Vista : Java Glossary

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The CurrCon Java Applet displays prices on this web page converted with today’s exchange rates into your local international currency, e.g. Euros, US dollars, Canadian dollars, British Pounds, Indian Rupees… CurrCon requires an up-to-date browser and Java version 1.8, preferably 1.8.0_131. If you can’t see the prices in your local currency, Troubleshoot. Use Firefox for best results.

Vista

Microsoft’s successor OS (Operating System) to Windows XP.

menu
Advantages	When Vista Won’t Boot	Repair	Class Action Lawsuit
Bugs	Where To Find	Installing	Books

Advantages

The key advantages are:

The font rendering is beautiful and crisp. This is the most important improvement.
built-in startup manager.
built-in backup to DVD (Digital Video Disc), at least in the business editions.
It displays a map of how you got to where you are in the menu tree similar to the way this website works.
IPv6 (Internet Protocol Version 6) support
Windows Defender. Using SpyNet voting Microsoft decides which programs are safe or dangerous. Then it blocks dangerous programs from running or queries you before running any unknown program. Unfortunately the fool thing keeps asking every time you run.
Useless eye candy like semi transparent label bars on the windows, that just make it hard to read the writing and gradually fading windows. You can configure the transparency off.
The directory listing of image files shows you a thumbnail.
You can buy an install disc of the 64-bit version for an additional from Microsoft. You need a credit card. It requires special 64-bit drivers for all your hardware, so you probably will still need to use the 32-bit version as well to use the software for your more exotic hardware. The main reason to go 64-bit is an 8 gig plus address space. The theoretical size is 2⁴⁸ bytes or 281,475 gigabytes of virtual address space. Different versions of Vista have different artificial addressing limits. Also processing of longs and doubles will benefit from the 64-bit data paths and the 64 general-purpose registers. (32-bit mode has access to only 8 general purpose registers.)
32-bit Vista supports 4 GB of RAM (Random Access Memory). However, you can order the 64-bit install CD (Compact Disc) then go up to 8 GB for Home Basic, 16 GB for Home Premium and 128 GB for the Business editions. The catch is you need 64-bit drivers for all your hardware, which might not exist.

Disadvantages and Bugs

A computer with 3 gig of RAM will run 3 to 5 times slower than one running XP
Signed Java Applets will not work get proper privilege to run if you have Account Control turned on.
I had three computers on a LAN (Local Area Network), (Win2K, XP and Vista). I could not get printer sharing to work until I connected the printer to the USB (Universal Serial Bus) port on the Vista machine. This was my third choice.
Less use of the right mouse button.
Needs twice as much memory.
When you copy files with drag and drop, it is extremely easy to drop your directory inside some other directory when you were trying to put it into the root. It is best to drop your file on the drive letter in the left panel rather that empty space in the drive listing.
The most infuriating thing about Vista is the fraudulent alleged bundling of Vista when you buy a new PC (Personal Computer), e.g. from Acer. It does not actually include Vista. Instead you get a pre-installed Vista and an inaccessible disk image to restore the machine to factory conditions. You don’t get an install DVD or even a repair DVD with the various repair utilities such as bootsect and bootrec. You can buy an install disc for an additional from Microsoft, but they won’t sell you the DVD, just a collection of CDs (Compact Discs) or a DVD with the 64-bit version that requires special 64-bit drivers for all your hardware. You need a credit card.
IE (Internet Explorer) won’t render iframes. It leaves a view button you must click.
It will no longer run my Olympus digital camera or my Labtek Web cam.
I had to upgrade to new versions of PaintShop Pro, Microsoft Visual C++, TopStyle and Opera to work with Vista. Most of these were not available when I first started using Vista. TweakDUN and the free version of PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) no longer work. Visual Slick Edit® no longer lets you drag and drop tool bars.
It often drops LAN connections for no reason. I have to reboot the other machine to get them back.
It loses sound after a few hours. I have to reboot to get it back.
LAN logons often fail mysteriously for no reason, then start working again equally mysteriously.
Often displays dialog boxes hidden behind the corresponding window.
It sometimes displays the progress bars as a row of chicklets instead of a continuous bar.
It no longer supports WinHelp format. This was done to ensure older programs would stop working. You can manually install support for it. When you are done you should see winhelp.exe and winhlp32.exe in your C:\Windows directory. However, I have not has success with this.
It won’t let you search, access or write the Documents and Settings folder.
It does not support automatic updates of Office 2000.
It won’t let you access most of your user files. It will gives you slightly better access if you go in via the account name entry on the start menu.
It sometimes paints black on black in the DOS (Disk Operating System) box.
The AppPaths feature for putting apps on the path via the registry no longer works.
The search rarely finds what I am looking for, even when I tell it to look through non-indexed files. You can’t narrow the search to a directory tree.
Dialog boxes are often eclipsed. You can’t get at them with Alt-Esc.
Deleting files is agonisingly slow. It reminds me of the speeds I got on floppies in the old days of DOS.
Sometimes you click back, sometimes you close a dialog box. This is inconsistent and highly annoying. It introduces one of the most annoying features of HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) into the Windows menu structure.
Vista drives you crazy with its cancel or allow messages even for very routine actions. Further, it asks over and over and over. It seems to think running a defragger is something highly dangerous. Apple does a clever advertisement to spoof this with a fat man representing a Vista PC and a cool one representing the Mac. Happily it is possible to turn of this account control feature.
The directory listing usually does not show you the fully qualified directory name. You can configure classic lists, but then you lose the nice new features. It is very confusing if you have the same file name in many different directories.
You can’t go to the directory containing a search result the way you used to.
You can’t copy paste error messages, directory names etc. You have to copy them down manually.
It does not support my Logitech MX-500 Optical mouse, other than as a simple 3 button wheelmouse. There is no Vista Logitech driver.
With only 1 GB of RAM any time I got too much running, everything would freeze. This is much better with 2GB. Sometimes many programs simply stop working or parts of them stop working. Often a reboot clears the problem.
When you boot for the first time, it just sits there for about 20 minutes, looking for all the world like it is in a loop. It issues no progress messages of any kind. Further, it reboots several times without telling you what it is up to. You can easily imagine it not working properly. Even after the initial install is complete, Vista often alarmingly sits for minutes at a time with a black screen while it is booting.
Getting your LAN working can be a hassle. If there is anything wrong it will try to get you to set up a wireless network or a password connection. It just drops the possibility of a not-quite-working LAN out of consideration. If you have trouble, turn off the firewalls until you have things working.
The drag and drop copy asks you over and over if you want to replace files. It makes it impossible to start up a long copy and walk away.
Vista has no index of file names, just contents of some of the files. So when you ask it to search for a directory or file, it starts at the beginning of disk C: and linearly searches all the disks. It takes forever. At the very least, it should have a fast look up of a directory name from part of the name, the way tcc does. I waste so much time trying to find where files went in Vista. I hope somebody implements my Fast File Find student project.
The drag and drop copy is so inept, I call it a giant bug.
1. It does not display the name of the file or directory being copied. It displays only the drives. Instead, it fills the dialog box with irrelevant redundant twaddle. The box is huge but contains either the same of the source file nor the target file, the two most relevant pieces of information for keeping your various copies-in-progress sorted out.
2. It gives outlandish estimates for time required. If it does not have enough data to calculate, it should just remain silent until it does.
3. When you are merging directories it gives you the option to overwrite or skip. It does offer the option keeping the newer, older, bigger or smaller. It does not let you avoid the copy when the files have identical times and sizes.
4. When you are merging directories it ask you over and over if you want to overwrite or skip. Even when you tell it to overwrite for the next n entries it still keeps asking. It is like some needy child pestering you for your attention. You can’t leave it alone to work while you do something else.
Somebody needs to figure out a way to redo copy and insert it to replace the MS version.
The entire OS suffers from inconsistency. Sometimes the thing you want is on the left panel and sometimes on the right. Sometimes your bread crumb trail is shown on the top bar. Sometimes it is not.
You can’t copy paste the bread crumb trail at the top of your navigations in the control panel to make notes for yourself how to refind some nugget.
The recycle bin has a delete option. You would think this means discard the files in the recycle bin, but instead it deletes the recycle bin itself, something you would almost never want to do.
Deleting files is painfully slow, reminiscent of the top speed on an old DOS 5½" floppy disk.
Directory listings of directories containing zips take forever because it opens the zips, even before you drill down.

Where To Find

Vista hides familiar tools in unfamiliar places. The classic view, available under additional options, makes it easier to find what you need without this guide. Here is where to look:

menu
account control	defrag your disks	menu
anti-aliasing	disk accessing	pagefile.sys
associations	disk cleanup	printer sharing
certificates	disk sharing	program data
clean junk files off your disks	DOS box command prompt	QuickLaunch
clock setting	drive letters	ReadyBoost
colours and Fonts	environment variables	restore point
correct problems	host/machine name	run
country	change icon size	search indexing
desktop	install a font	startup programs
device manager	IP configuration	task bar
dial the Internet	IP display	transparency
dialer default	.keystore	version
dialer disabling	lost icon recovery	wallpaper
dialing rules	memory test

Where Windows Vista Hides Interesting Information
Where Windows Vista Hides Interesting Information
Function	Where To Look	Notes
account control	To turn off account control (UAC (User Account Control) ): Click Start Control Panel User Accounts and Family Safety Click User Accounts Turn Account Control On Or Off	By default Windows warns you every time it runs a program not digitally signed or anything that could install or uninstall or change a setting. This can drive you nuts, since it will ask about the same program 10 times a minute.
Anti-aliasing	To turn on font smoothing (anti-aliasing) Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Performance Information and Tools Adjust Visual Effects (on left) smooth edges of screen fonts	By default anti-aliasing is on. For some fonts, Vista even supports subpixel anti-aliasing called Clear Type. With an LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) monitor, you want ClearType subpixel anti-aliasing. To turn it on click Start ⇒ Control Panel ⇒ Appearance and Personalization ⇒ Personalization ⇒ Windows color and appearance ⇒ Open classic colour and appearance ⇒ Effects ⇒ ClearType.
Associations	Click Start Click Control Panel Click Programs Click Default Programs Associate a file type or protocol with a program	Unlike earlier incarnations of Windows, Vista does not let you set up different associations for open, edit and print. You can just set up the open association. You might try out the Creative Element Power Tools to handle configuring all the associations and the icon.
certificates	To view digital certificates: Click Start Click Control Panel Click Network and Internet Click Internet Options Click Content Click Certificates Click Other People [or other category] Select certificate of interest Click View Click Details To edit/manage digital certificates: log on as administrator At the command prompt, type: mmc.exe certmgr.msc Follow your nose.	Let you view or add digital certificates used for SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) encrypted Internet links. Java code-signing certificates do not appear here. Editing certificates is not for novices. You might want to turn off OCSP revocation checking, for example.
clear event log	To get rid of old event logs that waste disk space: Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Click Administrative Tools Event Viewer Windows Logs right click clear log	There are several kinds of logs you can clear. You can sort by severity of the error first then scan the logs by eye to look for problems before you delete them.
clean junk files off your disks	To get rid of unnecessary orphaned temporary files: Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Click Administrative Tools Free up disk space	Get rid of temporary files, empty the recycle bin. Note you don’t actually click Administrative Tools. Look for Free up disk space right below it.
clock setting	To set the date and time: right click time in bottom right Adjust Date/Time. Don’t use this to adjust daylight savings. If you have the time zone configured properly the leaping forward and back should happen automatically. Using it to adjust for DST (Daylight Saving Time) will screw up your file dates which are based on invariant GMT/UTC. Internet Time Change Settings Update Now change the Date/time format: Click Start Click Control Panel Clock Language and Region Region and Language Options Change the Date, Time Or Number Format Customise this format Date tab You can select the format or write in your own, e.g. yy-MM-dd.	Synchronises with Microsoft atomic clock, time.windows.com. It is quite unreliable, so I suggest replacing it with another from this list of timeservers. If that does not work, try SetClock.
colours and fonts	To configure the colours, fonts, themes and decoration: Click Start Click Control Panel Appearance and Personalisation Personalisation Window Colour and Appearances Open Classic Appearance Advanced Configure colours and fonts used on various window widgets. If you find some great wallpaper, save a copy separately so you can reinstall it later. This is also true for fonts. The fonts themselves live in: C:\Windows\fonts.
correct problems	at the command prompt: sfc /scannow	This checks Vista files for consistency and automatically corrects some problems.
country	Click Start Click Control Panel Clock, Language and Region Region and Language Options Formats Current Format Select your country Location Current Location Select your country Administrative Copy To Reserved Accounts Change System Locale Current System Locale Select your country You will be forced to reboot.	The trick is you have to set the country in four places
desktop	C:\Users\`user`\Desktop\ and C:\Users\Public\Desktop\	Where desktop shortcuts and folders live.
device manager	To see what hardware and device drivers are configured: Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Device Manager	What devices are connected? Are there IRQ (Interrupt Request) conflicts? Where do I install new device drivers?
dial the Internet	To set up a dial-up Internet connection for the first time: Click Start Connect To	You can set up a connection to a new ISP (Internet Service Provider) or find all the existing ones.
dialer default	To configure which of several possible connections to use to access the Internet: Click Start Click Control Panel Click Network and Internet Network Sharing Center Manage Network Connection Advanced Advanced Settings Adapters and Bindings Settings	Which dial up ISP or LAN do you want to use to access the Internet? Put connections in priority order.
dialer disabling	To disable a dialer: Click Start Click Control Panel Click Network and Internet Network Sharing Center Manage Network Connection right click connection disable	You must disable all your diallers when you use the LAN, or you may find programs wanting to use them in preference to the LAN.
dialing rules	To configure the rules about how to dial the phone: Click Start Connect To Set Up a dial-up connection	Which exchanges are long distance require 1+? When do you need to dial the area code for local calls? Where are you dialling from? See my student project proposal to clean this mess up.
defrag your disks	To defrag your disks: Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Click Administrative Tools Defragment your hard drive	Pull files scattered over the disk into one contiguous piece. Note you don’t actually click Administrative Tools. Look for Defragment your hard drive right below it. See defraggers for better quality third party tools.
disk accessing	To access a shared disk: Click Start Network the desired computer (wait, wait wait) right click the desired disk share	Look at somebody else’s hard drive. Optionally, set up a drive letter so their drive forever after looks to be part of your machine. You won’t be able to access any network drives on a machine that is hibernating. Just looking at its drives will not bring it out of hibernation. You must walk over to the that machine and wake it up. This is also true for accessing a shared printer on a hibernating machine.
disk cleanup	To delete unnecessary files: Click Start All Programs Accessories System Tools Disk Cleanup OK More Options System Restore and Shadow Copies Clean up	This cleans up temporary files left after a crash and various bits of miscellaneous junk. It can really add up taking over the bulk of your hard disk if you don’t clean it out periodically.
disk sharing	To share your disk, or a folder with others: Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Click Administrative Tools Click Computer Management System Tools Shared Folders Shares Action New File Share	Share your folder or disk with others on the LAN.
DOS box command prompt	To bring up the DOS command prompt: Click Start All Programs Accessories Command Prompt	This is where you can run old DOS programs or BAT (Batch) files to automate running Windows files. If you use BAT files extensively, you probably should using tcc/TakeCommand instead.
drive letters	To change the drive letter of a disk partition, CD or DVD drive: Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Click Administrative Tools Create and Format hard disk partitions right click drive. Removable drives are at the very bottom. You will probably have to scroll down to see them. You can also use Click Tools Click Map Network Drive on the directory tool bar to map a drive letter to shareable directory on a local or remote drive. To map your entire E: drive so you can also access it as J:, first click My Computer. right click E: properties sharing share this folder ok Click My Computer right click E: open tools map network drive Choose J: as the drive and type in the name // `roedy`/E$ as the share name where roedy is your computer’s name. Infuriatingly, you can’t simply browse to the E:\ directory.	Making your CD-reader always R:, writer always W: and DVD reader/writer always V:. Be careful reassigning disk drives. Registry references will not automatically be adjusted. You may find all programs on that drive stop working. You can’t resetter the system partition or the partition CMOS (Complementary Metal Oxide on Silicon) booted from. This makes it vary hard to clone a system without help from a PowerQuest tools. Your clone has to have different drive letters, e. g. copy of the operating system seems to have its own set of drive letter mappings. However, they are fragile. If you add a drive, swap primary and secondary drives, or change the drive CMOS boots from first, it suddenly forgets its letters and reverts to a default set and very likely will become unbootable. You can use subst X: Y:\ to define alias drive letters for existing drives, or subst X: Y:\somedir to create shortcuts to commonly used directories. However, Windows forgets your settings after every reboot. To get around that problem you need to compose a bat file to do the SUBST and install it as the login script. SUBST is quicker and does not fail when other network connections fail. See J Drive for details.
eject	Ejecting a CD/DVD (Compact Disc/Digital Video Disc) is very flaky in Vista. There are three techniques to try when it does not work: Press the eject button on the drive. Right click the drive in My Computer and select eject. Type ejectmedia V: at the command prompt.	Often Vista saves up writing to do when the disk is closed/ejected, so be patient so long as the CD/DVD is whirring. Sometimes you have to reboot to clear a stuck eject.
environment variables	To set environment variables: Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Click System Advanced System Setting Environment Variables	Where you do you SET XX=YYYY controls for BAT files. If in doubt, put your variables in the system section. This way they won’t get lost if the system decides to rename your user directory, which it will do if you change your computer workgroup/name. After you set you variables, start new DOS boxes to make the changes take effect. To make the changes take effect in BAT files that you trigger with the task manager, you must reboot.
format	There are three places to format: FORMAT command line utility Control panel: Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Click Administrative Tools Click Computer Management storage Click disk management You can then format partitions. Pop-up. When you insert a blank DVD a dialog box pops up. Click burn files to disc Click show formatting options click Live File System or Mastered. See the DVD entry for which to choose.	You can format hard disks, CD s, DVDs (Digital Video Discs) and floppies.
host/machine name	To change your computer’s name on the LAN : Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Click System	Computer name and Workgroup for this machine. Only machines in the same workgroup see each other.
change icon size	To change the desktop icon size: Right click on an empty part of the desktop. Select view. Select Large Icons, Medium Icons or Classic Icons for small.
install a font	To install a font, usually TTF (TrueType Font) or OpenType-TTF: Click Start Click Control Panel Appearance and Personalisation Install or Remove a Font Click File. If you don’t see File, click Alt. Install New Font In the Add Fonts dialog box, under Drives, click the drive where the font that you want to install is located Under Folders, double-click the folder containing the fonts that you want to add Under List of fonts, click the font that you want to add click Install
IP (Internet Protocol) configuration	To manually assign a fixed IP: Click Start Network Network and Sharing Center Manage Network Connections right click connection Internet Protocol version 4 Properties	Configure static or dynamic (DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol) ) IP/DNS assignment. This menu item will not exist until your Ethernet card is functioning properly. Check with the device manager if you don’t see the Local Area Connection option.
IP display	To display the IP automatically assigned to your machine or manually configured: in a DOS box, type IPCONFIG.	What IP addresses in this machine using? What has DHCP given me for a DNS (Domain Name Service) server? The full name is C:\WINNT\system32\ipconfig.exe. Also shows dial up IP as well.
.keystore	C:\Users\`user`\.keystore	Java code-signing certificates. Use keytool.exe to view the file.
lost icon recovery	To recover lost desktop icons: Click Start Click Control Panel Click Appearance and Personalization Personalization Change Desktop and Icons (in the left panel). Then make sure all the icons you want to see are clicked, e.g. restore computer, network, `user` and the recycle bin.	Sometimes your recycle bin, computer, network etc. system icons will mysteriously disappear from the desktop. This is how to bring them back. It is fairly easy to accidentally delete one of the crucial system icons. I keep copies in a desktop folder just in case. You can recover Windows Update by creating a shortcut with: target: %SystemRoot%\system32\wuapp.exe start in: %SystemRoot%\system32 comment: @%windir%\system32\wucltux.dll,-2 You can recover Program Updates by creating a shortcut with: target: C:\Program Files\Common Files\InstallShield\UpdateService\isuspm.exe start in: C:\Program Files\Common Files\InstallShield\UpdateService\ You can recover your C++ Visual Studio Icon with: target: "F:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\Common7\ IDE (Integrated Development Environment) \devenv.exe" start in: "F:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\Common7\ IDE \" comment: Launch Microsoft Visual Studio 2009 When you drag an icon on to the start menu, it always creates a shortcut to the original icon. The shortcut will stop working if you delete or move the original icon. Thus it often works best to use icons in a hidden folder as your originals, where than can remain undisturbed. Sometimes Vista display old versions of icons. To clear its cache: Stop any browsers. At the command prompt type CD %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local type attrib -h IconCache.db type del IconCache.db Reboot Oddly even this does not always work. I resort to renaming icons.
memory test	To change run a memory diagnostic test. Click Start Click Control Panel Click Administrative Tools Memory Test
Menu	The menu structure is kept in the hidden directory: C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu.	You can manipulate the menu by deleting *.lnk shortcut entries, or moving them around in the menu tree, by renaming them or by modifying their properties.
pagefile.sys	To change the size or placement of the paging file: Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Click System Advanced System Settings Click Advanced Performance Settings Click Advanced Virtual Memory Change	Set the size of your backing store, usually to 1.5 to 3 times the size of real RAM, e.g. if you had 2 GB of real RAM set it to 3000 Mb.
printer sharing	To share your printer with others: Click Start Click Control Panel Hardware and Sound Printers Right click the printer you want to share sharing	Share your printer with others on the LAN, or access somebody else’s printer on the LAN. Anyone wanting to use the shared printer must have an account on the computer with the printer, or at least must know some user-id/password combination on the server to connect to the printer with. Anyone wanting to use the printer must first click start ⇒ control panel ⇒ view network devices ⇒ right click open on the computer with the printer ⇒ right click on the printer ⇒ click connect For more detail, see the printer sharing entry.
program data	C:\Users\`user`\AppData\Roaming\ (supposed to be for configuration data that would ideally follow you around from computer to computer) or C:\Users\`user`\AppData\Local\ (supposed to be for configuration data that is tied to this particular computer). or C:\Users\`user`\Documents\ (pre Vista). or C:\Windows (pre Win2K) or C:\Users\`user`\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\	Where programs tend to keep configuration information.
QuickLaunch	C:\Users\`user`\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch\	Where the *.lnk files corresponding to the QuickLaunch icons are stored. The QuickLaunch icons live in the left side of the task bar at the bottom of the screen. You can launch programs with a single click.
ReadyBoost	To configure ReadyBoost: To turn it off/on: Click Computer Select the read/write flash drive letter. Right click properties. Click ReadyBoost. Select use this drive on or off. Click Ok Reboot To turn high performance write-caching off/on: Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Click Device Manager Click disk drives Select the read/write flash drive letter: Optionally right click Update Drive Software Right click policies Click ReadyBoost Click quick removal for safety or click performance for higher speed, Click Ok Reboot	ReadyBoost is caching software to use your flash/flash drive to speed disk access. It allows you to use up to 4 gigabytes of a flash drive for speeding up hard disk access. You use the rest of the drive (if any) for storing, transporting and backing up files. If you select quick removal, data corruption is less likely. Nothing bad will happen if someone yanks the flash drive out of its slot with the power on. If you select performance it turns on write caching (procrastinating writes to the disk by temporarily staging them on the flash drive). If someone yanks the flash drive out with the power on your files, including your hard disk files, will be badly corrupted. You can use CHKDSK /F to repair some of the damage, but the recovery will not be perfect. Cheapie flash drives do not support write caching. Write caching is disabled by default.
restore point	To create a restore point: Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Backup and Restore Center Create a Restore Point System Protection	Keep several restore points (aka checkpoints or snapshots) since the most recent one may already have been corrupted. Restore points are not a substitute for image and file-by-file backups. It is probably a good idea to turn this on for all hard disks that have crucial system files. If you just turned on drive D:, you won’t protect changes to drive C:. The restore points will be stored in files with the unlike name of System Volume Information.
run	To run a program: Click Start All Programs Accessories Run	You can drag this entry to the desktop or to some prime real estate on the menu for more convenient access. If often use the command line, consider tcc/TakeCommand which offers many benefits.
search indexing	To tweak the search indexing: Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Performance and Information Tools Adjust indexing options.	The background indexer is so annoying I turned it off by telling it not to index any drives. I am using Copernic instead. You can control which directories are indexed and which file extensions.
startup programs	To control which programs automatically run (autorun) when you start up the computer: Click Start Click Control Panel Click Programs Change startup programs	Not only can you turn off programs that are automatically running, you can learn a bit about them both from where they are on disk and from a database that Microsoft maintains. You can also get at them via: Click Start Click All Programs Click Startup The short cut files themselves are stored in: C:\Users\`user`\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\ and C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup. You can manipulate them directly with copy/paste/delete.
task bar	To move the task bar from the side back to the bottom: Unlock the task bar by right clicking it and deselecting lock tool bar. Left click an unused part of the task bar and drag it to the bottom. It will suddenly jump to the bottom, not move smoothly as with other dragging, so it looks as if nothing is happening. Right click an empty region of the quick launch bar on the task bar just to the left of the dotted bar. Click view Select task bar icon size.
Transparency	To turn off transparent window borders Click Start Click Control Panel Click System and Maintenance Performance Information and Tools Adjust Visual Effects (on left) Uncheck enable transparent class.	By default transparent windows borders is on.
version	To find out the version and build number. At the command prompt, type winver.	The Control Panel welcome will not give you the version, just the OS variant name.
wallpaper	C:\Users\`user`\Pictures\. If you use Opera, sometimes they are stored in: C:\Users\`user`\AppData\Roaming\Opera\OPERA\skin\	Where Vista stores desktop wallpapers, past and present. You can change the wallpaper by finding a suitably large image in your browser and right click Use image on desktop.

When Vista Won’t Boot

You can repair the Vista Boot Configuration Data in the following way:

Put the Windows Vista installation disc in the CD \ DVD disc drive and then (re)start the computer. Unfortunately the fashion is to refuse to include this disc when you buy a new computer with Vista pre-installed.
Press a key when you are prompted
Select language, time, currency, keyboard or input method and then click Next.
Click Repair your computer.
Click the operating system that you want to repair, and then click Next.
In the System Recovery Options dialog box click Command Prompt
Type the following:
Bootrec.exe /FixMbr
Bootrec.exe /FixBoot
If you want to completely rebuild Boot Configuration Data, then you should issue the following command: Bootrec.exe /RebuildBcd This command scans all disks for installations that are compatible with Windows Vista. Additionally, this option lets you select the installations that you want to add to the Boot Configuration Data store.
If that does not work, the boot manager has been clobbered. Fixing it is quite a production. See the instructions.

In computer repair mode, you can use the command line bootsect.exe utility to repair the boot sector on various partitions. It will be damaged by any XP-style boot manager, such as grub. Vista uses an incompatible style of boot manager.

How to use bootsect.exe
How to Use Bootsect.exe
bootsect.exe { /help \| /nt52 \| /nt60 } { SYS \| ALL \| C: }
Option	Notes
/help	display help on command line options.
/nt52	Partition contains a bootable pre-Vista OS. Applies the master boot code that is compatible with NTLDR.
/nt60	Partition contains a bootable Vista OS. Applies the master boot code that is compatible with BOOTMGR.
SYS	Updates the master boot code on the system partition used to boot Windows.
C:	Updates the master boot code on the C: partition (or other drive letter).
ALL	Updates the master boot code on all bootable partitions. All bootable partitions must be pre-Vista /nt52 or all Vista /nt60 for ALL to make sense.

The catches:

bootsect.exe lives on your install CD. OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) installed copies of Vista don’t come with an install CD.
Vista Home Premium leaves out bootsect.exe so you can’t get at in even in repair mode when your machine is bootable.

Repair

My copy of Vista lost its ability to install security updates. After several months, Microsoft finally relented and gave me the DVD used to automatically repair such problems. It does not come with the Acer OEM version of Windows. It did not work until I shut down the defragger, indexer and other resident programs. Then about 6 hours and a dozen reboots later, my machine was up to date with security updates. The repair process, which MS refers to as an upgrade, is very slow and appears repeatedly to have hung. I was patient and eventually it would come to life again. The repair, as a side effect, fixed a problem with *.html files failing to be directed to Opera as configured. The catch was it uninstalled my OEM Ethernet driver. I had to get a copy from Yukon Marvell and reinstall it. It was a Good Thing™ I had a detailed configuration list, since Vista would tell me nothing at all about the Ethernet hardware. The repair process also destroyed my Boot-It multiboot and my offline defrag. Happily, it seems to have left all the applications and my data intact, unlike the proprietary brutal Acer repair which is in actuality a revert-to-factory-state.

Vista sometimes loses its ability to install and uninstall programs. It keeps repeatedly telling you that you don’t have permission to access some obscure file. You can sometimes correct the program by re-registering the windows installer itself.

Click Start and then click Command Prompt.
In the DOS box, type msiexec /unreg, and then press Enter.
type msiexec /regserver and then press Enter.

Installing Vista

There are two kinds of install, an upgrade which leaves your programs installed and a clean install which erases the registry, effectively uninstalling all your programs.

Installs take overnight unless you have 2+ gigs of RAM.
When you do a clean install, make sure you have room on your C: drive for two copies of Windows because the installer archives the old Windows files. You can later look at them, but they don’t do anything. The archives are useful for extracting configuration files to patch newly reinstalled software. If you don’t have room, use a partition manager such as Boot-It Bare Metal to expand the C: partition at the expense of some other partition.
During the install, the screen goes blank or apparently dead for minutes at a time, which can be alarming. Just be patient and it will eventually come back to life.

This is more of a bug that a gotcha. When reinstalling Vista, your old files will be placed in C:\Windows.old\. You can pick configuration information out of there to replace the default configuration files. When you are done you can delete the files in C:\Windows.old\, however, be very careful about any directories with red arrows on them. They point to your new configurations! If you delete the files in them, you will be deleting your new configuration files, causing you to have to start all over from scratch installing without a C:\Windows.old\.

Class Action Lawsuit

Microsoft, Acer and Compusmart (a retailer here in Victoria) conspired to defraud me. I bought an Acer Aspire AST180-ED380A desktop computer that allegedly included Windows Vista Home Premium. There was no DVD. There was an image of part of Vista on the disk, but it was not suitable for repairing damage to Vista, or to reinstall Vista if the hard disk should pack it in or if I should replace the disk. Microsoft, Acer and Compusmart all refused to provided the promised DVD. All three refused to sell it to me at nominal cost. Compusmart told me to buy an OS DVD for

Vista then developed a glitch and refused to do security updates. Acer wanted me to ship the computer at my expense to Toronto and be without it for a month or so while they reinstalled Vista. I refused. After a month or horsing around with Microsoft support trying to get it to work, they announced the only way to fix the problem was with the missing DVD. The Microsoft support person then agreed to ship me the DVD to repair this particular problem, but it would not be compatible with my activation key, so it could not be used to reinstall after a crash, only to fix this minor damage to the Vista installation.

These three have ripped off many other people besides me. If they advertise Vista is included, Vista should be included! I would like to launch a class action lawsuit against them to make them:

Provide the promised DVD to all OEM Vista users.
Include the DVD with all OEM shipments in future, or sell the DVD for or less (enough to cover the cost of duplication and shipping).
Pay punitive damages to richly reward the attorneys who take on these giants.

My damages are not big enough to justify a lawsuit on my own. I would be out a paltry

if I were to cave and buy another copy of the OS, and the inconvenience of being without security updates for several months. However the collective damage their con has done to the computing community would add up to millions of dollars.

I could also try for a criminal conspiracy fraud conviction, but my experience with the authorities show that too would take much more money and energy than I have. So if you have been similarly swindled, please let me know. Perhaps when enough of us get together, something can happen to put a stop to this outrage.

Books

recommend book⇒Windows Vista Annoyances

David A. Karp

978-0-596-52762-4

paperback

publisher

O’Reilly

published

2007-12-14

Problems with Windows Vista and what you can do to ameliorate them.

Online bookstores carrying Windows Vista Annoyances
	abe books anz	abe books.ca
	abe books.de	amazon.ca
	amazon.de	Chapters Indigo
	amazon.es	Chapters Indigo eBooks
	iberlibro.com	abe books.com
	abe books.fr	amazon.com
	amazon.fr	Barnes & Noble
	abe books.it	Nook at Barnes & Noble
	amazon.it	Kobo
	junglee.com	Google play
	abe books.co.uk	O’Reilly Safari
	amazon.co.uk	Powells
	other stores

Greyed out stores probably do not have the item in stock. Try looking for it with a bookfinder.

recommend book⇒Windows Vista Secrets

Brian Livingston, Paul Thurrott

978-0-7645-7704-8

paperback

publisher

Wiley

978-0-470-24200-1

hardcover

published

2007-01-10

978-0-470-12838-1

eBook

If one book can help you master Vista, this is it.
~ Fred Langa, former editor-in-chief of Byte Magazine

Online bookstores carrying Windows Vista Secrets
	abe books anz	abe books.ca
	abe books.de	amazon.ca
	amazon.de	Chapters Indigo
	amazon.es	Chapters Indigo eBooks
	iberlibro.com	abe books.com
	abe books.fr	amazon.com
	amazon.fr	Barnes & Noble
	abe books.it	Nook at Barnes & Noble
	amazon.it	Kobo
	junglee.com	Google play
	abe books.co.uk	O’Reilly Safari
	amazon.co.uk	Powells
	other stores

Greyed out stores probably do not have the item in stock. Try looking for it with a bookfinder.

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Vista : Java Glossary

Advantages

Disadvantages and Bugs

Where To Find

account control

Anti-aliasing

Associations

certificates

clear event log

clean junk files off your disks

clock setting

colours and fonts

correct problems

country

desktop

device manager

dial the Internet

dialer default

dialer disabling

dialing rules

defrag your disks

disk accessing

disk cleanup

disk sharing

DOS box command prompt

drive letters

eject

environment variables

format

host/machine name

change icon size

install a font

IP (Internet Protocol) configuration

IP display

.keystore

lost icon recovery

memory test

Menu

pagefile.sys

printer sharing

program data

QuickLaunch

ReadyBoost

restore point

run

search indexing

startup programs

task bar

Transparency

version

wallpaper

When Vista Won’t Boot

Repair

Installing Vista

Class Action Lawsuit

Books