explorer. Windows search uses IFilters
that are used by Windows Desktop Search as well. The IFilter interface can be implemented by software makers so that files created by their applications can be better integrated with search and indexing programs.
Searching can also be done from the box at the bottom of the start menu, so it is possible to start a program from here by typing its name, for example "Calc" to start the calculator, "Word" to start Microsoft Word, "Mail" to open Windows Mail, a web address to start the default browser at a particular site, the default search engine, or even a folder name, filename or network share name.
There is also the ability to save searches as a Search Folder
where opening the folder will execute a specific search automatically and display the results as a normal folder. A search folder is just an XML file which stores the search query, including the search operators as well. When these files are accessed, the search is run with the saved query string and the results presented as a virtual folder. Windows Vista also supports query composition, where a saved search (called a scope) can be nested within the query string of another search. These virtual folders are also distributable via RSS
.
Windows Vista also features an enhanced file content search for non-indexed locations, whereby the files being scanned are processed by the same IFilters that would be used for indexing, therefore offering more consistent results between indexed and non-indexed searches as well as the ability for third-parties to add support for additional file formats to have their content searched.
Windows Sidebar is a new panel which can be placed on either the left or the right-hand side of the screen where a user can place Desktop Gadgets, which are small applets designed for a specialized purpose (such as displaying the weather or sports scores). The gadgets can also be placed on other parts of the desktop, if desired, by dragging. By default, Windows Vista ships with 11 gadgets: Calendar, Clock, Contacts, CPU Meter, Currency Conversion, Feed Headlines, Notes, Picture Puzzle, Slide Show, Stocks, and Weather. Additional gadgets are published at Microsoft's web site, which offers both Microsoft-created and user-submitted gadgets in a gallery.
Gadgets
are written using a combination of DHTML
for visual layout, JScript
and VBScript
for functional code, and an XML
file for defining the gadget's metadata (author name, description, etc.) The gadget is then distributed as a ZIP file with a .gadget extension. Displaying the gadget using DHTML
allows the same gadget to be used on Microsoft's Live.com
and Windows Live Spaces
sites. Alternatively, on Windows Vista, the gadget can detect that WPF
is available and take advantage of its graphical abilities to display differently from the web version.
Windows Vista includes Internet Explorer 7 and can be upgraded to later versions of Internet Explorer such as Internet Explorer 8
or Internet Explorer 9
. Internet Explorer 7 adds support for tabbed browsing, Atom
, RSS
, internationalized domain name
s, a search box, a phishing
filter, an anti-spoofing URL engine, fine-grained control over ActiveX add-ons, thumbnails of all open tabs in a single window (called Quick Tabs), page zoom, and tab groups. Tab groups make it possible to open a folder of Favorites in tabs with a single click. Importing bookmarks and cookies from other web browsers is also supported. Additionally, there is now proper support for PNG images with transparency as well as improvements and fixes to CSS
and HTML rendering. The Windows RSS Platform
offers native RSS
support, with developer APIs.
On Windows Vista, Internet Explorer operates in a special "Protected Mode", which runs the browser in a security sandbox that has no access to the rest of the operating system or file system, except the Temporary Internet Files
folder. This feature aims to mitigate problems whereby newly-discovered flaws in the browser (or in ActiveX
controls hosted inside it) allowed hackers to subversively install software on the user's computer (typically spyware). Internet Explorer 7 in Windows Vista also exclusively supports Advanced Encryption Standard
(AES) key lengths up to 256 bits outlined in RFC 3268 and certificate
revocation checking using Online Certificate Status Protocol
. The TLS implementation has also been updated to support extensions as outlined in RFC 3546, most notable of which is Server Name Indication
support.
Internet Explorer 7 additionally features an update to the WinInet API. The new version has better support for IPv6
, and handles hexadecimal literals in the IPv6 address. It also includes better support for Gzip
and deflate
compression, so that communication with a web server can be compressed and thus will require less data to be transferred. Internet Explorer Protected Mode support in WinInet is exclusive to Windows Vista and later Windows versions.
Windows Media Player 11, which is also available on Windows XP
, features a revised interface. The Media Library is now presented without the category trees which were prominent in the earlier versions. Rather, on selecting the category in the left pane, the contents appear on the right, in a graphical manner with thumbnails—a departure from textual presentation of information. Missing album art can be added directly to the placeholders in the Library itself (though the program re-renders all album art imported this way into 1:1 pixel ratio, 200x200 resolution jpeg
s). Views for Music, Pictures, Video and Recorded TV are separate and can be chosen individually from the navigation bar. Entries for Pictures and Video show their thumbnails. Search has been upgraded to be much faster.
Windows Media Player 11 in Windows Vista Home Premium and Ultimate Editions supports MMC-5 driver commands for the AACS
content protection scheme, as well as the UDF
file system which is required for Blu-ray
and HD DVD
playback. However, all of the codecs required for playback of HD DVD and Blu-ray video are not included. VC-1
and the MPEG-2
video decoders, as well as the Dolby Digital (AC-3) 5.1
audio decoder are included in Windows Vista Home Premium and Ultimate Editions. H.264 video and other multichannel surround sound audio standards still require third party decoders.
Other features of Windows Media Player 11 include:
Certain features of Media Sharing in Windows Media Player 11 are only available in Windows Vista
and later. For example, WMP 11 on Windows Vista can also connect to remote media libraries; this is not available in the Windows XP version.
in Windows Vista, available in the Home Premium and Ultimate editions, has been upgraded significantly, including a considerable overhaul of the user interface. Each button in the main menu, which contains sections such as "Music", "Videos", and "TV", gets encased in a box when selected, and for each selection, a submenu comes up, extending horizontally. When any of the options is selected, the entries for each are presented in a grid-like structure, with each item being identified by album art, if its an audio file, or a thumbnail image if it is a picture, a video or a TV recording, and other related options, such as different views for the music collection if "Music" is selected, extend horizontally along the top of the grid. Similarly, other items are identified by suggestive artwork. The grid displaying the items is also extended horizontally, and the selected item is enlarged compared to the rest.
Other features of Windows Media Center include:
Windows Vista includes Internet Information Services (IIS) version 7, which has been refactored into a modular architecture, with integrated .NET extensibility. Instead of a monolithic server which features all services, IIS 7 has a core web server engine, and modules offering specific functionality can be added to the engine to enable its features. Writing extensions to IIS 7 using ISAPI
has been deprecated in favor of the module API. Much of IIS's own functionality is built on this API, and as such, developers will have much more control over a request process than was possible in prior versions.
A significant change from previous versions of IIS is that all web server configuration information is stored solely in XML configuration files, instead of in the metabase. The server has a global configuration file that provides defaults, and each virtual web's document root (and any subdirectory thereof) may contain a web.config containing settings that augment or override the defaults. Changes to these files take effect immediately. This marks a significant departure from previous versions whereby web interfaces, or machine administrator access, was required to change simple settings such as default document, active modules, and security/authentication.
IIS 7 also features a completely rewritten administration interface that takes advantage of modern MMC
features such as task panes and asynchronous operation. Configuration of ASP.NET
is more fully integrated into the administrative interface.
initiative, a great deal of work has gone into making Windows Vista a more secure operating system than its predecessors. Internally, Microsoft adopted a "Secure Development Lifecycle" with the underlying ethos of, "Secure by design, secure by default, secure in deployment". New code for Windows Vista was developed with the SDL methodology, and all existing code was reviewed and refactored to improve security.
Some of the most significant and most discussed security features included with Windows Vista include User Account Control
, Kernel Patch Protection
, BitLocker Drive Encryption
, Mandatory Integrity Control
, Digital Rights Management
, TCP/IP stack security improvements, Address Space Layout Randomization
and the EFS
and cryptography improvements. Additionally, Windows Vista includes a range of parental controls, which give owners of a computer a set of tools to limit what other accounts on a computer can do, and an improved Windows Firewall
which supports both inbound and outbound packet filtering, IPv6 connection filtering and more detailed configurable rules and policies.
s and power user
s better manage their systems. Notable changes include a complete replacement of the "Windows Setup" process based on Windows Preinstallation Environment
(WinPE), completely rewritten image-based deployment mechanisms, a significantly improved Task Scheduler
, a revamped eventing infrastructure, GUI recovery tools, support for per-application Remote Desktop
sessions, new diagnostic, health monitoring and system administration tools, and a range of new Group Policy
settings covering many of the new features.
Previous versions of IIS included with Windows XP had hard limits on concurrent connections and defined web servers; IIS 7.0 on Windows Vista will not limit the number of connections allowed but will limit workloads based on the active concurrent requests to 10.
is the new windowing system
which handles the drawing of all content to the screen. Instead of windows drawing directly to the video card's memory buffers, contents are instead rendered to back-buffers (technically Direct3D surfaces), which are then arranged in the appropriate Z-order, then displayed to the user. This drawing method uses significantly more video memory than the traditional window-drawing method used in previous versions of Windows, which only required enough memory to contain the composite of all currently visible windows at any given time. With the entire contents of windows being stored in video memory, a user can move windows around the screen smoothly, without having "tearing" artifacts be visible while the operating system asks applications to redraw the newly visible parts of their windows. Other features new to Windows Vista such as live thumbnail window previews and Flip 3D are implemented through the DWM.
Users need to have a DirectX
9 capable video card to be able to use the Desktop Window Manager. Machines that can't use the DWM fall back to a "Basic" theme, and use screen drawing methods similar to Windows XP.
The Desktop Window Manager
(DWM) is included in all editions of Windows Vista except the Starter edition.
practice of using "capability bits" to indicate which features are active on the current hardware. Instead, Direct3D 10 defines a minimum standard of hardware capabilities which must be supported for a display system to be "Direct3D 10 compatible". Microsoft's goal is to create an environment for developers and designers where they can be assured that the input they provide will be rendered in exactly the same fashion on all supported graphics cards. This has been a recurring problem with the DirectX 9 model, where different video cards have produced different results, thus requiring fixes keyed to specific cards to be produced by developers.
According to Microsoft, Direct3D 10 will be able to display some graphics up to 8 times faster than DirectX 9.0c because of the new improved Windows Display Driver Model
. In addition, Direct3D 10 incorporates Microsoft's High Level Shader Language
4.0. However, Direct3D 10 is not backward compatible like prior versions of DirectX. The same game will not be compatible with both Direct3D 10 and Direct3D 9 or below. Games would need to be developed for both APIs, one version for Direct3D 9 and below if targeting Windows versions prior to Windows Vista and another version using Direct3D 10 if targeting only Windows Vista. Windows Vista does, however, contain a backward compatible Direct3D 9 implementation.
The Direct3D 10 API introduces unified vertex and pixel shaders. In addition, it also supports Geometry Shaders, which operate on entire geometric primitives (points, lines, and triangles), and can allow calculations based on adjacent primitives as well. The output of the geometry shader can be passed directly onwards to the rasterizer for interpolation and pixel shading, or written to a vertex buffer (known as 'stream out') to be fed back into the beginning of the pipeline.
D3D10 functionality requires WDDM (Windows Display Driver Model
) and new graphics hardware. The graphics hardware will be pre-emptively multithreaded, to allow multiple threads to use the GPU in turns. It will also provide paging of the graphics memory.
The version of Direct3D 9 available in Windows Vista is called Direct3D 9Ex. This modified API also uses the WDDM
and allows Direct3D 9 applications to access some of the features available in Windows Vista such as cross-process shared surfaces, managed graphics memory, prioritization of resources, text anti-aliasing, advanced gamma functions, and device removal management.
Deprecation of other DirectX APIs:
In Windows Vista, only Direct3D
features an overhaul. The DirectX SDK mentions that most of the other APIs have been deprecated. DirectInput
and DirectPlay
have been deprecated and some of their components removed. DirectSound
and therefore, DirectMusic
lack hardware abstraction and are emulated in software. The DirectMusic
kernel mode synthesizer that supplies the DirectMusic components with a high-resolution timer has been removed.
, including a Capture DDI for video capture. The DDIs it shares with DXVA 1.0 are also enhanced with support for hardware acceleration of more operations. Also, the DDI functions are directly available to callers and need not be mediated by the video renderer. As such, pipelines for simply decoding the media (without rendering) or post-processing and rendering (without decoding) can also be created. These features require the Windows Display Driver Model
drivers.
Windows Vista
also introduces a new video renderer, available as both a Media Foundation
component and a DirectShow
filter, called the Enhanced Video Renderer (EVR). EVR is designed to work with Desktop Window Manager
.
DXVA 2.0 supports only Enhanced Video Renderer as the video renderer on Windows Vista. DXVA integrates with Media Foundation
and allows DXVA pipelines to be exposed as Media Foundation Transforms (MFTs). Even decoder pipelines or post-processing pipelines can be exposed as MFTs, which can be used by the Media Foundation
topology loader to create a full media playback pipeline. DXVA 1.0 is emulated using DXVA 2.0.
(WIC) is a new extensible imaging framework that allows applications supporting the framework to automatically get support of installed codecs for graphics file formats. Windows Presentation Foundation
applications also automatically support the installed image codecs. Third party developers can write their own image codecs for their specific image file formats. By default, Windows Vista ships with the JPEG
, TIFF, GIF
, PNG, BMP and HD Photo
codecs. Codecs for RAW
image formats used generally by high-end digital cameras are also supported in this manner. Windows Explorer
, Windows Photo Gallery
and Windows Photo Gallery Viewer are based on this new framework and can thus view and organize images in any format for which the necessary codecs are installed.
HD Photo (previously known as Windows Media Photo) is a photographic still image file format, that is introduced with Windows Vista. It supports features such as high dynamic range imaging
, lossy as well as lossless compression, up to 32-bpp
fixed
or floating point
representation, transparency, RGB
, CMYK
and n-channel color space
s, Radiance
RGBE
, embedded ICC
color profiles, multiple images per file and support for Exif
and XMP
metadata
formats. It is the preferred image format for XPS
documents.
. Its goal is to obtain color consistency across various software and hardware, including cameras, monitors, printers and scanners. Different devices interpret the same colors differently, according to their software and hardware configurations. As a result, they must be properly calibrated to reproduce colors consistently across different devices. WCS aims to make this process of color calibration automatic and transparent, as an evolution of ICC Color Profiles.
Windows Color System is based on a completely new Color Infrastructure and Translation Engine (CITE). It is backed up by a new color processing pipeline that supports bit-depths more than 32 bits per pixel, multiple color channels (more than 3), alternative color spaces and high dynamic range coloring, using a technology named Kyuanos developed by Canon
. The color processing pipeline allows device developers to add their own gamut
mapping algorithm into the pipeline to customize the color response of the device. The new pipeline also uses floating point calculations to minimize round-off losses, which are inherent in integer processing. Once the color pipeline finishes processing the colors, the CITE engine applies a color transform according to a color profile, specific to a device to ensure the output color matches to what is expected.
WCS features explicit support for LCD as well as CRT monitors, projectors, printers, and other imaging devices and provides customized support for each. WCS uses color profiles according to the CIE Color Appearance Model recommendation (CIECAM02
), defined using XML
, to define how the color representation actually translates to a visible color. ICC
V4 color profiles are also supported. Windows Photo Gallery
and Photo Viewer, Windows Imaging Component
, the HD Photo format, XPS
print path and XPS documents all support color management.
link state power management, processor state etc., and also allows configuring power settings for specific scenarios such as while sharing media files, giving a presentation, adaptive display mode and while indexing files.
In earlier Windows versions, drivers sometimes prevented Windows from entering or reliably resuming from a power-saving state. This problem has been solved in Windows Vista. Applications can disable sleep idle timers when needed such as when burning discs or recording media. Away mode, which is not a power plan by itself but a feature, automatically turns off displays, video rendering and sound but keeps the computer working when the user is away from the computer. Optionally, it can also switch to sleep mode. Power settings are also configurable through Group Policy.
The battery icon in the notification area has been improved to let the user more easily select a "Power plan". "Presentation Settings", through the Transient Multimon Manager (TMM), allow saving of display preferences when an external display such as a projector or external monitor is connected. The setting can be restored when the same device is re-connected later. Presentation settings are available only on mobile computers.
Beginning with Windows Vista Service Pack 1, the operating system can turn off periodic VSync interrupt counting of CPU when the screen is not being refreshed from new graphics or mouse activity. This can result in significant energy savings.
:
Segoe UI
is complemented by the following:
Four new Asian Segoe-UI-like fonts have been added:
Windows Vista
Windows Vista is an operating system released in several variations developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, tablet PCs, and media center PCs...
(formerly codenamed Longhorn) has many new features compared with previous Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
versions, covering most aspects of the operating system.
This article discusses the changes most likely to be of interest to non-technical users. The companion article, Technical features new to Windows Vista
Technical features new to Windows Vista
Windows Vista has many significant new features compared with previous Microsoft Windows versions, covering most aspects of the operating system....
, discusses the technical advancements in Windows Vista, while the article Security and safety features new to Windows Vista
Security and safety features new to Windows Vista
There are a number of security and safety features new to Windows Vista, most of which are not available in any prior Microsoft Windows operating system release....
discusses the security advancements. The article Management features new to Windows Vista
Management features new to Windows Vista
Windows Vista contains a range of new technologies and features that are intended to help network administrators and power users better manage their systems...
discusses the management and administrative improvements, which may be of interest to IT professionals.
Windows Aero
Premium editions of Windows Vista include a redesigned user interface and visual style, named Windows Aero (Authentic, Energetic, Reflective and Open). Aero is intended to be cleaner and more aesthetically pleasing than previous Windows versions, including glass-like transparencies and window animations. Windows Aero also features a new default font (Segoe UISegoe UI
Segoe is a Humanist typeface family that is best known for its usage by Microsoft. The company uses Segoe in their online and printed marketing materials, including recent logos for a number of products...
) with a slightly larger size, a streamlined style for wizards
Wizard (software)
A software wizard or setup assistant is a user interface type that presents a user with a sequence of dialog boxes that lead the user through a series of well-defined steps. Tasks that are complex, infrequently performed, or unfamiliar may be easier to perform using a wizard...
, and a change in the tone and phrasing of most of the dialogs and control panels.
In addition to the Windows Aero visual style, Windows Vista Home Basic exclusively includes a "Windows Vista Standard" theme which has the same hardware requirements as "Windows Aero", and therefore uses the Desktop Window Manager
Desktop Window Manager
Desktop Window Manager is the window manager in Windows Vista and Windows 7 that enables the Windows Aero graphical user interface and visual theme. The Desktop Window Manager requires video cards supporting DirectX 9.0 and Shader Model 2.0. DWM is not included with Windows Vista Starter edition...
for desktop composition, but does not include the ability to generate live thumbnails of running applications, nor does it allow transparency of the window frame. As a result, 3D effects and other features associated with live thumbnails are not included with this theme.
Included with all versions, there is a "Windows Vista Basic" theme which does not use desktop composition, and is geared towards lower-end machines that are not able to use the Desktop Window Manager
Desktop Window Manager
Desktop Window Manager is the window manager in Windows Vista and Windows 7 that enables the Windows Aero graphical user interface and visual theme. The Desktop Window Manager requires video cards supporting DirectX 9.0 and Shader Model 2.0. DWM is not included with Windows Vista Starter edition...
; this theme being comparable to the Luna XP theme. Finally Vista includes the "Windows Classic" and "Windows Standard" themes which are similar to the classic themes in Windows 2000 and Windows XP. Windows Aero
Windows Aero
Windows Aero is the graphical user interface and the default theme in most editions of Windows Vista and Windows 7, operating systems released by Microsoft. It is also available in Windows Server 2008, but is not enabled by default. Its name is a backronym for Authentic, Energetic, Reflective and...
is not available in Windows Vista Home Basic and Starter editions, although the Desktop Window Manager
Desktop Window Manager
Desktop Window Manager is the window manager in Windows Vista and Windows 7 that enables the Windows Aero graphical user interface and visual theme. The Desktop Window Manager requires video cards supporting DirectX 9.0 and Shader Model 2.0. DWM is not included with Windows Vista Starter edition...
is included in Windows Vista Home Basic.
Start menu
In Windows VistaWindows Vista
Windows Vista is an operating system released in several variations developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, tablet PCs, and media center PCs...
, the Start Menu has undergone major changes, with the taskbar icon no longer labeled "Start" but instead has the Windows pearl orb. At the top level, the Start Menu, as in Windows XP, has two columns of menu choices. Under the default configuration, the "Run," and "Printers" options do not appear. However, those items can be added to the Start Menu. One of the chief additions with Windows Vista is a Search pane or box, where users may begin typing immediately. The contents of the Start menu itself are indexed and searchable, besides the global search index. If indexing is turned on, the search box returns results on-the-fly as users type into it. This allows the Start menu to act as a fast and powerful application launcher. The Start menu search also doubles as the Run command from previous versions of Windows; simply typing any command will execute it. The Run command can also be added separately to the right column in the Start menu.
Another major change to the Start menu in Windows Vista is that it no longer presents the All programs menu as a horizontally expanding cascading list which utilizes the entire screen space, but instead as a nested folder view with a fixed size. The list of submenus and single items appears over the left column contents with a Back button below it. Subfolders expand and collapse vertically within the list when single-clicked, in a tree-like fashion similar to Windows Explorer. Single items appear at the top and folders appear at the bottom. Hovering the mouse over a folder does not open it; the folder needs to be clicked. A limitation of the new Start menu is that subfolders inside the All Programs menu cannot be opened simply by searching or double clicking. Also, as more programs are installed, a vertical scroll bar appears between the two columns. A dynamically changing icon showing the user's display picture by default is present at the top of the right column. It changes as users hover over any other item to reflect that item's icon. The Power button's action is configurable through Power options in the Control Panel, though the default setting is to put the computer into Sleep mode. Users can quickly lock their user account by pressing the Lock button. Additional power and account related actions are listed in a sub-menu which appears when the small arrow next to the Lock button is clicked.
Like Windows XP, Windows Vista allows users to switch back to the pre-Windows XP style "Classic" Start menu, however, the Search box is not present on the Classic Start menu.
Layout and visualization
Windows Explorer's task pane has been removed, integrating the relevant task options into the toolbar. A Favorites pane on the left contains commonly accessed folders and prepopulated Search Folders. Seven different views are available to view files and folders, namely, List, Details, Small icons, Medium icons, Large icons, Extra large icons or Tiles. File and folder actions such as Cut, Copy, Paste, Undo, Redo, Delete, Rename and Properties are built into a dropdown menu which appears when the Organize button is clicked. It is also possible to change the layout of the Explorer window by using the Organize button. Users can select whether to display Classic Menus, a Search Pane, a Preview Pane, a Reading Pane, and/or the Navigation Pane. Document Properties are available from the common 'Open' and 'Save' dialog boxes, so it is easier to add metadata (such as author or subject) to a document. The metadata can be viewed and edited in the Details Pane that shows up at the bottom of an Explorer window. The Navigation Pane contains a list of most common folders (the Favorites) for quick navigation. It can also show the folder layout of the entire hard drive or a subset of it. It can contain both real folders as well as virtual ones. By default it contains links to folders such as Documents and the publicly shared folder, as well as virtual folders that search and present the saved virtual folders and that lists the recently changed documents. The Preview Pane can be used to preview the contents of a document, including viewing pictures in a size larger than the thumbnails shown in the folder listing, and sampling contents of a media file, without opening any additional program. Explorer can show a preview for any image format if the necessary codec authored using the Windows Imaging ComponentWindows Imaging Component
The Windows Imaging Component is a Component Object Model based imaging codec framework introduced in Windows Vista and Windows XP Service Pack 3 for working with and processing digital images and image metadata...
is installed. Also, if an application installs Preview handlers (like Office 2007
Microsoft Office 2007
Microsoft Office 2007 is a Windows version of the Microsoft Office System, Microsoft's productivity suite. Formerly known as Office 12 in the initial stages of its beta cycle, it was released to volume license customers on November 30, 2006 and made available to retail customers on January 30, 2007...
does), then the documents can be edited in the preview pane itself.
Windows Explorer also contains modifications in the visualization of files on a computer. A new addition to Windows Explorer is the Details pane, which displays metadata and information relating to the currently selected file or folder. Windows Vista introduces a newer IThumbnailProvider interface that shows thumbnails in the Details pane as well as in large icon views. Furthermore, different imagery is overlaid on thumbnails to give more information about the file, such as a picture frame around the thumbnail of an image file, or a filmstrip on a video file. Thumbnails can be zoomed on. The preview panel allows you to see thumbnails of all sorts of files and view the contents of documents, similar to the way you can preview email messages in Outlook, without opening the files. There's a new intelligent algorithm for creation of Video thumbnails, which chooses a random frame inside the video and ensures the thumbnail is not black (XP showed the first frame, it was usually black).
The address bar has been modified to present a breadcrumbs
Breadcrumb (navigation)
Breadcrumbs or breadcrumb trail is a navigation aid used in user interfaces. It allows users to keep track of their locations within programs or documents. The term comes from the trail of breadcrumbs left by Hansel and Gretel in the popular fairytale....
view, which shows the full path to the current location. Clicking any location in the path hierarchy takes the user to that level, instead of repeatedly pressing the Back button. This is roughly analogous to what is possible prior to Windows Vista by pressing the small down-arrow next to "Back" and selecting any folder from a list of previously accessed folders. It is also possible to navigate to any subfolder of the current folder using the arrow to the right of the last item, or to click in the space to the right of this to copy or edit the path manually. As with many other Microsoft-made Windows Vista applications, the menu bar is hidden by default. Pressing the Alt key makes the menu bar appear. Free and used space on all drives is shown in horizontal indicator bars. Check boxes allow the selection of multiple files. When items are grouped, clicking the group header selects all items under that group. Multiple groups of files can also be selected by clicking the group headers while holding down Ctrl.
Icons
IconsIcon (computing)
A computer icon is a pictogram displayed on a computer screen and used to navigate a computer system or mobile device. The icon itself is a small picture or symbol serving as a quick, intuitive representation of a software tool, function or a data file accessible on the system. It functions as an...
in Windows Vista are visually more realistic than illustrative. Icons are scalable in size up to 256 × 256 pixels. Required icon sizes are 16 × 16, 32 × 32, and 256 × 256. Optional sizes are 24 × 24, 48 × 48, 64 × 64, 96 × 96, and 128 × 128. Document icons show the actual document contents and several media types are distinguished by icon overlays (video, audio, photos). The icons can be zoomed in and out using a gradual slider or by holding down the Ctrl key and using the mouse scroll wheel. To optimize and reduce the size of large icons, icons may be stored as compressed PNGs. To maintain backward compatibility with earlier versions of Windows, only larger sized icons can use lossless PNG
Organizing & metadata
Windows Explorer includes significant changes from previous versions of Windows in terms of organization. Column headers are available in all Explorer views and allow filtering, sorting, grouping and stacking. Combined with integrated desktop search, Explorer allows users to find and organize their files in new ways, such as "Stacks". The "Stacks" view groups files according to the criterion specified by the user. Stacks can be clicked to filter the files shown in Windows Explorer. Windows Explorer also sorts files on-the-fly automatically as they are renamed or pasted.The Details pane also allows for the change of some textual metadata such as "Author" and "Title" in files that support them within Windows Explorer. A new type of metadata called tags allows users to add descriptive terms to documents for easier categorization and retrieval. Some files support open metadata, allowing users to define new types of metadata for their files. Out of the box, Windows Vista supports Microsoft Office documents and most audio files. Metadata support for other file types can however be added by writing Property handlers. Unlike previous versions of Windows, all metadata is stored inside the file, so that it will always travel with the file. However, initially, users will be able to add metadata to only a few file types.
File operations
When moving or copying files, Windows Explorer displays the full source and destination path, size and number of items and the transfer speed in megabytes per second (MB/s). If a conflict or error is encountered, it does not terminate the copy, move or delete operation. Rather, the file is skipped and the rest of the files processed. At the end of the operation, the errors are presented to the user with resolution options (if available). If two files have the same name, an option is available to rename the file; in previous versions of Windows, the only options were to either replace the destination file or cancel the process. The user can also choose to apply the same action to further conflicts, if any. Also, for the first time in Windows, processing of dates when moving trees is somewhat consistent. Until now, every folder and subfolder obtained all three dates new to the time of operation. This was from the own nature of the operation at the file system level, create destination folders, move files, delete origin folders. Moved folders in Vista preserve creation and modification dates. Access date gets the time of the operation.When renaming a file, even when extensions are being displayed, Explorer highlights only the filename without selecting the extension. Renaming multiple files is quicker as pressing Tab automatically renames the existing file or folder and opens the file name text field for the next file for renaming. Shift+Tab allow renaming in the same manner upwards.
In case a file is in use or "locked" by another application, Windows Explorer informs users to close the application and retry the file operation. Also, a new interface
IFileIsInUse is introduced into the API which developers can use to let other applications switch to the main window of the application that has the file open or simply close the file from the "File In Use" dialog. If the running application exposes these operations by means of the IFileIsInUse interface, Windows Explorer, upon encountering a locked file, allows the user to close the file or switch to the application from the dialog box itself.Default Programs
A common issue in previous Windows versions was that competing applications doing common tasks each tried to associate themselves as the default for a certain file type using their own custom user interface. The default application information for a particular file type was stored in the registry on a per-machine basis, resulting in applications changing another user's default program when one user's defaults were changed and each application querying several different registry values when launched. In Windows Vista onwards, file type associationsFile association
A file association associates a file with an application capable of opening that file. More commonly, a file association associates a class of files with a corresponding application .-Associations and verbs:A single file extension may have several associations for performing various actions, also...
and protocol handlers can be set on a per-user basis using the new Default Programs API, meaning default programs for file types and tasks can be different for each individual user. There is an API for calling a common user interface so applications no longer need to maintain their own file association UI. The Default Programs API gives applications a programmatic way to check for and discover other default applications, restore a single or all registered defaults, query for the owner of a specific default file association/protocol, launch the Default Programs UI for a specific application or clear all per user associations. Applications only need to registered at install time to be part of Default Programs.
Windows Flip and Flip 3D
Windows Ultimate Extras
Windows Ultimate Extras are optional features offered to users of Windows VistaWindows Vista
Windows Vista is an operating system released in several variations developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, tablet PCs, and media center PCs...
Ultimate
Windows Vista editions
Windows Vista is available in six different marketing editions. With the exception of Windows Vista Starter, all editions support both 32-bit and 64-bit processor architectures....
, accessible from Windows Update
Windows Update
Windows Update is a service provided by Microsoft that provides updates for the Microsoft Windows operating system and its installed components, including Internet Explorer...
. They include Windows DreamScene
Windows DreamScene
Windows DreamScene is a utility that allows videos and other optimized animations to be used as desktop wallpapers. It is one of the Windows Ultimate Extras. Prior to its official announcement, DreamScene was rumored to be in creation under the names Motion Desktop and Borealis...
, a utility that allows videos to be used as desktop backgrounds, MUI packs, Windows Sound Schemes, games and BitLocker enhancements.
Other shell improvements
- The Date and Time control panel has been rewritten completely for Windows Vista and allows two additional clocks to be displayed in analog and digital style which can be from other time zones. The calendar control is also enhanced.
- Detection of Blu-ray DiscBlu-ray DiscBlu-ray Disc is an optical disc storage medium designed to supersede the DVD format. The plastic disc is 120 mm in diameter and 1.2 mm thick, the same size as DVDs and CDs. Blu-ray Discs contain 25 GB per layer, with dual layer discs being the norm for feature-length video discs...
, HD DVDHD DVDHD DVD is a discontinued high-density optical disc format for storing data and high-definition video.Supported principally by Toshiba, HD DVD was envisioned to be the successor to the standard DVD format...
, Super Video CDSuper Video CDSuper Video CD is a digital format for storing video on standard compact discs. SVCD was intended as a successor to Video CD and an alternative to DVD-Video, and falls somewhere between both in terms of technical capability and picture quality...
and Video CDVideo CDBefore the advent of DVD and Blu-ray, the Video CD became the first format for distributing films on standard 120 mm optical discs. The format is a standard digital format for storing video on a Compact Disc...
were added to AutoPlayAutoPlayAutoPlay, a feature introduced in Windows XP, examines newly discovered removable media and devices and, based on content such as pictures, music or video files, launches an appropriate application to play or display the content. It is closely related to the AutoRun operating system feature...
. AutoPlay in Windows Vista and later is a global Control Panel setting instead of a per-device setting. - It is now possible to install and select non-English languages on a per-user basis which transforms the entire shell user interface and applications into Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Japanese or Spanish from the next login. This feature is only available in the Enterprise and Ultimate editions of Windows Vista.
- JPEGJPEGIn computing, JPEG . The degree of compression can be adjusted, allowing a selectable tradeoff between storage size and image quality. JPEG typically achieves 10:1 compression with little perceptible loss in image quality....
files can be natively set as the desktop wallpaperComputer wallpaperWallpaper is an image used as a background of a graphical user interface on a computer screen or mobile communications device. On a computer it is usually for the desktop, while for a mobile phone it is usually the background for the 'home' or 'idle' screen...
without using Active DesktopActive DesktopActive Desktop was a feature of Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0's optional Windows Desktop Update that allows the user to add HTML content to the desktop, along with some other features. This function was intended to be installed on the then-current Windows 95 operating system...
(which is no longer supported). Also, the aspect ratioAspect ratioThe aspect ratio of a shape is the ratio of its longer dimension to its shorter dimension. It may be applied to two characteristic dimensions of a three-dimensional shape, such as the ratio of the longest and shortest axis, or for symmetrical objects that are described by just two measurements,...
of images is maintained properly while applying them as the desktop wallpaper. - Windows Vista includes new Disk CleanupDisk CleanupDisk Cleanup is a computer maintenance utility included in Microsoft Windows designed to free up disk space on a computer's hard drive. The utility first searches and analyzes the hard drive for files that are no longer of any use, and then removes the unnecessary files...
handlers for cleaning up setup log files, system error memory dumps and the thumbnail cache. - A Property Sheet shell extension known as Previous Versions can revert the contents of any file to an arbitrary point in the past from the file's Properties. The Previous Versions feature utilizes Shadow Copy, a storage backup technology introduced in Windows Server 2003.
- Dialog boxDialog boxIn a graphical user interface of computers, a dialog box is a type of window used to enable reciprocal communication or "dialog" between a computer and its user. It may communicate information to the user, prompt the user for a response, or both...
es also display their status on the taskbarTaskbarIn computing, a taskbar is a bar displayed on a full edge of a GUI desktop that is used to launch and monitor running applications. Microsoft incorporated a taskbar in Windows 95 and it has been a defining aspect of Microsoft Windows's graphical user interface ever since. Some desktop environments,...
. Previously, only windowsWindow (computing)In computing, a window is a visual area containing some kind of user interface. It usually has a rectangular shape that can overlap with the area of other windows...
showed their status on the taskbar. - The Version tab that appeared for binary files with version information in Windows XP and the Summary tab that appeared for all files on NTFS volumes have been combined into a single Details tab. If a Property handler is installed, the Details property sheet allows editing file metadata similar to the Details pane. Windows Explorer has built-in ability to remove any extra metadata associated with the file (Remove Properties and Personal Information).
- Windows Vista includes context menu commands for folders to open a command prompt at the selected folder and to copy their path. Shortcut items have a context menu to open their target location. A sound event and shell overlay icon are also present for User Account ControlUser Account ControlUser Account Control is a technology and security infrastructure introduced with Microsoft's Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 operating systems, with a more relaxed version also present in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2...
. - A new Task Dialog API to address the common misuse of the old Message Box API and make designing custom dialogs easier.
- Common dialogs for applications such as Open, Save, Choose folder, Print, Page Setup, Font have been enhanced.
- Windows Vista includes a Games folder (also known as the Games Explorer), which provides access to all installed games from a single location, thereby making it easy to manage multiple games.
- WebDAVWebDAVWeb-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning is a set of methods based on the Hypertext Transfer Protocol that facilitates collaboration between users in editing and managing documents and files stored on World Wide Web servers...
has been enhanced to support operation over SSL connections, as well as connecting on alternate ports. An update for Windows XPWindows XPWindows XP is an operating system produced by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops and media centers. First released to computer manufacturers on August 24, 2001, it is the second most popular version of Windows, based on installed user base...
SP2 which supports this feature is also available. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/892211 However, in Windows VistaWindows VistaWindows Vista is an operating system released in several variations developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, tablet PCs, and media center PCs...
, only the WebDAV redirector is present while the original "Web folders" client has been removed. The Web Folders client is only installed if Office 2003 or an earlier version of Office is installed. - Improvements to the Windows C++ standard and common controls.
Windows Search
Windows Vista features system-wide integrated search, called Instant Search (also known as Windows Search). Instant Search is designed to run significantly faster and offers more customized search capabilities. Search boxes have been added throughout the Explorer user interface, to the Start menu, Open/Save dialog boxes, and several of the applications included with Windows Vista. By default, Instant Search indexes only a small number of folders such as the start menu, the names of files opened, the Documents folder, and the user's e-mail. Beyond searching for files, search works with Help, Control Panel, Networking, and more. In Control Panel, for example, typing "firewall" will instantly return all applets that have to do with the system firewall.Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
's Windows Desktop Search 3.0 (Windows Search
Windows Search
Windows Search is an indexed desktop search platform released by Microsoft for the Windows operating system....
version 4.0 in Vista SP2), allowing third-party applications (e.g. Microsoft Outlook
Microsoft Outlook
Microsoft Outlook is a personal information manager from Microsoft, available both as a separate application as well as a part of the Microsoft Office suite...
2007) to use the indexing platform to store metadata
Metadata
The term metadata is an ambiguous term which is used for two fundamentally different concepts . Although the expression "data about data" is often used, it does not apply to both in the same way. Structural metadata, the design and specification of data structures, cannot be about data, because at...
and perform searches on Windows Vista or Windows XP (with the Windows Desktop Search redistributable installed). This is in contrast to the search engine of Windows XP, which takes some time to display results, and only after the user has finished typing the search string. The Windows Vista search allows users to add multiple filters to continually refine search results (Such as "File contains the word 'example'"). It is also possible to search across RSS and Atom
Atom (standard)
The name Atom applies to a pair of related standards. The Atom Syndication Format is an XML language used for web feeds, while the Atom Publishing Protocol is a simple HTTP-based protocol for creating and updating web resources.Web feeds allow software programs to check for updates published on a...
feeds, straight from Windows Explorer. Windows search uses IFilters
IFilters
An IFilter is a plugin that allows the Windows Indexing Service and the newer Windows Desktop Search to index different file formats so that they become searchable. Without an appropriate IFilter, contents of a file cannot be parsed and indexed by the search engine...
that are used by Windows Desktop Search as well. The IFilter interface can be implemented by software makers so that files created by their applications can be better integrated with search and indexing programs.
Searching can also be done from the box at the bottom of the start menu, so it is possible to start a program from here by typing its name, for example "Calc" to start the calculator, "Word" to start Microsoft Word, "Mail" to open Windows Mail, a web address to start the default browser at a particular site, the default search engine, or even a folder name, filename or network share name.
There is also the ability to save searches as a Search Folder
Virtual folder
In computing, a virtual folder generally denotes an organizing principle for files that is not dependent on location in a hierarchical directory tree...
where opening the folder will execute a specific search automatically and display the results as a normal folder. A search folder is just an XML file which stores the search query, including the search operators as well. When these files are accessed, the search is run with the saved query string and the results presented as a virtual folder. Windows Vista also supports query composition, where a saved search (called a scope) can be nested within the query string of another search. These virtual folders are also distributable via RSS
RSS (file format)
RSS is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works—such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video—in a standardized format...
.
Windows Vista also features an enhanced file content search for non-indexed locations, whereby the files being scanned are processed by the same IFilters that would be used for indexing, therefore offering more consistent results between indexed and non-indexed searches as well as the ability for third-parties to add support for additional file formats to have their content searched.
Windows Sidebar
Windows Sidebar is a new panel which can be placed on either the left or the right-hand side of the screen where a user can place Desktop Gadgets, which are small applets designed for a specialized purpose (such as displaying the weather or sports scores). The gadgets can also be placed on other parts of the desktop, if desired, by dragging. By default, Windows Vista ships with 11 gadgets: Calendar, Clock, Contacts, CPU Meter, Currency Conversion, Feed Headlines, Notes, Picture Puzzle, Slide Show, Stocks, and Weather. Additional gadgets are published at Microsoft's web site, which offers both Microsoft-created and user-submitted gadgets in a gallery.
Gadgets
Microsoft Gadgets
Microsoft Gadgets are lightweight single-purpose applications, or software widgets, that can sit on a Microsoft Windows user's computer desktop, or are hosted on a web page...
are written using a combination of DHTML
Dynamic HTML
Dynamic HTML, or DHTML, is an umbrella term for a collection of technologies used together to create interactive and animated web sites by using a combination of a static markup language , a client-side scripting language , a presentation definition language , and the Document Object Model.DHTML...
for visual layout, JScript
JScript
JScript is a scripting language based on the ECMAScript standard that is used in Microsoft's Internet Explorer.JScript is implemented as a Windows Script engine. This means that it can be "plugged in" to any application that supports Windows Script, such as Internet Explorer, Active Server Pages,...
and VBScript
VBScript
VBScript is an Active Scripting language developed by Microsoft that is modeled on Visual Basic. It is designed as a “lightweight” language with a fast interpreter for use in a wide variety of Microsoft environments...
for functional code, and an XML
Extensible Markup Language
Extensible Markup Language is a set of rules for encoding documents in machine-readable form. It is defined in the XML 1.0 Specification produced by the W3C, and several other related specifications, all gratis open standards....
file for defining the gadget's metadata (author name, description, etc.) The gadget is then distributed as a ZIP file with a .gadget extension. Displaying the gadget using DHTML
Dynamic HTML
Dynamic HTML, or DHTML, is an umbrella term for a collection of technologies used together to create interactive and animated web sites by using a combination of a static markup language , a client-side scripting language , a presentation definition language , and the Document Object Model.DHTML...
allows the same gadget to be used on Microsoft's Live.com
Live.com
Windows Live Personalized Experience was a customizable portal launched by Microsoft in early November 2005. It was one of the first Windows Live services to launch.- Features :...
and Windows Live Spaces
Windows Live Spaces
Windows Live Spaces was Microsoft's blogging and social networking platform. The site was originally released in early 2004 as MSN Spaces to compete with other social networking sites, and re-launched in 2006 as a part of a shifting of community services away from the MSN brand...
sites. Alternatively, on Windows Vista, the gadget can detect that WPF
Windows Presentation Foundation
Developed by Microsoft, the Windows Presentation Foundation is a computer-software graphical subsystem for rendering user interfaces in Windows-based applications. WPF, previously known as "Avalon", was initially released as part of .NET Framework 3.0. Rather than relying on the older GDI...
is available and take advantage of its graphical abilities to display differently from the web version.
New and upgraded applications
- Backup and Restore CenterBackup and Restore CenterBackup and Restore is a component of Microsoft Windows introduced in Windows Vista and included in later versions that allows users to create backup. It is a replacement of NTBackup, which was included in previous Windows versions.-Features:There are two different types of backup supported: File...
also known as Windows Backup Status and ConfigurationBackup and Restore CenterBackup and Restore is a component of Microsoft Windows introduced in Windows Vista and included in later versions that allows users to create backup. It is a replacement of NTBackup, which was included in previous Windows versions.-Features:There are two different types of backup supported: File...
replaces NTBackupNTBackupNTBackup is the built-in backup application introduced in Windows NT around 1997 and part of all subsequent versions up to and including Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003. It uses a proprietary backup format to back up files. Files can be backed up to tape, ZIP drives, floppy...
although Windows NT Backup Restore Utility is available for download Backup and Restore Center operates in two modes: (a) Backup/Restore selected files or (b) Complete PC Backup. If using Complete PC Backup, incremental snapshots are stored on external hard disk or optical media, and the complete system can be restored to protect against hardware failure or severe software damage. Automatic scheduling of file backups is not available in Vista Home Basic. Complete PC Backup is not available in Vista Home Basic and Home Premium. - Windows MailWindows MailWindows Mail is an email and newsgroup client included in Windows Vista, that was superseded by Windows Live Mail. It is the successor to Outlook Express. Microsoft previewed Windows Mail on Channel 9 on October 10, 2005....
replaces Outlook ExpressOutlook ExpressOutlook Express is an email and news client that is included with Internet Explorer versions 4.0 through 6.0. As such, it is also bundled with several versions of Microsoft Windows, from Windows 98 to Windows Server 2003, and is available for Windows 3.x, Windows NT 3.51, Windows 95 and Mac OS 9...
, the emailEmailElectronic mail, commonly known as email or e-mail, is a method of exchanging digital messages from an author to one or more recipients. Modern email operates across the Internet or other computer networks. Some early email systems required that the author and the recipient both be online at the...
client in previous Windows versions. It incorporates a Phishing Filter like the one found in IE7 as well as Bayesian junk mail filteringBayesian spam filteringBayesian spam filtering is a statistical technique of e-mail filtering. It makes use of a naive Bayes classifier to identify spam e-mail.Bayesian classifiers work by correlating the use of tokens , with spam and non spam e-mails and then using Bayesian inference to calculate a probability that an...
which is updated monthly via Windows Update. Also, e-mail messages are now stored as individual files rather than in a binary database to reduce frequent corruption and make messages searchable in real-time. Backing up and restoring account setup information, configuration and mail store is now made easier. It does however omit some features of Outlook Express , such as identities and a "Block sender" for Usenet access. Windows Mail is itself being replaced with Windows Live MailWindows Live MailWindows Live Mail is a free of charge email client from Microsoft's Windows Live set of products. It is intended to be a successor for Outlook Express on Windows XP and Windows Mail on Windows Vista...
. - Windows ContactsWindows ContactsWindows Contacts is a contact manager which is included in Windows Vista and Windows 7 which replaced and retained most of the functionality of Windows Address Book. Windows Mail integrates with it. Windows Contacts uses a new XML-based schema format where each contact appears as an...
, a new unified contact and personal information management application, replaces Windows Address BookWindows Address BookWindows Address Book is a component of Microsoft Windows that lets users keep a single list of contacts that can be shared by multiple programs. It is most commonly used by Outlook Express. It was introduced with Internet Explorer 3 in 1996 and improved in subsequent versions. The Windows Address...
(WAB). It is based on a new XMLXMLExtensible Markup Language is a set of rules for encoding documents in machine-readable form. It is defined in the XML 1.0 Specification produced by the W3C, and several other related specifications, all gratis open standards....
based file format where each contact appears as an individual .contact file, and features extensibility APIs for integration with other applications. It can store custom information related to contacts, including display pictures. The legacy *.wab format and the open standard *.vcf (vCardVCardvCard is a file format standard for electronic business cards. vCards are often attached to e-mail messages, but can be exchanged in other ways, such as on the World Wide Web or Instant Messaging...
) and *.csv (Comma separated values) file formats are also supported. - Windows CalendarWindows CalendarWindows Calendar is a calendar application that is included with Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008. It natively supports the iCalendar file format, and has the ability to publish and subscribe to web-based calendars by using HTTP and WebDAV...
is the new calendar application that is included in Windows Vista. It supports the popular iCalendarICalendariCalendar is a computer file format which allows Internet users to send meeting requests and tasks to other Internet users, via email, or sharing files with an extension of .ics...
format as well as sharing, subscribing and publishing of calendars on WebDAVWebDAVWeb-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning is a set of methods based on the Hypertext Transfer Protocol that facilitates collaboration between users in editing and managing documents and files stored on World Wide Web servers...
-enabled web servers and network shares. - Windows Fax and ScanWindows Fax and ScanWindows Fax and Scan is an integrated faxing and scanning application included in some versions of the Windows Vista operating system and all versions of Windows 7. Windows XP includes Fax Console instead.-Features:...
, which is available only in the Business, Ultimate and Enterprise editions of Windows Vista, is an integrated faxing and scanning application. With this users can send and receive faxes, fax or email scanned documents and forward faxes as email attachments from the computer. It replaces (or enhances) the 'Fax Services' component which was available as an optional component in Windows XPWindows XPWindows XP is an operating system produced by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops and media centers. First released to computer manufacturers on August 24, 2001, it is the second most popular version of Windows, based on installed user base...
. By connecting a scannerImage scannerIn computing, an image scanner—often abbreviated to just scanner—is a device that optically scans images, printed text, handwriting, or an object, and converts it to a digital image. Common examples found in offices are variations of the desktop scanner where the document is placed on a glass...
and a fax-capable modemModemA modem is a device that modulates an analog carrier signal to encode digital information, and also demodulates such a carrier signal to decode the transmitted information. The goal is to produce a signal that can be transmitted easily and decoded to reproduce the original digital data...
to the computer, users can preview documents before scanning them and can choose to directly fax or email the scanned documents. The user interfaceUser interfaceThe user interface, in the industrial design field of human–machine interaction, is the space where interaction between humans and machines occurs. The goal of interaction between a human and a machine at the user interface is effective operation and control of the machine, and feedback from the...
resembles that of 'Windows MailWindows MailWindows Mail is an email and newsgroup client included in Windows Vista, that was superseded by Windows Live Mail. It is the successor to Outlook Express. Microsoft previewed Windows Mail on Channel 9 on October 10, 2005....
' with preview pane, tree views etc. - Windows Meeting SpaceWindows Meeting SpaceWindows Meeting Space is the name of a peer-to-peer collaboration program in Windows Vista that supports 2–10 users. Meeting Space does not exist in any version of Windows 7...
, the replacement for NetMeeting, is a peer-to-peerPeer-to-peerPeer-to-peer computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads among peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the application...
(p2p) collaboration application. Users can share applications (or their entire desktop) with other users on the local network, or over the Internet. Windows Meeting Space allows sharing of the desktop with other co-workers, distribution and collaborative editing of documents, and passing notes to other participants. Windows Meeting Space automatically finds other users using People Near Me, a technology that uses WS-Discovery to see other users on a local network. - Paint has new features such as a crop function and the undo limit has been raised from 3 to 10.
- WordPadWordPadWordPad is a basic word processor that is included with almost all versions of Microsoft Windows from Windows 95 upwards. It is more advanced than Notepad but simpler than Microsoft Works Word Processor and Microsoft Word. It replaced Microsoft Write....
now supports the Text Services FrameworkText Services FrameworkThe Text Services Framework , is a COM framework and API in Windows XP and later Windows operating systems that supports advanced text input and text processing. The Text Services Framework is designed to offer advanced language and word processing features to applications...
, using which Windows Speech RecognitionWindows Speech RecognitionWindows Speech Recognition is a speech recognition application included in Windows Vista and more recently, Windows 7.-Features:Windows Speech Recognition allows the user to control the computer by giving specific voice commands...
is implemented. Therefore, it is possible to dictate text in WordPad, and similar other applications which support RichEdit. - Sound RecorderWindows Sound RecorderSound Recorder is an audio recording program included in Microsoft Windows. The Vista version can record for longer durations but contains fewer options, and cannot play back recorded sound....
has been rewritten and now supports recording clips of any length and saving them as WMAWindows Media AudioWindows Media Audio is an audio data compression technology developed by Microsoft. The name can be used to refer to its audio file format or its audio codecs. It is a proprietary technology that forms part of the Windows Media framework. WMA consists of four distinct codecs...
. However, saving to WAVWAVWaveform Audio File Format , is a Microsoft and IBM audio file format standard for storing an audio bitstream on PCs...
format is not supported except in the N editions of Windows Vista.
- Snipping ToolSnipping ToolSnipping Tool is an application included in Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Experience Pack for Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005. It was originally released as a powertoy for the Tablet PC launch on November 7, 2002. The program is a screen-capture tool that allows taking screenshots of an open...
, first introduced in Experience Pack for Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005, is a screen-capture tool that allows for taking screen shots (called snips) of windows, rectangular areas, or free-form areas. Snips can then be annotated, saved (as an image file or HTMLHTMLHyperText Markup Language is the predominant markup language for web pages. HTML elements are the basic building-blocks of webpages....
page), or e-mailed. - The Magnifier accessibility tool uses WPFWindows Presentation FoundationDeveloped by Microsoft, the Windows Presentation Foundation is a computer-software graphical subsystem for rendering user interfaces in Windows-based applications. WPF, previously known as "Avalon", was initially released as part of .NET Framework 3.0. Rather than relying on the older GDI...
, which in turn uses vector images to render the content. As a result, the rendered magnified image is sharp and not pixelated. However, this applies only to WPF applications. Non-WPF applications are still magnified the traditional way. Also, due to a change introduced in WPF 3.5 SP1, this functionality is lost if .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 is installed. Microsoft has also released a Magnification API to allow assistive technology applications to use the Magnifier engine.
- Windows Photo GalleryWindows Photo GalleryWindows Photo Gallery is a photo management, tagging, and editing tool developed by Microsoft, and is included with all editions of Windows Vista...
, a photo and video library management application. It can import from digital cameras, tag and rate individual pictures including custom metadata based on the Extensible Metadata PlatformExtensible Metadata PlatformThe Adobe Extensible Metadata Platform is a standard, created by Adobe Systems Inc., for processing and storing standardized and proprietary information relating to the contents of a file....
. It also allows basic editing of images, such as adjusting color and exposure, resizing, cropping, red-eye reduction and printing. Slideshows, with pan, fade and other effects, can also be created, and burnt to DVD. It allows custom metadata to be added to images and videos, and enables searching by the attributes. It also supports RAW imagesRAW image formatA camera raw image file contains minimally processed data from the image sensor of either a digital camera, image scanner, or motion picture film scanner. Raw files are so named because they are not yet processed and therefore are not ready to be printed or edited with a bitmap graphics editor...
natively and can open and organize any image format for which image codecs are installed in the Windows Imaging ComponentWindows Imaging ComponentThe Windows Imaging Component is a Component Object Model based imaging codec framework introduced in Windows Vista and Windows XP Service Pack 3 for working with and processing digital images and image metadata...
. Images and videos may be viewed in the Windows Photo Gallery Viewer with options to zoom, pan and losslessly rotate images, pause or play videos, and bring up the Info pane to view and edit metadata about a photo or video. ICC V4 color profiles embedded in images are also supported. The Photo Print Wizard has been improved to offer a lot of customizability. An upgraded version of this, Windows Live Photo GalleryWindows Live Photo GalleryWindows Live Photo Gallery is a photo management and photo sharing application released as a part of Microsoft's Windows Live initiative. It is an upgraded version of Windows Photo Gallery, which is a part of Windows Vista....
allows you to upload and share photos and videos online as part of Windows LiveWindows LiveWindows Live is the collective brand name for a set of services and software products from Microsoft, part of their software plus services platform. A majority of these services are Web applications, accessible from a browser, but there are also client-side binary applications that require...
services.
- Windows Movie MakerWindows Movie MakerWindows Movie Maker is a video creating/editing software application, included in Microsoft Windows Me, XP, and Vista. It contains features such as effects, transitions, titles/credits, audio track, timeline narration, and Auto Movie. New effects and transitions can be made and existing ones can be...
supports smooth Direct3DDirect3DDirect3D is part of Microsoft's DirectX application programming interface . Direct3D is available for Microsoft Windows operating systems , and for other platforms through the open source software Wine. It is the base for the graphics API on the Xbox and Xbox 360 console systems...
-based effects and transitions, editing and outputting HD video, importing recorded DVR-MSDVR-MSDVR-MS is a proprietary video and audio file container format, developed by Microsoft used for storing TV content recorded by Windows XP Media Center Edition, Windows Vista and Windows 7....
format videos, as well as burning the output movie on a CD. In Windows Vista Home Premium and Ultimate editions, it can import HDVHDVHDV is a format for recording of high-definition video on DV cassette tape. The format was originally developed by JVC and supported by Sony, Canon and Sharp...
video from camcorders and output video to Windows DVD MakerWindows DVD MakerWindows DVD Maker is an application included in premium editions of Windows Vista, and Windows 7 Home Premium and above editions that is designed to enable the creation of DVD movies that can be played using DVD playback software or on a standalone consumer DVD player...
for creating DVD-VideoDVD-VideoDVD-Video is a consumer video format used to store digital video on DVD discs, and is currently the dominant consumer video format in Asia, North America, Europe, and Australia. Discs using the DVD-Video specification require a DVD drive and a MPEG-2 decoder...
discs. New effects and transitions have been added. All Windows Vista Movie Maker versions require pixel shader hardware support. - Windows DVD MakerWindows DVD MakerWindows DVD Maker is an application included in premium editions of Windows Vista, and Windows 7 Home Premium and above editions that is designed to enable the creation of DVD movies that can be played using DVD playback software or on a standalone consumer DVD player...
, a DVD creation application. Applications can also pass an XML file to DVD maker for authoring and burning.
- Games: MinesweeperMinesweeper (computer game)Minesweeper is a single-player video game. The object of the game is to clear an abstract minefield without detonating a mine. The game has been written for many system platforms in use today....
, Solitaire, Hearts, FreeCellFreeCellFreeCell is a solitaire-based card game played with a 52-card standard deck. It is fundamentally different from most solitaire games in that nearly all deals can be solved...
and Spider SolitaireSpider Solitaire (Windows)Spider Solitaire is a card game that is included in Microsoft Windows. It is a version of Spider. It was first included in Microsoft Plus! for Windows 98.-Features:...
have been updated and rewritten to take advantage of Windows Vista's new graphics capabilities. Also included are new games, namely, Purble PlacePurble PlacePurble Place is a suite of computer games, developed by Oberon Games and included in Windows Vista and Windows 7 that offers an environment for children to practice pattern recognition, represented by the schoolhouse at the left of Purble Place. The object is to clear the tableau in the fewest...
, Chess TitansChess TitansChess Titans is a chess video game developed by Oberon Games and included in Windows Vista and Windows 7 Home Premium, Business/Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate.-Graphics:...
and Mahjong TitansMahjong TitansMahjong Titans is a computer game version of mahjong solitaire developed by Oberon Games and included in Windows Vista and Windows 7 Home Premium, Business/Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate, but it can run in Windows XP, too...
. InkBallInkBallInkBall is a computer game that is included with Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005 and the Home Premium, Business, Enterprise and Ultimate editions of Windows Vista. It employs the use of a stylus or mouse to draw lines to direct balls into holes of corresponding colors...
, a game previously available only with Windows XP Tablet PC EditionTablet computerA tablet computer, or simply tablet, is a complete mobile computer, larger than a mobile phone or personal digital assistant, integrated into a flat touch screen and primarily operated by touching the screen...
, has been included and can also be played using a mouse. PinballFull Tilt! PinballFull Tilt! Pinball is a pinball video game developed by Cinematronics and published by Maxis in 1995. It featured pre-rendered 3D graphics and three "tables", which were essentially different games. The tables were called Space Cadet, Skulduggery, and Dragon's Keep...
has been dropped. As of September 2008, users of the Ultimate edition of Windows Vista can also download Texas Hold 'Em Poker and Microsoft TinkerMicrosoft TinkerMicrosoft Tinker is a puzzle video game in which the player controls a robot through various mazes and obstacle courses. It was originally released on September 23, 2008 as part of Windows Ultimate Extras, and contained 60 levels including a 20-level tutorial...
as Ultimate ExtrasWindows Ultimate ExtrasWindows Ultimate Extras are optional features offered to users of Windows Vista Ultimate Edition. They are accessible with Windows Update. Ultimate Extras replace the market role of Microsoft Plus!, a product sold for prior consumer releases of Microsoft Windows...
.
Windows Internet Explorer 7
Windows Vista includes Internet Explorer 7 and can be upgraded to later versions of Internet Explorer such as Internet Explorer 8
Internet Explorer 8
Windows Internet Explorer 8 is a web browser developed by Microsoft in the Internet Explorer browser series. The browser was released on March 19, 2009 for Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, and Windows 7. Both 32-bit and 64-bit builds are available...
or Internet Explorer 9
Internet Explorer 9
Windows Internet Explorer 9 is the current version of the Internet Explorer web browser from Microsoft. It was released to the public on March 14, 2011 at 21:00 PDT. Internet Explorer 9 supports several CSS 3 properties, embedded ICC v2 or v4 color profiles support via Windows Color System, and...
. Internet Explorer 7 adds support for tabbed browsing, Atom
Atom (standard)
The name Atom applies to a pair of related standards. The Atom Syndication Format is an XML language used for web feeds, while the Atom Publishing Protocol is a simple HTTP-based protocol for creating and updating web resources.Web feeds allow software programs to check for updates published on a...
, RSS
RSS (file format)
RSS is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works—such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video—in a standardized format...
, internationalized domain name
Internationalized domain name
An internationalized domain name is an Internet domain name that contains at least one label that is displayed in software applications, in whole or in part, in a language-specific script or alphabet, such as Arabic, Chinese, Russian, Hindi or the Latin alphabet-based characters with diacritics,...
s, a search box, a phishing
Phishing
Phishing is a way of attempting to acquire information such as usernames, passwords, and credit card details by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication. Communications purporting to be from popular social web sites, auction sites, online payment processors or IT...
filter, an anti-spoofing URL engine, fine-grained control over ActiveX add-ons, thumbnails of all open tabs in a single window (called Quick Tabs), page zoom, and tab groups. Tab groups make it possible to open a folder of Favorites in tabs with a single click. Importing bookmarks and cookies from other web browsers is also supported. Additionally, there is now proper support for PNG images with transparency as well as improvements and fixes to CSS
Cascading Style Sheets
Cascading Style Sheets is a style sheet language used to describe the presentation semantics of a document written in a markup language...
and HTML rendering. The Windows RSS Platform
Windows RSS Platform
Windows RSS Platform, included in Internet Explorer 7 and Windows Vista is a platform that exposes feed handling and management to Windows applications. The RSS support in Internet Explorer 7 is built on the Windows RSS Platform.-Overview:...
offers native RSS
RSS (file format)
RSS is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works—such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video—in a standardized format...
support, with developer APIs.
On Windows Vista, Internet Explorer operates in a special "Protected Mode", which runs the browser in a security sandbox that has no access to the rest of the operating system or file system, except the Temporary Internet Files
Temporary Internet Files
Temporary Internet Files is a folder on Microsoft Windows which holds browser caches. The directory is used by Internet Explorer and other web browsers to cache pages and other multimedia content, such as video and audio files, from websites visited by the user. This allows such websites to load...
folder. This feature aims to mitigate problems whereby newly-discovered flaws in the browser (or in ActiveX
ActiveX
ActiveX is a framework for defining reusable software components in a programming language-independent way. Software applications can then be composed from one or more of these components in order to provide their functionality....
controls hosted inside it) allowed hackers to subversively install software on the user's computer (typically spyware). Internet Explorer 7 in Windows Vista also exclusively supports Advanced Encryption Standard
Advanced Encryption Standard
Advanced Encryption Standard is a specification for the encryption of electronic data. It has been adopted by the U.S. government and is now used worldwide. It supersedes DES...
(AES) key lengths up to 256 bits outlined in RFC 3268 and certificate
Public key certificate
In cryptography, a public key certificate is an electronic document which uses a digital signature to bind a public key with an identity — information such as the name of a person or an organization, their address, and so forth...
revocation checking using Online Certificate Status Protocol
Online Certificate Status Protocol
The Online Certificate Status Protocol is an Internet protocol used for obtaining the revocation status of an X.509 digital certificate. It is described in RFC 2560 and is on the Internet standards track...
. The TLS implementation has also been updated to support extensions as outlined in RFC 3546, most notable of which is Server Name Indication
Server Name Indication
Server Name Indication is a feature that extends the SSL and TLS protocols. To properly secure the communication between a client and a server, the client requests a digital certificate from the server; once the server sends the certificate, the client examines it, uses it to encrypt the...
support.
Internet Explorer 7 additionally features an update to the WinInet API. The new version has better support for IPv6
IPv6
Internet Protocol version 6 is a version of the Internet Protocol . It is designed to succeed the Internet Protocol version 4...
, and handles hexadecimal literals in the IPv6 address. It also includes better support for Gzip
Gzip
Gzip is any of several software applications used for file compression and decompression. The term usually refers to the GNU Project's implementation, "gzip" standing for GNU zip. It is based on the DEFLATE algorithm, which is a combination of Lempel-Ziv and Huffman coding...
and deflate
DEFLATE
Deflate is a lossless data compression algorithm that uses a combination of the LZ77 algorithm and Huffman coding. It was originally defined by Phil Katz for version 2 of his PKZIP archiving tool and was later specified in RFC 1951....
compression, so that communication with a web server can be compressed and thus will require less data to be transferred. Internet Explorer Protected Mode support in WinInet is exclusive to Windows Vista and later Windows versions.
Windows Media Player 11
Windows XP
Windows XP is an operating system produced by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops and media centers. First released to computer manufacturers on August 24, 2001, it is the second most popular version of Windows, based on installed user base...
, features a revised interface. The Media Library is now presented without the category trees which were prominent in the earlier versions. Rather, on selecting the category in the left pane, the contents appear on the right, in a graphical manner with thumbnails—a departure from textual presentation of information. Missing album art can be added directly to the placeholders in the Library itself (though the program re-renders all album art imported this way into 1:1 pixel ratio, 200x200 resolution jpeg
JPEG
In computing, JPEG . The degree of compression can be adjusted, allowing a selectable tradeoff between storage size and image quality. JPEG typically achieves 10:1 compression with little perceptible loss in image quality....
s). Views for Music, Pictures, Video and Recorded TV are separate and can be chosen individually from the navigation bar. Entries for Pictures and Video show their thumbnails. Search has been upgraded to be much faster.
Windows Media Player 11 in Windows Vista Home Premium and Ultimate Editions supports MMC-5 driver commands for the AACS
Advanced Access Content System
The Advanced Access Content System is a standard for content distribution and digital rights management, intended to restrict access to and copying of the "next generation" of optical discs and DVDs. The specification was publicly released in April 2005 and the standard has been adopted as the...
content protection scheme, as well as the UDF
Universal Disk Format
Universal Disk Format is an implementation of the specification known as ISO/IEC 13346 and ECMA-167 and is an open vendor-neutral file system for computer data storage for a broad range of media. In practice, it has been most widely used for DVDs and newer optical disc formats, supplanting ISO 9660...
file system which is required for Blu-ray
Blu-ray Disc
Blu-ray Disc is an optical disc storage medium designed to supersede the DVD format. The plastic disc is 120 mm in diameter and 1.2 mm thick, the same size as DVDs and CDs. Blu-ray Discs contain 25 GB per layer, with dual layer discs being the norm for feature-length video discs...
and HD DVD
HD DVD
HD DVD is a discontinued high-density optical disc format for storing data and high-definition video.Supported principally by Toshiba, HD DVD was envisioned to be the successor to the standard DVD format...
playback. However, all of the codecs required for playback of HD DVD and Blu-ray video are not included. VC-1
VC-1
VC-1 is the informal name of the SMPTE 421M video codec standard, which was initially developed as a proprietary video format by Microsoft before it was released as a formal SMPTE standard video format on April 3, 2006...
and the MPEG-2
MPEG-2
MPEG-2 is a standard for "the generic coding of moving pictures and associated audio information". It describes a combination of lossy video compression and lossy audio data compression methods which permit storage and transmission of movies using currently available storage media and transmission...
video decoders, as well as the Dolby Digital (AC-3) 5.1
Dolby Digital
Dolby Digital is the name for audio compression technologies developed by Dolby Laboratories. It was originally called Dolby Stereo Digital until 1994. Except for Dolby TrueHD, the audio compression is lossy. The first use of Dolby Digital was to provide digital sound in cinemas from 35mm film prints...
audio decoder are included in Windows Vista Home Premium and Ultimate Editions. H.264 video and other multichannel surround sound audio standards still require third party decoders.
Other features of Windows Media Player 11 include:
- Windows Media Format 11 Runtime - Updates the earlier Windows Media runtime to support low bitrate WMA Professional Audio and includes a VC-1VC-1VC-1 is the informal name of the SMPTE 421M video codec standard, which was initially developed as a proprietary video format by Microsoft before it was released as a formal SMPTE standard video format on April 3, 2006...
compliant WMV Advanced Profile codec. Support for ripping audio CDs to WAVWAVWaveform Audio File Format , is a Microsoft and IBM audio file format standard for storing an audio bitstream on PCs...
and WMA 10 Pro formats is also added. - Stacking - Stacking allows graphical viewing of how many albums exist in a specific category of music. The pile appears larger as the category contains more albums.
- Search improvements - Searches and displays results as characters are being entered, without waiting for Enter key to be hit. Results are refined based on further characters that are typed.
- Disc spanning - CD Burning now shows a graphical bar showing how much space will be used on the disc. It splits a burn list onto multiple discs in case the content does not fit on one disc.
- Global Status - Global status shows a broad overview of what the player is doing. The information presented include status information regarding buffering, ripping, burning and synchronization.
- Improved synchronization features for loading content onto PlaysForSure-compatible portable players. WMP 11 supports reverse-synchronization, by which media present on the portable device can be replicated back to the PC.
- Media Sharing - which allows one to share their Media library and make it accessible to other PCs running Windows VistaWindows VistaWindows Vista is an operating system released in several variations developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, tablet PCs, and media center PCs...
or later Windows versions, Xbox 360Xbox 360The Xbox 360 is the second video game console produced by Microsoft and the successor to the Xbox. The Xbox 360 competes with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles...
, or networked Media Receivers via UPnP. Content (Music, Pictures, Video) can be streamed to and from Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) AVUniversal Plug and PlayUniversal Plug and Play is a set of networking protocols for primarily residential networks without enterprise class devices that permits networked devices, such as personal computers, printers, Internet gateways, Wi-Fi access points and mobile devices to seamlessly discover each other's presence...
enabled devices such as the PS3, Xbox 360Xbox 360The Xbox 360 is the second video game console produced by Microsoft and the successor to the Xbox. The Xbox 360 competes with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles...
, and Roku SoundBridgeSoundBridgeSoundBridge is a remote hardware device from Roku designed to play internet radio or digital audio streamed to it across a home network, either WiFi or Ethernet. SoundBridge devices directly browse the Radio Roku Internet Radio Guide....
. This includes DRM protected PlaysForSure content. - URGEURGEThe URGE digital music store was an online music distribution service run by MTV Networks. URGE was integrated into Windows Media Player 11.URGE was opened on May 17, 2006. Downloaded files come with restrictions on their use, enforced by Windows Media DRM, Microsoft's digital rights management...
- The new music store from MicrosoftMicrosoftMicrosoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
and MTVMTVMTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....
networks is integrated with the player. As of October 28, 2007, the URGE service was discontinued when it merged with Rhapsody; the link in Windows Media Player 11 remains but is no longer functional. In order to use Rhapsody, a separate download is required.
Certain features of Media Sharing in Windows Media Player 11 are only available in Windows Vista
Windows Vista
Windows Vista is an operating system released in several variations developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, tablet PCs, and media center PCs...
and later. For example, WMP 11 on Windows Vista can also connect to remote media libraries; this is not available in the Windows XP version.
Windows Media Center
Media CenterWindows Media Center
Windows Media Center is a digital video recorder and media player developed by Microsoft. It is an application that allows users to view and record live television, as well as organize and play music and videos...
in Windows Vista, available in the Home Premium and Ultimate editions, has been upgraded significantly, including a considerable overhaul of the user interface. Each button in the main menu, which contains sections such as "Music", "Videos", and "TV", gets encased in a box when selected, and for each selection, a submenu comes up, extending horizontally. When any of the options is selected, the entries for each are presented in a grid-like structure, with each item being identified by album art, if its an audio file, or a thumbnail image if it is a picture, a video or a TV recording, and other related options, such as different views for the music collection if "Music" is selected, extend horizontally along the top of the grid. Similarly, other items are identified by suggestive artwork. The grid displaying the items is also extended horizontally, and the selected item is enlarged compared to the rest.
Other features of Windows Media Center include:
- Support for two dual-tuner cards
- Native DVD/MPEG-2 support
- Addition of Movies and DVD button which lists all the movies on the hard drive and DVD.
- Tasks button that provides access to jobs such as setting up and configuring a media center extender device.
- Any video playing is overlaid on the background of the user interface, if the UI is navigated while the video is still playing.
- Support for high-definition (HD) content, and CableCARDCableCARDCableCARD is a special-use PCMCIA card that allows consumers in the United States to view and record digital cable television channels on digital video recorders, personal computers and television sets without the use of other equipment such as a set top box provided by a cable television company...
support. - Uses the .NET 2.0 CLR
Internet Information Services 7
Windows Vista includes Internet Information Services (IIS) version 7, which has been refactored into a modular architecture, with integrated .NET extensibility. Instead of a monolithic server which features all services, IIS 7 has a core web server engine, and modules offering specific functionality can be added to the engine to enable its features. Writing extensions to IIS 7 using ISAPI
ISAPI
The Internet Server Application Programming Interface is an N-tier API of Internet Information Services , Microsoft's collection of Windows-based web server services...
has been deprecated in favor of the module API. Much of IIS's own functionality is built on this API, and as such, developers will have much more control over a request process than was possible in prior versions.
A significant change from previous versions of IIS is that all web server configuration information is stored solely in XML configuration files, instead of in the metabase. The server has a global configuration file that provides defaults, and each virtual web's document root (and any subdirectory thereof) may contain a web.config containing settings that augment or override the defaults. Changes to these files take effect immediately. This marks a significant departure from previous versions whereby web interfaces, or machine administrator access, was required to change simple settings such as default document, active modules, and security/authentication.
IIS 7 also features a completely rewritten administration interface that takes advantage of modern MMC
Microsoft Management Console
Microsoft Management Console is a component of Windows 2000 and its successors that provides system administrators and advanced users an interface for configuring and monitoring the system.- Snap-ins and consoles :...
features such as task panes and asynchronous operation. Configuration of ASP.NET
ASP.NET
ASP.NET is a Web application framework developed and marketed by Microsoft to allow programmers to build dynamic Web sites, Web applications and Web services. It was first released in January 2002 with version 1.0 of the .NET Framework, and is the successor to Microsoft's Active Server Pages ...
is more fully integrated into the administrative interface.
Security and safety
Beginning in early 2002 with Microsoft's announcement of their Trustworthy ComputingTrustworthy Computing
The term Trustworthy Computing has been applied to computing systems that are inherently secure, available, and reliable. The Committee on Information Systems Trustworthiness’ publication, Trust in Cyberspace, defines such a system as one which...
initiative, a great deal of work has gone into making Windows Vista a more secure operating system than its predecessors. Internally, Microsoft adopted a "Secure Development Lifecycle" with the underlying ethos of, "Secure by design, secure by default, secure in deployment". New code for Windows Vista was developed with the SDL methodology, and all existing code was reviewed and refactored to improve security.
Some of the most significant and most discussed security features included with Windows Vista include User Account Control
User Account Control
User Account Control is a technology and security infrastructure introduced with Microsoft's Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 operating systems, with a more relaxed version also present in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2...
, Kernel Patch Protection
Kernel Patch Protection
Kernel Patch Protection , informally known as PatchGuard, is a feature of 64-bit editions of Microsoft Windows that prevents patching the kernel...
, BitLocker Drive Encryption
BitLocker Drive Encryption
BitLocker Drive Encryption is a full disk encryption feature included with the Ultimate and Enterprise editions of Microsoft's Windows Vista and Windows 7 desktop operating systems, as well as the Windows Server 2008 and Windows Server 2008 R2 server platforms. It is designed to protect data by...
, Mandatory Integrity Control
Mandatory Integrity Control
In the context of the Microsoft Windows range of operating systems, Mandatory Integrity Control or Integrity Levels is a core security feature, introduced in Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008, that adds Integrity Levels to processes running in a...
, Digital Rights Management
Protected Media Path
The Protected Media Path is a set of technologies creating a "Protected Environment," first included in Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system, that is used to enforce digital rights management protections on content....
, TCP/IP stack security improvements, Address Space Layout Randomization
Address space layout randomization
Address space layout randomization is a computer security method which involves randomly arranging the positions of key data areas, usually including the base of the executable and position of libraries, heap, and stack, in a process's address space.- Benefits :Address space randomization hinders...
and the EFS
Encrypting File System
The Encrypting File System on Microsoft Windows is a feature introduced in version 3.0 of NTFS that provides filesystem-level encryption...
and cryptography improvements. Additionally, Windows Vista includes a range of parental controls, which give owners of a computer a set of tools to limit what other accounts on a computer can do, and an improved Windows Firewall
Windows Firewall
Windows Firewall is a software component of Microsoft Windows that provides firewalling and packet filtering functions. It was first included in Windows XP and Windows Server 2003...
which supports both inbound and outbound packet filtering, IPv6 connection filtering and more detailed configurable rules and policies.
Management and administration
Windows Vista contains a range of new technologies and features that are intended to help network administratorNetwork administrator
A network administrator, network analyst or network engineer is a person responsible for the maintenance of computer hardware and software that comprises a computer network...
s and power user
Power user
A power user is a user of a personal computer who has the ability to use advanced features of programs which are beyond the abilities of "normal" users, but is not necessarily capable of programming and system administration...
s better manage their systems. Notable changes include a complete replacement of the "Windows Setup" process based on Windows Preinstallation Environment
Windows Preinstallation Environment
Windows Preinstallation Environment is a lightweight version of Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, Windows 7, or Windows Server 2008 R2 that is used for the deployment of workstations and servers...
(WinPE), completely rewritten image-based deployment mechanisms, a significantly improved Task Scheduler
Task Scheduler
Task Scheduler is a component of Microsoft Windows that provides the ability to schedule the launch of programs or scripts at pre-defined times or after specified time intervals. It was first introduced in the Windows 95 Plus! pack as System Agent but was renamed to Task Scheduler in Windows 98...
, a revamped eventing infrastructure, GUI recovery tools, support for per-application Remote Desktop
Remote Desktop Protocol
Remote Desktop Protocol is a proprietary protocol developed by Microsoft, which provides a user with a graphical interface to another computer. The protocol is an extension of the ITU-T T.128 application sharing protocol. Clients exist for most versions of Microsoft Windows , Linux, Unix, Mac OS...
sessions, new diagnostic, health monitoring and system administration tools, and a range of new Group Policy
Group Policy
Group Policy is a feature of the Microsoft Windows NT family of operating systems. Group Policy is a set of rules that control the working environment of user accounts and computer accounts. Group Policy provides the centralized management and configuration of operating systems, applications, and...
settings covering many of the new features.
Previous versions of IIS included with Windows XP had hard limits on concurrent connections and defined web servers; IIS 7.0 on Windows Vista will not limit the number of connections allowed but will limit workloads based on the active concurrent requests to 10.
Desktop Window Manager
The Desktop Window ManagerDesktop Window Manager
Desktop Window Manager is the window manager in Windows Vista and Windows 7 that enables the Windows Aero graphical user interface and visual theme. The Desktop Window Manager requires video cards supporting DirectX 9.0 and Shader Model 2.0. DWM is not included with Windows Vista Starter edition...
is the new windowing system
Windowing system
A windowing system is a component of a graphical user interface , and more specifically of a desktop environment, which supports the implementation of window managers, and provides basic support for graphics hardware, pointing devices such as mice, and keyboards...
which handles the drawing of all content to the screen. Instead of windows drawing directly to the video card's memory buffers, contents are instead rendered to back-buffers (technically Direct3D surfaces), which are then arranged in the appropriate Z-order, then displayed to the user. This drawing method uses significantly more video memory than the traditional window-drawing method used in previous versions of Windows, which only required enough memory to contain the composite of all currently visible windows at any given time. With the entire contents of windows being stored in video memory, a user can move windows around the screen smoothly, without having "tearing" artifacts be visible while the operating system asks applications to redraw the newly visible parts of their windows. Other features new to Windows Vista such as live thumbnail window previews and Flip 3D are implemented through the DWM.
Users need to have a DirectX
DirectX
Microsoft DirectX is a collection of application programming interfaces for handling tasks related to multimedia, especially game programming and video, on Microsoft platforms. Originally, the names of these APIs all began with Direct, such as Direct3D, DirectDraw, DirectMusic, DirectPlay,...
9 capable video card to be able to use the Desktop Window Manager. Machines that can't use the DWM fall back to a "Basic" theme, and use screen drawing methods similar to Windows XP.
The Desktop Window Manager
Desktop Window Manager
Desktop Window Manager is the window manager in Windows Vista and Windows 7 that enables the Windows Aero graphical user interface and visual theme. The Desktop Window Manager requires video cards supporting DirectX 9.0 and Shader Model 2.0. DWM is not included with Windows Vista Starter edition...
(DWM) is included in all editions of Windows Vista except the Starter edition.
DirectX
Windows Vista includes a new version of Direct3D, called Direct3D 10. It adds scheduling and memory virtualization capabilities to the graphics subsystem and forgoes the current DirectXDirectX
Microsoft DirectX is a collection of application programming interfaces for handling tasks related to multimedia, especially game programming and video, on Microsoft platforms. Originally, the names of these APIs all began with Direct, such as Direct3D, DirectDraw, DirectMusic, DirectPlay,...
practice of using "capability bits" to indicate which features are active on the current hardware. Instead, Direct3D 10 defines a minimum standard of hardware capabilities which must be supported for a display system to be "Direct3D 10 compatible". Microsoft's goal is to create an environment for developers and designers where they can be assured that the input they provide will be rendered in exactly the same fashion on all supported graphics cards. This has been a recurring problem with the DirectX 9 model, where different video cards have produced different results, thus requiring fixes keyed to specific cards to be produced by developers.
According to Microsoft, Direct3D 10 will be able to display some graphics up to 8 times faster than DirectX 9.0c because of the new improved Windows Display Driver Model
Windows Display Driver Model
Windows Display Driver Model is the graphic driver architecture for video card drivers running Microsoft Windows versions beginning with Windows Vista....
. In addition, Direct3D 10 incorporates Microsoft's High Level Shader Language
High Level Shader Language
The High Level Shader Language or High Level Shading Language is a proprietary shading language developed by Microsoft for use with the Microsoft Direct3D API. It is analogous to the GLSL shading language used with the OpenGL standard...
4.0. However, Direct3D 10 is not backward compatible like prior versions of DirectX. The same game will not be compatible with both Direct3D 10 and Direct3D 9 or below. Games would need to be developed for both APIs, one version for Direct3D 9 and below if targeting Windows versions prior to Windows Vista and another version using Direct3D 10 if targeting only Windows Vista. Windows Vista does, however, contain a backward compatible Direct3D 9 implementation.
The Direct3D 10 API introduces unified vertex and pixel shaders. In addition, it also supports Geometry Shaders, which operate on entire geometric primitives (points, lines, and triangles), and can allow calculations based on adjacent primitives as well. The output of the geometry shader can be passed directly onwards to the rasterizer for interpolation and pixel shading, or written to a vertex buffer (known as 'stream out') to be fed back into the beginning of the pipeline.
D3D10 functionality requires WDDM (Windows Display Driver Model
Windows Display Driver Model
Windows Display Driver Model is the graphic driver architecture for video card drivers running Microsoft Windows versions beginning with Windows Vista....
) and new graphics hardware. The graphics hardware will be pre-emptively multithreaded, to allow multiple threads to use the GPU in turns. It will also provide paging of the graphics memory.
The version of Direct3D 9 available in Windows Vista is called Direct3D 9Ex. This modified API also uses the WDDM
Windows Display Driver Model
Windows Display Driver Model is the graphic driver architecture for video card drivers running Microsoft Windows versions beginning with Windows Vista....
and allows Direct3D 9 applications to access some of the features available in Windows Vista such as cross-process shared surfaces, managed graphics memory, prioritization of resources, text anti-aliasing, advanced gamma functions, and device removal management.
Deprecation of other DirectX APIs:
In Windows Vista, only Direct3D
Direct3D
Direct3D is part of Microsoft's DirectX application programming interface . Direct3D is available for Microsoft Windows operating systems , and for other platforms through the open source software Wine. It is the base for the graphics API on the Xbox and Xbox 360 console systems...
features an overhaul. The DirectX SDK mentions that most of the other APIs have been deprecated. DirectInput
DirectInput
In computing, DirectInput is a Microsoft API for collecting input from a computer user, via input devices such as the mouse, keyboard, joystick or other game controllers. It also provides a system for action mapping, which allows the user to assign specific actions within a game to the buttons and...
and DirectPlay
DirectPlay
DirectPlay is part of Microsoft's DirectX API. DirectPlay is a network communication library intended for computer game development, although its general nature certainly allows it to be used for other purposes....
have been deprecated and some of their components removed. DirectSound
DirectSound
DirectSound is a software component of the Microsoft DirectX library for the Windows operating system. DirectSound provides a low-latency interface to the sound card driver and can handle the mixing and recording of multiple audio streams....
and therefore, DirectMusic
DirectMusic
DirectMusic is a deprecated component of the Microsoft DirectX API that allows music and sound effects to be composed and played and provides flexible interactive control over the way they are played. Architecturally, DirectMusic is a high-level set of objects, built on top of DirectSound, that...
lack hardware abstraction and are emulated in software. The DirectMusic
DirectMusic
DirectMusic is a deprecated component of the Microsoft DirectX API that allows music and sound effects to be composed and played and provides flexible interactive control over the way they are played. Architecturally, DirectMusic is a high-level set of objects, built on top of DirectSound, that...
kernel mode synthesizer that supplies the DirectMusic components with a high-resolution timer has been removed.
DirectX Video Acceleration 2.0
Windows Vista introduces DirectX Video Acceleration (DXVA) 2.0 which enhances the implementation of the video pipeline and adds a host of other DDIsDevice driver
In computing, a device driver or software driver is a computer program allowing higher-level computer programs to interact with a hardware device....
, including a Capture DDI for video capture. The DDIs it shares with DXVA 1.0 are also enhanced with support for hardware acceleration of more operations. Also, the DDI functions are directly available to callers and need not be mediated by the video renderer. As such, pipelines for simply decoding the media (without rendering) or post-processing and rendering (without decoding) can also be created. These features require the Windows Display Driver Model
Windows Display Driver Model
Windows Display Driver Model is the graphic driver architecture for video card drivers running Microsoft Windows versions beginning with Windows Vista....
drivers.
Windows Vista
Windows Vista
Windows Vista is an operating system released in several variations developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, tablet PCs, and media center PCs...
also introduces a new video renderer, available as both a Media Foundation
Media Foundation
Microsoft Media Foundation is a COM-based multimedia framework pipeline and infrastructure platform for digital media in Windows Vista, Windows 7 & Windows 8...
component and a DirectShow
DirectShow
DirectShow , codename Quartz, is a multimedia framework and API produced by Microsoft for software developers to perform various operations with media files or streams. It is the replacement for Microsoft's earlier Video for Windows technology...
filter, called the Enhanced Video Renderer (EVR). EVR is designed to work with Desktop Window Manager
Desktop Window Manager
Desktop Window Manager is the window manager in Windows Vista and Windows 7 that enables the Windows Aero graphical user interface and visual theme. The Desktop Window Manager requires video cards supporting DirectX 9.0 and Shader Model 2.0. DWM is not included with Windows Vista Starter edition...
.
DXVA 2.0 supports only Enhanced Video Renderer as the video renderer on Windows Vista. DXVA integrates with Media Foundation
Media Foundation
Microsoft Media Foundation is a COM-based multimedia framework pipeline and infrastructure platform for digital media in Windows Vista, Windows 7 & Windows 8...
and allows DXVA pipelines to be exposed as Media Foundation Transforms (MFTs). Even decoder pipelines or post-processing pipelines can be exposed as MFTs, which can be used by the Media Foundation
Media Foundation
Microsoft Media Foundation is a COM-based multimedia framework pipeline and infrastructure platform for digital media in Windows Vista, Windows 7 & Windows 8...
topology loader to create a full media playback pipeline. DXVA 1.0 is emulated using DXVA 2.0.
Imaging
Windows Imaging ComponentWindows Imaging Component
The Windows Imaging Component is a Component Object Model based imaging codec framework introduced in Windows Vista and Windows XP Service Pack 3 for working with and processing digital images and image metadata...
(WIC) is a new extensible imaging framework that allows applications supporting the framework to automatically get support of installed codecs for graphics file formats. Windows Presentation Foundation
Windows Presentation Foundation
Developed by Microsoft, the Windows Presentation Foundation is a computer-software graphical subsystem for rendering user interfaces in Windows-based applications. WPF, previously known as "Avalon", was initially released as part of .NET Framework 3.0. Rather than relying on the older GDI...
applications also automatically support the installed image codecs. Third party developers can write their own image codecs for their specific image file formats. By default, Windows Vista ships with the JPEG
JPEG
In computing, JPEG . The degree of compression can be adjusted, allowing a selectable tradeoff between storage size and image quality. JPEG typically achieves 10:1 compression with little perceptible loss in image quality....
, TIFF, GIF
GIF
The Graphics Interchange Format is a bitmap image format that was introduced by CompuServe in 1987 and has since come into widespread usage on the World Wide Web due to its wide support and portability....
, PNG, BMP and HD Photo
Windows Media Photo
JPEG XR is a still-image compression standard and file format for continuous tone photographic images, based on technology originally developed and patented by Microsoft under the name HD Photo...
codecs. Codecs for RAW
RAW image format
A camera raw image file contains minimally processed data from the image sensor of either a digital camera, image scanner, or motion picture film scanner. Raw files are so named because they are not yet processed and therefore are not ready to be printed or edited with a bitmap graphics editor...
image formats used generally by high-end digital cameras are also supported in this manner. Windows Explorer
Windows Explorer
This article is about the Windows file system browser. For the similarly named web browser, see Internet ExplorerWindows Explorer is a file manager application that is included with releases of the Microsoft Windows operating system from Windows 95 onwards. It provides a graphical user interface...
, Windows Photo Gallery
Windows Photo Gallery
Windows Photo Gallery is a photo management, tagging, and editing tool developed by Microsoft, and is included with all editions of Windows Vista...
and Windows Photo Gallery Viewer are based on this new framework and can thus view and organize images in any format for which the necessary codecs are installed.
HD Photo (previously known as Windows Media Photo) is a photographic still image file format, that is introduced with Windows Vista. It supports features such as high dynamic range imaging
High dynamic range imaging
In image processing, computer graphics, and photography, high dynamic range imaging is a set of techniques that allows a greater dynamic range between the lightest and darkest areas of an image than current standard digital imaging techniques or photographic methods...
, lossy as well as lossless compression, up to 32-bpp
Color depth
In computer graphics, color depth or bit depth is the number of bits used to represent the color of a single pixel in a bitmapped image or video frame buffer. This concept is also known as bits per pixel , particularly when specified along with the number of bits used...
fixed
Fixed-point arithmetic
In computing, a fixed-point number representation is a real data type for a number that has a fixed number of digits after the radix point...
or floating point
Floating point
In computing, floating point describes a method of representing real numbers in a way that can support a wide range of values. Numbers are, in general, represented approximately to a fixed number of significant digits and scaled using an exponent. The base for the scaling is normally 2, 10 or 16...
representation, transparency, RGB
RGB color model
The RGB color model is an additive color model in which red, green, and blue light is added together in various ways to reproduce a broad array of colors...
, CMYK
CMYK color model
The CMYK color model is a subtractive color model, used in color printing, and is also used to describe the printing process itself. CMYK refers to the four inks used in some color printing: cyan, magenta, yellow, and key...
and n-channel color space
Color space
A color model is an abstract mathematical model describing the way colors can be represented as tuples of numbers, typically as three or four values or color components...
s, Radiance
Radiance (software)
Radiance is a suite of tools for performing lighting simulation originally written by Greg Ward. It includes a renderer as well as many other tools for measuring the simulated light levels. It uses ray tracing to perform all lighting calculations, accelerated by the use of an octree data structure...
RGBE
RGBE image format
RGBE is an image format invented by Gregory Ward Larson. It stores pixels as one byte each for RGB values with a one byte shared exponent. Thus it stores four bytes per pixel....
, embedded ICC
International Color Consortium
The International Color Consortium was formed in 1993 by eight industry vendors in order to create a universal color management system that would function transparently across all operating systems and software packages....
color profiles, multiple images per file and support for Exif
Exchangeable image file format
Exchangeable image file format is a standard that specifies the formats for images, sound, and ancillary tags used by digital cameras , scanners and other systems handling image and sound files recorded by digital cameras...
and XMP
Extensible Metadata Platform
The Adobe Extensible Metadata Platform is a standard, created by Adobe Systems Inc., for processing and storing standardized and proprietary information relating to the contents of a file....
metadata
Metadata
The term metadata is an ambiguous term which is used for two fundamentally different concepts . Although the expression "data about data" is often used, it does not apply to both in the same way. Structural metadata, the design and specification of data structures, cannot be about data, because at...
formats. It is the preferred image format for XPS
XML Paper Specification
Open XML Paper Specification , is an open specification for a page description language and a fixed-document format originally developed by Microsoft as XML Paper Specification that was later standardized by Ecma International as international standard ECMA-388...
documents.
Color management
Windows Vista features Windows Color System (WCS), a platform for color managementColor management
In digital imaging systems, color management is the controlled conversion between the color representations of various devices, such as image scanners, digital cameras, monitors, TV screens, film printers, computer printers, offset presses, and corresponding media.The primary goal of color...
. Its goal is to obtain color consistency across various software and hardware, including cameras, monitors, printers and scanners. Different devices interpret the same colors differently, according to their software and hardware configurations. As a result, they must be properly calibrated to reproduce colors consistently across different devices. WCS aims to make this process of color calibration automatic and transparent, as an evolution of ICC Color Profiles.
Windows Color System is based on a completely new Color Infrastructure and Translation Engine (CITE). It is backed up by a new color processing pipeline that supports bit-depths more than 32 bits per pixel, multiple color channels (more than 3), alternative color spaces and high dynamic range coloring, using a technology named Kyuanos developed by Canon
Canon Inc.
is a Japanese multinational corporation that specialises in the manufacture of imaging and optical products, including cameras, camcorders, photocopiers, steppers and computer printers. Its headquarters are located in Ōta, Tokyo, Japan.-Origins:...
. The color processing pipeline allows device developers to add their own gamut
Gamut
In color reproduction, including computer graphics and photography, the gamut, or color gamut , is a certain complete subset of colors. The most common usage refers to the subset of colors which can be accurately represented in a given circumstance, such as within a given color space or by a...
mapping algorithm into the pipeline to customize the color response of the device. The new pipeline also uses floating point calculations to minimize round-off losses, which are inherent in integer processing. Once the color pipeline finishes processing the colors, the CITE engine applies a color transform according to a color profile, specific to a device to ensure the output color matches to what is expected.
WCS features explicit support for LCD as well as CRT monitors, projectors, printers, and other imaging devices and provides customized support for each. WCS uses color profiles according to the CIE Color Appearance Model recommendation (CIECAM02
CIECAM02
Published in 2002 by the CIE Technical Committee 8-01 , as of 2008 CIECAM02 is the most recent color appearance model ratified by the CIE, and the successor of CIECAM97s.| quote=The CIECAM97s model was adopted by the CIE in 1997 for color imaging applications. It includes forward and reverse modes...
), defined using XML
XML
Extensible Markup Language is a set of rules for encoding documents in machine-readable form. It is defined in the XML 1.0 Specification produced by the W3C, and several other related specifications, all gratis open standards....
, to define how the color representation actually translates to a visible color. ICC
International Color Consortium
The International Color Consortium was formed in 1993 by eight industry vendors in order to create a universal color management system that would function transparently across all operating systems and software packages....
V4 color profiles are also supported. Windows Photo Gallery
Windows Photo Gallery
Windows Photo Gallery is a photo management, tagging, and editing tool developed by Microsoft, and is included with all editions of Windows Vista...
and Photo Viewer, Windows Imaging Component
Windows Imaging Component
The Windows Imaging Component is a Component Object Model based imaging codec framework introduced in Windows Vista and Windows XP Service Pack 3 for working with and processing digital images and image metadata...
, the HD Photo format, XPS
XML Paper Specification
Open XML Paper Specification , is an open specification for a page description language and a fixed-document format originally developed by Microsoft as XML Paper Specification that was later standardized by Ecma International as international standard ECMA-388...
print path and XPS documents all support color management.
Mobile computing
Some significant changes have been made to Windows Vista for mobile computing.Sleep state
In Windows Vista, the user can select a Hybrid Sleep option. Hybrid Sleep saves information from the computer's memory to the hibernation file on disk, but instead of turning off the computer, it simultaneously enters Standby mode. If power is lost, the system resumes from the existing hibernate image on disk. On a laptop, after the specified amount of time, it shuts down (hibernates). Hybrid Sleep thus, offers the benefits of fast resume when in Standby mode and improved reliability in case of power loss.Fine-grained power configuration
Windows Vista allows fine-grained control over power settings such as setting the power saving mode for wireless adapters, USB selective suspend, PCI ExpressPCI Express
PCI Express , officially abbreviated as PCIe, is a computer expansion card standard designed to replace the older PCI, PCI-X, and AGP bus standards...
link state power management, processor state etc., and also allows configuring power settings for specific scenarios such as while sharing media files, giving a presentation, adaptive display mode and while indexing files.
In earlier Windows versions, drivers sometimes prevented Windows from entering or reliably resuming from a power-saving state. This problem has been solved in Windows Vista. Applications can disable sleep idle timers when needed such as when burning discs or recording media. Away mode, which is not a power plan by itself but a feature, automatically turns off displays, video rendering and sound but keeps the computer working when the user is away from the computer. Optionally, it can also switch to sleep mode. Power settings are also configurable through Group Policy.
The battery icon in the notification area has been improved to let the user more easily select a "Power plan". "Presentation Settings", through the Transient Multimon Manager (TMM), allow saving of display preferences when an external display such as a projector or external monitor is connected. The setting can be restored when the same device is re-connected later. Presentation settings are available only on mobile computers.
Beginning with Windows Vista Service Pack 1, the operating system can turn off periodic VSync interrupt counting of CPU when the screen is not being refreshed from new graphics or mouse activity. This can result in significant energy savings.
Other mobility enhancements
- Windows Vista supports USB selective suspend for a wider range of class drivers such as USB video class, portable devices, USB Bluetooth class etc.
- Windows Mobility CenterWindows Mobility CenterWindows Mobility Center is a component of Microsoft Windows, introduced in Windows Vista, that centralizes the most relevant information to mobile computing.-Overview:...
is a new control panel available only on mobile computers that centralizes relevant information and configuration. It is extensible so that hardware manufacturers can add further capabilities to control other features specific to their hardware. - Windows Mobile Device CenterWindows Mobile Device CenterWindows Mobile Device Center is a synchronization software program developed by Microsoft, and the successor to ActiveSync. It is designed to synchronize various content including music, video, contacts, calendar events, web browser favorites, and other files between Windows Mobile devices and the...
centralizes management of external mobile devices. It includes a basic RNDIS driver to make simple connections to mobile devices. For complete functionality including synchronization of tasks, calendar data, contacts, email etc. with Microsoft Office Outlook, a driver needs to be downloaded. Synchronization with Windows MailWindows MailWindows Mail is an email and newsgroup client included in Windows Vista, that was superseded by Windows Live Mail. It is the successor to Outlook Express. Microsoft previewed Windows Mail on Channel 9 on October 10, 2005....
, Windows CalendarWindows CalendarWindows Calendar is a calendar application that is included with Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008. It natively supports the iCalendar file format, and has the ability to publish and subscribe to web-based calendars by using HTTP and WebDAV...
or Windows ContactsWindows ContactsWindows Contacts is a contact manager which is included in Windows Vista and Windows 7 which replaced and retained most of the functionality of Windows Address Book. Windows Mail integrates with it. Windows Contacts uses a new XML-based schema format where each contact appears as an...
is not supported. Whenever a Windows Mobile device is connected, the Mobile Device Center pane pops up giving options to manage media and other files on the device, as well as control their settings. - Windows Vista has built-in USB Media Transfer ProtocolMedia Transfer ProtocolThe Media Transfer Protocol is a devised set of custom extensions to the Picture Transfer Protocol . Whereas PTP was designed for downloading photographs from digital cameras, Media Transfer Protocol supports the transfer of music files on digital audio players and media files on portable media...
support, with MTP over TCP/IP as well. With the Platform Update for Windows Vista installed, it also supports MTP over Bluetooth. - A new Windows Portable Devices API has been introduced to communicate with attached media and all portable devices such as mobile phones, portable media players, PDAs etc.
- Windows Vista introduces WinUSBWinUSBWinUSB is a generic USB driver provided by Microsoft, for their operating systems starting with Windows Vista but which is also available for Windows XP. It is aimed at simple devices that are accessed by only one application at a time...
, a generic user-mode USB driverDevice driverIn computing, a device driver or software driver is a computer program allowing higher-level computer programs to interact with a hardware device....
with client API for simple devices that are accessed by only one application at a time. - Sync Center is a centralized location which provides an organized summary view of any sync partnership users have created for synchronizing data and files, such as mobile devices, network syncing (offline files), portable media devices and so on. While the earlier promised ability to automatically synchronize files among computers using peer-to-peerPeer-to-peerPeer-to-peer computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads among peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the application...
technology is not included, a powertoy, SyncToySyncToySyncToy is a freeware tool in Microsoft's PowerToys series that provides an easy-to-use graphical user interface for synchronizing files and folders. It is written using Microsoft's .NET framework and uses the Microsoft Sync Framework.-Features:...
, is available that supports synchronizing local and network files. - Windows SideShowWindows SideShowWindows SideShow is a technology introduced in Windows Vista that enables Windows PCs to drive a variety of auxiliary display devices connected to the main PC. These devices can be separate from or integrated into the main PC , enabling access to information and media even when the PC is turned off...
is a new technology that lets Windows Vista drive a small external display that is built into the outside of a mobile PC's lid. The display can be updated with a number of different kinds of information, such as contacts, maps, calendar, and email. This can then be consulted while the mobile PC is otherwise powered down. - All the handwriting recognition, speech recognition and pen & ink features from Windows XP Tablet PC Edition as well as accessories like Tablet PC Input PanelTablet PC Input PanelThe Tablet PC Input Panel is an accessory included in Microsoft Windows that allows input of text using a pen and digitizing tablet, touch screen, an on-screen soft keyboard or mouse. It performs handwriting recognition and converts handwriting into text for use in most non-full-screen Windows...
, Windows JournalWindows JournalWindows Journal is a notetaking application, created by Microsoft and included in Windows XP Tablet PC Edition as well as Home Premium or superior editions of Windows Vista and Windows 7. It allows the user to create and organize handwritten notes and drawings and to save them in a JNT-File...
, Sticky Notes and InkBallInkBallInkBall is a computer game that is included with Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005 and the Home Premium, Business, Enterprise and Ultimate editions of Windows Vista. It employs the use of a stylus or mouse to draw lines to direct balls into holes of corresponding colors...
have been included. New features include gestures and pen flicks. There is intrinsic support for handwriting and ink, via the Ink Analysis API. A new control, the InkCanvas is made available by the API to add ink support to applications. Ink support can not only recognize handwriting and formatting, but also hand-drawn shapes which are converted to vector-graphics, rendered as the shape that was intended to be drawn. An update for Windows XP Tablet PC Edition containing Ink Analysis and StylusInput API support is also available. Support for touchscreenTouchscreenA touchscreen is an electronic visual display that can detect the presence and location of a touch within the display area. The term generally refers to touching the display of the device with a finger or hand. Touchscreens can also sense other passive objects, such as a stylus...
s is also included. - The Tablet PC Input PanelTablet PC Input PanelThe Tablet PC Input Panel is an accessory included in Microsoft Windows that allows input of text using a pen and digitizing tablet, touch screen, an on-screen soft keyboard or mouse. It performs handwriting recognition and converts handwriting into text for use in most non-full-screen Windows...
has been updated to support AutoComplete. Handwriting recognition accuracy can be improved by training using the handwriting recognition personalization tool. By installing an MUI pack for a particular language, handwriting recognition if available for that language can be used as well.
New fonts
Windows Vista includes six new western (Latin, Greek and Cyrillic) fonts, the "C-series", all optimized for ClearTypeClearType
ClearType is a trademark for Microsoft's implementation of subpixel rendering technology. ClearType attempts to improve the appearance of text on certain types of computer display screens by sacrificing color fidelity for additional intensity variation. This trade-off is asserted to work well on...
:
- CalibriCalibriCalibri is a humanist sans-serif typeface family under the Microsoft ClearType Font Collection.In Microsoft Office 2007, it replaced Times New Roman as the default typeface in Word and replaced Arial as the default in PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook, and WordPad...
(sans-serifSans-serifIn typography, a sans-serif, sans serif or san serif typeface is one that does not have the small projecting features called "serifs" at the end of strokes. The term comes from the French word sans, meaning "without"....
) - CambriaCambria (typeface)Cambria is part of the suite of fonts that comes with Microsoft Windows Vista, Windows 7, Microsoft Office 2007, Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac and Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac, specifically designed for on-screen reading and to be aesthetically pleasing when printed at small sizes. It is a...
(serifSerifIn typography, serifs are semi-structural details on the ends of some of the strokes that make up letters and symbols. A typeface with serifs is called a serif typeface . A typeface without serifs is called sans serif or sans-serif, from the French sans, meaning “without”...
) - CandaraCandaraCandara is a humanist sans-serif typeface, which is bundled with Microsoft Windows Vista and Windows 7. Candara’s verticals show both entasis and ekstasis on opposite sides of stems, high-branching arcades in the lowercase, large apertures in all open forms, and unique ogee curves on diagonals.The...
(sans-serif) - ConsolasConsolasConsolas is a monospaced typeface, designed by Lucas de Groot. It is a part of a new suite of fonts that take advantage of Microsoft's ClearType font rendering technology. It comes with Microsoft's Windows Vista, Windows 7, Microsoft Office 2007 and Microsoft Visual Studio 2010, and is available...
(monospaced) - ConstantiaConstantia (typeface)Constantia is part of the suite of typefaces that come with Microsoft Windows Vista, Windows 7, and Office 2007. The development began in 2003....
(serif) - CorbelCorbel (typeface)Corbel is a sans-serif typeface designed by Jeremy Tankard for Microsoft and released in 2005. It is a part of the new suite of fonts that come with Microsoft Windows Vista developed to take advantage of ClearType to improve the reading experience in Windows Vista and Office 2007.Corbel is designed...
(sans-serif)
Segoe UI
Segoe UI
Segoe is a Humanist typeface family that is best known for its usage by Microsoft. The company uses Segoe in their online and printed marketing materials, including recent logos for a number of products...
is complemented by the following:
- Segoe Script (scriptScriptScript may refer to:Computing* Script , a small program written for a command interpreter or another scripting language* script , a tool that records a tty session* SCRIPT/VS, a text formatting language developed at IBM...
) - Segoe Print (casualCasualIn the European tradition, casual is the dress code that emphasizes comfort and personal expression over presentation and uniformity. It includes a very wide variety of costume, so it is perhaps better defined by what it isn't than what it is...
)
Four new Asian Segoe-UI-like fonts have been added:
- Malgun GothicMalgun GothicMalgun Gothic is a Korean sans-serif typeface developed by Sandoll Communications, with hinting by Monotype Imaging, as a replacement of Dotum and Gulim as the default system font for the Korean language version of Windows Vista...
(Korean) - MeiryoMeiryois a Japanese sans-serif gothic typeface. Microsoft bundled Meiryo with Office Mac 2008 as part of the standard install, and it replaces MS Gothic as the default system font for Vista on Japanese systems....
(Japanese) - Microsoft JhengHeiMicrosoft JhengHeiMicrosoft JhengHei is a sans-serif typeface included in Windows Vista and later and Microsoft Office 2007. It follows the Standard Form of National Characters prescribed by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of China and is intended to be used in Traditional Chinese language environments...
(Traditional Chinese) - Microsoft YaHeiMicrosoft YaHeiMicrosoft YaHei is a sans-serif gothic typeface created by Founder Electronics and Monotype under commission from Microsoft. Hinting for the font was undertaken by Monotype Imaging....
(Simplified Chinese)
Language support
Windows Vista supports more languages than previous versions of Windows (usually Asian e.g. Khmer, Lao). In addition, Windows Vista Enterprise and Ultimate editions allow installing additional languages using MUI packs instead of just the install language. Unicode font and character support has also been improved. Windows Vista also supports "custom locales", allowing users to create their own locale data for use in applications using the Locale Builder tool.See also
- Features new to Windows 7Features new to Windows 7Some of the new features included in Windows 7 are advancements in touch, speech, and handwriting recognition, support for virtual hard disks, support for additional file formats, improved performance on multi-core processors, improved boot performance, and kernel improvements.-Shell and user...
- Features new to Windows XPFeatures new to Windows XPWindows XP introduced many features not found in previous versions of Windows.-Graphics:With the introduction of Windows XP, the C++ based software-only GDI+ subsystem was introduced to replace certain GDI functions...
- History of Microsoft WindowsHistory of Microsoft WindowsIn 1983, Microsoft announced the development of Windows, a graphical user interface for its own operating system , which had shipped for IBM PC and compatible computers since 1981...
- Windows Server 2008
- Features removed from Windows VistaFeatures removed from Windows VistaWhile Windows Vista contains many new features, a number of capabilities and certain programs that were a part of previous Windows versions up to Windows XP were removed or changed - some of which were later re-introduced in Windows 7....
External links
- Microsoft's Windows Vista homepage
- List of ATI's Windows Vista capable GPUs that support the latest features of Windows Vista.
- List of NVIDIA's Windows Vista capable GPUs that support the latest features of Windows Vista.