When people ask me what I like most about Vista, my immediate answer is searching. Sure, you can get desktop search from Microsoft or Google for Windows XP, but it’s just not the same. In Windows Vista, search is integrated into the Start menu, every Explorer window, and even the Control Panel. I find that I use it constantly now, especially from the Start menu.

Search will index most common file types (based on their file extension), but it might not index all file types that are important to you. For example, it doesn’t index .log files, like those generated by Mirc. It does index .XML log files, like those generated by Windows Live Messenger.

To index .LOG files or any other type of file, follow these steps:

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Like Descapa the mystery Microsoftie, you’re a busy person with an active lifestyle. You don’t have time to type “www.” or “.com”.

In either Internet Explorer or Firefox, just type the name of the website (ie., “Vistaclues” or “Cnn”). Then, press Ctrl+Enter. Your Web browser will add the www. and .com automatically.

If you type a word in the address bar and just press Enter, Internet Explorer will search for the phrase in your default search engine, while Firefox will take you to the website you’re most likely looking for.

I love that search box in the upper-right corner of Explorer windows (you know, Documents, Pictures, etc). Of course, you can type in it to find files by their name or contents, but you can also search by date or several other criteria using Advanced Query Search (AQS).

Let’s say I want to find pictures taken on New Year’s Eve, 2006. I’ll type date:december31, 2006 and press Enter. Windows Vista immediately shows all my files modified on that date.

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Blogs are all the rage because they provide a constantly updated source of information on thousands of different topics, and people love fresh info. Keeping up with your favorite blogs can waste hours every day, though.

You can stay more informed (or entertained) by reading more blogs. To do it without wasting your life in front of a computer, use an RSS reader than aggregates your blogs. This is built into Internet Explorer and most browsers, but I wouldn’t recommend that–I find it slow and clumsy, and I don’t know the point of reading one blog at a time.

I use Google Reader to view dozens of blogs at once. It keeps track of which entries I’ve looked at, and only shows me the new stuff. I can flip through hundreds of entries in just a few minutes to find the ones that really interest me (I always use the All items link in the upper-left corner). Pictures and instructions after the break…

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You can group files in Explorer to make them easier to browse. This is especially useful for pictures. Let’s say you want to find a picture you took last week, but you took an awful lot of pictures. Hover your cursor over the Date taken heading, and then click the down-arrow. Then, click Group. You can also right-click the folder, click Group By, and then click Date modified.

Windows Vista groups your files by date. Now, you can also manage them using that grouping. Click the down-arrow to collapse a group, and click it again to expand it. Click the line itself to select the entire group so you can easily delete or move the files.

If you have too many files in a folder, or in search results, you can quickly narrow it down if you know when the file approximate date the file was modified.
In Explorer, hover your cursor over the Date Modified column. When the down-arrow appears, click it. Then, select the date ranges you want to see. Windows Vista filters the display to show only the files or folders in the selected range.

You can do this for any of the columns–Type and Date are also very useful.

To quickly pull up a calendar, just click the clock on the Windows Vista taskbar. You can also put a calendar on your Sidebar, but why waste the space?

If you’re the only user of your computer, and you don’t have to worry about other people sitting at your computer and reading your e-mail or abusing your account, you might want it to automatically log you on each time the computer starts.

You can do this using the registry, but it requires you to put your password in plain text, where someone might be able to find it. Here’s a better way: the AutoLogon.exe tool provided by the Microsoft Shell developers. It’s not officially supported, but it’ll do the job. Instructions after the break.

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To quickly copy the full path of a file to your clipboard, hold down the Shift key, right click a file, and then click Copy as Path. The full path to the file is placed on your clipboard.

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I discovered this trick while looking in my referrer logs. Steve Clayton clues us in that clicking the scroll wheel shows full-screen tiles of all your windows. I like it even better than Alt-Tab. Now, if they would just make it work with multiple monitors…

I manually setup this hack in Windows XP. Thoughtfully, it’s built into Windows Vista. Just Shift-click any folder, and then click Open Command Window Here to open a command prompt.

Now if I could just figure out how to always open an Administrator command prompt…

Hold down the control key while scrolling your mouse wheel up or down to quickly zoom in or out. This works on your desktop to make the icons bigger, in your Pictures folder (or any folder with thumbnails) to make the thumbnails larger, and it even works in programs such as Internet Explorer and Microsoft Word to scale the text and graphics.

This is a HUGE help if you have a high-resolution monitor, and i love the huge Recycle Bin.

The Quick Launch toolbar gives you one-click access to your favorite programs. Windows XP had it too, but Windows Vista adds keyboard shortcuts for the first ten programs.

To enable the Quick Launch toolbar (if it’s hidden), follow these steps:

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Two of the best ways to improve your computer productivity are:

• Reduce the number of times you move your hand from your mouse to your keyboard
• Reduce the distance you need to move your mouse for repetitive actions

You can accomplish both of these by programming the special keys that are on most new mice, such as the two buttons on the side of the mouse in the picture above. If you have a Microsoft mouse like I do and you’re using Windows Vista, you’ll need to download the latest version of IntelliPoint. Vista shipped with a beta version of the software.

After you install the software, follow these steps to configure your special buttons:

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One of the best ways to improve your computer productivity is to take advantage of the programmable keys on your keyboard and mouse to save yourself some keystrokes. If you have a Microsoft keyboard like I do and you’re using Windows Vista, you’ll need to download the latest version of IntelliType. Vista shipped with a beta version of the software.

After you install the software, follow these steps to configure your special keys:

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