I was reading a post at TechRepublic by Jason Hiner who pointed out his hits and misses in Windows 7, and in many ways I agree with him.  The system and data partitions should be split up by default to allow the OS to be wiped out and corrected without losing user data.  The OS is leaner than previous releases and will keep itself out of the way even in terms of UAC.

The one area where my opinion of Windows 7 differs from Mr. Hiner is in the area of the taskbar.  At first I wasn’t sure if the new Dock-like taskbar would be useful, but in fact it is onw of the most used places in the OS for me.

The addition of jump lists from both the start menu and taskbar make information very easy to find.  Mousing over the item on the taskbar, when it is running will show you the list of instances available just like grouped task bar items did in Windows XP. 

For example, mousing over a taskbar icon for Internet Explorer, will show a preview window of the open tabs.  You can then select which tab you need by clicking the instance.  For me this is an improvement over the list of titles when you click the XP taskbar because you get to preview the windows that are open.

I do not disagree that the new taskbar will be confusing for users as they get started with Windows 7.  The missing quick launch toolbar, and its move to the entire taskbar, was a bit of a change even for me when I didn’t use the QL toolbar for much of anything.

The review of hits and misses is a great read, and will help point out some key areas where things are better and where they aren’t, but because the OS is new and there are a large number of XP users still out there, the confusion will be seen, I think as a learning curve in most cases.  Will there be some who want to go back to XP?  Sure.  There will be and thats alright for now… as more and more companies and consumers get their hands on Windows 7 this will change and might even repair the damage done by Windows Vista.

So far, I haven’t found, other than a few driver issues that I need to fix, much in Windows 7 that doesn’t feel like an improvement.  The ability to search for anything on my computer from the start menu or Windows Explorer is huge.  I realize that this is a Vista carry over, but it seems to work better for me in Windows 7.  I no longer get discouraged that something isnt where I thought it would be in places like Control Panel because I can simply search for it or the action I wish to perform and get taken right to the item I need.

I am excited to see where Windows 7 takes the PC and Microsoft, and even curious about how it might shape the next version of Windows.  So far the vista from Windows 7 is pretty promising, especially given the view from the last Windows release.

Affiliation Disclosure: Derek is a contract contributor to TechRepublic and a Microsoft MVP.