Vista WS4 Bug

I ran into a bug in Vista this weekend. This is really the first major bug I've seen (if you don't count the EXTREME slowness in IE 8b with the Google toolbar loaded) and after hours of troubleshooting I was tempted to go buy another license of XP. The problem was only cropping up when I tried to create a folder, move a file or delete a file. Only. In any of those instances, the Explorer window involved would hang. The file operation would complete, but the prompt or window would stay unusable. If I killed the Explorer process and ran a new instance, then the computer ran just fine until the next rename, move or delete. Then I'd have to kill Explorer and kick off a new process. In short...this really stunk up a weekend where I had several hours of development that needed to be done.

I spent several hours revering to various restore points, but the problem always remained. It wasn't until early this morning that I found a forum post that indicated that Window Search might be the problem. In the case of the forum poster it was an upgrade that solved his problem. For me, I downgraded by uninstalling Windows Search 4. My initial test delete worked like a champ so I went to bed. I really hope that fixed the problem and I can get back to work this evening.

It's a Safari out there

It's likely not surprising news to you, but a beta Safari browser has been released for Windows. Finally developers can (crosses fingers) test cross-browser functionality for Mac users who use Safari. But before I can get to that point, my OCD (not really, but kinda) forced me to notice that the extra buttons on my trackball optical don't allow me to navigate back and forward in the browser history. That's because the default of ctrl-left arrow and ctrl-right arrow don't work in Safari. Instead you have to application specifically map your mouse to ctrl-[ and ctrl-].

So far I like the Safari browser, but I don't think I've fallen for the trap that Apple laid.