I know that 2008 Server was supposed to be released at the same time as Vista SP1, however I think someone was a little over zealous:

cool, so does that mean we've avoided all the crap and bugs that are inevitable in an initial release?

Shame Vista didn't start at service pack one million.

It is kind of strange, but with it sharing the kernel and most other stuff with Vista, it makes sense to artificially call the first release SP1. That way the next SP is "SP2 for Vista and Windows Server 2008", not "SP2 for Vista/SP1 for Windows Server 2008" and all the ensuing confusion that could would lead from it.

What I find troublesome is that nobody cared enough to update that Windows 95 monitor picture, despite the $$$ and t that went into the pretty Vista icons. 

I didn't think the icons in Vista were all that great.  It seems that they are only interested in minor changes to the icons between releases in order to not confuse the computer illiterate.

CRNewsom:

I didn't think the icons in Vista were all that great.  It seems that they are only interested in minor changes to the icons between releases in order to not confuse the computer illiterate.

Do you mean besides the major change in having the icons be vector based? Because I think that is a drastic improvement.

I was referring to the <i>design</i> of the icons, not the nature of them.  For instance, the recycle bin looks like only a minor change in design from the one used in XP.  It is a much more detailed recycle bin, but only a minor change in design from the previous one (clear bin from a frosted, translucent one).  Maybe it's just my aesthetics, and my preference to use the command line...

CRNewsom:

I was referring to the <i>design</i> of the icons, not the nature of them.  For instance, the recycle bin looks like only a minor change in design from the one used in XP.  It is a much more detailed recycle bin, but only a minor change in design from the previous one (clear bin from a frosted, translucent one).  Maybe it's just my aesthetics, and my preference to use the command line...

Not really sure how much fancier or more detailed they could get with the recycling bin....

I don't think the icons in Vista look that bad really. But you have always been able to replace the icons for these things.

I am sure plenty of other people can point every other little shortcoming in Vista though...

MasterPlanSoftware:

I am sure plenty of other people can point every other little shortcoming in Vista though...

Touché.

Quinnum:

cool, so does that mean we've avoided all the crap and bugs that are inevitable in an initial release?

Just think of all those people who staunchly say, " I'll wait for Service Pack 1! "  Now, they can safely upgrade without worry.  After all, it's not really a first release anymore.

MasterPlanSoftware:

Not really sure how much fancier or more detailed they could get with the recycling bin....

OSX has a wire mesh bin. Tehee.

MasterPlanSoftware:

Not really sure how much fancier or more detailed they could get with the recycling bin....

I've always wanted to see more than just "empty" and "full."  I think there should be a single crumpled up peice of paper added for every so many megs you put in.  When it gets extremely full, you start seeing it overflow, ie, crumpled sheets over the top, on the floor next to the bin.   Perhaps it could even start encroaching on the surrounding desktop space eventually -- sort of a friendly but persistent reminder to empty the thing and keep your office clean.

shadowman:

MasterPlanSoftware:

Not really sure how much fancier or more detailed they could get with the recycling bin....

 

I've always wanted to see more than just "empty" and "full."  I think there should be a single crumpled up peice of paper added for every so many megs you put in.  When it gets extremely full, you start seeing it overflow, ie, crumpled sheets over the top, on the floor next to the bin.   Perhaps it could even start encroaching on the surrounding desktop space eventually -- sort of a friendly but persistent reminder to empty the thing and keep your office clean.

That would be fantastic, and then all the forums would again be filled with WTF! Bloatwarez!

shadowman:

I've always wanted to see more than just "empty" and "full."  I think there should be a single crumpled up peice of paper added for every so many megs you put in.  When it gets extremely full, you start seeing it overflow, ie, crumpled sheets over the top, on the floor next to the bin.   Perhaps it could even start encroaching on the surrounding desktop space eventually -- sort of a friendly but persistent reminder to empty the thing and keep your office clean.

MasterPlanSoftware:

CRNewsom:

I didn't think the icons in Vista were all that great.  It seems that they are only interested in minor changes to the icons between releases in order to not confuse the computer illiterate.

 

Do you mean besides the major change in having the icons be vector based? Because I think that is a drastic improvement.

Figures you're into the girlie-graphix. 

shadowman:

I've always wanted to see more than just "empty" and "full."  I think there should be a single crumpled up peice of paper added for every so many megs you put in.  When it gets extremely full, you start seeing it overflow, ie, crumpled sheets over the top, on the floor next to the bin.   Perhaps it could even start encroaching on the surrounding desktop space eventually -- sort of a friendly but persistent reminder to empty the thing and keep your office clean.

Why stop there? You should 3D render your documents onto crumpled up paper (paper sizes correct for your region, with full AA/shading too, of course) individually, deleted .EXEs should be rendered as CDs/floppies depending on the install media, photos should be rendered as crumpled up polaroids, deleted emails should be in evelopes with the recipient/senders addresses rendered on the front, etc.

The fact that Windows doesn't do this instead of a boolean empty/full that doesn't even depict what's in there disgusts me.

Actually the earlier Longhorn betas (pre RC) did do the recycle bin thing you speak of (where it would incrementally fill the graphical bin). For some reason it was removed.

RayS:

Why stop there? You should 3D render your documents onto crumpled up paper (paper sizes correct for your region, with full AA/shading too, of course) individually, deleted .EXEs should be rendered as CDs/floppies depending on the install media, photos should be rendered as crumpled up polaroids, deleted emails should be in evelopes with the recipient/senders addresses rendered on the front, etc.

RayS:

Why stop there? You should 3D render your documents onto crumpled up paper (paper sizes correct for your region, with full AA/shading too, of course) individually, deleted .EXEs should be rendered as CDs/floppies depending on the install media, photos should be rendered as crumpled up polaroids, deleted emails should be in evelopes with the recipient/senders addresses rendered on the front, etc.

RobTF:

Actually the earlier Longhorn betas (pre RC) did do the recycle bin thing you speak of (where it would incrementally fill the graphical bin). For some reason it was removed.

Maybe they had trouble coming up with a proper rule for determining how the data in Trash corresponds to the fullness of its icon. And I can't blame them. Most choices you make would be fairly arbitrairy (10% of disk? 5% of free space? linear rendering? logarithmical? file size = crumple size?) -- and do you add complexity by making it customisable to the user? At least the empty/something duality is beyond dispute.

dhromed:

Maybe they had trouble coming up with a proper rule for determining how the data in Trash corresponds to the fullness of its icon.

User-defined number of bytes -- which is currently being done with a percent slider in XP (and probably others):

Of course, it would probably take forever for any visible change in the icon in the case of large drives, so another slider would probably be more useful.

dhromed:

do you add complexity by making it customisable to the user?

I don't see how that adds complexity considering it can be defaulted like everything else in Windows.

dhromed:

At least the empty/something duality is beyond dispute.

It's a server OS fer crying out loud - the last thing it needs is a sexy Recycle Bin icon.

They did the same for Server 2003, by the way (although they used a conventional numbering scheme after it was actually relelased), so no great surprise there.  I'd seriously worry about the viability of the so-called "SP" if it's never been used in anger in a real-world production environment, though.

AbbydonKrafts:

dhromed:

Maybe they had trouble coming up with a proper rule for determining how the data in Trash corresponds to the fullness of its icon.

User-defined number of bytes -- which is currently being done with a percent slider in XP (and probably others):

 

[screen]

I had absolutely and completely forgotten about those options. 

mfah:

It's a server OS fer crying out loud - the last thing it needs is a sexy Recycle Bin icon.

I can't even think why anyone would incorporate this into a desktop OS.

People bash MS enough as is for being 'bloatware' just because they added fancier graphics to Vista. Can you imagine the /. outcry for the recycling bin being fancy and taking up MORE resources?

MasterPlanSoftware:

CRNewsom:

I didn't think the icons in Vista were all that great.  It seems that they are only interested in minor changes to the icons between releases in order to not confuse the computer illiterate.

 

Do you mean besides the major change in having the icons be vector based? Because I think that is a drastic improvement.

Actually, I don't think Vista supports vector-based icons.   That is, the icon source is still bitmapped, regardless of the fact that Vista scales icons "smoothly" between 32x32 and 256x256 (using interpolation, presumably).  If Vista used true vector-based icons, you would be able to scale icons to any resolution without loss of detail, like vector-based Flash animations.

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa511296.aspx

http://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=505291&view=findpost&p=587974529 

I agree that the "smooth scaling" is nice.