The five biggest changes from Windows 7 beta

Microsoft just released details of changes it's made since the beta of Windows 7 was released. Here are the top five changes.

The Engineering Windows 7 blog lists three dozen changes. None are earth-shaking. But here are the top five changes:

At-Tab integrates with Aero Peek

Aero Peek is one of the niftiest new features of Windows 7, and lets you "peek" underneath open windows to the desktop. With the latest build of Windows 7, when you use Alt-Tab, Windows Peek also springs into action, but only when you want it.

It's easier to spot newly installed programs

Whenever I install new software, I generally want to run it, and right away. But software doesn't always launch right after installation. With Windows, it usually takes some hunting and pecking to find your newly installed software. No longer. Now the icon for newly installed software will automatically be placed at the bottom of the Start menu, so you can easily find it.

UAC improvements

Microsoft continued to tinker with UAC. In the previous beta, there were complaints it was so watered down that safety was compromised. New tweaks supposedly make it safer.

Getting your attention

Sometimes Windows or an application needs to get your attention, for example, to tell you that Outlook is giving you a reminder. It's easy to not notice those reminders, so Microsoft has made several changes to make them more obvious. Here's what the Engineering Windows 7 blog says about it:

First, we changed the flashing animation curve to make it more noticeable (from a sine to a sawtooth wave). Second, we used a bolder orange color. Finally, we wanted to double the number of flashes which is currently set to three. As a nod to Windows 7, we decided to go with seven flashes instead.

More taskbar space

The Windows 7 taskbar serves many purposes, and it could feel cluttered. So Microsoft did some redesign, cleaned up the Notification Area, and you can now fit significantly more icons in the taskbar than previously. Below it a chart from Microsof that details how many more icons can fit, based on screen resolution:

Maximum taskbar button capacity before scrolling