Most popular submissions in 'Usability' of all time
Don't cancel an entire "Move" or "Copy" action because of a single error.
Sometimes I have to copy or move a very large folder to another spot on the hard drive. There is absolutely nothing more annoying then when it is almost finished with this thirty minute to hour long process then when I get an error like "Cannot copy (more...)
Is anyone here familiar with the xcopy command line tool? There are parameters that you can set that makes it follow certain rules; one of these rules is that it will ignore errors and copy all the files it can, then tell you which ones weren't copied (more...)
High
High
Not fixed
It's Time: Unified Control Panel
UPDATE 6/22/2010: Re-uploaded all of the concept images. Sorry!
I think the largest issue in terms of usability with the Windows operating system to date is the lack of a central unified control panel. While the OS does have a fairly large (more...)
Merge everything, all properties, options, tasks, EVERYTHING into the control panel.
Please see the mockups I have created here: http://davidswebserver.com/ControlPanelConcepts/
High
High
Not fixed
Enable Drag&Drop to the Breadcrumb bar
The most needed feature missing in the shell IMO is dragging files and folders to the breadcrumb bar in Explorer. This would enable users to easily move items to the parent folder or extract files from a zipped folder without going trough the extraction (more...)
High
High
Fixed
Output to more than one audio device simultaneously
Can't send audio stream to more than one audio device simultaneously.
Allow stream output to more than one audio output device simultaneously, perhaps with (optional) automatic or manual latency adjustment.
The next logical step would be what commenter Webweaver refers to below as "many to many": (more...)
High
High
Not fixed
Improved Registry Editor
Registry Editor hasn't been updated in a long time and it shows.
Add search functionality such as Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT) wildcards, regular expressions, by date search (newer than, older than).
Show all results at once, perhaps in a separate tab so we don't have to F3 all the way.
I (more...)
Low
Low
Not fixed
Feature: Enable ISO Mounting as native in Windows 7 Explorer
Since Virtual CD doesn't work any more a native integrated way (in Explorer) to mount ISO to the My Computer. It would also solve any conflicts with drivers and the like. I had to use System Restore in order to get Windows 7 to work again after trying (more...)
It would be beneficial for MSDN subscribers and the general public and would also get rid of Spy-ware ridden software that enables this. So the solution would be to have a native integrated way (in Explorer) like Zip except it asks to mount the ISO instead.
(more...)
Medium
Medium
Fixed
Now on Windows 8!
Bigger Window for Advanced Power Settings
When changing the system's Advanced Power Settings, the window contains a vast amount of settings in a tree format, however, the size of the window is far too small. This makes navigating all of the settings painfully difficult, especially as you (more...)
The Advanced Power Options should be in a window the same size as the regular power options. Personally, I do not think the settings should be in a tree format either. That alone makes them difficult to navigate.
Medium
Medium
Not fixed
Properly Size Default Columns in File Explorer
When in "Details" view within Explorer, there is a large amount of blank unused space by default, yet many of the columns or "dividers" are sized too small, so much so that relatively short file names and extension types are cut off.
By default, all of the dividers should be properly sized to take up the entire width of the window, focusing primarily on the Name divider.
Low
Low
Not fixed
Extend the taskbar to multiple screens
Now when you have multiple screens, the taskbar is only shown on the first one.
It is annoying not having the taskbar extend onto the next screen because you can't see which windows are on there.
It would be nice if the taskbar extends to all the screens, preferably a taskbar per screen.
High
High
Fixed
It's there in Windows 8.
Option to pause (and resume) a file transfer
Sometimes a file transfer can take up a lot of resources so I think it would be useful if you could pause it and resume it again at a later time.
Add a pause button on the file copy dialog.
Medium
High
Fixed
Available in Windows 8.
Document thumbnails should reflect number of pages
Thumbnails are simply shown with a rectangular border—this doesn't give a good visual representation of multi-page documents.
File types that have the 'pages' property, like Word Documents, should have a representation based on the number of pages they have—a document with more than one page shown as a pile, the front page with a curl.
Or, if there's (more...)
Low
Medium
Not fixed
Closing laptop should NOT hibernate after shutdown has been ordered
When I physically close my laptop computer, Windows goes into hibernation, which is a good thing since it saves battery power.
However, this also happens if I close the laptop shortly AFTER ordering it to shut down. The shutdown is interrupted (more...)
Once a system shutdown has been ordered, disable the service that puts the system into hibernation when the laptop is being physically closed.
Medium
High
Not fixed
Add the ability to queue file transfers in windows explorer
Since i can't really explain it, i'll try illustrate a mock up scenario where the problem happens:
1. Your fiend is over at your place and you're impressing him with your amazing video library.
2. He decides (more...)
Simply add the ability to queue transfers.
Low
High
Fixed
Fixed in Windows 8.
Just a lot of "Windows ..." (application naming)
Every application that may ship with Windows 7 starts with “Windows” like Windows Media Player and so on (except for the old ones like Paint or Notepad). If you open enough of them, the taskbar shows a lot of “Windows…” titles. I have counted (more...)
If that works on Mac OS X why not on Windows? Hide the term "Windows" on the taskbar buttons or rename the new applications. There is nothing wrong with simple names like "Paint" or "Notepad".
Medium
Medium
Not fixed
Allow MSCONFIG and windows like it to be scalable.
There are many windows like this, but ill stick with Msconfig. One of the handiest little tools in the past few builds, letting you turn off startup programs.
But the window is so small and the content is soo long, it's a file location (more...)
Allow these windows to be scalable.
Medium
High
Not fixed