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This describes various ways to disable UAC in Windows Server 2008.

Service Pack 1 won't exactly make Vista more desirable as an OS; but it is a psychological landmark that says "we worked most of the bugs out and we're finally done with it". Businesses may bite; but I'm not 100% convinced that Vista is better than XP quite yet.

This SP full of patches still probably won't prevent people from deleting their Recycle Bin, end the UAC nazi tyranny and let admins do admin things with computers. Once MS figures-out a way to make Vista useful without all those annoyances and brick walls, then I may give it another look.

I know I'm going to -1 Flamebait hell for this; but if a Windows box has to be insecure in order to be useful, then so be it.

Which version of Exchange are you using? In 2003 they have a "Premium" version of the OWA application which comes with all the annoying Active X crap.

This Page talks about OWA 2003 and the different versions.

Don't ask me why they felt the need to break standards. It's microsoft. Huge pain in my ass though because the management wanted access to the "Premium" web app from outside the LAN, and that's a total bitch on the secure proxy I set up...Finally got someone higher up in corporate to tell them they couldn't have it because it's a security risk, so it's something of a sore subject with me.

Your post betrays the fact that you indeed are somewhat blinded by 'the Windows way', and haven't even asked why some things are different. The Dock is designed so that it doesn't matter whether an application is running or not, and when you think about it, it shouldn't matter to the user whether an application is running. Just that they want to use it. The Dock downplays the distinction very well, and gets to the real core of what the user is intending to do - use an application. They shouldn't have to know or care whether it is running already or not.

As for the start menu. In Windows 95 it was a decent application menu. Nice. In XP it's hideous, a mess of command and concepts. Can you describe what it does in one short coherent sentence? No! It's a settings altering, document listing, search capable shutdown/restart/sleep/application menu with a "Run..." command bolted on. Seriously... why are there so many things in there? Because MS didn't want to rock the boat, won't or can't innovate and add these things in more descrete intuitive places. And in Vista, I simply cannot believe my eyes when they see this: Vista Menu

The Start menu in Vista is absolutely ridiculous, I use OS X mostly, but also have a PC, and EVERY time I open that thing I have to stare at it for 2-3 seconds before the information overload is over. It is crazy

Look - even PalmOS fanatics like the thing. It kills any RIM device, Today! OMA makes Blackberry mail seem like a POP3 account, for organizations that operate an Exchange server.

This device is incredible. Complete freedom from using the stylus for all web/mail and phone - with full Windows Mobile 2005 - not the bastard stripped-down Smartphone version. EVDO connectivity - leaves GPRS in the dust. I don't miss WiFi, with this. I had reservations leaving GSM networks, but this device and connectivity are more than compensatory. I'll use my old, HTC Wallaby with an Orange "pay-as-you-go" when back in the U.K.

Once I upgrade to a 2Gb SD card, I am ditching the Nano. The iPod dial is replaced with voice commands.

Using VBScript, I believe so. I know it's capable of sending key commands; I'm not sure about key combinations such as Alt+anything or Ctrl+Anything. To read up a bit on it, check here. There's more information here.

It amazes me no-one has mentioned RIS.

I'm no fan of MS, but the one place I've worked where it was used, it was invaluable.

Put the machine GUID into Active Directory, PXE boot the machine, select the OS image, it formats the drive and puts the image on. You can add whatever updates/drives you want to the image. The rest can be delivered by SMS (Systems Management Service), it can be very slow though.

The other excellent option I've seen is a custom linux partition on each drive that has a modified version of init, boots and checks the windows partition with an image on a remote network drive using rsync. Once done it reboots with the windows partition selected for default boot.

All the admin need do is update the image and reboot the terminals.

A couple other views of the Vista control panel:

Category view from build 5112. Another full screen shot with the menu bar on the left.

Icon view

Personally, I use the classic view in XP, setting it to show a menu in the Start Menu. I know where I want to go, and it's nice that the options haven't changed much since 95. It's nice that they don't go renaming and regrouping the different options every release.

I do like the category view in Vista better than XP. The "quick links" to oft-used functions in each category are listed under the main category name, a big improvement. The fewer sub-menus I have to open, the better.

Avalon is not the new DirectX, it is the new GDI. It will replace the Windows interface rendering system, accelerating it and providing new features with 3D, and providing XAML to all applications. Here is a reference.