Recently the Windows 7 Team Blog posted a very informational article about Device Stage in Windows 7.
For those of you who are not familiar with the technology, “Device Stage helps you interact with any compatible device connected to your computer. From Device Stage you can see device status and run common tasks from a single window. There are even pictures of the devices which makes it really easy to see what's there. Device manufacturers can customize Device Stage. For example, if your camera manufacturer offers a custom version of Device Stage, then when you plug your camera into your PC, you could see things like the number of photos on your camera and links to helpful information”.
In other words, Device Stage is designed to give you the most of what you need from your device without installing any third party drivers and application to support its features and services.
Device Stage is an extension of Microsoft’s new device management in Windows 7, available from Devices and Printers in the Start Menu.
Devices and Printer – Device Experience for the poor…
Devices and Printers is available from the Windows 7 Start Menu. Devices and Printers gives you tools to manage and use your devices. For example, if you right click your wireless card, there is a shortcut to Network Settings. Right clicking your mouse enables you to change mouse settings.
One of the icons you’ll see in Devices and Printers is your Computer. Right clicking your computer name gives you general management tools to manage your computer. A cool thing you can do is creating a shortcut of the computer icon on the desktop and access these management tools directly from there.
This is the regular device experience you’ll see in Windows 7. Its better that what Windows XP had, but it’s not what Device Stage is going to be.
Device Stage – I guess we’ll have to wait…
As said earlier, “Device Stage is designed to give you the most of what you need from your device without installing any third party drivers and application” (and I know it’s wired I’m quoting myself…), and as you can see in the images below, the device management is much more intuitive than what was in earlier versions of Windows. To check if your device works with Device Stage, just double click its icon in Devices and Printers.
The next examples are two devices connected to my home computer supported with Device stage.
One of them is Microsoft Multimedia Keyboard, rather old hardware (I bought it at least 5 years ago…). This old device is working with Device Stage but it doesn’t have any special features accept “Configure My Keyboard” and some help and promotional information.
On the other hand, the second one is a new SanDisk Sansa View Player I bought a few months ago. This device experience has more features like Firmware Upgrade, Media Converter, Sync Configuration, Charging Status, Media Management option and more. Some of the options direct you to Windows applications (‘Manage Media on Your Device’ opens Windows Media Player...) and others direct you to SanDisk Web site (to download Firmware Updates, for example…).
As you can see, this device experience ease your device management, but it’s still lacks the features to manage the device directly from the device page. I’ll expect that a feature like the ‘Firmware Updates’ option will check and download the firmware directly to Windows instead of directing me to SanDisk site to download an installer that downloads the Firmware, for example.
Device Stage is a really cool feature in Windows 7, which helps you use your devices without using any third party drivers or applications that can damage your computer stability, but as for know there are only few devices that support it. As any new technology, it takes some time until hardware manufacturers add their support for it, but I believe that in a world where Microsoft operating systems control the market, it won’t take long until new devices will emerge and work with Device Stage. If not in Windows 7, maybe in Windows 8.
As for now (and probably in the near future…) Google is the best search engine around. Although Microsoft released their new shiny Search Engine Bing (based on Windows Live Search, Live Search,…) with new enhancements and look, Google is still the #1 search engine available.
But, is the Search giant copying from Bing?
One of Bing features is the Left Navigation Pane, something that Google didn’t have until now (well, at least not like the Navigation Pane they are working on…)
It seems that Google is working on a new interface for their Search Engine, adding a new Navigation Pane in search result and a new look in Google’s homepage. This new interface is not yet public, but someone already found a way to enable it with a small tweak.
This is what you need to do:
- Go to Google.com
- Paste the following in the Address Bar (only this, with no Google.com at the beginning):
BLOCKED SCRIPTvoid(document.cookie="PREF=ID=20b6e4c2f44943bb:U=4bf292d46faad806:TM=1249677602:LM=1257919388:S=odm0Ys-53ZueXfZG;path=/; domain=.google.com");
- Hit Enter.
- Refresh the page or enter Google.com again.
You’re Done.
Now, you’ll see that the Google’s homepage has a new look:
Before After
Besides the new look, a new navigation pane is added to your search result:
The new navigation pane helps you categorize your search result ,just like Bing…;-).
I know Microsoft has a lot to learn from Google in the Search Engines area, but it’s nice to see that Google is learning something from Microsoft as well….