My Digital Life

It turns out that after installing SP1, the process leaves behind ~800MB of original Windows files to allow uninstallation. 

After filling up my old laptop last night a quick search found this article pointing to a cleanup utility that sits in the Windows\System32 folder.

To run the utility, start a command prompt as an admin (right click | Run as Administrator), change directory to the system32 folder, and run ‘vsp1cln.exe’.

In between some meetings today I did some reading around Windows Desktop Search and Vista Search.  Although its not something we currently ‘officially’ supply, we’re seeing more people using WDS and Google Desktop.  Not really a problem but when people start indexing the network shares our file servers and network don’t like it much…

So anyway I was reading up on how best to manage WDS, and it turns out its nice and simple as MS have provided an .adm file for Group Policy.  During my reading though I found this good article on the search syntax supported by WDS and Vista. 

The syntax is quite intuitive, and there are a surprising number of filters there, so you can do some pretty complex searches quite easily.

Here’s a few examples, but check out the full list here.

Back in the day I used to look after big desktop deployments both here at Atkins and a few other places.  Managing large numbers of desktops is always a problem.  There’s no doubt that managed desktops are A Good Thing(TM), but the tools available to do the job were always a bit harsh on either the end users or the IT guys. 

Whilst Group Policy is great, you almost always needed other scripts and tools to get the complete result you wanted.  Whether those were included in the image or applied at logon it didn’t really matter, they were a pain to manage.  Group Policy also completely enforces the settings, there is no way to set the default value, but allow the users to edit the setting if they wished.  Once its set, that’s it for Joe User.

The new Group Policy Preferences functionality allows you to configure mapped drives, deploy files, setup shortcuts, quick launch buttons etc, manage ODBC sources, IE settings, all kinds of stuff.  It can also filter the settings on a per setting basis, no need to have new policies for each filter like GPO.  Plus the range of criteria available for those filters is huge.

There’s too much detail to go into here, but take a look at this screencast over at Technet Edge to see some examples.  It’s good stuff and will take a lot of work out of the more detailed config that enterprise managed desktops require.

An article on Techmeme is suggesting that Windows 7 might have moved forward a year and arrive sometime late in 09.  Whether this is true or not who knows, but from my perspective as an enterprise customer it would make some sense - and probably make my life easier in the long run! 

Selling a Vista migration to the people who will pay the bills is proving to be quite a task.  The business isn’t overly interested in what OS we choose to run, only that they have the applications they need, can use them where they are and that they’re nice and speedy.  This makes Vista rather a hard sell, especially considering the work needed to assess and fix Vista compatibility for application portfolio of some 1600 apps.  That’s not to say Vista isn’t a great product - I’d have migrated six months ago if it was up to me.

Bringing Windows 7 forwards would provide businesses with a renewed incentive to move away from XP.  It’d assume it’ll include a whole bunch of new functionality to further improve on Vista (mobile working, deployment etc), and I’d guess will also provide improved support for some MS’s S+S initiatives - something we’ll be looking at in a lot of detail this year.

The problem for MS is that a quicker release would be effectively writing off Vista for any big corporate’s who haven’t already started their Vista migration.  Certainly if the move is true I would doubt we would do much work towards a vista, we’d delay those projects by six months to include Windows 7.  Having said that, those same large corporates are going to have enterprise licensing so they’ll probably be paying for a ‘desktop’ not the version of windows that’s on it.  Interesting stuff…

Over the past couple of days I’ve had a few conversations about how people interact with computers and more importantly the apps running on them.  The conversations started off about how Nintendo Wii’s (and to a lesser extent the PS3 with its sixaxis controllers) are changing how people play games.  It got us thinking about what this might mean in the wider context of IT.  Peoples expectations of how they can and should be interacting with software are changing.  A kid who grows up today using a wii and an iPod touch is going to be a tad disappointed by a plain old keyboard and mouse.  This idea of ‘digital natives’ is something I talk about a lot in terms of the software and services we deliver as an IS organisation, but I’ve never really thought about it in on terms of the real basics - how you use a computer.

There are clearly things happening in this area, Surface for example looks very cool, and it seems like Windows Mobile 7 is going to step ahead of Apple and bring a whole new level of motion based interaction to mobile phones and PDA’s.   Tablet PC’s introduced pen/touch style input to the mainstream and have been around for a while.  In Vista I think are a genuine alternative to a regular laptop - imho it’s about time for someone to revived the old ’slate’ style tablets like my trusty old TC1100 (with Vista on it’s still by far the best tablet I’ve used in terms of size and form factor that I’ve used).  But how do these new interfaces reach the humble desktop PC? 

At home, and at work for that matter, I’ll happily use a laptop or tablet.  It works well for me and my job, but if you spend your day in AutoCAD or some random GIS app the chances are you’ll be using a desktop or workstation.  There are pretty obvious benefits to using touch style interfaces in those apps, but at the moment other than traditional graphics tablets and some bespoke and expensive tablet screens, I’m not sure how it could be achieved in the mainstream.

The obvious answer would be ‘touch’ enabled monitors.  A touch version of the Dell Crystal monitor Steve Clayton posted about the other day would look very ‘minority report’!   How well would a traditional monitor work though?  There’s probably an argument to say that it would be (quite literally) painful to use a screen that way over a full day. 

I don’t use the tablet features on my laptop nearly as much as I should, but when I do its on a desk or on my lap.  My workmate Trevor on the other hand only ever uses the pen on his tablet and found that having it flat on a desk became uncomfortable after a while.  He’s now using an small artists easel to hold the tablet at an angle like a traditional drawing board.  Having tried it myself I have to say that works very well indeed.  Perhaps the age of the drawing board isn’t quite over yet.  We’ll just have less pens than before!

There are plenty of stories out there at the moment about Vista’s poor business sales, whether they are true or not who knows.  I do know I’m having trouble selling a migration to the business here.  A Multitouch interface coupled with technology like SeaDragon and decent ISV support from people like AutoDesk could well be a ‘killer app’ for whatever release brings it to Windows.  It looks like most of the software technology is there, I know lenovo have multitouch drivers available for my T61, but where are the devices that would bring it all together?  I guess that’s where Apple have a key advantage, they control the hardware platform their OS runs on so can easily bring the whole end-to-end package together without having to rely on partners to deliver solutions to customers.