Living with Live

Recently in my Windows Live group , LIVESOAPBOX we have all been discussing the new Windows Security Essentials beta which will now provide the only missing part of the security measures already built in to Windows 7. Those of you who haven’t yet downloaded and tried out Windows 7 will not be familiar with how ALL aspects of your computer including SECURITY and MAINTENANCE are now all taken care of by the ACTION CENTRE therefore leaving only ANTI-VIRUS as the only security feature not actually built into the Operating System and which therefore needs to be additionally installed.  I will attempt here to explain to those of you who aren’t familiar with Windows 7 how to make full use of the ACTION CENTRE.

You can think of the ACTION CENTRE as a complete ‘all round’ maintenance and security feature that only requires you the user to set up just once in order to keep the whole of your computer running smoothly and safely, and as far as setting up the ACTION CENTRE to suit yourself is concerned,  the default settings will probably be more than adequate for most average users of Windows 7.  The only thing that you will  have to set up will be your own choice of schedule for Windows Defender to carry out a scan of your computer including whether or not to do a quick scan or a full scan, and when to schedule any backups of your system and your files including where to place those backups.  As an ordinary user you don’t really have to know HOW it all works, but I will try and show you the parts of the Action Centre that you will no doubt notice the most as you use Windows 7 especially how it Alerts you to either problems or requests you to perform certain tasks in order to keep everything running smoothly.

On the Windows 7 taskbar you will see a small white FLAG icon to the right hand side next to your Internet connection icon and the Speaker icon.  If all is running smoothly with your computer, this white flag icon will remain white so you have a very prominent reminder right where you can’t help but notice it that all is well.   If something is amiss however, the white flag icon will have a red cross through it as shown, which again you can’t help but notice easily.  If you then click on the flag icon you will receive a ‘pop up’ window informing you of any problems OR outstanding actions that you need to take in order to keep everything running smoothly but unlike some security programs this window will not pop up or bother you until YOU click on the flag when it shows a red cross.  If you just ignore it, it will just remain a warning, so it is not obtrusive at all and its entirely up to you when to actually instigate any action.  Of course if the ACTION CENTRE does require your attention because there is something seriously amiss, then a small balloon will pop up just above the taskbar informing you of this, but this only occurs when there is a serious security problem for example, such as the Windows Firewall being disabled.

These alerts can range from informing you that Windows Defender has not done a scan of your computer yet and therefore needs to do so, to reminding you that some security updates need to be installed and will do so automatically when you next ‘log off’.  It will also warn you when you first install Windows 7 that there is no ANTI-VIRUS program installed and that you need to install one.  But the ACTION CENTRE is far more versatile than just acting as a warning and alert service!  If you click on the white flag to open the actual ACTION CENTRE itself, you can then see just how comprehensive and far reaching this part of Windows 7 actually is. On the left hand side in the sidebar area, you can change the ACTION CENTRE settings to suit yourself, Change the USER ACCOUNT control settings, view any archived messages made by the ACTION CENTRE about your computer and also view your computers PERFORMANCE information.  For now we will just take a look at the main window choices. This is divided into two main areas, SECURITY and MAINTENANCE. You will notice that each area has a drop down arrow to the right, and if you click on the SECURITY arrow, you will then be able to access the SECURITY list.

As you can easily see, this is pretty comprehensive and let’s you know just what has been enabled on your system. If you aren’t sure about a particular setting or how you should have these settings configured then you can click on the blue helpline at the bottom of the list to find out more information to help and guide you in how to have the settings configured.  As you can see, I don’t have NETWORK ACCESS PROTECTION  enabled, so let’s just find out more about it and whether or not I ought to have it ‘switched on’ So if I now click on the blue ‘WHAT IS NETWORK ACCESS PROTECTION’ another ‘help’ window will open which explains what NEP is and who it is useful for. As I am not a NETWORK ADMINISTRATOR nor do I have a NETWORK as such, just one computer, then I now know that I can safely leave this feature switched off without putting my computer into any danger. So now let’s take a quick look at MAINTENANCE.

First in the list is CHECK FOR SOLUTIONS TO PROBLEM REPORTS. What does all that mean? Well, whenever the ACTION CENTRE reports any problem with the running of your computer, it first tries to find a solution to the problem. Lets say that you were having problems connecting up your printer, then ACTION CENTRE would first of all try to find a solution, perhaps by searching online for a new driver for example. However, if it couldn’t find a solution, then that problem would be logged as not resolved but in the meantime a new driver might come available later,  so by asking ACTION CENTRE to recheck for solutions to any previous problems that may have manifest themselves in the past, those problems can then be resolved.

Following that there is the BACKUP schedule and the date and time of the last back up made followed by CHECK FOR UPDATES which also will report if there is any action you need to take regarding that area.  At the bottom of the SECURITY list is TROUBLESHOOTING SYSTEM MAINTENANCE. Again, if there is any problem here you will be informed.  Notice that Windows is ACTIVELY checking your system for maintenance problems. This means in essence that the ACTION CENTRE is continually monitoring the whole of your system to make sure that it is working at its best.  You can change the TROUBLESHOOTING settings here if you wish by clicking on the blue sentence underneath.

Obviously this post only covers the surface of the ACTION CENTRE but tries to give those who have not yet tried out Windows 7 an inkling as to just how everything to do with the SECURITY of your system and also its MAINTENANCE for optimum running have been incorporated right there inside the operating system so that you can relax and feel safe and secure. Next post about the ACTION CENTRE I will try and dig a little deeper into how to set it all up to just to suit you.

TG

Here is my Windows 7 desktop as I have it at the moment. The wallpaper is from my HD Windows 7 Wallpaper theme available to all on my network from HERE.

The Gadgets that I use are as follows, the weather gadget which is available by default in Windows 7 so that I can keep my eye on the conditions outside, two CLOCKS one showing my time and the other one PST time in case I am intending to listen to a podcast or watch a live videocast such as the one recently made for Bing. The CLOCKS are not the default one but are a desktop clock that chimes on the hour, half hour and quarter. I prefer this audible reminder of the time as I am not always at the computer and like to be able to hear it. Its a nice chime but you can turn it off if you don’t like it. The clock also allows you to give it a name, make it look ‘glassy’ add a second hand and also add the date if you so wish.

The next gadget is the NATIONAL RAILWAYS TIMETABLE  gadget which lets me keep track of all the trains leaving our local station, or if I prefer I can input any station into it and any destination so that I could check on a particular route for a planned journey. It is updated in real time and is very handy to have on the desktop.  I also have the SYSTEM MONITOR GADGET which is configured to show my quad core processors, my RAM usage and my internet connection. The other gadget on my desktop is the VIDEO MESSAGE GADGET that I have posted about in the clubhouse previously and which allows me to easily make a video message to send to members of my family if I so wish without leaving my desktop to do so.

The taskbar is very busy on my Windows 7 desktop because I don’t like my programs displayed as icons, preferring instead to place them on the taskbar. Along the taskbar travelling from left to right and only one click away for me to access I have the following, Flock the social browser for going online and keeping tabs on everyone, Internet Explorer 8 for browsing online, my folders on my computer, Windows Media player for listening to my music files, the snipping too that comes with Windows 7, the Sticky notes in case I need to write a reminder to myself on the desktop, Windows Live Mail which is always my very first ‘click of the day’ after logging on, Live Movie Maker beta, Windows Live Photo Gallery, Writer for writing my blog posts, Auto Collage so that I can create a Collage of my pictures although actually this is not really needed on the taskbar because I can do this from inside Live Photo Gallery!

Blu for sending any tweets and catching up to others peoples tweets made since I was last on twitter, Windows Media Centre, Snag it for capturing screens etc, Snag it Editor for editing those captures, Deep Zoom which again, although it is installed on my computer its actually much easier to use the online program  DEEPZOOMpix to make a DeepZoom composition rather than use the installed application, Paint for touching up those screen grabs etc. my Webcam program and setup, Spotify for listening to music that isn’t stored on my computer, and the Bing desktop application. Following that is the Control panel and lastly the Gadget Gallery.

As you can see, I could remove some of these as being rather unnecessary because I tend to access them elsewhere so maybe a ‘taskbar tidy up’ is in order soon!  As soon as I download any program or application I intend to use frequently then it is immediately  pinned to my taskbar because that is where I like it to be then whatever I want to use is just one click away even if I am surfing online!  Plus I can then also make use in Windows 7 of those awesome ‘jump lists!

TG

Had a lovely surprise this morning,  BING was available here in the UK!  I wasted no time in accessing it to try out. To my amazement the first thing it asked me once I accessed the BING home page was did I want to enable it in my browser? (Flock) Why amazing?  Because I couldn’t use Live Search inside Flock it just wasn’t available to me even when I visited the Live Search home page.  So I enabled it as my default search engine in Flock, and there it will stay.

It became immediately apparent that not everything is fully implemented yet in our UK version, we don’t have the list of our search history on the left hand side of the search results for example, and some other aspects have not been included yet.  Hopefully this will all  be rectified on June 3rd when it officially launches.

The biggest surprise for me was that a Bing Community is available  as this was not mentioned previously in the information received up to press about Bing.  At the moment this chiefly comprises of a Blog area which contains the following All Blogs, Search Blogs, Webmaster Blogs, Developer Blogs, Travel Blogs and Maps Blogs which are all currently written by the individual BING teams.  There is also a forum included for members of the Bing community to post questions and queries about different aspects of Bings features and to give the relevant teams some feedback regarding  BING.  These forums are divided into the following categories, All Forums,  General, Developer, Search and Webmaster. There are also two other separate areas available for Media and Events.

 

In order to become a member of the Bing Community , you need to fill in the usual Profile details about yourself, choose an Avatar to use in the Forums, etc. You can also enrol your blog or website address to be added to  Microsoft’s search index from HERE.  As for the blogs available to read inside the Bing Community these are written by the different Search teams and not by members of the community nor does it seem that there is any intention to include blog posts made by the members of the Bing Community,  although a member of the Bing Team Betsy states that it may be possible for members to contribute a ‘guest post’ by requesting this in a reply to a Bing team members blog.

I was really surprised by the inclusion of this BING community, I had seen nothing to indicate that a community was to be included inside the BING website.  In order to join it all you need is your Windows Live ID.  Why not give it a try and post some questions about BING to the teams?

TG.   Oh and my BING desktop application is not working fully as yet either,  so it looks like I’ll have to wait until June 3rd, then BING will hopefully  be just one click away!

 

Just thought I would get myself prepared for the big day on June 3rd and Bing’s arrival by downloading this to my desktop. And apparently you will be able to use all of Bing’s search abilities from inside all of the Live Essentials suite of programs as well! 

Quote:

Windows Live Essentials

Windows Live Essentials gives you instant messaging, e-mail, blogging, photos and more. You can bring together multiple e-mail accounts and calendar applications from MSN, Google, Yahoo! and others, enabling you to more easily stay in touch and share content with friends and family. And of course you get quick, easy access to Bing search from all the Windows Live applications.

 

Check it out for yourselves at  http://www.decisionengine.com/Default.html 

Download the Digital Reviewers Guide desktop application from http://www.discoverbing.com/behindbing/downloads.aspx and be like this Granny, get ready for the launch on June 3rd!  I can’t wait to try it all out for myself.

TG 

Most users on Windows Live who have been using the site for many years as a blogging platform by using Windows Live Spaces will be well aware that poor old Spaces was not included in the Wave 3 updates. In fact it remained completely untouched.  Compared with the rest of Windows Live it now looks really dated and in need of some tender loving care in this users opinion.  You see, Windows Live Spaces is still (in my humble opinion) the best blogging site out there for all ranges of user, whether they be a newbie to setting up there own page, or a more able user who has been blogging for quite some time.

By visiting other blogging sites such as Blogger or Wordpress for example and trying to set up a blog on there, you quickly realise just how versatile the Live Spaces Team actually made the ability to create our very own web page. Okay, the other sites have Themes available as well,  but you can’t easily change the layout or the fonts used by that theme without knowing CSS and I for one do not want to be messing around when creating my own page, I want full customization, but I want it simply presented to me and I am sure that many other users on Windows Live feel exactly the same. Other sites also let you have modules and you can to a certain extent move these around but it is not as straight forward as setting up the layout of your Spaces page, and in fact I have realised just how versatile the tools given to users of Live Spaces actually are.

Its obviously not easy to create methods of organizing a page that suits every type of user, but Windows Live Spaces comes pretty close to achieving that ideal.  Because Spaces cleverly keeps the pages layout separate from the actual theme choice, you as a user trying to make the look of your Space your very own, and configure it just how you want it to look have an almost unlimited method of achieving this. The brilliant method used on Windows Live to give each user as much control as possible over their own page (or Space as it was very cleverly named) really works well in my opinion.

However, it hasn’t had a facelift for quite some time.  No new themes.  No new fonts. No new choices in sizes of fonts.  No ability to change one area of fonts such as being able to make the title of each blog as huge as you like independent of any other area of the page for example.  It would be really brilliant to be able to choose to use the very same themes on your Spaces page as you can now employ on the rest of your Windows Live pages, and  one of my pet wishes, be able to add your picture or avatar to the header area as illustrated above.  Being able to choose between fixed width and flexible width would also be very welcome and allow you to have modules at both sides of the writing area if you so wished instead of those silly wasted empty areas which are there at the present time. 

 I would also love to be able to choose my own header background from my computer in much the same way that I can do in Messenger, and I would like to be able to choose to use  ‘round cornered’ modules instead of the square cornered plain boring ones available at the moment. It would be great to be able to pull and stretch them to be different sizes on the page as well.  Of course the user should have at their disposal a very extensive choice of colours to use for backgrounds and for fonts, and far more font choices than are currently offered at the moment.

How about the introduction of ‘tabs’ at the top for page navigation instead of needing so many different modules, so you could have tabs for ‘all about me’ (profile) guestbook, links,(for other blogs that you read) photos and so on,  which would then allow your visitors and readers to easily navigate around the page and have access to more information about you or other areas.  These ‘tabs’ could be fully customizable by the user as to what they contained or where they went. They would be attached to the bottom of the header area as per my rather crude illustration above.

Most average users aren’t knowledgeable enough to design and construct their own webpage, and this was very much the initial remit for Windows Live Spaces so that the average user could with the tools and choices offered to them, construct their very own webpage that was unique, that they could truly call their own to be used as they saw fit, for graphics, for photographs, to post a daily diary and to truly reflect their own personality. Windows Live Spaces has been and still is in my view a very unique service. Yes, there are other blogging sites out there, but none afford the ability to make friends, to form a community, to feel close to someone who resides on the other side of the world to you when you read their blog and their stories as does Windows Live Spaces. In this users view,  it deserves only the best of attention from the Windows Live Teams and bringing bang up to date in Wave 4.

TG