Adding Features

I almost forgot to talk about the Add/Remove Features dialogue that I came across when looking for my Solitaire and Freecell.

Inexplicably, as you can see, Vista seems to think that I have a tablet PC. While my wife does (and loves it), I don't think it's that smart to know that small detail. I on the other hand, do not. Why they decided to put this in by default, or why it thought that I actually had one is beyond me. Personally I think it points to the overall poor quality of the release.

Tablet PC features do nothing but take up space on my system so while I was turning on Solitaire, I thought I might get rid of the unnecessary Tablet PC stuff.

However, one of the first tools that I found when I started up Vista was the Snipping Tool. Ah, now they've got it right, they included a nice, small window/screen capture utility. As a guy who takes a lot of screenshots (for things like this) I thought it was great. No more SnagIt for me.

Unfortunately, as you can see above, it's a package deal. You get all the Tablet PC features or you get none of them. Why you can't pick and choose individual pieces like the Games section above is painful. I just want the Snipping Tool.

(Who named that? It sounds like something a Vet uses.)

And as it's named "Tablet PC Optional Components", what other Tablet PC specific features are lurking underneath the surface taking up unnecessary space? Is this why Vista is taking up nearly 8gb of my 100gb drive?

But in the end of the day it didn't really matter. The Snipping Tool has two major failings: it puts a bright red border around every screen or window capture saving it in the resulting file, and it doesn't scroll windows.

SnagIt wins and I'm not even sure it knew it was in a fight. I sure didn't until it was all over and I just unchecked the box to remove it all.

It's like pulling away from a Fiat Panda at a light. You may have been in a race, but you didn't need to know that detail against something that takes 20 seconds to hit 60mph. There's no glory in that win.

As far as not removing individual features goes, perhaps Microsoft knew the Snipping Tool was a sad utility and planned ahead for someone wanting to get rid of it all together.