Information Madness

Microsoft has made one of the biggest upgrades to its PC operating system with Windows 8. To start with, it will replace the Start Menu with a Start Screen. The tiles will contain shortcuts to applications. This will be similar to the Metro interface seen on its Windows Phone 7OS. It will be introducing the ribbon interface to Windows Explorer. This was first seen in Microsoft Office 2007. It will also launch a store for the new Metro style Apps.

Windows 8 has been designed to support ARM processors. These are the chips used in tablets. The same operating system will be available on desktops, laptops and slates.  Windows 8 utilizes a system that incorporates pictures and gestures in user authentication to allow for better security. Users will have to first select an image on which to perform a gesture. The gestures could be tapping on something in the picture or drawing a line between two points. A password could be made up of this combination.

Enterprise versions of the Windows 8 OS will be able to run off a flash drive or a portable hard drive. Windows 8 boot process will support a new built in mechanism called `Secure Boot’. This will make sure that the system being booted is not tampered by malware. Another anti malware feature is the SmartScreen. It will check the URLs entered in the browser against a database of malware links. The browser also checks the status of the file you want to download and warns you if the file is unknown or downloaded by very few people. If you are running multiple file operations, they will be consolidated into a single window showing all transfers.