SMB IT | Curtis Franklin » TAG: Vista

June 10, 2008 | Comments: (0)

TechEd Notes: Tricks of the Vista masters

TAGS: Vista

One of the sessions I most wanted to attend was "Tricks of the Vista Masters." Let me be honest here: I wasn't looking for things that would make Vista do lots of new tricks, but rather things that would simply let Vista run a little (or, in a perfect world, a lot) better. Peter Bruzzese, the speaker in the session, seems quite thoroughly knowledgeable, but most of the presentation has been on teaching Vista new tricks. There are a couple of neat things he showed about analyzing the issues you might have in Vista, but nothing about how to really make it operate more like a production operating system.

I'm not sure whether that's because I'm the only user still having trouble with Vista, or because no one's figured out quite how to fix it yet, but I'm still a bit disheartened.

Vista still seems like a car with a really superb paint job and a 15-horse lawnmower engine under the hood. The bells and whistles are there, but the basics still need work.

More, later, when I find out that I'm wrong about all this...

Posted by Curt Franklin on June 10, 2008 12:55 PM

April 30, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Book Review: Windows Vista, The Missing Manual

TAGS: Book Reviews, Vista

I looked at the table of contents inside David Pogue's Windows Vista, The Missing Manual and thought I was going to pan it. I see a title containing a phrase like 'Missing Manual' and for some reason I think it's going to contain secret hacker-style Easter egg sort of things that geeks like me love. But read only the Table of Contents and all you see are explanations of all the obvious stuff that nerds already know. Things like operating the file system, right-clicking operations, printer installation, security settings, etc. etc. et nauseum cetera.

But don't close it based on the chapter headings. Start reading through it. Okay, it's still not for someone like me. But being this is a blog on SMB topics, this book very much is for someone on your SMB staff. Most likely several someones--usually those people who don't wear propeller beanies, never heard of gnome illusionists and have social lives. Pogue's Missing Manual does a real good job walking those folks through a potentially nerve wracking Vista move.

True, I wish it were smaller for those people, but there are ways around that. Generally, you show them a book this size and they start sniffling like Dumbo rubbing trunks with his Mom. But you don't have to make them read all of it. Skim the work and put together a syllabus for the average biz users in your group.

If it were me, I'd have them read chapters 1-3. Get them through that and they're generally good to go as long as you've got an IT guy around to do the setup, backup and similar back-end tasks for them. Lots of Web work and more reliance on bundled apps means they should also read chapters 7 & 11. After that, day-to-day non-nerd users are generally okay.

What's nice about this book is that it's got an accessible, tutorial writing style. Clear, non-geeky and intellectually padded with loads of annotated screen shots. Yeah, you can use this as a text book and teach your co-workers this stuff while they're reading it; but unless they ate a lot of lead paint chips as children, Pogue's word smithing doesn't really need a teacher's backup.

Power users can go through the other chapters in Pogue's book and get benefit, too. Especially the items on security, the new control panel features, the maintenance and disk sections and even the media sections if they're turning their home machines into TiVos.

It's not a book of hidden hacks and ways to make Vista do things only a hobbit could love, but Windows Vista, The Missing Manual is a solid primer for the new OS. Well written and clear to boot. Recommended as long as you're a member of the appropriate audience.

Posted by Oliver Rist on April 30, 2007 11:05 AM