Windows Vista: It's the little things...

…that make all the difference in the world to me.  I've been using Beta 1 a lot recently, and although "most of the stuff that we would expect that tech enthusiasts and consumers will be interested in will happen at Beta 2," every once in awhile come across a small improvement that makes me much more productive than on Windows XP.  I guess that officially makes me a bithead?

For example, how many times have you copied a bunch of files/folders only to have the whole operation abort because a file was in use:

   

(I usually get this when copying an open VS project due to those pesky .ncb files.)  I just did this on Windows Vista, and got the following instead:

   

It lets me fix the issue and retry!  Hooray!  Also, you've got to notice the "Repeat my answer each time this occurs" that appears on various dialogs.  No more shift-clicking to get that elusive "No to All" behavior!

Another favorite "little thing" of mine is filtering/searching of the Control Panel as you type:

   

This feature finally makes the default view better than the classic view!  (Although it works with that, too.)

The same type of searching can be done on your Start Menu programs:

   

Where's that event viewer again?  Who cares!

It even works like "Run" if the program is in the path:

   

It unfortunately doesn't search control panel items, though.

Even better, that search box gets focus when you click Start (or press the Windows key).  So I can save a keystroke in my frequent [Windows+R cmd Enter] routine by just typing [Windows cmd Enter] instead!

Yes the UI can be awkward at times, but I wouldn't worry too much.  Check out these screenshots - [1], [2], [3], and [4] - of Windows XP ("Whistler") Beta 1 from an old review by winsupersite.