Yesterday. the latest versions of the Windows Live applications became available. These are designated Final versions, so the programs are officially out of beta.

Since I have been using the betas, I have been generally very happy with the performance of the various applications. The applications have always behaved well, and when problems have been encountered they have been repeatable, and miniscule.

Throughout the beta cycle, Messenger has given me no problems. From all I have been able to gather, not that much was really changed, just a couple of small bugs squashed, that I was never shown or that I have never experienced. The Mail application, which draws much from Outlook, and little from Outlook Express, has given only minor problems during the beta cycle, and I was quick to see if the Final was going to exhibit the problems of the previous revision. I have exercised the application over the last 16 hours, and I cannot duplicate any of the few quirks I had observed before. This will make Outlook something that gets used less than ever before. Thunderbird developers, take notice. This is how a mail and news application should work. If there are any limits to the usage, other than what OS it runs on, I have not been able to find them.

The Live Photo Gallery is something I have not used extensively, both because I don’t have that many pictures permanently shared and because, up until the last beta, the application would only run if the Windows Desktop Search was also used. Since I use X1, and am not about to change, I had not used it long. From the small amount of use I’ve logged, it is very nice, and user friendly. Many of the features remind me of my favorite graphics viewer, Firegraphic 8.

The Live Writer application is the most difficult to rate. It continues to both amaze and irk. As I use it more and more, I see that many of the things I don’t like about the behavior are by design, and not bugs, and I have experienced few of the bugs the others have reported. I can be very specific here, as I was fully plugged in to the bug reports. All of the bugs and fixes were sent to my e-mail each day. For the most part, this is amazing, making writing very easy for anyone who uses Windows XP or Vista. Unfortunately, the users  of 64bit XP and Vista are on their own, as the installer program fails upon trying to install. Work on that continues, and there are workarounds for those who are enterprising.

I almost forgot about the Live Toolbar. Again, it really changes little from the toolbar for Internet Explorer before “Live” was the buzzword. No problems here, and if you were for or against before, your opinion should not change over just a different name.

I am one of the biggest critics of Microsoft for the problems with Vista, and the business tactics the company has come to use daily, but I must give credit when due. These programs are very useful, very reliable, address things almost everyone wants addressed today, and are free. Other than a few small nits to pick about the look and feel, the programs are a resounding success. Vista should have been done so well.

By the way, all testing has been, for me, on my 3 different XP SP2 machines. Looking at the bug reports, I don’t see any that are specific to Vista.

These programs bring to mind all the good things I remember about the old Microsoft.

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[tags] Microsoft, Live, Live Messenger, Live Photo Gallery. Live Mail, Live Writer, Vista, Windows XP [/tags]

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