If there's one thing that puts me off an application, it's when it unnecessarily inserts itself into the Windows startup process so that it can have its very own system tray icon from whence it can spam me with annoying messages. Obviously it makes sense for some applications to run on startup (for example, I want Windows Live Messenger to be running without me needing to manually start it each time). The problem is that there are multiple places where an application can register itself for execution on startup, and this makes it hard to retain control over which programs are granted such esteemed status.

Of course, I wouldn't be writing this entry unless Windows Vista had a solution! From the start menu search bar, type System Configuration, and click on the link that comes up. You'll be required to provide privilege elevation unless you've disabled UAC, and then you'll see the following utility:

As you can see from the above screenshot, the Startup tab enumerates all the applications that are set to run as startup, regardless of whether they are set in the registry (either per-machine or per-user), the user profile, or simply the startup folder in the Programs entry of the start menu. You can disable any or all of them; they'll still be listed there so that you can switch them on again if you need to.

I should note in passing that this tool also allows you to do some other pretty useful things, like editing your boot configuration database (no need to master arcane bcdedit commands any longer) or accessing a variety of other system tools and utilities. It's the power user's configuration tool of choice - go check it out!

I posted in June about the wonderful New York Times reader application, written entirely in WPF. I'm delighted that this is now available for public download.

Scott Hanselman calls it WPF's first killer app. Ryan Stewart from ZDNet says it shows off exactly what a Rich Internet Application should be. CNET thinks it really is a better way to read the Times' news, but wishes these capabilities existed in general purpose form.

What do you think?

The awesome guys from the Windows Vista Magazine revealed a great Windows Vista secret recently that I wanted to bring to a broader audience.

When you're browsing around the file system in Explorer, it's often useful to be able to quickly switch between different folder views. If you're looking at a folder with lots of long filenames, maybe the Details view works best. If you're looking at a folder with lots of photos, maybe a small thumbnail view works well; for a folder with lots of documents, maybe a larger thumbnail view works better. Now you can use the Views button on the toolbar to modify this - click the button to toggle between views or use the down arrow to get access to the slider - but it's quicker to use a shortcut. Simply hold down the Ctrl key and use your mouse scrollwheel to resize the icons from small to extra large.

What's really cool about this, as Jon points out, is that it also works on the desktop itself. If the desktop has focus, simply do Ctrl+mousewheel and you can go from the regular 48x48 icons to full 256x256 photographic-quality renditions. For those of you who have a desktop filled with documents and shortcuts, you can of course also use this feature to cram even more on your screen so that you never have to create a folder again!

On a more practical note than my last blog posting, I want to encourage everyone to check out the Windows Vista compatibility cookbook. Despite our best efforts, there will always be some breaking changes between releases of an operating system, particularly when security model changes such as UAC are introduced.

This excellent guide, recently updated for RC1 of Windows Vista, tells you everything to know about the changes that might break your application, from basic, simple-to-fix things (e.g. GetVersion() reports a major version number of 6) to more esoteric yet complex changes (the GINA extensible logon model has been replaced with a new credential provider model).

If you write Windows applications, I'd encourage you to download and read it - it's as simple as that!

We go to fairly extreme lengths to try to maintain compatibility with older applications, as Raymond Chen's blog often demonstrates in vivid fashion. As an example of this, some of you may remember seeing Jim Allchin's demonstration of Visicalc (the earliest spreadsheet) at PDC 2003 running on Windows Vista (then known as "Longhorn", of course).

So I wondered - what is the oldest component still present in Windows Vista? After a bit of digging around, I think I've finally discovered the answer.

Dear old edlin, the very first line editor in MS-DOS, is still available for your batch editing pleasure over a quarter of a century after its introduction. According to wikipedia, edlin even pre-dates MS-DOS, having been written for an even earlier operating system that was one of the company's first acquisitions. My first exposure to MS-DOS was version 3.2 on my father's office computer, and I used to remember most of the mnemonic commands by heart. It's not a user-friendly tool, but it was fast to load and more forgiving of mistakes than the alternative of copy con filename.txt.

This is one secret that has mere curiosity value, but I still have a warm spot for this venerable editor and I salute its indefatigability!