What’s Coming to Windows 7 RC?

With the first release candidate for Windows 7 to be released next month (rumor), you might be wondering what kind of changes will be put in place from the beta. Well, you don’t have to wonder, as the developer team posted a blog update last Friday that details 36 different changes, all of which they take a look at in some depth.

If you’ve been using the beta at any length, then many of these changes should be pretty obvious. The first change mentioned regards the “Aero Peek” feature, one that shows an outline for currently opened windows. Due to demand, this has now been tied into Windows’ ALT+TAB functionality. Also new are shortcuts for the quick launch. Pushing the Windows Key + # (respective number for the application in your quick launch), will go ahead and launch it. This can prove useful if you don’t currently have control of the mouse.

Another somewhat major change is the taskbar scaling, and the number of icons that are able to be placed. Because they unified the launching/switching buttons, we’ve gained around ~25% more space, depending on your resolution. Also, since Windows 7 doesn’t allow applications to automatically insert themselves into your quick launch, to make things easier, the OS will place the newly installed application towards the bottom of your start menu, so that you will immediately see it next time you go in there. That’s to allow you the option to drag it to the quick launch, should you want to.

There is a lot more new than what I mentioned here though, so if you want to study what’s en route, be sure to check out the blog post.

Building on the previous post that looked at the broad view of feedback, we want to start posting on the feedback and the engineering actions we’ve taken in responding to the feedback. We won’t be able to cover all the changes (as we’re still busy making them), but for today we wanted to start with a sampling of some of the more visible changes. We’re still on the same path working towards the release candidate and of course we know everyone is anxious for the next phase of our path to RTM.