SoftHints - programs that Microsoft should consider adding to Vista ...

In a previous post here I went on the record saying "another important suggestion would be to use the huge pile of Micro$oft money and buy a few small companies with 'power-user toys' that should be added as optional features in the higher-end versions of Vista" - it was only a coincidence that weeks after that Microsoft bought Sysinternals (AND Winternals) and I certainly consider that as a very wise move - the only small problem is that those amazing Sysinternals tools from Mark Russinovich and Bryce Cogswell are pretty much on the 'very technical end' and free in the first place while the other even more advanced Winternals programs (like ERD Commander) were very much enterprise-oriented and will most likely remain non-free Microsoft tools!

So what should be next ? Obviously Microsoft marketing experts might have their own agenda - but here are by very first two suggestions (from a longer series, just keep reading this blog during the next weeks :) - and we'll also continue with some CoolHints !)

The very first suggestion would be Total Commander by Christian Ghisler - it is certainly the most famous, longest supported and pretty much the best of the commander-like file managers or orthodox file managers and it will be a great power-toy to extend/replace your Windows Explorer! What can I say more - if you are a power user you probably have some idea of what I'm talking or you can just try the evaluation version and see for yourself, if not ... your bad :) It will also be a well-deserved moral (and probably not only) reparation since Microsoft (pretty much illegally) forced the author to rename his product from the original Windows Commander (used for more than 10 years) to the current Total Commander ...

The second suggestion is also a small program called WhereIsIt and is a very usable 'catalog manager' to keep track of your disks/archives and not only - again a power-user tool but my feeling is that with the advance of digital photography many people will discover that it's a good idea to keep archives of your ever growing collection of digital photos ... and searching in the WhereIsIt thumbnails certainly beats searching by manually inserting each CD/DVD and viewing each file one by one :)

So now you have the first SoftHints - feel free to comment and add your own and keep an eye on this site for the next group of suggestions!