There a few things you need to know about 64-bit Windows. Existing 32-bit Win apps will run fine under 64-bit Windows, according to Microsoft, which also stresses that performance improvements are clearly apparent during highly data-intensive tasks, that memory utilization is also much improved, and 64-bit Windows supports up to 128GB of RAM (if you can afford it). The software giant offered a convincing demonstration of 64-bit SQL Server's advantages during Bill Gates' keynote address. I also saw private vendor demos — most notably one by a special effects and animation company SoftImage — that made me a believer.

For most enterprise Windows Server applications, eventually upgrading to Windows Server 2003 x64 (or Windows Longhorn Server x64) is practically a no-brainer. But the downsides of 64-bit Windows on the desktop are significant. Windows XP Pro x64 does not support 16-bit applications, including 16-bit installers. Many 32-bit Windows apps have 16-bit setup routines. The big Achilles' heel, though, is that all device drivers, including peripherals, must be fully 64-bit. That means that if your printer is older than a couple of years, a 64-bit driver probably won't be contained in Windows XP Pro x64's driver pack, and its manufacturer may be slow to release a 64-bit driver. In fact, there's every likelihood that no such driver will be forthcoming. I'm the classic example of someone who might get into trouble. I'm still using a trusty HP LaserJet 5MP purchased in 1995. Finally, in case this isn't obvious, 64-bit Windows requires a 64-bit CPU and other components. Most PC makers have been shipping 64-bit hardware for a while, especially in server or dual-core configurations. Microsoft also reports it will not be selling 64-bit Windows at retail; you'll have to buy new hardware or possess a volume license agreement to get it.

One of the cooler aspects of Longhorn's file search functionality is something called virtual folders. A virtual folder is a folder that contains files just like any other folder. But those files don't actually reside in that folder on your hard drive. Instead, they are shortcuts to files that are grouped together by a contextual commonality. For example, they all share the same author (or file creator). They were all created on the same day. They all have the same word in their file name, or the same file format. Longhorn will come with some preset virtual folders, but you can also create your own. By adding manual keywords, you can also create virtual folders that share a specific keyword.

Back to the underpinnings for a moment, it's important to keep in mind that XP's text-indexing facility is dog-slow, turned off by default, and pretty useless when it's turned on. Greg Sullivan alluded to the possibility that search technology, probably derived from MSN Search, would be employed instead. I hope they do something to make this thing go, or the feature will fall flat. Also, whatever search technology they employ, Sullivan says it will be turned on automatically. Taking advantage of many or all of these search-based features is also likely to require the use of the NTFS file system (as opposed to FAT32). Microsoft hasn't even said whether Windows Longhorn will support FAT32. More than likely it will continue to be able to access FAT32 volumes, but it is very likely that many more aspects of the forthcoming OS will require NTFS than is the case in Windows XP.

One of the trade-offs for Longhorn's search-based user interface is that, without WinFS and the SQL database search technology, it's unlikely, according to Greg Sullivan, that Microsoft will be able to incorporate background indexing that automatically appends keyword metadata to the files on your system based on the contents of those files. That means the only way keywords can be added to your files is manually. That greatly reduces the usefulness of this tool — because most of us aren't going to get around to manually entering keywords, especially not for file types like Web pages and email messages. The whole point of the new search features is to help you find your data quickly. Having to run a full-text search through all your data every time you want to find something isn't quick. It's much faster to search metadata than it is to do a full-text search. Microsoft will likely get this right after WinFS becomes an integral part of the OS, but as I wrote last year, we might all have to wait for the version of Windows after Longhorn to see this fully buttoned up.

How do you do that? Enter another new feature. If you've never opened Microsoft Word's File > Properties dialog, I suggest taking a few seconds to try that if you have Microsoft Word handy. Imagine a better version of Word's Properties sheet that you can turn on as a pane that stretches across the bottom of any Windows explorer/folder window. When you select any file in the folder window, the file properties pane displays several bits of data about that file. One of the things it displays is keyword metadata, and you can edit this field and permanently save new keywords to the file.

Even without automatic metadata appending, there are several cool things that Microsoft's new search-based interface can do. As in the PDC2003 version of Longhorn, file and folder icons scale. As they scale larger in size, the icons depict details about the contents of the file or folder. The feature supports a wide range of file formats. XP offers a glimpse of this functionality with folders that contain images files when you turn on the Thumbnail view, but it's very slow, not as detailed, and only supports images. Let's hope Longhorn's vector-based graphics-rendering presentation subsystem is able to do this much faster. Microsoft calls this set of features file/folder visualization.

There are several new aspects of Longhorn's desktop search feature set, and I'm skipping over a couple of them but will to this topic and cover it more thoroughly when I can show you pics, because that helps. One last search-based feature worth mentioning is the ability to search your entire hard drive for data by typing keywords into a search field. As you type in words, or even partial words, the number of files in the folder winnows down. It's kind of a low-tech variation on the theme that I bet gets used a lot more than some of the other stuff.

My favorite new little feature, though, is a souped up version of the Start Menu Run dialog. Longhorn adds a command-line program-launching field right above the Start button on the Start menu. Want Notepad? Just click Start, click into the new program search field, and type Notepad. The new feature can also auto-complete for you. This facility can search your entire hard drive for .EXE files, so any program installed on your system or any executable in the Windows or other folders is fair game. It's so obvious, you wonder why it wasn't there before. Sometimes it's the little things that make all the difference.

A decision about another little nicety you may not agree with, but I do. Microsoft has axed the "Sidebar" from the 5048 and later builds of Longhorn. I've written fairly extensively about the Sidebar in the past. To see a picture of it, follow this link (259K, 621 by 926 pixels); it's the vertical bar on the right side of that screen. Although the official word is that Microsoft is still considering what, if anything, to do with Sidebar, scuttlebutt has it that this overly large piece of graphical interface has hit the scrap heap, never to return. I hope that's the case because I'm a big fan of screen real estate, and even though Sidebar was configurable, it just became another big thing to manage on your desktop. But I also hope that some of the programlets that it housed will find another, less intrusive way to be added by users to customize their Windows experience. Perhaps Microsoft could employ transparency to soak them into the desktop itself?

More Longhorn in Upcoming Issues
There are several other aspects of the new OS I want to detail for you, especially the current state of the Avalon presentation subsystem and also the smart ways that Microsoft is already developing a user interface around transparency. I'm very impressed with Avalon. Don't think of this as visual window dressing. It's going to have an impact on how you think of and work with Windows — assuming you have the hardware to make it go. More detail as I have time to do the research and preparation.

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It's usually the second or third time I attempt to launch Firefox in a Windows session that it balks. The browser almost always launches and operates fine the first time I run it after Windows boots. Sometimes I can terminate an apparently hung firefox.exe process in Task Manager, and that let's me run the browser. Other times, there's no apparent Firefox process shown in Task Manager, and I'm forced to reboot Windows in order to get the browser to work. The installation of Firefox 1.0.3 didn't help. Clean installing Firefox didn't help. (On half of the six machines I'm following a clean-installation process for all upgrades of Firefox anyway; on the other three machines I'm purposely performing upgrade installations just to see what trouble I might get into.) Another issue I've noticed recently is that when I click a link in an email message, Word document, or anywhere other than a Web page, it takes a long time for Firefox to open a new tab or program window. That second problem is one many people reported with earlier versions of Firefox.

I've spent little time trolling around Mozilla's sites and other places where I might expect to find possible solutions to my Firefox troubles. One likely source of the problem is a conflict with one or more of the many extensions I have installed on my machines. Most of them have the exact same set of extensions installed. Although I have uninstalled all the extensions on one machine, I haven't had time to test it thoroughly to see whether that Firefox installation now works properly, indicating a probably extension conflict with the newer releases of Firefox. Most of the extensions I use have been updated since 1.0.2 in any case. Still, I'm admitting up front that my focus at the moment is on Longhorn, not Firefox. And I have work to do with Firefox before I draw any hard conclusions about the cause of the issues.

The thing is, in order to do well in the market place long-term, a Web browser has to work better than this. You can't roll out x.x.1 security patches and break people's installations. And if you're going to support third-party extensibility, I think you have to fully support it. If as I believe is probably the case, that an extension (or other customization) conflict proves to be the culprit, then Mozilla needs to think hard about integrating and fully testing the common functionality that the more popular extensions provide.

If you know the cause of the Firefox-won't-launch issue, feel free to drop me a line. (For more on the extensions and customizations I use, see the newsletter's Customizing Firefox article.) My buddy at TechWeb, Mitch Wagner, who is also very keen on Firefox, has the same exact problem by the way. I'm sure I will resolve this on my own as soon as I have time to focus on something other than Longhorn. And if I don't, Mitch probably will. What I'd really like to hear about is problems you may have been having with Firefox. If you write to me, I'd like to be able to reprint part of your message or mention your name (nothing more) in a story we're working on at TechWeb and the Pipeline sites. So, tell me about your Firefox problems, if any.

Clean Install All Firefox Versions
Please note that I am now advising all Scot's Newsletter readers to clean install every new version of Firefox, even the most minor of releases. This is very easy to do, and you won't lose even a tiny bit of your program customization, including bookmarks, extensions, and themes. Here are the steps:

Download the new Firefox update installer from the website and save it in your Downloads folder. (In other words, don't use the online update method.) Uninstall Firefox from the Add or Remove Programs Control Panel. Restart your computer. Double check that the Firefox program folder in the C:\Program Files folder is deleted. If you installed to a custom folder, make sure that folder is deleted. Do not remove your Firefox Profile folder, located here:

{Drive Letter}:\Documents and Settings\{User Name}\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox

This folder contains data you need to save to preserve your settings and customizations.

Install the new version of Firefox. When you install, save yourself possible grief and just select the default location for installing the program. And finally, after you launch Firefox and run it successfully, make sure to check for extension updates. Some of your extensions may no longer be compatible (and in most cases, just stop operating) until their program authors offer updates.

That's all there is to it. It takes less than 15 minutes start to finish, and there are no gotchas or surprises. Each time you perform this step, I recommend that you make a quick review of the extensions you have installed a part of the process, and uninstall any old extensions you don't use.

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For the month of May 2005, I broke the newsletter into two editions in an effort to get you timely information about Windows Longhorn. So please expect a second edition at some time over the next few weeks.

You can always find out when the next issue of Scot's Newsletter is expected to appear by visiting the Scot's Newsletter home page.

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