Live Mesh Wish List
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- Welcome to the Live Mesh Tech Preview!
Got a suggestion for a feature you’d like to see? Here’s the place to share it.
We’re all very excited about the ways that Live Mesh might work for us. Different people, from different backgrounds, with different needs: there’s no end to the variety of ways that each of us might find to make Live Mesh better – anything from small tweaks that would make Live Mesh easier to use, to full scenarios that would enhance the Live Mesh experience. So, if you have a moment, please, use your imagination and share your suggestions!
While we can’t answer every post, do know that the Live Mesh product team is reading your suggestions and coding like crazy to keep up with your ideas – so keep them coming!
*Update*
We have a new place for your wishes, a fresh start now that we're in beta phase: The new Live Mesh Beta: Suggestions Thread
Thanks for all the feedback!- Edited byBen [Live Mesh] Wednesday, April 23, 2008 4:13 AMSpacing
- Edited byBen [Live Mesh] Thursday, May 29, 2008 8:08 PMupdate
- Edited byBen [Live Mesh] Thursday, October 30, 2008 6:07 PMLink to new Suggestions thread
All Replies
- Am not in the Beta (yet), so maybe it is already in there.
Restore older files...
It is most likely already on the to do list, but if I should delete a file, or erase the data inside a Word file for instance, I would like it if there was a way to restore the old version. - Requests to get my hands on it are still in 'Pending' stautus (sob!); but ability to search across several meshes comes to mind. Interestingly, the Live Search component was not mentioned on the presentations. Is it included? Is there an API to search *meshes* for publicly shared documents (if there is such a concept)?
- SB- Edited byxf007 Wednesday, April 23, 2008 7:57 PMThe name had to be changed.
- I have a few enterprise type suggestions, I apologize if some of these are already in the release, I am not an official tester yet.
1) SSL connection to a fileserver over the WAN using windows pass through authentication.
2) Delta (bit level) File Sync over WAN, triggered when changes are made to the file.
3) Support for Delta level .pst file sync (very helpful for road warriors with lots of Outlook PST db's that don't want to lose everything if their laptop is lost)
4) Have the ability to email a link to a specific file to someone at a different company/network. The link would have an access token embedded in it that would expire after a specified period of time.
Thanks!
Ed- Edited byTheBigEd Wednesday, April 23, 2008 9:07 PMForgot to add something.
First one.
When i want to share a folder with someone let me pick someone from my Live Contacts rather than having to type in their email address
I've only been using it for 10 minutes...I'll have LOTS more to come I'm sure.
-jamie
http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - If your question is answered, please mark as answered.- I think this is a good idea, so long as it's not exclusive. One should be able to type in an email address as well.
Walter B - [ Todd Manlon asked me here to post this.]
Remote administration.
I spend a lot of time providing ad hoc "tech support" to my less tech-savvy relatives. It would be great if Mesh could enable a "Remote Adminstration" feature so that I could get onto their machines and help them.
I know that this could be enabled by adding their device to my device ring however its not strictly speaking my devie is it? hence, I guess the request is, enable me to remotely access devices that are not in my device ring - assuming that device's owner has given me permission to access it.
-Jamie
http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - If your question is answered, please mark as answered. - itsgreen said:
Am not in the Beta (yet), so maybe it is already in there.
Restore older files...
It is most likely already on the to do list, but if I should delete a file, or erase the data inside a Word file for instance, I would like it if there was a way to restore the old version.
That sounds like a "recycle bin in the cloud". Which sounds like a good idea to me.
http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - If your question is answered, please mark as answered. - Must have wish list features for me:
- File versions, so each time a change is made to a file, all previous versions are stored in the cloud and can be viewed and restored. A must for collaboration.
- Undelete, anytime a file is deleted it should be able to be restored. Perhaps add this functionality in the News Pane. This could be a link in the News panel next to the deletion entry. Such as "Jane Doe deleted file XYZ.docx. Click here to restore this file"
- Delta sync, so I don't have to wait for 500MB worth of pictures to re-upload (and re-download to my other devices) when I add a tag or star rating to them. Only the part of the file that has changed would be uploaded and downloaded.
- Mr. Paul said:
Must have wish list features for me:
- File versions, so each time a change is made to a file, all previous versions are stored in the cloud and can be viewed and restored. A must for collaboration.
- Undelete, anytime a file is deleted it should be able to be restored. Perhaps add this functionality in the News Pane. This could be a link in the News panel next to the deletion entry. Such as "Jane Doe deleted file XYZ.docx. Click here to restore this file"
I love those 2 ideas. Especially a "Click here to restore this file" link in the news feed. Undelete sounds like the recycle bin idea that I mentioned above.
If you were to allow different file versions then there should also be:-
The ability to rollback to a previous version
-
Ability to see how much of your space entitlement is being filled up with old versions.
-Jamie
http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - If your question is answered, please mark as answered. - 1. The ability to keep the sidebar minimized by default. (It *always* opens when I open a folder window.)
2. File versioning.
3. The ability to share files with people who don't have a Windows Live ID.
4. A more logical response by the taskbar icon to the mouseover -- right now, a tooltip AND the Live Mesh taskbar window appear on the mouseover. I'd rather have the tooltip appear on the mouseover and the taskbar window appear on a mouse click. - What I would very much like to see is the ability to sync Outlook across all devices or perhaps a selectable sync - such as sync email, but not calendar.
Along those same lines I would love to see an event calendar so that I can seemlessly sync my personal calendar with my work calendar without emailing an exported file from one machine to another. Perhaps even sync selected calendars in Sharepoint as well.
IT Professional - Add Remote Desktop Wake-on-Lan capabilities
- i know this isn't a "relevant-to-the-product" "wish", but i would like some Live Mesh wallpapers to be posted on the Mesh blog or Windows blog. i know there are some out there :-P; for instance, the guy on the channel 10 interview had an orange wallpaper with the Mesh logo on it.
- I would like to see a direct link to this forum from within the Mesh interface as it makes it easier for getting here to give feedback or discuss problems encountered.
SL - In Windows proper I can use SHIFT and/or CTRL in concert with my mouse to select multiple files in a folder. This doesn't work in Live Desktop.
Please could you enable this?
-Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - Scøtt Lovegrove said:
I would like to see a direct link to this forum from within the Mesh interface as it makes it easier for getting here to give feedback or discuss problems encountered.
SL
I thought the same thing. For now I have bookmarked the forum, but I think it would be invaluable to have this linked from the Mesh interface directly. It will expose more people to the fact that the forum exists.
-steve
Microsoft MVP Windows Live / Windows Live OneCare Forum Moderator - Syncing across devices without having to upload the files to Live Desktop first. That would be so amazing.
- When a Mesh folder is opened on the real desktop, there needs to be a right-click drop-down menu or a button to add and manage users so one doesn't have to go back and right-click on the folder icon to get to it.
- Also, it would be really convenient if one could invite someone to a folder from within Live Desktop.
- Extra storage
Hi,
I imagine that as and when Live Mesh gets properly released then the 5GB limit will, at some point, increase.
5GB is nowhere near enough for me though. I would like to use Live Mesh as my backup for my entire media library which today amounts to about 80GB and that will grow significantly when I start to digitally purchase movies. I know that 5GB to 100+GB is a very big jump so I'd like to request that you introduce a premium subscription service where I can pay for more space in the cloud.
Thanks
Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - How about being able to add network folders to your folder list? One of the first things I did after installing the binaries was get very confused about why the "add folder to your live mesh" wasn't available. Turns out that you can't add folders from a network share, even if they're mirrored locally. Since my "home drive" (my documents, etc) on my work computer is mirrored and offline-synced from the file server, I can't add the most useful folders for sync. Took me a good while to figure that one out too. I finally got the idea to create a folder directly under the hard drive and saw it work.
- More!
1. Better installer. I've had tons of issues with the one that's out now. The UAC requirement for windows vista is absurd, for example. Also, the MSI doesn't really work that well. As a system admin first, I want to be able to deploy this at a whim, and have an unattended install available.
2. Have some way to get rid of that annoying toolbar that comes up next to a synced folder when you open it.
3. Network location sync. As above. Makes live mesh next to useless on my work computers.
4. Ability to install on windows server. Lots of us use it at home. And yes, we have legit installs for various reasons.
I guess these are more bugs? I've made bug reports on connect for them too. As for less techie wishes:
1. Better integration with live spaces. For example, a "Spaces Photos" folder on my mesh desktop that's synced to a "Spaces Photos" subfolder in "My Pictures" that's synced to the "Photos" section of my live space. Yeah, awesome. I think it would be great to have some sort of "Send State" function. So that if, for example, you right click the Title Bar of Internet Explorer you can hover over "Send State" and a list of the devices in your cloud ring show up and you can just send the state to a device.
The state should include things like; what web pages are open, where you have scrolled to on the page, any text that you have highlighted. It would be nice if the state of a video could be saved but that would probably be very difficult.
It would be good if it worked on other programs like Office or Adobe Reader too.
On the receiving PC a little box should show up asking if you want to accept the state and if the receiving PC is off then the state should be stored somewhere in the cloud so that as soon as you turn the computer on, the state is waiting for you.
- I would like the ability to sync my Live Mail, Contacts & Calendar with Outlook using Mesh.
I would also like to sync OS and Program settings with Mesh. So for example, once I Installed a fresh copy of Vista I could connect to Mesh and then it would update all the settings so I wouldn't have to configure anything. Same process could be used for Programs, such IE favorites, Media Player playlists, etc.
Extra storage would also be nice, even if we had to pay for it.
James- Edited byJamesMoore Monday, April 28, 2008 5:36 AMtypo
- I've been using Live Mesh for a few days now and I love the direction that this is going. I have some ideas that I would love to see implimented on live mesh some time in the future.
1. Office Sync - I posted earlier about syncing Calendar, Contacts, Email. But what I really want is a full sync between all my Office applications as far as settings so that when I sit in front of my laptop, my Office Word workspace can look identical to my Office Word workspace at my place of employment. What I would like it to do is when I change the UI or change the preferences/options on one machine they are mirrored back to the device of my choosing (other than pathing settings). That way I don't have to reset things up twice. The bonus here is should I get a new laptop or desktop unit I can just sync the settings and it's set up exactly the way I like it. Why should I have to keep doing this?
2. Along the same lines, lets do the same with browsers. Can't we sync the settings from one machine to another? If I install a new application on one machine and perform all the setup - why can't I just install the application on another machine and sync the two applications? I can understand if this can only be accomplished initially with MS applications but that would be enough to get the other companies to follow suit.
3. How about the ability to link meshes? While I don't have a concrete use for this at the moment, I do see the possibility at some point to be able to interact with other meshes in some form. Perhaps sharing a folder between two meshs, maybe sharing the same device between two or more meshes.
4. Sync common data between difference devices. What I would really love is that my contact list in Outlook become my defacto contact list for all devices. When I get a new phone, it connects to the mesh and sync's with Outlook. As I add a new contact on my phone, it becomes available to my Outlook contacts. Since this method has a way to make my Outlook contact list grow fairly big, the device would have to support some type of inteligent filtering or syncing in that when I go to send a email, if the contact has a phone number but no email address it's not presented to Outlook as a possible email contact.
5. Music. I have a rather large music collection. I might not want to share all of the content on my mesh, but I might like to share a subset of that music, perhaps a playlist complete with songs. I already have set playlists on my Zune, I should be able to simply tag the playlist as well as a artist, album or type of music.
6. Perhaps have groups (sub rings) within the ring. This might be necessary as we start to add devices to the ring. Currently I have 5 computers in my ring but I just as easily could expand that to 10 - once we are able to add devices like camera's, phones, musicplayers, etc. That ring is going to look awful crowded. There are computers that I would want in my ring to share file content, others that I would need to have remote access to but perhaps not share file content. Again, this might be getting back to sharing or linking rings. I could set up a mesh for my parents, but I would need access to their ring to remote in to their computer to perhaps fix something or show them how something is done. Presently, I would have to have them in my ring for this to happen.
7. Web notification of updates available. Just thinking out loud here, but how about if the mesh were able to scan my computer (or the parts of my computer that I grant access to) and check automatically for software updates and present a list of updates available when I log on or present a icon that shows application updates are available? A large amount of today's applications are dependant on me having to either manually check application websites for updates or to press a check for update button within the application. Couldn't the mesh check my installed applications (there is already a list of installed applications which should have version information) and present me a list of applications that have updates available with links to install them? Again, I understand this is not something that will happen overnight, but having a central area to give me that information on all my devices much like MS does with their O/S updates (and in some case driver updates) would be a great time saver for me.
These are some of my ideas that would make my life easier.
IT Professional - OK, here is one I ran into today. How about run Live Mesh as a service, so I don't have to be logged in to connect to a remote computer. For example, I installed new software on a remote computer this evening that required me to reboot the remote machine. When the machine came back up, I could no longer connect to it as Live Mesh was not running as I was not logged in. Instead I had to VPN in and use remote desktop. I'll check on connect and see if this is already suggested.
Steve
Ok, it looks like it works on Vista, but not XP. I'll have to do some more testing on this and see.
Steve- Edited byswattz101 Tuesday, April 29, 2008 11:20 PMupdate
- I think it would be great to have a self-hosted Mesh down the line somewhere. This would allow for much more file space on the Mesh Desktop. This would be a great opportunity to connect up with the Windows Home Server team. It would be great to allow the Home Server to host the Mesh. That way we can put our own equipment at the center of our computing experience and still retain the "cloud" concept of Live Mesh. Having Windows Home Server also be a "Mesh Server" would do wonders for both products. There would be much more file storage, faster sync process (in most cases), and many more.
If the self-hosted "Mesh Server" idea doesn't come through, it would at least be nice to be able to install this on Windows Home Server. That would eliminate the manual sync'ing of data to it.- Edited bympalermo Tuesday, April 29, 2008 6:07 PMSmall Addition
- Not sure if my suggestion is what mpalermo is talking about, but I would love the ability to have the mesh interaction on a local lan that has no connectivity to the internet. The mesh server would be hosted in this lan allowing all of the devices (mesh capable devices) to talk to each other just as if they were all connected through the internet. I know the application portion of the mesh has yet to be unveiled, and maybe this is a mood point, but if all of my devices could talk to each other (through a local mesh server) via ethernet (with no connection to the internet) then this would allow me to host my own cloud with complete security control. This would also be very helpful for places where there is no connection to the internet (yes, these places do exist unfortunately).
http://www.theamoebaproject.com/blog/2 - I would also like to echo the frustration with the UAC requirement. Is this going to be a trend for MS apps? I've really found Mesh to be quite a step in the right direction, but forcing us to use UAC to install and RUN Mesh, is about to make me uninstall it. Perhaps if I could customize what UAC decides needs administrative priveleges, I'd be okay; but I'm an admin, I don't want it on all the time...
- As a developer I'm itching to get hold of the SDK (please don't make us wait until the PDC). Here's what I would like to see:
- An application repository for the live desktop so that you can run hosted apps from the live desktop and use cloud based data. The ability to synchronize that application to devices if a variant is available (maybe WPF for windows based PCs - etc). The Mesh should become the way to deploy and manage application installations.
- Standard schemas for contacts/inbox/tasks/notes etc.. These should be used by Outlook etc and hosted as typed data in the cloud. Basically you would get a unified offline/online storage (like PST files). This would enable some great hosted productivity apps. The Mesh could deliver on the promises of WinFS.
- Enterprise hosting for the Mesh that federates with the cloud storage. This should be based on an extension of Sharepoint.
- On the technical side I want to see the ability to provide good indexing tips for custom schemas.
- I also want to see more granular sharing options. At the moment all nodes are at the root level. This won't work for more complex data structures. For example, you don't want to synchronize email attachments to a phone device, but you do a PC.
- Make this a real platform on all devices. I want to be able to access my Live Desktop from Zune and run a Silverlight app to read my email and contacts.
- Provide transcoding of media and a hosted DRM solution so that media can be shared between devices without worrying about formats, licenses etc.
- An application repository for the live desktop so that you can run hosted apps from the live desktop and use cloud based data. The ability to synchronize that application to devices if a variant is available (maybe WPF for windows based PCs - etc). The Mesh should become the way to deploy and manage application installations.
- Support for my NAS drive. I store all my photos on my NAS drive and I want to share them with my family. I just want to right click on a share on my NAS and it to my mesh.
Program Manager, SQL Server Reporting Services - sb770 said:
I would also like to echo the frustration with the UAC requirement. Is this going to be a trend for MS apps? I've really found Mesh to be quite a step in the right direction, but forcing us to use UAC to install and RUN Mesh, is about to make me uninstall it. Perhaps if I could customize what UAC decides needs administrative priveleges, I'd be okay; but I'm an admin, I don't want it on all the time...
For what it's worth, the connect blog says they are working on it. :-) There was a change with Vista SP1 that they may be able to do it. As for the UAC requirement, I followed the instructions to automatically elivate and I like that idea better than turning it off.
You can read the blog here.
http://blogs.msdn.com/LiveMesh/
Steve
Steve - Looks like it's in the planning already.
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/04/27/just-say-yes/
David Treadwell: I see your point. That’s one of the things we know we have to do a good job with Mesh; that is, to be IT-friendly, and to give IT control on what kinds of data can and can’t be stored on this thing. In addition, one of the things that we expect to do longer-term is to allow IT departments to operate their own cloud storage mechanisms, such that data owned by that enterprise would only be stored on that enterprise’s devices and that enterprise’s servers. They would never go to Microsoft and they would have complete control of that data. - joeyw_forum said:I agree with both of these! Really, really looking forward to the SDK and would love some test apps to demonstrate the power of Mesh with right now. People (such as my customers) aren't all that jazzed about yet-another-file-sharing-app, but when they see the video of the application data sync, they are.
As a developer I'm itching to get hold of the SDK (please don't make us wait until the PDC).
One more thing - can you provide some of the test apps shown in the videos as part of the preview? - How about supporting synch/integration with Office Live Workspace and/or Google Docs? I'm using all of the above now, but what would be nice is 1 central place where I could manage/access all my docs.
Thx!
- I second the integration with Office Live Workspaces.
Program Manager, SQL Server Reporting Services - The ability to upload folders is a "must have" feature. Uploading folders one file at a time is a real time waster and detracts from the overall usefulness of Live Mesh.
Jim - MVP Windows Live / Windows Live One Care Forum Moderator- Edited byJimR1MVP, ModeratorThursday, May 01, 2008 2:48 PMAdded information. Post does not appear below thread I was replying to.
- In the little side bar that is attached to the Explorer window (which I'd like to second the suggestion that we can default it to hidden...) when looking at the news anything that didn't occur in the current day is just marked as "Earlier". I'd kind of like to know what day the file was added/deleted/modified etc instead of just seeing the time.
The date does properly show up on the web site, but we're going to be stuck seeing the side bar I'd at least like the date to also be present for the news. - Please enable syncing without Live Desktop!
As discussed in this thread, we would like the ability to sync folders without having them sync with the Live Desktop, like FolderShare (but Mesh is cooler ;)).
At the moment, you cannot remove the Live Desktop as a folder syncing option. In the Live Mesh Options->Change Sync Settings menu for a meshed folder, the Synchronize files "Never with this device" option is grayed out for Live Desktop. Please enable it!
We all have folders which we want to synchronize, but which don't need to be pushed up to the Live Desktop.
- Mr. Paul said:
Must have wish list features for me:
- File versions, so each time a change is made to a file, all previous versions are stored in the cloud and can be viewed and restored. A must for collaboration.
- Undelete, anytime a file is deleted it should be able to be restored. Perhaps add this functionality in the News Pane. This could be a link in the News panel next to the deletion entry. Such as "Jane Doe deleted file XYZ.docx. Click here to restore this file"
- Delta sync, so I don't have to wait for 500MB worth of pictures to re-upload (and re-download to my other devices) when I add a tag or star rating to them. Only the part of the file that has changed would be uploaded and downloaded.
I agree 100% these are the top priorities.
I would add screen sharing ro remote control of devices that are not yours as #'s 4 and 5.
Ariel Assaf - Good job! I know there is a lot planned not yet implemented.
It is good to know what some of those are, so I can relax and not fret. Is there a public list (Mesh todo) somewhere?
Thanks for the "known issues list". Very useful.
Please add "how to" elevate privilege for Vista Home editions that don't have secpol.msc
The following I don't know if are in planning stage or even concidered.
Cloud folders don't remember view settings. Be nice to have all this saved. I usually have to:
- maximize the folder
- change view to "details"
- widen the "Modified Time" column so its readable
- sort "Modified Time" column
Also to quickly find files I can't quite remember the name of I miss having:- type sorting: lacking having few if any file types
- type icons: if system icons are not possible, then maybe some generic file type icons?
Frustration with initial slow upload (50kB/s 1st day of Mesh). I normally have much greater upload speed. Is it done yet, can I shut down and secure my system and catch my flight? There are multiple ways to see if a folder sync is up to date (WELL DONE) but... I am still not always sure which, if, and if not when all is sync'd.
FASTER sync [Delta sync?]
Thanks,
Rybak- Edited byRybak Thursday, May 01, 2008 10:14 PMspelling, formatting
- 1) Forum based Meshified folder UX. Opening the folder will show "MS Forum" like view of the mesh folder. App shipped with Mesh vNext. Easy way to deploy ad-hoc Forums with postings and content.
2) Flag files as "Sticky" like in the forum. That way, Explorer could handle its meta data special and show stickys at top of window with Desc, etc. Good way to post FAQ, Help, and Welcome info in a mesh folder.
3) 1-way push flag. So clients could delete own files, but not others.
4) Meshify printers using a local device agent. Copy files to printer device and it pops files and prints them. Would seem to be an easier way to print local from a remote session without having to setup remote print drivers (ala Quickbooks, etc).
- Please add the ability to sync large folders or large numbers of files. I have a 12GB pictures folder that I would like to keep up to date on both my pc and notebook. Unfortunately, Mesh does not allow anything over 5GB so it falls far short of my needs for only one folder!!!
Brian Murphy - How about a deleted items folder or recycle bin just like on the windows desktop
Brian Murphy - brianm_94 said:How about an option to shred a file? I like the idea of undelete in case someone else deletes a file I shared read-write. I also like the idea of multiple 'versions' of a file. But what if I accidentally upload something personal that I don't want 'in the MESH.' Not only do I want the options to delete it, but I would like to make sure someone else with read-write to my folder can't undelete it. It would be great to 'shred' it, but with current technology, I know that's not completely possible, what with back-ups, multiple replicated servers, and files moving around in the 'cloud' there will always be echoes of a file, but hopefully nothing that someone can put back together. ;-)
How about a deleted items folder or recycle bin just like on the windows desktop
Brian Murphy
Steve - I'll add that I want to be able to sync between devices without the Live Desktop being involved AT ALL! I want to have folders that I can truly choose where to share ... as in only between the devices that I want. Currently, I am being forced to always share with Live Desktop ...
- Hello,
I have tree ideas for the Wish List.
1 - Complete synch of the Users folder. When we log on another computer with our live ID we have access to same folder, same wallpaper, same settings of Apps, and same documents. And here come my second idea :
2 - A "Lite" Sync. Imagine a computer with a Solid State Drive (SSD) (8 gb or 16 gb) in a laptop or less size like the EEE PC. It would be great to have access to all our files on demand. I click on my word documents on my Desktop or a picture in my Pictures folder, it download. Then I modify it and it sync the change with other PC. And to be able to free space, if I don't use it for a specified time the hard drive space is free until I want to modify it again.
So if we combine the two idea we can have all our files on all our computer even with little hard drive. And maybe in the future it would be integrated inside Windows (Windows seven ?), and we could have access to our profile and documents everywhere. Multiple PC, one experience.
The Live desktop is great but if I need to modify a document I need to download it, modify then upload again. If we could see our document inside Windows without download all it would be great.
3 - My last wish list is to have somthing like Google Reader which sync with Windows Live Mail and a web app when we use phone (iphone etc...)
Regards.
LG- Edited byRoranippon Sunday, May 04, 2008 12:36 AMAdd about Live Desktop
- I really want to have options to enable "toast notifications" and also sounds on my laptop to indicate when updates occur, or notes are added to a folder. This should be configured on a folder by folder basis.
When I am working on my laptop, I could then easily notice that files had been added, updated, or deleted ... and see the notes that other people sharing the folder have added.
Again ... it would be important to be able to enable pop-up "toast" notifications *AND/OR* sounds (that I can choose/assign :-) so that I can choose how distracting that I want this to be. Toast notifications should *NOT* steal the focus of what I am working on ... and should auto hide after a brief amount of time ... - There is a currently greyed out option in a folder's sync settings saying "Only files smaller than 500KB" - obviously a sync option that will be enabled later.
I have suggestion though - please can you let us specify a maximum size limit rather than giving us only one option - 500k.
Thanks
Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - I would like to have the ability to send a "meshage" to everyone in my mesh that would come up in the bar. Perhaps the MesHage could appear as a sticky note that then gets transferred to history - in this way instead of a document appearing without reference you could provide context and more clear relevance. It seems to me that a folder tree that has items appearing by magic could benefit from more clarity.
- Wouldn't it be cool if the LiveDestop device could actually also be a VM? So maybe you could buy hosting for your LD as an option. So now when you transfer to a folder, the pages are live in your hosting directory. Other services could "hook on" the same way (ftp, SOA, etc). Maybe it could be a virtual-virtual machine (VM2). So no dedicated VM is actually running for each account, but some kind of provisioned service.
- getpat said:
I would like to have the ability to send a "meshage" to everyone in my mesh that would come up in the bar. Perhaps the MesHage could appear as a sticky note that then gets transferred to history - in this way instead of a document appearing without reference you could provide context and more clear relevance. It seems to me that a folder tree that has items appearing by magic could benefit from more clarity.
I would agree. It seems one would need more context of messages then just a list of 100 posts on the right. Posts should be in context of the file for example, or the folder in general. So clicking a file would show messages specific to that file. Maybe you could start a new message thread in a folder - and the new thread is actually a file in the folder with a special icon. Then you can click the file (i.e. thread) to see all posts in that thread. So the paradim would stay file based. Might be interesting. - Thin version of client is needed IMO. (maybe it is same exe with config file changes).
I can see uses already where I want to have people access to my mesh folder on their desktop, but I know they will not have time or patience to install full mesh client, nor will they really understand it (no slam, just busy biz people). For example, I would like to send my bookkeeper an invite that would just install the link on her desktop and she would get copies of my QB files - simple and clean and no other fuss. Just having web access to folder would not really work as multiple step process all the time.
So have option to send invitation in email that will install only the folder on other users desktop. They have 1 thing to click and it runs install of thin client. If they already have Mesh, then install not needed. If they already have thin client, no install needed. After the install, it walks them into live ID if they don't have. Maybe the folder itself has a reminder in it until they activate with a live id.
Why is this easier? The scope is even smaller and more focused and easier for non-techies to understand. No icon in task bar. No RDP. No circles. No needing to explain to user what mesh is why they want it. If they get it - fine. If not, we have a simple way to "remote" install (at their approval) a folder on their machine. I could use this for many right now (accountant, bookeeper, attorney, etc). - JamesMoore said:
I would like the ability to sync my Live Mail, Contacts & Calendar with Outlook using Mesh.
I would also like to sync OS and Program settings with Mesh. So for example, once I Installed a fresh copy of Vista I could connect to Mesh and then it would update all the settings so I wouldn't have to configure anything. Same process could be used for Programs, such IE favorites, Media Player playlists, etc.
Extra storage would also be nice, even if we had to pay for it.
James
I like those. I'd also like to see RSS feeds in addition to favorites. History would be good, too. - mpalermo said:
I think it would be great to have a self-hosted Mesh down the line somewhere. This would allow for much more file space on the Mesh Desktop. This would be a great opportunity to connect up with the Windows Home Server team. It would be great to allow the Home Server to host the Mesh. That way we can put our own equipment at the center of our computing experience and still retain the "cloud" concept of Live Mesh. Having Windows Home Server also be a "Mesh Server" would do wonders for both products. There would be much more file storage, faster sync process (in most cases), and many more.
If the self-hosted "Mesh Server" idea doesn't come through, it would at least be nice to be able to install this on Windows Home Server. That would eliminate the manual sync'ing of data to it.
I second this! I'd really like to have Windows Home Server be an "always on" home for Live Mesh for each of my family. Even for a home server, it's important that this be able to handle multiple meshes simultaniously. - Glenn Blinckmann said:mpalermo said:
I think it would be great to have a self-hosted Mesh down the line somewhere. This would allow for much more file space on the Mesh Desktop. This would be a great opportunity to connect up with the Windows Home Server team. It would be great to allow the Home Server to host the Mesh. That way we can put our own equipment at the center of our computing experience and still retain the "cloud" concept of Live Mesh. Having Windows Home Server also be a "Mesh Server" would do wonders for both products. There would be much more file storage, faster sync process (in most cases), and many more.
If the self-hosted "Mesh Server" idea doesn't come through, it would at least be nice to be able to install this on Windows Home Server. That would eliminate the manual sync'ing of data to it.
I second this! I'd really like to have Windows Home Server be an "always on" home for Live Mesh for each of my family. Even for a home server, it's important that this be able to handle multiple meshes simultaniously.
I third that. Home server (of any flavor) would seem to make a great "home" for a mesh server/client. - The ability to sync with existing SkyDrive folders as well as the Windows Live Photo Gallery. Unification of these services would greatly enhance its usefulness.
Not all those who wander are lost I would like to see:
1. I would be nice if I could set a picture that is in one of my live mesh folders as the background/wallpaper of the live desktop, or at least have a few from Microsoft to pick from.2. I would like to disable the side bar that comes up when opening the live mesh folders on the live desktop and on the device, Maybe you could at a button to the folder that opens/shows it.
3. I would rather have to click on the live mesh icon in the taskbar to make it open, not open when you mouse over like it does now.
4.I would like to hide the "Create new folder" icon on the live mesh desktop, maybe be able to access it by right clicking or put it in the menu when you click on the live mesh icon that’s on the live mesh toolbar.
5. And as a future goal it would be cool if I could run simple programs. To make it a little easier to implement maybe have it so you could run any program that doesn’t need installing, like the portable apps made for jump drives.- I'd like a "one-way sync", where my "master folder" gets copied to the other devices, but no changes from the devices are sent back the other way.
Use case: machines in branch offices showing images of real estate/properties. I want them to have the current set of images and associated files, and I don't want anyone making changes that go "back up". These are unattended machines that just play pictures in a loop. There's security to stop people messing with them, but I'd like the sync function to help me out too. - Let me second LRKuderick's call for robust Outlook sync via Live Mesh, among other things. I really want to see a Windows Live Mesh Outlook Connector that does the specific things that the Windows Live Outlook Connector builds are not handling well.
Let me lay out the specific functionality problems I'm seeing -- all deriving from the fact that a single user may have multiple profiles and email address inboxes of Outlook running on one PC box -- and that Outlook has severe problems handling this.
1. Plenty of PC boxes require support for multiple users with entirely separate Outlook inboxes and profiles.
2. You're seeing large numbers of single user PCs split into multiple user profiles for Outlook, which are a major chore / undertaking to start / keep synced. User Account Controls makes it much more likely that people will split their logins between regular and Administrator sessions. (Moreover, plenty of people are trying to bypass UAC by turning on the hidden (full) Administrator account in MMC -> Local Security Policy. Others, like me, have it turned on for purposes of installations & reconfigurations, but occasionally need to use Outlook while in that account.)
3. It's becoming far more common to run across multiboot platforms -- even multiboot MS-only machines.
a. HDD sizes have grown to be very generous even in laptops.
b. Vista is built to make partitioning that HDD space a cinch -- and thereby makes room easily for multiple OSes.
c. Plenty of people want to keep an install of XP alongside Vista.
d. Lots of other people are doing x86 Vista alongside x64 Vista.
e. NeoSmart's EasyBCD and VistaBootPro are both great ways of adding more OSes to Vista.
f. Some IT Pros have a lot of testing to do, and (like me) wind up with a multiboot of Windows Server 2008 and Vista. I've run across Windows Home Server and Vista multiboots. When Windows Small Business Server 2008 arrives this summer, that will provide other testbed OS options.
4. Outlook 2007 isn't handling multiple user profiles well.
a. It is a serious problem to sync multiple email address inboxes / .pst files / Business Contact Manager files / RSS feeds if you have more than one user / user profile / MS OS on your PC box.
b. You have to install Outlook on each OS partition no matter how many OSes you have -- no overwrite-installing for multiple OSes on a shared programs partition.
c. Business Contact Manager can't be moved to any other partition -- there are no install options for doing so.
d. Tangentially related evidence for the multi-profile hurdles in Office -- Some add-ins like the new Help Commands Ribbon have to be installed for every user profile, even if you originally install it via the full Administrator account.
So, absent a total rebuild of Outlook's settings code, it would be great if MS built a small app to replace the current Windows Live Outlook Connector -- a new Live Mesh connector -- that would eliminate all of the barriers currently in the way of easily syncing up Outlook data:
1. Across machines / devices without Exchange Server
2. Across MS OSes [virtually different machines]
3. Across user profiles for the many multi-user machines, as well as single-user Vista machines that now necessitate the maintenance of multiple Outlook user profiles.
4. Across multiple email accounts.
5. Across multiple MS apps that share the RSS Common Feeds within Vista.
6. Incorporating Business Contact Manager databases, etc.
Long way of saying Outlook is becoming part of the cloud too.
So, if MS wants early adoption of Live Mesh, It's time to provide a Connector add-in that rebuilds Outlook and unfetters its functionality as a consequence of people adopting their new service strategy!
Many thanks for bringing this to the attention of the right program managers around Microsoft.
Sincerely yours,
Martin- Edited bya_k_a Friday, May 09, 2008 12:38 AMsyntax
There doesn't seem to be an active discussion among the IE8, RSS, Live Mesh and Windows Live teams at MS about building a new web UI. Hope that you'll consider how MS could get leverage from one -- especially through Live Mesh, if you want to generate a user base.
I can't be the sole user who sees the current emphasis in Live Mesh platform as the rudiments of a different UI, not just a device sync. I don't, when it comes down to it, need device syncing as bad as I need better GTD / information-handling experiences on the web. I am feeling very cramped and frustrated with current client-side browsers and feed readers, especially from MS and third-party partners. Services / apps in this KM vein should be on the drawing board very soon at MS.
Does MS want to leverage its huge investment in Windows Live and Live Mesh as the next generation 'web' UI? Changing the UI browser / KM experience on the web would seem to make much better strategic sense than hitching a company's fate to companies like Yahoo, and trying to 'drive' users to particular sites on the web! If Live Mesh is just for peer-to-peer syncing, the platform will still miss the larger point about information overload. To wit, some thoughts:
Information loads are driving a need for full-function browsing / KM tools, and IE8 is only a minor UI gesture in that direction. Increasingly, web browsing, whether through IE, Firefox or an RSS reader, is becoming too client-app heavy, and personal start-pages are not positioned to substitute for client-side functionality.
If the dev team is serious about the FeedSync idea, then it would be nice to see evidence that it does what feeds were originally intended to do -- make for a better web browsing / KM experience. How about putting FeedSync to use to create a Live Mesh hub for browsing that isn't as client-app heavy? In the process, you would also consolidate a lot of the "social networking" user base under Live Mesh as well.
MS currently has no serious KM tools in its client app inventory -- in spite of IE's dominance. Live Mesh would be a nice place to host that functionality, but these tools could just as easily be embedded in the IE8 client. Just depends on who at MS will ask for the green light first to create the code.
At the moment, there are 'baby steps' toward this new web UI that should be taken, even though they haven't been, in the current MS web UI:
1. Lots of people are high-volume browser users -- who have a reason to bookmark lots of info -- but in any event have been too swamped to sync their bookmarks across multiple devices and keep on top of their bookmark structure. Therefore, MS needs a hyperefficient folder-tree builder for user-tagged/-bookmarked content. (Without it, a browser is not going to scale to meet current web navigation/research demands.)
a. Hierarchies are vital for research, even when tagging, once you reach a certain volume of tags. So, think folder tree capabilities, even if you are only putting tags into folders, not the actual site bookmarks.
b. Any other tool beats IE and Outlook at deftness of drag-and-drop for bookmarks/favorites/feeds folders. MS' own client-side interface in IE and Outlook for reorganizing folders is a complete slug, totally unwieldy. IE and Outlook are collapsing under the weight of the info they have to handle.
2. These browsing KM tools should allow people not just to bookmark / tag info, but to archive a snapshot of it on a mesh. (A local Google cache of sorts. This is what a cool new startup in alpha, Iterasi, is doing.)
3. These browsing KM tools would be great if they had extensions to mesh with existing collaborative project spaces / live meeting areas. (Think of MS Groove or 37 Signals' Basecamp or AirSet / MS LiveMeeting or Google's Marratech or Citrix or Skype.)
4. The entire mesh's KM folder tree contents have to be exportable for offline work/reference and syncing with new devices and new browsing apps.
a. The exported data has to sync into multiple folders on a client HDD simultaneously. (I don't want the entire account just sent to a single folder on my HDD, which I'll then have to manually dissect and refile. That just duplicates work and eliminates the advantage of saving the webpage and filing it at the same time, from within IE.) If it requires a client-side app, then fix SyncToy to make it easier to do so. Users will be grateful for this time-saver.
b. The account's contents must be exportable as bookmarks, with an intact folder tree.
c. The account's contents must also be exportable as entire archives (ZIPs), containing intact folder trees and nested webpage files. The pages can be saved as .mht files, as .pdf files (provided the links are live), or for browsers that don't care enough to support .mht, as .html file folders.
d. MS needs a web-clipping service (partial contents of a page, using a lasso or box, a la OneNote, and could even export clippings in OneNote's OpenXPS format.)
5. Automate the KM tools' "discovery" of new content on HTML sites.
a. Look into converting HTML pages into RSS feeds, or allow the tools to RSS scrape Windows Live Search results.
b. More ideas under RSS (next item).
6. RSS:
a. The primary RSS constraint in MS apps so far is that you're constrained in the Common Feeds setup to a 'river of news' view.
b. Make the RSS feeds viewable in some subdirectory, like Favorites is, so that it's easier to reorder the contents. The interface to create/edit folders within IE7 and Outlook is very sluggish and touchy. (You can only move one feed folder at a time up or down the list. No batch moves.) A folder for RSS would presumably fix that.
c. Give the user the option to save a page in its RSS version, if a feed exists on the page. The advantages would be obvious: You can clean out the embedded ads and CSS clutter. (That would help save you guys a hefty amount on server-side storage bills too.)
d. These tools should have a feed generator. Convert the pages you save into a custom feed that can be sent to your feed reader.
e. Off topic, but related to exporting, I'm just going to say what has long annoyed me. You want to do the entire RSS movement a favor? RSS readers tend to obliterate folder trees when you backup/export your RSS feed collections as OPML files. If you have a large number of feeds, rebuilding them is an absolute nightmare. (See: IE, Outlook.) So, as a side project, create a small app or file format that exports or uploads RSS feeds back into readers, so that your previously-created nested folder tree for these feeds remains intact.
f. Consider partnering with an RSS reader company.
g. Along RSS lines, make these research tools lifestream capable. (Not a huge priority, but another natural marketshare. If you're already using the toolbar add-in for bookmarking content, it should be shareable, and blog posts should be uploadable.)
7. These tools have to be able to save "grey web" pages that you can't otherwise permalink ... that only materialize from the bowels a long search session that would be too labor-intensive to repeat.
8. Look at the Onfolio getting started guide as a model of the kind of client Live Mesh browsing KM tools could be. It was the best organized research client, but MS has done nothing with it since buying it up in 2002. You'll see a million ways its functions could be redesigned so that its functions boost the capabilities of IE8, or even OneNote, or Live Mesh.
9. If the KM tools had the above export/sync features, and built-in client-side research organizer and RSS reader, MS would outcompete other browsing clients, and potentially change users' browsing experiences.
a.k.a.- A.K.A.,
Would you be available for off-forum e-mailing? Your comments were very interesting to me, and we're thinking along similar lines in certain areas.
Regards,
Nicholas Bedworth, CTO
DigitalDirect
www.digitaldirect.com
nicholas.bedworth@digitaldirect.com - Syncing of OneNote Notebooks.
- Edited byaatreya Sunday, May 11, 2008 1:42 AMupdate
- I too would lke to see Outlook sync via Live Mesh. Sync browser bookmarks across multiple devices. A way to keep the bar from showing if you prefer. More cloud space for bigger files.
This is going to be great! - Simple one. Can we have a MOE for Windows Home Server please?
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - "Send to Mesh..." menu item would be good in Office apps. Similar to the "Send to pdf". So you can easily "print" an email or document directly to a mesh folder as a pdf or xps document saving many steps and poking around.
- I second that request! I would like to see Mesh work with Windows Home Server. The comments about Office programs specifically Outlook sounds great also.
Thanks,
Kevin - Ability to exclude folders, from directory structure. For instance if top folder is selected, you should be able to exclude a folder from syncing thats under it.
- Hi, I'm using Live Mesh Tech preview. I think that a way to sync RSS feeds between computers would be really useful.
- This is aimed at the installstion:
You have to have UAC on vista enabled for the installstion to take place. This is Extremely annoying, for those who do not like the constant pop ups.
Jase - TheBigEd said:
4) Have the ability to email a link to a specific file to someone at a different company/network. The link would have an access token embedded in it that would expire after a specified period of time.
I STRONGLY second this idea. It would be extremely useful for me to simply copy a file into a mesh folder, grab a public link to it, and email/IM that to someone in order to share something with them, just as a one-time thing (without having to bother with adding them as a shared user and signing them up for live mesh.) - aatreya said:
I STRONGLY second this idea. It would be extremely useful for me to simply copy a file into a mesh folder, grab a public link to it, and email/IM that to someone in order to share something with them, just as a one-time thing (without having to bother with adding them as a shared user and signing them up for live mesh.)
Does Skydrive not suffice for this?
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - Well sure. Dropbox also has this feature. I think it would be useful to be added to Mesh, however.
- Some sort of "colaboration mode" which greatly speeded up the updates to a selected directory for some period of time would be great. I can see using OneNote, Word, or Powerpoint with others in a phone meeting where we are all able to work on a shared document at one time.
- Had three suggestions, please review here (links go to Connect):
Add Members to Folder by Drag/Drop from IM Buddy List
Improve Efficiency of Duplicate File Upload/Download
Identify Friends with Mesh Ok, after looking at some of the suggestions in the thread, here are some of my ideas, including things already posted. (In other words, things I would vote for plus my additional ideas.)
- Files and Folders
- Delta File Sync - ability to change just the bits instead of uploading whole changed file
- File Versions - Keep alternate versions
- Show who changed the file and when
- Ability to determine how many versions to keep/delete specific version
- Recycle Bin - Ability to undelete file. Versions are good, but if you delete the whole file or a specific version, then what?
- Shredder - Ability to securely delete a file. I've mentioned this before, and it may be hard to delete from offline back-ups, but this is a must for personal information.
- Ability to share files/folders within folder - keep from duplicating files / folders within the mesh.
- Sticky Files - File (such as a FAQ) that would always stay at the top of the folder
- Title/description of folder - Have a description next to the folder name in folder window (ex: Hawaii Pictures -- Pictures of my 2008 trip to Hawaii)
- Sharing
- Ability to email a specific file link
- Connection with some sort of Windows Live address book, containing Windows Live Messenger contacts, hotmail/ live mail contacts, Live Spaces contacts.
- Dropdown box to add people
- Add groups - be able to add all my family members to a 'family' group and then share folder to group instead of individual people
- One-way Sync -- I know that eventually we will be able to share files with friends and give them read-only access, but how about for devices also.
- Allow syncing with other products
- Ability to sync with other Microsoft products, such as Skydrive, Folder Share, Windows Live Photo Gallery, MSN Spaces ...
- Ability to share with non-Microsoft products, such as Flicker, Picassa, mySpace ...
- Remote Desktop
- Ability to remote into separate session in case console is being used
- Ability to share console
- Ability to share desktop with another users mesh - remote desktop for someone who's mesh you are a user, but devices are not in your mesh. Ability to share it out on a limited bases, not perpetual
- Wake-on-Lan for remote desktop
- Mesh
- Ability to host mesh on your own network
- Enterprise Mesh
- Local Mesh for Windows Home Server
Just a few ideas. I may come back and edit this as I come up with more ideas, and post them on connect or hunt down those from others and vote on them as I have time.
Thanks for the great Tech Preview
Steve- swattz101 said:
Add groups - be able to add all my family members to a 'family' group and then share folder to group instead of individual people
Great ideas Steve, just on this one above. We already have the ability to group our family/friends together via Live Contacts. This ability is exposed in a number of places, most notably in live Messenger. I would like Mesh to be able to leverage these groups.
I also believe that Live Groups (when it arrives) will fill a big space here.
-Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - Jamie Thomson said:
Great ideas Steve, just on this one above. We already have the ability to group our family/friends together via Live Contacts. This ability is exposed in a number of places, most notably in live Messenger. I would like Mesh to be able to leverage these groups.
I also believe that Live Groups (when it arrives) will fill a big space here.
-Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomsonThanks Jamie,
I just looked at http://dev.live.com/contacts/ and it looks interesting. I especially like the map feature. It looks like it's been around for a while, so I'm surprised I hadn't seen it yet. I made a couple of changes through the api and it didn't update to my messenger or hotmail address book. Either I'm doing it wrong, or it's not connected yet, as it is in beta also.
Anyway, this is a discussion for another place, not the mesh forums. :-) I only bring up the topic, because this would be a great thing to combine into the "mesh." Share info / folders / contact information with someone through the mesh, and if and of it updates, it shows up in the "news" section. I could also see an address book Application in the Live Desktop with current information updated by your contacts, so it is current. Kind of like it is through some of the other Live products.
Steve - My suggestion is about "asimetric" sync. For instance, imagine this: you have 10GB of pictures in your desktop and want to have all of them "everywhere". But your cellphone doesn't have that much capacity. So you could be able to select an option to resize pictures to "fit" the phone screen.
Not only in mobile phones, but also to many other devices. I'm thinking here of picture viewers/frames, portable consoles, car multimedia devices, Music/Video players, UMPCs, etc. There are times when you don't need "full resolution".
Going a bit futher, I envision a future where you can take a 10MPx picture with a Wifi/3G/WiMax enabled digital camera and have it automatically "uploaded" to the mesh. Then it will be "downloaded" to your desktop, laptop and also to your cellphone, but here with just 1MPx, because you don't need that much resolution in a 640x480 screen. And dreaming even more, you could have an "on demand" sync? You get your 1MPx picture in your cellphone, but if you want the full one, just click on a button and it will be downloaded!
I thinik I am dreaming too much! I've done a lot of flowcharts and notes about this.... maybe you are interested?
I hope I'll be soon invited to test Live Mesh! I really love this software+services!
Thanks for your work and keep on it!
Marc Vallribera i Ros - I would like the ability to see if a remote device is currently is use before I attempt a remote connection. I cannot tell if my wife is using our home PC before I attempt a remote connection.
- Gakubuchi said:
My suggestion is about "asimetric" sync. For instance, imagine this: you have 10GB of pictures in your desktop and want to have all of them "everywhere". But your cellphone doesn't have that much capacity. So you could be able to select an option to resize pictures to "fit" the phone screen.
Not only in mobile phones, but also to many other devices. I'm thinking here of picture viewers/frames, portable consoles, car multimedia devices, Music/Video players, UMPCs, etc. There are times when you don't need "full resolution".
Going a bit futher, I envision a future where you can take a 10MPx picture with a Wifi/3G/WiMax enabled digital camera and have it automatically "uploaded" to the mesh. Then it will be "downloaded" to your desktop, laptop and also to your cellphone, but here with just 1MPx, because you don't need that much resolution in a 640x480 screen. And dreaming even more, you could have an "on demand" sync? You get your 1MPx picture in your cellphone, but if you want the full one, just click on a button and it will be downloaded!
I thinik I am dreaming too much! I've done a lot of flowcharts and notes about this.... maybe you are interested?
I hope I'll be soon invited to test Live Mesh! I really love this software+services!
Thanks for your work and keep on it!
Marc Vallribera i Ros
Sounds like a gread idea, Marc.
I just came across this the other day through Betanews. http://www.eye.fi/products. It's a wifi enabled SD card that you put in your camera and it automatically uploads your pictures to the major picture sharing sites or your PC on your home wifi network. One of the things I'm looking for is integration with the major picture sites and mesh for sharing. Something like this and your idea of changing the resolution for different devices would be great. I especially like the idea of connecting the mesh to a wireless picture frame and selecting specific pictures to show. I've thought about getting one for my mother so I can push up new pictures of the kids as I get them, but currently they are still to much for my small budget. :-)
Steve - Robert Day said:
I would like the ability to see if a remote device is currently is use before I attempt a remote connection. I cannot tell if my wife is using our home PC before I attempt a remote connection.
Great idea Robert.
My problem is that everyone uses my main signon (even though I have set up sperate ones for them). Since the computer stays signed in, I can't tell if they are on or not. What I would like to see is the ability to use more than one session on a computer, then when I remote in, it can ask if I want a remote session or a console session, ideally telling me who is signed into the console, if anyone is.
Steve
Great idea Robert.
My problem is that everyone uses my main signon (even though I have set up sperate ones for them). Since the computer stays signed in, I can't tell if they are on or not. What I would like to see is the ability to use more than one session on a computer, then when I remote in, it can ask if I want a remote session or a console session, ideally telling me who is signed into the console, if anyone is.
Steve
There was a similar discussion with the Smart Displays. It was a kind of monitor that could be detached and carried across the house. It had WiFi and used remote desktop to interact with the computer. The idea of 2 sessions at the same time (one with a "real" monitor and another with the smart display) was great, but there was a licensing problem. Windows is licensed for single usage. Well, many people can use a Windows installation, but only one at the same time.
What could be possible is that Live Mesh tells you if there is an active session or not, but having 2 concurrent sessions I think is legally impossible.
MarcThere was a similar discussion with the Smart Displays. It was a kind of monitor that could be detached and carried across the house. It had WiFi and used remote desktop to interact with the computer. The idea of 2 sessions at the same time (one with a "real" monitor and another with the smart display) was great, but there was a licensing problem. Windows is licensed for single usage. Well, many people can use a Windows installation, but only one at the same time.
What could be possible is that Live Mesh tells you if there is an active session or not, but having 2 concurrent sessions I think is legally impossible.
Marc
I thought about mentioning the licensing issue when I posted. Currently, when running any server addition, including WHS, you are licensed for 2 terminal services sessions in addition to the console session. I would like to see this extended to at least Vista Ultimate if not Vista Home Premium. There are many reasons for this, just one of them being remote sessions with Live mesh. The other main discussion I have seen deals with Windows Media Center, both XP and Vista. The scenario with MCE is one person watching TV on it while another user wants to remote into it to do something without taking over the tv session.The smart display looks cool. To bad it didn't take off. I remember reading about another similar device that is like a reverse KVM. Two monitors, keyboard and mice connected to one PC, so two users could log on. I can't seem to find a link right now, except for Linux, though the one I remember was windows. Anyway, Linux has it, why not allow it on windows? It would be a great Vista Ultimate perk. :-)
Steve- I have 3 ideas. One of which I've seen tossed out, the others I haven't.
1) I'd also like the ability to sync files with computers, but not with the desktop. Ideally, this would allow me to sync a 10GB folder, without affecting my storage space. Eventually, I would expect to have to pay for bandwidth, at least a little
2) I haven't seen it mentioned, but I'd like to be able to sync single files with the mesh. An example is _vimrc files and other single config style files
3) The invite functionality needs to be easier. I like it where it is, for the purpose of adding people for sharing, but it should also be somewhere obvious, like on the main mesh.com page
Thanks for the cool product.
Jim Deville
IronRuby
alias: jdeville - [Ben asked me here to post this].
I often have multiple logins on one machine. For example, on my laptop I have my personal login for home use and my work login that's joined to the company's domain. Let's say I have a Live Mesh folder named "My Stuff" that I'd like to have access to no matter which account I'm currently using on my laptop. Under each login account I went to mesh.com and added my laptop and I'm able to access the "My Stuff" folder from each account. However, my Mesh's device circle now has two identical entries for my laptop, one per account. It's pretty annoying, because depending on which account I'm logged in under, one will say it's not-syncing and the other will say that it is syncing, and both offer the option to connect remotely. Since I have multiple machines on which I have multiple accounts, my device circle is full of duplicate entries. I think it would be a much better user experience if there were only one entry for each machine, but the UI somehow indicated that I have multiple accounts on that machine that are participating in the mesh and showed which account was currently active and syncing.
Keep up the good work. Live Mesh is shaping up to be something great.- Edited bygkramer Wednesday, May 21, 2008 4:47 AMAdded link to request to post in the wishlist thread
- Jamie Thomson said:
[ Todd Manlon asked me here to post this.]
Remote administration.
I spend a lot of time providing ad hoc "tech support" to my less tech-savvy relatives. It would be great if Mesh could enable a "Remote Adminstration" feature so that I could get onto their machines and help them.
I know that this could be enabled by adding their device to my device ring however its not strictly speaking my devie is it? hence, I guess the request is, enable me to remotely access devices that are not in my device ring - assuming that device's owner has given me permission to access it.
-Jamie
http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - If your question is answered, please mark as answered.
I would like to see this also, this could be useful not only for personal but for work. I choose not to store/save my password on one of my computers for security reasons. When the computer boots it allways pops up the window asking for my password. I wouldn't make it the default, but an option to start the program minimized so that I can choose when I wanted to login would be nice. Another option would be a smaller popup balloon telling me to login.
~Jared- You know how when you do a remote desktop session, the screen locks when you disconnect? How about an option to disable that? Of course having the current way as the default is best, but it's real annoying when I'm controlling my media pc, and the session breaks, and it locks the console in the middle of my show.
- The ability to change color depth to increase performance on rd
If I have a Office 2007 or 2003 license, to allow the use of Word or Excel in the Virtual Desktop. And directly modify those documents right on the site.
- It would be great if I could synch documents in my Office Live Workspace with my Live Mesh folders.
I'm not entirely sure this is the right thread for feature update request but here goes:
- Progress bar during installation: It is a relatively fast install compared to others but the vista spinning wheel doesn't really give me confidence after two minutes...
- Could we get a multiple file uploader into the Virtual Desktop (maybe nick it from Windows Live Spaces Image Uploader :p)?
- And, if this is possible - could you get an unzip option for uploaded ZIP files, or as an option before you click upload? I know the .NET Framework supports this :p
- And, also - would it be possible to get some Windows Live Folders (SkyDrive) integration? Virtual Desktop at first glance appears similar with more options including the availibilty of sync'ing. It would be nice to have the two services integrated.
Oh - and i like the Recycle Bin for Virtual Desktop idea
Andy M- Hi Andy,
This is indeed the exact right thread for feature update requests. :)
Thanks for the ideas; I'm adding them to the ever-growing list of great suggestions the team is receiving.
Ben. - Earlier in this thread (page 3 I think) somebody suggested setting synchronization for new computers.
I have this enabled on my computer for the below, and if there is a specific thread for where these settings are, somebody lead me to it.
Here's what I've got so far.
To sync your RSS Feeds from IE (or other centrally managed RSS reader):
Sync the folder C:\Users\%UserName%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Feeds\
To sync your Sidebar settings and gadgets:
C:\Users\%UserName%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Sidebar\
If anyone knows a better place for posting this info you can go ahead and post it.
Thanks!
By the way, I would suggest a "Hide this folder" option for these, at least on the Live Desktop, to reduce clutter. Great work Mesh Team!- Edited bycobrin Saturday, May 24, 2008 2:19 AMNeeded Context
- I use to have Foldershare before I got a Mesh invite and the only feature I miss is remote access to the folder structure and files on remote computers. 5GB's of storage isn't enough space to store all my work in the cloud, but allowing remote access to the file system would solve this for me.
matty - I wish that
Live Mesh can be soon combined with other Live Services
Allowing more developers to develop application for Mesh
Allow users to feed a "pet", which can give help/suggestion if we encounter some problems
Allow users to set a network(~VPN) between Meshs - Support French OS! And Select msn live contact instead of adding e-mail
- upload multiple files
- connorb3 said:
By the way, I would suggest a "Hide this folder" option for these, at least on the Live Desktop, to reduce clutter. Great work Mesh Team!
I would really like a "hide this folder" option as well. I don't like the blue folders cluttering up my desktop. - Christopher Seidel said:
The ability to change color depth to increase performance on rd
I think this is a must, and I'm sure it's an issue with everyone. The RD is just way too slow. Not useable by any means. - When i connect to the live desktop, and open a folder full of photos there are 3 items that would be nice to see...
(1) The preview pane that you can pull down takes FOREVER to load up... these photos are large in size, but woudl be nice if the previews could come up more quickly
(2) These previews - once they are displayed - are 50% accurate and the other roughly 50% are displayed as a bunch of horizontal lines... no visible rendering of the image... just some horizontal lines.
(3) When I click on an image, it is displayed in the main window, but there's no ability to zoom in... this is a required feature - the zoom ability.
thanks.
clay - Features I desire, think should be included:
- Public folders - Folders and files should be able to be made public if chosen, not requiring adding individual people from emails/contact list...this would then negate the need for SkyDrive
- Drag and drop - it does say this is coming, but highlight here anyway, needs to allow:
- Drag and drop bewteen pc and live folder/s
- Drag and drop bewteen live folder and live folders
- Drag and drop bewteen pc and other remotley connected devices, without requiring uploading/syncing to live folders
- Versions and restore - for collaboration, so people can see what version file is, highlighting changes, and revert back to previous versions if required/desired
- Undelete - for the same reasons as above
- Syncing between devices only - should have ability to allow syncing bewteen chosen devices without requiring syncing to live desktop as well, should be able to keep the live desktop out of the loop if desired
- Views - should have thumbnail option
- Contacts list - there should be the ability to add users via the messenger contact list, rather than just the tedious entering of emails manually
- Network folders/NAS - ability to add network attached storage folders/files to live mesh
Thats my list for now....
- 3. How about the ability to link meshes?
Excellent idea. I currently have 3 devices, but one belongs to the missus. I don't want all of her stuff synced to my PC, but there are some that I would need. There is also a need to link to other users at my church to share files. I currently use Skydrive to do this, but having them sync would be so much easier.
Bill Weimer - Bill Weimer - think you can do this today - though i've not tried it.
Right click on a folder you've mesh-enabled and click LiveMesh Options and then 'add members in livemesh folder'... believe you should then be able to invite other users to get access to this folder... again, haven't tried it - but i believe that's what this option is intended to do... - Le Master said:
Syncing across devices without having to upload the files to Live Desktop first. That would be so amazing.
I also think this is very useful, especially when two computers are in the same LAN but uploading/downloading to the cloud might be much slow(er). Probably the delta sync idea others mentioned can also benefit this idea.
By the way, although I haven't got an invitation to use dropbox, I believe they have something similar to this "local sync" idea. - Local Sync would be very useful.
- I second/third, Jamie Thomson from page 4, that an obvious addition is to add an MOE for WHS to allow for offsite backup for critical files as well as the sharing of photos etc with family. I added a piece on Cloud Storage on my blog recently that ended with "Final thought is that this could all become a non issue anyway in the coming months if Microsoft includes WHS in the evolving Mesh story"
http://www.customrm.com ¦ http://softwareplusservices.spaces.live.com- Edited bySJKP Tuesday, May 27, 2008 6:37 PMforgot reference to original post
- I have been using the likes of Foldershare and Skydrive for a little while, I (beit good or bad, have the RDP working in home premium, SP1). SO for me - to use this all legit with Mesh is awesome! so first thoughts are to the makers and people behind the scenes! very impressive!
My suggestions so far:
- Being able to use without UAC - doesnt really need to be explained - atleast give me the option.
- Choosing where the folders sync - (like foldershare) - choose a folder on each machine and sync, rather than to the desktop - again atleast give me the options.
- allow the RDP client to work as a service - thus if my machine restarts, and does not autologin, I can still RDP in and use the welcome screen (much like RDP, Logmein).
- Allow to sync (like foldershare) - without all the items using up my space on the cloud - so just sync between two machines, without going to the cloud also.
I am sure I will think of more as I get to use it more, and maybe I just haven't found these things yet.
I'd like to see what other suggestions could be implemented - It would be nice to see a product really take into consideration what the beta guys reckon ;)
(I apologise, I didnt see this thread first, and although some of my points are/have been mentioned, I'd like to show my interest in these particulars!) - You can actually synchronize to places other than your desktop by using the explorer and right-clicking on a folder.
- HAHA! funny you should say that - I did go exploring and managed to find it - can you tell I aint had it long! Cheers!
- I too would appreciate the ability to add my desktop to the live mesh.
www.parmmann.com - This isn't so much a "Mesh" wish, but a "Live Mesh" wish. (Although in Mesh requests, I'm in the linking meshes/ad hoc RDP Invite crowd)
I'd like to see more of a unified, at the very least consistent, Windows Live user experience. (UX)
Photo Gallery and Skydrive have Upload tools, not mesh (I realize CTP is post alpha pre-beta, so this is forgiven still noted tho)
You can brand/personalize the color schemes of mail.live.com, messenger, Me.spaces.live.com, but not skydrive.live.com, me.home.services.spaces.live.com, home.live.com, or mesh.live.com.
Mechanics for permissions, while "round", are still "reinvented" for every *.live.com offering. Also, they don't interoperate. Permissions set in Skydrive aren't known in Spaces, etc.
Could someone get the teams talking about some inheritence? Branding Options, default permissions, consistent Upload tools/UI.
I'd like to be able to just go to home.live.com, set a color scheme and basic permissions, and have mail, skydrive, spaces, gallery, calendar, messenger aware of it. Yes personalization would allow me to override a setting (set mesh back to the default blue, for example). Think NTFS file permissions: Inherit from parent, append, or override.
Xbox live friend's list setting is friends only.
Messenger contact updates are friends only.
Spaces default permissions should therefor be.... open to the internet! </sarcasm>
What's the point of linking an identity to my Passport, when the only thing that anyone cares about is password authentication?
Thanks for reading, the tone of this is intended to be less snarky than what probably came across.
We've read people's wishes for mesh being the basis for true "roaming profiles" (mainly in office app settings above). Before getting to that point, *.live.com would need to consolidate so that it is a branded offering instead of a collection of services hosted under the same domain. (Can you imagine what Office 2007 would be like if ONLY Word had the Fluent User Ribbon?) - WillFa said:I'd only have trouble finding things in Word 2007? <semi-sarcasm />
(Can you imagine what Office 2007 would be like if ONLY Word had the Fluent User Ribbon?)
Your suggestions have a lot of merit. The different user interfaces are confusing at first, even to experienced users. Things are hidden - someone had to point out the "Sign In" entry at the top right of the Live Desktop for me. Totally, totally missed it. - 2 things I would like to see:
1. The ability to edit/delete comments posted in a folder
2. The ability to set permissions for subfolders. For example I have a folder on my PC for photos, I would like to add this to the mesh but some of the sub folders contain photos that I do not wish to share with everyone as they simply would not interest them. Rather than create two top level folders (one for my close friends and one for everyone else) I would rather link the entire photos directory to the mesh and then restrict access to specific folders.
I have been playing with MESH for a week or so and offer these (either supportive or additive) thoughts (more detail in various posts on my blog):
1. Kaspersky thought the Mesh installer was a Trojan, someone needs to fix that!!
2. I appreciate that this is a tech preview, however for 2 years effort with the first sample application being file sync:
a. I was surprised that the current sync conflict detection is at the file level, surely this should be at the file content level
b. Sync conflict resolution needs to be improved, currently the only option appears to be to accept the most recently edited or “save as” any other variants. Some sort of delta compare, with file merge options please
3. Editing a document directly from the Live Desktop does not offer an edit and replace, but rather an edit and “save as”
Anyway more playing ahead....
http://www.customrm.com ¦ http://softwareplusservices.spaces.live.comVery excited about what Mesh could offer. Only real concern at the moment is that the current Tech Preview could be a red herring and distract people/developers/designers/architects from thinking more creatively about the business applications the Mesh platform could enable.
What about using Mesh as a mechanism for partners to exchange purchase order and invoices, with an audit application provided off the Live Desktop (see blog for more on this)
http://www.customrm.com ¦ http://softwareplusservices.spaces.live.com- RaiderClay said:
Right click on a folder you've mesh-enabled and click LiveMesh Options and then 'add members in livemesh folder'... believe you should then be able to invite other users to get access to this folder... again, haven't tried it - but i believe that's what this option is intended to do...
This allows you to add others to the folder, but the only security role I can assign is "Owner". All other options are grayed out.
Bill Weimer - I don't know if it is already here cause the list is so long.
I wish we could merge different users changes... when posible of course. Let's say a open a word doc, and at the same time one f my budies opens the same file and edit just a small piece of it. Now the client tells me that there was a conflict and that I have to choose to get rid of one of the versions... i believe in some cases merging could me posible.
Regards,
Seba
http://sgomez.blogspot.com - As with above poster, not sure if these have been mentioned already as the list is getting quite long. My vision for mesh would be the following:
I think the live desktop could be much more than it currently is. I would love to see the ability to build an actual desktop. For example the ability to install the windows live services (messenger, mail, photo gallery). Possibly even a version of works or the office viewers installed by default or offered via a link (in the same way messenger currently is in vista). A person could log in to their live desktop top from anywhere with an internet connection and use it much in the same way as they do their own desktop at home. Photo gallery would by default contain all photo's in your mesh folder, clicking on a word document in your folder would open in word viewer within the desktop, etc.
It would also be cool to be able to hover over a item in your folder and have it expand to show a larger image (like photo gallery). Another cool feature would be the ability to drag and drop a web page or part of a webpage (ie photo or article) and drop it in to your folder. It would show in your folder as an image and as in previous suggestion hovering over it would enlarge the image. Clicking on it could then open a web browser within your live desktop. This could be used as a simple way to bookmark an article for later reading or to share an article with someone else in your mesh.
The last item for my wish list would be the ability to have a folder sync but not store on line. Ie. a folder would synch to my home server and I could then share that folder on live mesh and I and others could access that folder on the live desktop. This would also be a great way for my parents/inlaws/friends to backup items to my homeserver. They could simply drag and drop to the folder and it would synch and save a copy on my server.- Edited byTroyleb Thursday, May 29, 2008 3:24 PMafterthought
- Hi all,
As those above have mentioned, this list is getting quite long - but that's a good thing, because we're grateful for all the suggestions! Please don't worry about posting a suggestion that's already been made. In fact, we want that: it serves as a kind of voting mechanism, and we're keeping track of how often various features are requested. So, of course, this means that even if you know that a suggestion has already been made, we encourage you to "second" or "third" or etc. that suggestion if it's something you want to see!
Thanks for all the feedback!
Ben. - In another vote (re-vote since I already chimed in on this?) for inviting others to my Mesh and RDP delegation... What about incorporating SharedView/Tahiti for this? (Why reinvent the wheel)
If it's good enough for MSN Messenger, It may be good enough for mesh.
Though one thing that I'd think to add to that sharedview experience... The Chat/broadcast message to participants feature in it, I'd like to see captured and logged in a single News Item enclosure... kind of like keeping a transcript of a screencast. But that's tweaking their product, not yours.
I'm guessing SharedViews's initial e-mail invite is setting up a teredo handshake, which I would like to see that done transparently by a feed synced out and MoeMonitor or Live Desktop popping up the invite request.
So maybe reinvent that wheel, and add white-walls. :) - Idea born in this thread.
Live Mesh becomes active before a user actually logs on. So some sort of "Live Lock" would be awesome. If the client becomes active before a user signs in then suppose my laptop get's stolen. I could log on to my Live Desktop, mark the device as stolen and force a 'format c:' command on the stolen device before the thief even gets to log on to the machine.
That would be a very cool feature. Ofcourse it would only work if the machine is hooked up to the internet after being stolen, even so, in a lot of cases it probably will be.
Cheers,
- Mark Blomsma - Bill_Weimer said:RaiderClay said:
Right click on a folder you've mesh-enabled and click LiveMesh Options and then 'add members in livemesh folder'... believe you should then be able to invite other users to get access to this folder... again, haven't tried it - but i believe that's what this option is intended to do...
This allows you to add others to the folder, but the only security role I can assign is "Owner". All other options are grayed out.
Bill Weimer
I've submitted this as a bug.
Bill Weimer - Some thoughts building upon Ori Amiga's video. Around the 27 minute mark, he's showing off the DeepZoon/Seadragon app that's mesh aware. He says "a user installs the app..." If I make a mesh aware application, why not just use the mesh?
1. Mesh Syncs via feeds. How about letting different types of feeds sync to the different containers. A Folder App to the applications OM container, or a folder to the Membership container. This would allow a folder to contain contact items that can be used as a "Group" for permissions (since Live ID doesn't have the feature, and wouldn't rely on sharing Hotmail/Messenger contact lists). It's more important to my suggestion to allow a Developer that makes Meshified apps to have a folder that he's owner of, and then be subscribed to as a "reader" by his user's applications container. Distribution and Update channel. Also, cross platform installer (Windows Installer vs One Click, vs WinMobile installer (Sliverlight has Mac and Linux support coming. Mesh too?))
2. Permissions for "SELF" (a la AD or NTFS permissions). As an example, if your app is licensed, you could keep track of a "GraceLogins" metadata attribute to allow the app to still run while offline. When the user connects to the internet again, your own code refreshes the license and the app itSELF resets the "GraceLogins" count.
3. Licensing enforcement. Have MOE be able to check a Max# of replication partners and not allow new subscribers. For Example, if Office becomes Mesh Aware, you don't want Office replicated to every copy of Windows a user has on a single license, do you?
4. Extensible events. Allow hooks into the Invite/Subscribe process for cutom handlers, if the dev chooses.
5. Attribute Generator Plugins/Callbacks. See example below.
Hypothetical:
I'm an app developer that wrote "Mesh.NET Stockings", a twitter client for cyberstalking your friends. I'm so proud (or delusional) of my app that I think users will pay directly for it instead of using all the freebies out there.
One such disposable-income-laden individual, Lou, comes to my website, checks out my product pages, blog, and screencasts; and decides that this thing is worth the $5 per user, $2 per device that I'm charging and coughs up $9 for 2 device licenses. My e-commerce platform spits out the charge confirmation and instead of sending out an e-mail with a download link to the installer, sends out a Mesh invite to a folder I have owner privileges over.
Lou accepts, and gets a new app provisioned to his apps container. A custom handler I've added to my source folder adds programmatically generated metadata attributes so that this app syncs to Lou's Live Desktop (or Local MOE) with a License Token (with the "plugin" generated value. Mesh's replication wouldn't see changes in this value, but allows for personalization on a per subscriber basis. Allows Unique Keys to go out to each customer) attribute, MaxDevices attribute and AvailableLicenses (a "well-known" optional attribute that MOE will check). Lou then right-clicks on the app and sets it to replicate to his work PC as well. MOE decrements "AvailableLicenses" to 1, and adds WorkPc's Device ID to a "Lesees" Well-known attribute. (This second attribute is for when the user acts like a user and tries unsubscribing a device to free up a license. Thus just moving a single license around to every machine) Lou runs Mesh.NET Stockings from his home PC. My app code checks the "Lesees" attribute, sees the Home Device ID isn't in it, but there's an available license. Burns the license (decrements Available), updates the Lesees, everyone's square and happy.
Lou then tries to subscribe his Smartphone, MOE catches that the phone's ID isn't in lesee's, and there's no available license, and raises the event "LicenseViolationSubscribe" which calls a handler I've written and specified in the initial replication. The "ExtortforMoMoney" proc runs which tries to upsell, but more importantly, sends News back to my Source folder to let me see how many sales I'm dropping (News item correlated to web site sales), or who's trying to hack my app (which may lead me to rethink my licensing terms).
Lou runs my app and thinks it's the best thing since honey on sliced bread, and tries to invite his friend to it. (Not sure if invites on the app container happen, camera went out of focus when Ori was showing his provisioned apps. Coincidence?). This triggers a "LicenseViolationInvite" event and runs my proc saying "Mesh.Net Stockings isn't available to be shared directly. Would you like to send 'friend@live.com' an e-mail linking them to 'http://www.softwaredev.com/MeshNetStock/about.aspx?referredby=Lou.Zerr@live.com'?
Thus as a developer, Mesh could help me as an installer, an auto-update channel, a license compliance framework, a "Customer Improvement Program" submission engine, and a viral/grassroots marketing platform.- Edited byWillFa Sunday, June 01, 2008 7:53 PMproofreading
- swattz101 said:Robert Day said:
I would like the ability to see if a remote device is currently is use before I attempt a remote connection. I cannot tell if my wife is using our home PC before I attempt a remote connection.
Great idea Robert.
My problem is that everyone uses my main signon (even though I have set up sperate ones for them). Since the computer stays signed in, I can't tell if they are on or not. What I would like to see is the ability to use more than one session on a computer, then when I remote in, it can ask if I want a remote session or a console session, ideally telling me who is signed into the console, if anyone is.
Steve
Even without using multiple sessions, The Live Remote Desktop should be in it's own session rather than the logged on users. In fact, connecting via Mesh Remote Desktop should have nothing to do with who's at the console. This would be in-line with how RDP works. If another user is currently logged on to the console (and fast user switching is enabled), you'll get a prompt that says that another user is logged-on, continue? If you hit yes, then it prompts the person at the console (with a timeout) and at that point, you login to your normal profile. It doesn't matter who is logged in, you only login to your profile. I actually see this as a security hole, one that RDP already long-since solved, but that Mesh Remote Desktop is introducing -- I posted about it here: http://forums.community.microsoft.com/en/LiveMesh/thread/805f2237-60c4-4981-9877-b4ad346b78f2. Add My vote for contacts list, would like it to be imported from MSN, Outlook, GoogleMail, LiveMail etc. with the ability to associate a mesh login to the email address so that I can grant access to a folder without having to re-invite the person.
ie. if person x gives me the authority I can share a folder with them that will then show up on their LiveDesktop without having to email them an invite.- Favorites sync with http://favorites.live.com
I've been dying for a way to get my live favorites on my WinMo phone somehow
- Your in luck, it already does that.
If you install the Live mesh client for windows, set it up, then right click any folder on your computer, you will get a option "add to live mesh", this will upload it to your Live mesh desktop and also sync it with what ever device you tell it to in your live mesh ring.
- I'd like to have permalinks that take us directly to folders on our Live Desktop. e.g. If I have a folder called "myfolder", http://www.mesh.com/folders/myfolder might take me to it.
Discussed more with Ben from the Live Mesh team here: http://forums.community.microsoft.com/en-US/LiveMesh/thread/21424573-0ea6-4e35-a01b-0de81310c7ff/
-Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - I like Jamie's "permalinks" idea too...
- PLease add support for Windows 2003 and Windows 2008. I know it's server OS but there are a lot of people like me who run it at home for fun and would like to use LiveMesh on it. I don't think it shall be so much difficult to add support for both of those.
- Lorry Craig said:
PLease add support for Windows 2003 and Windows 2008. I know it's server OS but there are a lot of people like me who run it at home for fun and would like to use LiveMesh on it. I don't think it shall be so much difficult to add support for both of those.
Second this, along with Windows Home Server. As soon as we start looking beyond the current consumer orientated tech preview and rather at Mesh as a business application platform, with secure sync of business documents as an example, then we are going to want to have the source and target machines based on server technology rather than desktop. This also means that the MOE will need to be able to run as a service under a specified "account", rather than in the context of a logged in desktop user.
http://www.customrm.com ¦ http://softwareplusservices.spaces.live.com - The concept of "vaulting" mesh folders on a device would be good. The idea that I can add aditional challenge response security on a folder outside of the machine security.
eg. I have a "Private" folder synced and would like to have a password request pop up every time I access this folder for it's contents. So if my device is compromized, I have an additional level of protection. this sould be settable by device.
Re-entering the "live/passport" password would be sufficient. - Support for Virtual storage devices please.
In this context a virtual storage device would be some space in the cloud that behaves like a device. e.g.:
- Skydrive
- SSDS (i.e. SQL Server Data Services)
- Box.net
Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson Already submitted this through the feedback link of the help file, but let me just add it here as well.
Support for Low Height screens. I'm using a Fujitsu U850 right now, and it has a screen dimensions of 1024x600. The news bar extends too far down and iI can't click on any of the buttons below. Seems like there's either a minimal height in the code displaying the bar or some other reason that's causing it to not shrink to fit the screen properly.
It definetly looks like it'll fit even at the smaller size though. And if you're wondering how many people would access Mesh through such a low display size, keep in mind that small screen notebooks like my U850, the 7" eeePC are bursting into the market and since these devices are very likely to be supplementary systems, they must defiently be able to access the Live desktop! ;)- First of all I'd like to give a big +1 to the following:
- Recycle bin style - restore deleted files from the Live Desktop.
- File versioning - roll back/forward to other versions.
I didn't notice this one yet, so:
- The ability to access a folder via a direct link - i.e. rather than syncing with a folder five me direct access to the folder on the cloud.
I'm assuming its on the list already, but it would be great if I could install the Mesh client on my home server (currently a Trial Windows Server 2008 - the decission is still out as to what the final platform will be).
Next up, I'd like to add a small rant about the GUI. This is a repeating bone of mine with many of the live applications. It would be great if the local GUI better integrated with the system style. Rather than using the obvious Live style (granted very similar to the Vista Aero style, couldn't the GUI use the system style?
While I'm on the subject of GUI. I'd like to give a +1 to having the option to default the control panel (at the side of each mesh folder when open) to "minimized". Better yet, if the minimized state of the control bar could somehow be integrated as a windows toolbar (admittedly not thought too much about the how).
By the way, loving Mesh so far with the integration of a few of these suggestions and it will be unbeatable. - I've posted some of my feature requests on my blog (http://mark-dot-net.blogspot.com/2008/05/live-mesh-first-impressions.html and http://mark-dot-net.blogspot.com/2008/04/thoughts-on-live-mesh.html), but I'll summarise them here too:
A couple of features to reduce network usage for those who pay per GB on their broadband usage:
1. Ability to sync between folders computers without also going to the live desktop. This should not send data via the internet if those computers are on the same network.
2. Similarly, if two computers on the same network are downloading a folder, it should only be downloaded from the cloud once. (not sure if it already does this).
3. Ability to exclude certain file types and subfolders from a shared folder (e.g. when sharing C# source code, I don't want to sync .pdb files, or the contents of bin and obj folders
4. Ability to have a read-only copy of a shared folder, where you only want one-way sync
And some applications that would benefit from live-mesh integration
1. OneNote - can we share a notebook in a live mesh folder?
2. OneCare Live backup - (obviously only when more disk space is available)
Mark - Password protected encrypted folders.
Thanks to Live Mesh my working files are synchronized everywhere I might need them... but yikes the sensitive personal and customer information they contain is now everywhere.
My wish is for a Live Mesh feature to encrypt and password protect synchronized folders. I don't want some random person who gets access to my Mesh or one of my devices to get in to my shorts.
- imabanana said:Shouldn't you be applying that encryption to the files already, albeit with a third-party app? If they are that sensitive?
Password protected encrypted folders.
Thanks to Live Mesh my working files are synchronized everywhere I might need them... but yikes the sensitive personal and customer information they contain is now everywhere.
My wish is for a Live Mesh feature to encrypt and password protect synchronized folders. I don't want some random person who gets access to my Mesh or one of my devices to get in to my shorts.
I understand your request. Particularly since it would suggest that there would be a ubiquitous encryption/decryption across the various devices/platforms that Live Mesh is suggesting it will support. Still, relying on a "just" the encryption in the product might not be enough to protect your sensitive information (it's likely not ever going to be hugely strong, given the export restrictions on cryptography, etc.).
My two cents, probably worth less than that... - When a PC is on Standy, it would be great if connecting via Live Mesh remote desktop could bring it out of standby. This is important because it would be very useful to use Live Mesh from home at the weekend or whilst on vacation and you don't really want to leave your office PC guzzling full power when we should be energy conscious nowadays.
Thanks. - I haven't read through all of the suggestions to know if this was suggested yet (too many to read!), but as a .NET developer, I'm using MESH to sync source code from my work PC, laptop and home computer. I would like an option to add a folder to my MESH, but then within that folder's settings, exclude file sync based on file type, size, or exclude a sub-folder in my MESH folder. For example, with Visual Studio, if I add my solution folder to my MESH, it updates every time I do a build and syncs all of the unnecessary build output.
So basically, for a MESH folder, having the ability to exclude or include files from syncing based on some rules (ie: file size, file name, file type, or a whole sub-folder) would be wonderful! - I think this is a good suggestion, and I would like to this this somehow implemented as well.
I believe it might have to depend a bit too much on the hardware being used for the particular machine which enters sleep mode/standby or hibernate. We all know the problem users have been having with Vista and sleep mode and waking up! Certainly, it would be a good thing to have a consistent method of waking a Vista computer from standby (or better yet, sleep mode). - Suggestion:
To be able to start the sync process yourself, I know if i'm in a rush you've got to wait for live mesh to pick up there new files been added/edited.
Another would be having 2 installstions of live mesh on one PC, it's rather frustrating to install it on 2 different user accounts, maybe theres a way to pick your user (or even both) to sync with live mesh and the other devices.
Jase - I've been enjoying Live Mesh for weeks now (Thank you!) and would like to add my contributions to the wish list.
- Select / Deselect Folders and Sub-folders.
The My Pictures folder on my main desktop computer contains lots of sub-folders, many of which also contain sub-folders. I'd like to be able to choose which folders I sync and where I sync them to. At present it would be impossible to navigate the Live Desktop if I was to sync each sub-folder individually and would take forever to set it up and manage it.
- Don't Sync To The Live Desktop.
I have a number of folders synced between myself and my wife but neither of us particularly need them synced with the Live desktop. It's wasting valuable and limited space on the Live Desktop and slowing down the syncing process between two computers on the same LAN.
- Remote Connection Privileges.
I have a loan notebook and a loan desktop which a number of people use and which are often loaned out. I'd like to be able to choose whether these devices can remotely connect to other devices or whether other devices can remotely connect to them. I don't want to lend a co-worker a notebook and have them connect to my desktop but I may want to be able to connect to the loan notebook.
I'd also like to share Remote Desktop connections in the same way I can share Live Folders. I may for example want to allow my wife to connect to my desktop remotely whilst logged into her Live Mesh account (and have my desktop visible in her device ring) or allow a team manager to connect to a team member's desktop.
- Device Icons.
I know this feature is on its way but I'm adding it here anyway. I'd like a notebook icon for my notebook and a few different desktop icons so I can have one icon for my personal desktops and a different icon for my work desktops.
- Wake Up on LAN / Stand-by.
I'd like to reduce my electricity bill by either turning my devices off or leaving them in low power mode / stand-by mode when not in use but I often need access to these devices. It would be nice if I could wake these devices from Live Mesh, access them and then put them back to sleep again.
- Permalinks.
Some form of permalink system so I can bookmark files and folders or email links to them.
- Synced Settings.
I try and replicate favourites, settings and various other things between my computers so no matter where I am I have a similar experience. It would be nice if I could choose from a list of things I'd like to share, such as IE favourites, and which machines I'd like them synced on and when I add or change something on one device the changes are automatically made to all of them.
Jon
- Select / Deselect Folders and Sub-folders.
- slightly better security, some other than just your password, im thinking along the lines of what some forums do before you send a reply you have to input the security identifier.
I'm just bothered by the fact that key loggers are out there, one if the do manage to get in and remote desktop, then that's end of it all.
Thanks for the invite to MS, I've deployed it on my Vista Ultimate SP1 PC and my XP SP2 laptops with out any issues so far.
- it would make this program dumb... thats not the word i want but its 3 am and i cant sleep lol... anyway the whole point to this project is to be able to share your important files with other computers....
- that was to an earlier post of not wanting to sync to the mesh desktop. I have been on the beta for a few days now and the only thing i have noticed that i would like to see improved is the ability to use Firefox 3 (in release candidate 2) for remote control. IE7 is just not cutting it for me now en days... i do hate those captcha codes but there is a point to that security thing... i too would not like someone to get a hold of my stuff that easy....
- i do like the idea of the remote desktop deal we have now... i have two vista home premiums that cant do remote desktop so when i saw this feature in live mesh i was jumping for joy. I am a network administratior in my home so my grandparents have computer issues it is nice to be able to whereever i am to connect to the laptop and fix the "issue" all other third party apps would not get access because of our firewalls... this is the sweetest feature i have seen yet in this product.... Thanks again! Man i cant wait to see what is next in store for us!!!
- i dissagree every time i have used rd on mesh it has been a fast experience!
- this one can be done now... when you share a folder on your ring/cloud it will give u some options afterwords. Go to the file or folder you shared and right click it to "view mesh options" and then the option of "sync settings".
- Allow to sync (like foldershare) - without all the items using up my space on the cloud - so just sync between two machines, without going to the cloud also.
- Some sort of version control system would be fantastic.
- iden32 said:this one can be done now... when you share a folder on your ring/cloud it will give u some options afterwords. Go to the file or folder you shared and right click it to "view mesh options" and then the option of "sync settings".
- Allow to sync (like foldershare) - without all the items using up my space on the cloud - so just sync between two machines, without going to the cloud also.
Although Mesh options appear - It does not allow to "not sync" with the cloud - The options are greyed out.
Also - at present - it is virtually impossible to use remote desktop - everytime i want to connect it says it cannot, and to check the notifier, and if when I get back home, I find there are updates available. This is getting annoying as the whole point of RDP is to be able to remotely manage, but I cannot do this! 1)Provide a client compatible with Windows Home Server
More info here : http://www.wegotserved.co.uk/forums/index.php?s=&showtopic=1983&view=findpost&p=11832
2)Upload status bar for individual folders on the live desktop
Currently there is no obvious way to tell how much of a folder has been synced up to the live desktop. A bar showing the overall percentage of file synced (i.e. 100% being the file is fully synced)
3)Make the mesh client work correctly with standard user accounts in vista home premium
Needles to say this is very frustrating.
4)I am also in favour of mesh recycle bin held in the cloud
I think foldershare has something similar.
5)Provide a mesh client for Linux!
I know this pretty unlikely, but I thought i’d mention it anyway. If you are going other premium services thorough mesh it makes sense to support all platforms. Especially with the rise of net-books using linux.
6)More space on the live desktop
I am a subscriber to hotmail plus, with 10GB of space, which I don’t use the majority of. Would like to be able to use that allowance with live mesh.
7)Another vote for file version control
- Timo84 said: 1)Provide a client compatible with Windows Home Server
More info here : http://www.wegotserved.co.uk/forums/index.php?s=&showtopic=1983&view=findpost&p=11832
2)Upload status bar for individual folders on the live desktop
Currently there is no obvious way to tell how much of a folder has been synced up to the live desktop. A bar showing the overall percentage of file synced (i.e. 100% being the file is fully synced)
3)Make the mesh client work correctly with standard user accounts in vista home premium
Needles to say this is very frustrating.
4)I am also in favour of mesh recycle bin held in the cloud
I think foldershare has something similar.
5)Provide a mesh client for Linux!
I know this pretty unlikely, but I thought i’d mention it anyway. If you are going other premium services thorough mesh it makes sense to support all platforms. Especially with the rise of net-books using linux.
6)More space on the live desktop
I am a subscriber to hotmail plus, with 10GB of space, which I don’t use the majority of. Would like to be able to use that allowance with live mesh.
7)Another vote for file version control
Point 1 - Agree
Point 5 - If the Mesh team are going to offer a MAC client, then why not Linux
Point 6 - Actually think that MS will have to go down a route of offering some sort of "storage limit per LiveID" summed across all the Live assets. e.g. today you get Mesh 5Gb, Skydrive 5Gb, Office Live Workspaces 5Gb, Hotmail 5Gb etc so why not offer 20Gb to use as you wish
http://www.customrm.com ¦ http://softwareplusservices.spaces.live.com - Seeing what Apple are doing with their Mobile Me system has amde we want there to be Exchange like facilities within Mesh.
To have one system that allows me to have OTA syncing of files, contacts, calendars, email would be perfect. At the moment I have Mesh to share files (eventually to include my WinMo phone), Yahoo IMAP (when it wants to work) on my phone but only POP3 via my Outlook and my contacts and calendar in sync via WMDC but only when I plug it in/am in BT range of my desktop and laptop.
Without my phone there would be no way to keep my contacts in sync across my desktop and my lappie.
Push email via Mesh (if possible) would be brilliant. Being able to share a .pst would be a start but they're too big.
Oh for a fully functioning eco sysem where everything joins up! - I am totally digging live mesh! I can't wait to see the final product and how it fits in to Win7!
I think a more detailed revision history in the feed bar, and an option to expand and see what changes were made in office and text documents would be an extremely useful tool for business. Perhaps their can be something that integrates into MS Office which tracks the changes...
Good work. Mesh is Microsofts next big thing! - I want to keep Outlook .pst files synchronized, but when I set up a Mesh folder, the .pst files are not synched. I found in the Help where it says Live Mesh blocks files with extension .pst "by default" -- that implies I can override this "default" but I can't find where to do this.
My Live Mesh wish list:
All current Mesh capabilities PLUS
E-mail, Contacts, Calendar, Tasks all in the Mesh and ability to move/send objects seamlessly to other users (like Exchange within a corp today)
Ability to store/access documents, photos, music, and videos with the ability to access from any connected device (including public PC with a browser, Mobile Phones, MIDs, etc.)
Ability to sync / use all of the above to a device for offline use and re-sync when re-connected, including smart conflict t resolution
Have the following functionality equivalents in the Mesh – accessible from anywhere (including public PC with a browser, Mobile Phones, MIDs, etc.): Stripped down Word, Excel (like EditGrid), PPT, Visio, Access (maybe like BLIST),simple personal finance app, Photo editing similar to Paint .NET, music player, video player, web clipping tool like OneNote or EverNote
IM (includes audio/video capabilities for up to 10 participants at a time) plus Sharedview capability for any of the apps for up to 10 users
Home page/portal with customizable/configurable widgets for all of the above plus RSS capabilities
Personal and Professional social pages / sites (think Facebook + LinkedIn)
Ability to integrate with corporate applications / serversIntegration with Windows Home Server
All of the above + 50 GB storage for $99 / yr … additional 5GB for $0.99 / month or $10/yr … unlimited bandwidth.
- Hi,
I'd like to be able to take a folder offline by right clicking it and choosing "Live Mesh Options -> Offline".
Scenario:
a) If I have large files (virtual pc images) I don't want Live Mesh to synchronize while I'm using the virtual machines.
b) Bulk updates on images where multiple passes (and saves) are done before I'm done.
After I'm done I'll choose: "Live Mesh Options -> Online".
Cheers,
Mark - My wish list:
1. Sync exclusions. Some folders, particularly My Documents (XP)/Documents (Vista), there is a lot of crud and subfolders left by other programs (Visual Studio, Virtual PC, and so on) that I don't want to sync. And in XP, of course, it contains the My Pictures and My Music folders, which would make sense to synchronize separately. I suggest extension- and subfolder-based exclusions ("no subfolders" "include particular subfolders" "exclude particular subfolders"). Then I don't have to worry about synchronizing needless junk, or have to make custom folders on my computer just for documents I want to sync.
2. Intelligently lowering bandwidth usage when I'm trying to use the connection. When it's syncing, and there is a lot to sync, the internet becomes barely usable. - Client app support for Windows Server 2003 and 2008. These are my primary OSs as I always develop on the target platform. Thank you!
- There should be a way to ignore some file names or extensions. Some applications like Office create temporary files next to the working file for various reasons (recovery/backup, locks, etc.). These get created, updated, and deleted quite often, and it both wastes bandwidth and resources (syncing with the mesh) and clutters the news feed for the folder.
Also, be able to sync differently the contents of a folder. For example, say I've got a folder for a project that involves both media (videos or pictures) and text. The folder could be organized with several sub-folders for reference pictures, photoshop/illustrator files, exported JPEGs of the work in progress, and texts. On some devices (mostly mobile devices) I would want to only sync the JPEGs and the texts, and exclude the subfolders with the big files I wouldn't be able to open anyway. This way, I can work on the text while on the go.
Those rules would again probably be either extension based (exclude files of types you can't consume on your device) or folder/filename based.- Edited bylordabdul Thursday, June 12, 2008 6:32 PMAdded another feature request
- Some features that would be great are:
1. Folder exclusion, the ability to not sync certain subfolders
2. Don't sync to the Live Desktop, just sync between devices
3. Sharing files with people who don't have a Windows Live ID
4. More than 5Gb, I currently pay $50 a year for 30Gb with SugarSync....thats the pricepoint we need.
Keep up the great work! - I will 77th that wish for Wake on LAN. [i dont know if im number 77, its just a guess]/
I want it so bad, because I keep my pc at home asleep as much as possible.
D2 - I would also like to see the ability to sync directly to another device without having to go through the live desktop for every file. Syncing *.pst files is one of the key features that I would like to see in the program. It would make life so much easier.
- I'm liking what I see sofar and the future is pretty wide open. Here are some of the big ticket items I see that will help elevate Live Mesh...
Short Term Wish List
Drag-n-Drop: Within Mesh Desktop, it should provide better file/folder manipulation. In Windows, I often reorganize folders and files by draggring files/folders around to other folders/drives. Live Mesh Desktop currently wants you to reupload files.
Live SkyDrive: link it as a "Mesh Drive" accessible from within the Mesh Desktop and your Devices (PC, etc).
Office Live/Sharepoint: link document folder as a "Mesh Drive" (same as above).
Windows Home Server: alot could/needs to be done here. However, why upload/sync files from Windows Home Server when you have all that storage. Instead, Live Mesh (Hub) should be able to "tunnel" into Windows Home Server to access files.
Windows Mobile Device Support. Pretty much goes without say.
Long Term Wish List
Mid Term Wish List
- Bake Live Mesh into OS (Vista, Server 2008, Windows 7 and Windows Home Server).
- Work with Media Center and Zune teams to develop a future DRM scheme where download licenses are tied to Live Mesh (Hub)
instead of a single PC.
- Start to get some Windows Application rewritten in Silverlight/MeshFX and available in Live Mesh (ex. Calculator, NotePad/WordPad, etc). Applications could be sync'd and cached on the local desktop.
- Application Virtualization (SoftGrid). I'm still trying to wrap my ahead around what running applications on this platform will look like..and what is possible. Ultimately, I think we are talking about completely transforming the desktop environment.
...still thinking about that one - John Cz said:
I'm liking what I see sofar and the future is pretty wide open. Here are some of the big ticket items I see that will help elevate Live Mesh...
Short Term Wish List
Drag-n-Drop: Within Mesh Desktop, it should provide better file/folder manipulation. In Windows, I often reorganize folders and files by draggring files/folders around to other folders/drives. Live Mesh Desktop currently wants you to reupload files.
Live SkyDrive: link it as a "Mesh Drive" accessible from within the Mesh Desktop and your Devices (PC, etc).
Office Live/Sharepoint: link document folder as a "Mesh Drive" (same as above).
Windows Home Server: alot could/needs to be done here. However, why upload/sync files from Windows Home Server when you have all that storage. Instead, Live Mesh (Hub) should be able to "tunnel" into Windows Home Server to access files.
Windows Mobile Device Support. Pretty much goes without say.
Long Term Wish List
Mid Term Wish List
- Bake Live Mesh into OS (Vista, Server 2008, Windows 7 and Windows Home Server).
- Work with Media Center and Zune teams to develop a future DRM scheme where download licenses are tied to Live Mesh (Hub)
instead of a single PC.
- Start to get some Windows Application rewritten in Silverlight/MeshFX and available in Live Mesh (ex. Calculator, NotePad/WordPad, etc). Applications could be sync'd and cached on the local desktop.
- Application Virtualization (SoftGrid). I'm still trying to wrap my ahead around what running applications on this platform will look like..and what is possible. Ultimately, I think we are talking about completely transforming the desktop environment.
...still thinking about that one
I like the idea of Sky Drive integration here - there is a place for Skydirve and Mesh in the world, not everyone wants people to be able to have mesh like access to files, sometimes I ust want to give people an URL to download a template from. Same goes for Workspace.
On the WHS front - I like this idea as well. Possibly an application along the lines of Foldershare, allowing it to fit into your mesh from a remote access point of view rather than uploading a ton of data when, as you say, there's already all that storage there.
Mobile support - gotta happen! Pleas happen soon! I want my phone in my Mesh - would makemy commute so much more productive! WHS is just another OS. So the request should be more general and not specific to WHS. You want the same "virtual" drive available from any host (i.e. xp, vista, WinServer, etc). Flag a directory as "non-sync", but read/write only. The mesh could upload the "metadata" only to the cloud so your other clients will see the file names, etc, but have to go p2p to the server to get the bits. Naturally this means the machine needs to be on at all times which will "catch" you from time to time when you really want a file from another device. However, I see the important use case here. Namely in terms of video, high def pictures, and designer files.
- iden32 said:
it would make this program dumb... anyway the whole point to this project is to be able to share your important files with other computers....
Yes, but there's often no need to sync files with the Live Desktop as well. Maybe I just want to sync the My Pictures folder between myself and my wife so we both have the same photos but don't want these photos on the Live Desktop wasting space as we'll never want to access them from another location. - WilliamStacey said:
WHS is just another OS. So the request should be more general and not specific to WHS. You want the same "virtual" drive available from any host (i.e. xp, vista, WinServer, etc). Flag a directory as "non-sync", but read/write only. The mesh could upload the "metadata" only to the cloud so your other clients will see the file names, etc, but have to go p2p to the server to get the bits. Naturally this means the machine needs to be on at all times which will "catch" you from time to time when you really want a file from another device. However, I see the important use case here. Namely in terms of video, high def pictures, and designer files.
You've nailed it. Thanks. WHS is designed to be always on so I think it fits in nicely in variety of scenarios, some of which you describe. Another advantage to Live Mesh/WHS is that it provides WHS customers a way to alleviate one of the most burdensome issues with remote access to WHS. Mainly ,consumer ISP services block incoming ports 80/443. Most consumer are not going to be well versed on what to do. So, Live Mesh can add significant value there. Not to mention, it provides a unified way for other Live Mesh capatible devices to take advantage of those resources. - Mesh is as tantalizing for its possibilities as for its current early-stage execution. I, too, would like to see integration with SharePoint and Workspaces in OfficeLive, as well as drivemapping. Also, this is a small thing, and realizing that this is "early days" [and that Silverlight itself is in Beta]: it would be nice to see the media player more closely mimic Windows Media Player, with a more robust feature set: progress bar for track playing, playlist creation, etc. Perhaps those features will come. Also, BlackBerry integration is keenly looked for [at least by me, and as mentioned elsewhere]. Nice work and congratulations to the team; looking forward to seeing this evolve.
- Another idea:
Lets say a Live Mesh folder is in the middle of synching a lot of big files to your desktop from your laptop, and you'd like to use a particular file on your laptop. There should be a warning that LiveMesh gives when you try to access a file that is going to be updated but hasn't yet, and Live Mesh should automatically move syncing of that file to the front of the queue and then tell you that the file you wanted is ready for you to use.
- Remote Desktop Connection To Support 8 bit color, ie. Slower connection speeds
Hi guys, the remote desktop connection feature is very cool, but please allow the remote image to be set to a lower quality (say 8 bit) cause we don't ALL have fast internet connections on the go. :P Cause I realized that unlike RDP which seems to be able to tell the other side "draw a window here" the mesh's rdp connection seems to work more like VNC in the fact that it's pushing back screen snap shots (i of course may be wrong at how RDP actually works but it's just a comparison)
Even RDP connections have variable quality settings so please have a low quality version for this as well, since it takes a LOOOOOONG while to transfer a 1080p screen in 32bit color :P And I'm only connecting through EDGE via a thethered phone so it don't work too fast. - I'd really like to give people, who I don't have their MSN/e-mail, temporary read-only access to certain folder/Files, including those who don't even have Live MESH on their PC/Mac. You get a link with gobbigdygook, to paste in to some chat or web page. How temporary? Should be User defined, I think 30 min is good for a Default setting.
As an Trainee/Artist, It really helps if I can send files to who can well see where I'm going wrong without setting up a VPN Remote Desktop.
Remote Desktop "invites" to other user is an something I'd like to see.
If both PCs are on the same LAN at the same time, cut out off the Internet. For both Folder and very much Remote Desktop.
Finally, I'd really like to be able to just share a folder with a fellow user and give them limited access. I really don't want to give them my files that they can edit on the fly.
I'm not sure, but this is more of a Office Live thing to me, being able to give limited access when sending out a file, such as only being able to add comments, to a Document. I know that Office 2007 does this with support of a Server PC. I really like to pass my document out and people comment on it. - My wish list:
1. email sync on all devices, between different outlook versions (2003, 2007)
2. Sync between devices with out live desktop
3. More storage available (can never have enough)
a. Maybe tie into a third party offer like SugarSync or HP Upline
4. Faster remote connections
5. File type exclusion
6. Sub folder exclusion
7. Apps available on Live Desktop
8. Office live, Sky Drive and Desktop Live in One big happy package with built in interconnections
Thanks for the software
Guy - I'd love to see a way to have multiple Mesh accounts logged in to a single computer.
Possible uses:
- Family computer, would allow access to anyone in the family remotely. For example, I'm at work, my wife is at school and we both want to be able to access our home computer through our own Mesh accounts at various points in the day.
- A work computer at a small office that multiple people use, where it's not economically wise to pay for expensive remote desktop software.
- Allow for family/friend tech support. For example, my brother and I both provide help for my parents on their computer, and it would be easier to have both of our Mesh accounts active rather than try to get them to log one of us out and the other in.
I'm sure there are plenty of other uses people could think of for this. If you have an idea (or two or three), please post them.
- Any hope of an XP-64 Client?
Steve - I like it so far!
As others have mentioned, Server 2008 support would be just grand, and heck, let the 2k3 folks have some cake too!
- That sounds good but I think that the type E-mail option should still remain as a choice.
- I thought this myself and agree, I think the free storage should be around 10 - 25 GBs.
- Hmm maybe there should be a offline and Business versions of the installer.
- aatreya said:
Syncing of OneNote Notebooks.
Although Syncing of OneNote Notebooks does work with Live Mesh at the present I think that better intergradation & collaboration should be implemented, also give the live web desktop at least basic reading abity of OneNote notebooks. - wisher said:
Hi, I'm using Live Mesh Tech preview. I think that a way to sync RSS feeds between computers would be really useful.
I second (or whatever number we are up to) that - Jamie Thomson said:aatreya said:
I STRONGLY second this idea. It would be extremely useful for me to simply copy a file into a mesh folder, grab a public link to it, and email/IM that to someone in order to share something with them, just as a one-time thing (without having to bother with adding them as a shared user and signing them up for live mesh.)
Does Skydrive not suffice for this?
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson
Yeah it does, I it would be a good idea to merge some or all of SkyDrive's features into Live Mesh. As well as adding a public mesh for for finding and viewing folders maked viewable to everyone, maybe even adding that folder to your own mesh, for easy viewing. ( I don't think it is yet possible to mark a folder as public on live mesh yet though.) - aatreya said:
Well sure. Dropbox also has this feature. I think it would be useful to be added to Mesh, however.
Souds great. I second that (or whatever number we are up to). - James Tomasko said:
Some sort of "colaboration mode" which greatly speeded up the updates to a selected directory for some period of time would be great. I can see using OneNote, Word, or Powerpoint with others in a phone meeting where we are all able to work on a shared document at one time.
Great idea. I second this. - swattz101 said:
Ok, after looking at some of the suggestions in the thread, here are some of my ideas, including things already posted. (In other words, things I would vote for plus my additional ideas.)
- Files and Folders
- Delta File Sync - ability to change just the bits instead of uploading whole changed file
- File Versions - Keep alternate versions
- Show who changed the file and when
- Ability to determine how many versions to keep/delete specific version
- Recycle Bin - Ability to undelete file. Versions are good, but if you delete the whole file or a specific version, then what?
- Shredder - Ability to securely delete a file. I've mentioned this before, and it may be hard to delete from offline back-ups, but this is a must for personal information.
- Ability to share files/folders within folder - keep from duplicating files / folders within the mesh.
- Sticky Files - File (such as a FAQ) that would always stay at the top of the folder
- Title/description of folder - Have a description next to the folder name in folder window (ex: Hawaii Pictures -- Pictures of my 2008 trip to Hawaii)
- Sharing
- Ability to email a specific file link
- Connection with some sort of Windows Live address book, containing Windows Live Messenger contacts, hotmail/ live mail contacts, Live Spaces contacts.
- Dropdown box to add people
- Add groups - be able to add all my family members to a 'family' group and then share folder to group instead of individual people
- One-way Sync -- I know that eventually we will be able to share files with friends and give them read-only access, but how about for devices also.
- Allow syncing with other products
- Ability to sync with other Microsoft products, such as Skydrive, Folder Share, Windows Live Photo Gallery, MSN Spaces ...
- Ability to share with non-Microsoft products, such as Flicker, Picassa, mySpace ...
- Remote Desktop
- Ability to remote into separate session in case console is being used
- Ability to share console
- Ability to share desktop with another users mesh - remote desktop for someone who's mesh you are a user, but devices are not in your mesh. Ability to share it out on a limited bases, not perpetual
- Wake-on-Lan for remote desktop
- Mesh
- Ability to host mesh on your own network
- Enterprise Mesh
- Local Mesh for Windows Home Server
Just a few ideas. I may come back and edit this as I come up with more ideas, and post them on connect or hunt down those from others and vote on them as I have time.
Thanks for the great Tech Preview
Steve
They are all great ideas and and would all be highly usefull. I love them all. Therefore i second them all. - Jamie Thomson said:swattz101 said:
Add groups - be able to add all my family members to a 'family' group and then share folder to group instead of individual people
Great ideas Steve, just on this one above. We already have the ability to group our family/friends together via Live Contacts. This ability is exposed in a number of places, most notably in live Messenger. I would like Mesh to be able to leverage these groups.
I also believe that Live Groups (when it arrives) will fill a big space here.
-Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson
I agree. - swattz101 said:Jamie Thomson said:
Great ideas Steve, just on this one above. We already have the ability to group our family/friends together via Live Contacts. This ability is exposed in a number of places, most notably in live Messenger. I would like Mesh to be able to leverage these groups.
I also believe that Live Groups (when it arrives) will fill a big space here.
-Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomsonThanks Jamie,
I just looked at http://dev.live.com/contacts/ and it looks interesting. I especially like the map feature. It looks like it's been around for a while, so I'm surprised I hadn't seen it yet. I made a couple of changes through the api and it didn't update to my messenger or hotmail address book. Either I'm doing it wrong, or it's not connected yet, as it is in beta also.
Anyway, this is a discussion for another place, not the mesh forums. :-) I only bring up the topic, because this would be a great thing to combine into the "mesh." Share info / folders / contact information with someone through the mesh, and if and of it updates, it shows up in the "news" section. I could also see an address book Application in the Live Desktop with current information updated by your contacts, so it is current. Kind of like it is through some of the other Live products.
Steve
I agree. The windows live contacts app included with windows live mail could be a good front end, but it would be good for third parties to be able to produce thier own as well. - Robert Day said:
I would like the ability to see if a remote device is currently is use before I attempt a remote connection. I cannot tell if my wife is using our home PC before I attempt a remote connection.
I second this. - swattz101 said:Robert Day said:
I would like the ability to see if a remote device is currently is use before I attempt a remote connection. I cannot tell if my wife is using our home PC before I attempt a remote connection.
Great idea Robert.
My problem is that everyone uses my main signon (even though I have set up sperate ones for them). Since the computer stays signed in, I can't tell if they are on or not. What I would like to see is the ability to use more than one session on a computer, then when I remote in, it can ask if I want a remote session or a console session, ideally telling me who is signed into the console, if anyone is.
Steve
I second this. - Gakubuchi said:
Great idea Robert.
My problem is that everyone uses my main signon (even though I have set up sperate ones for them). Since the computer stays signed in, I can't tell if they are on or not. What I would like to see is the ability to use more than one session on a computer, then when I remote in, it can ask if I want a remote session or a console session, ideally telling me who is signed into the console, if anyone is.
Steve
There was a similar discussion with the Smart Displays. It was a kind of monitor that could be detached and carried across the house. It had WiFi and used remote desktop to interact with the computer. The idea of 2 sessions at the same time (one with a "real" monitor and another with the smart display) was great, but there was a licensing problem. Windows is licensed for single usage. Well, many people can use a Windows installation, but only one at the same time.
What could be possible is that Live Mesh tells you if there is an active session or not, but having 2 concurrent sessions I think is legally impossible.
Marc
Yes, but since Microsoft owns and makes both Windows and Live Mesh I'm sure they could figure something out, or in other words make it legal for Live Mesh. To avoid thoes anti-trust complaits people just love to put on Microsoft, they could sell licences to other compienes that wish to sell products that do something simlar with remote desktop (ie signmein, etc). - gkramer said:
[Ben asked me here to post this].
I often have multiple logins on one machine. For example, on my laptop I have my personal login for home use and my work login that's joined to the company's domain. Let's say I have a Live Mesh folder named "My Stuff" that I'd like to have access to no matter which account I'm currently using on my laptop. Under each login account I went to mesh.com and added my laptop and I'm able to access the "My Stuff" folder from each account. However, my Mesh's device circle now has two identical entries for my laptop, one per account. It's pretty annoying, because depending on which account I'm logged in under, one will say it's not-syncing and the other will say that it is syncing, and both offer the option to connect remotely. Since I have multiple machines on which I have multiple accounts, my device circle is full of duplicate entries. I think it would be a much better user experience if there were only one entry for each machine, but the UI somehow indicated that I have multiple accounts on that machine that are participating in the mesh and showed which account was currently active and syncing.
Keep up the good work. Live Mesh is shaping up to be something great.
I second this. And as gkramer said "Keep up the good work. Live Mesh is shaping up to be something great." - Ender7 said:Jamie Thomson said:
[ Todd Manlon asked me here to post this.]
Remote administration.
I spend a lot of time providing ad hoc "tech support" to my less tech-savvy relatives. It would be great if Mesh could enable a "Remote Adminstration" feature so that I could get onto their machines and help them.
I know that this could be enabled by adding their device to my device ring however its not strictly speaking my devie is it? hence, I guess the request is, enable me to remotely access devices that are not in my device ring - assuming that device's owner has given me permission to access it.
-Jamie
http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - If your question is answered, please mark as answered.
I would like to see this also, this could be useful not only for personal but for work.
I third this. - JColeson said:
I choose not to store/save my password on one of my computers for security reasons. When the computer boots it allways pops up the window asking for my password. I wouldn't make it the default, but an option to start the program minimized so that I can choose when I wanted to login would be nice. Another option would be a smaller popup balloon telling me to login.
~Jared
I personly don't do this, but it would be alot less anoying for thoes that do if JColeson's idea was implemented. So I second it. - jordanmills said:
You know how when you do a remote desktop session, the screen locks when you disconnect? How about an option to disable that? Of course having the current way as the default is best, but it's real annoying when I'm controlling my media pc, and the session breaks, and it locks the console in the middle of my show.
I second this. - Jerky said:
If I have a Office 2007 or 2003 license, to allow the use of Word or Excel in the Virtual Desktop. And directly modify those documents right on the site.
I doublely second this. - Andy 01264 said:
I'm not entirely sure this is the right thread for feature update request but here goes:
- Progress bar during installation: It is a relatively fast install compared to others but the vista spinning wheel doesn't really give me confidence after two minutes...
- Could we get a multiple file uploader into the Virtual Desktop (maybe nick it from Windows Live Spaces Image Uploader :p)?
- And, if this is possible - could you get an unzip option for uploaded ZIP files, or as an option before you click upload? I know the .NET Framework supports this :p
- And, also - would it be possible to get some Windows Live Folders (SkyDrive) integration? Virtual Desktop at first glance appears similar with more options including the availibilty of sync'ing. It would be nice to have the two services integrated.
Oh - and i like the Recycle Bin for Virtual Desktop idea
Andy M
These are all really great. I second them all. - connorb3 said:
Earlier in this thread (page 3 I think) somebody suggested setting synchronization for new computers.
I have this enabled on my computer for the below, and if there is a specific thread for where these settings are, somebody lead me to it.
Here's what I've got so far.
To sync your RSS Feeds from IE (or other centrally managed RSS reader):
Sync the folder C:\Users\%UserName%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Feeds\
To sync your Sidebar settings and gadgets:
C:\Users\%UserName%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Sidebar\
If anyone knows a better place for posting this info you can go ahead and post it.
Thanks!
By the way, I would suggest a "Hide this folder" option for these, at least on the Live Desktop, to reduce clutter. Great work Mesh Team!
This is great. This shoud be intergrated or somthing. - mattyt said:
I use to have Foldershare before I got a Mesh invite and the only feature I miss is remote access to the folder structure and files on remote computers. 5GB's of storage isn't enough space to store all my work in the cloud, but allowing remote access to the file system would solve this for me.
matty
Like mattyt I used to have Foldershare before I got a Mesh invite, and I also miss that feature. It would be good if you could access the file system remotely so that you don't have to remote in to get a file that is not in a Mesh folder. It would also be good if you could use it to make folder a Live Mesh Folder. - RaiderClay said:
Bill Weimer - think you can do this today - though i've not tried it.
Right click on a folder you've mesh-enabled and click LiveMesh Options and then 'add members in livemesh folder'... believe you should then be able to invite other users to get access to this folder... again, haven't tried it - but i believe that's what this option is intended to do...
That is correct you can view and sync folders via the above method but you can't remote to a computer in another mesh yet. - GuyWithDogs said:WillFa said:I'd only have trouble finding things in Word 2007? <semi-sarcasm />
(Can you imagine what Office 2007 would be like if ONLY Word had the Fluent User Ribbon?)
Your suggestions have a lot of merit. The different user interfaces are confusing at first, even to experienced users. Things are hidden - someone had to point out the "Sign In" entry at the top right of the Live Desktop for me. Totally, totally missed it.
Yes, I think they fixed the Live Mesh sign in thing by copying the sign in button onto the middle of the webpage and made it alot more bigger and obvious. - Timhock9206 said: These are all really great. I second them all.
Glad that's out of the way. Maybe since we know you love all of the ideas and second them all, you won't have to post an "I second this." response to the remaining posts in this thread.
"We're all in it together, kid." - Harry Tuttle, Heating Engineer - Troyleb said:
As with above poster, not sure if these have been mentioned already as the list is getting quite long. My vision for mesh would be the following:
I think the live desktop could be much more than it currently is. I would love to see the ability to build an actual desktop. For example the ability to install the windows live services (messenger, mail, photo gallery). Possibly even a version of works or the office viewers installed by default or offered via a link (in the same way messenger currently is in vista). A person could log in to their live desktop top from anywhere with an internet connection and use it much in the same way as they do their own desktop at home. Photo gallery would by default contain all photo's in your mesh folder, clicking on a word document in your folder would open in word viewer within the desktop, etc.
It would also be cool to be able to hover over a item in your folder and have it expand to show a larger image (like photo gallery). Another cool feature would be the ability to drag and drop a web page or part of a webpage (ie photo or article) and drop it in to your folder. It would show in your folder as an image and as in previous suggestion hovering over it would enlarge the image. Clicking on it could then open a web browser within your live desktop. This could be used as a simple way to bookmark an article for later reading or to share an article with someone else in your mesh.
The last item for my wish list would be the ability to have a folder sync but not store on line. Ie. a folder would synch to my home server and I could then share that folder on live mesh and I and others could access that folder on the live desktop. This would also be a great way for my parents/inlaws/friends to backup items to my homeserver. They could simply drag and drop to the folder and it would synch and save a copy on my server.
I secind this - Remove the necessity for ActiveX for the remote desktop. If you are going to support multiple devices (mac, etc) you should enable people using different hardware or software (non-ie) to use your features. I am not sure how it is implemented so my suggestion may be completely infeasible but it seems to me it might be possible to implement it using a technology like Silverlight.
- Zune integration, including Zune Pass Subscription music!
- Server integration!
- Desktop drive mapping!
- Anonymous56461564 said:
I haven't read through all of the suggestions to know if this was suggested yet (too many to read!), but as a .NET developer, I'm using MESH to sync source code from my work PC, laptop and home computer. I would like an option to add a folder to my MESH, but then within that folder's settings, exclude file sync based on file type, size, or exclude a sub-folder in my MESH folder. For example, with Visual Studio, if I add my solution folder to my MESH, it updates every time I do a build and syncs all of the unnecessary build output.
So basically, for a MESH folder, having the ability to exclude or include files from syncing based on some rules (ie: file size, file name, file type, or a whole sub-folder) would be wonderful!
I second this. "for a MESH folder, having the ability to exclude or include files from syncing based on some rules (ie: file size, file name, file type, or a whole sub-folder) would be wonderful!" - jonfry said:
I've been enjoying Live Mesh for weeks now (Thank you!) and would like to add my contributions to the wish list.
- Select / Deselect Folders and Sub-folders.
The My Pictures folder on my main desktop computer contains lots of sub-folders, many of which also contain sub-folders. I'd like to be able to choose which folders I sync and where I sync them to. At present it would be impossible to navigate the Live Desktop if I was to sync each sub-folder individually and would take forever to set it up and manage it. - Don't Sync To The Live Desktop.
I have a number of folders synced between myself and my wife but neither of us particularly need them synced with the Live desktop. It's wasting valuable and limited space on the Live Desktop and slowing down the syncing process between two computers on the same LAN. - Remote Connection Privileges.
I have a loan notebook and a loan desktop which a number of people use and which are often loaned out. I'd like to be able to choose whether these devices can remotely connect to other devices or whether other devices can remotely connect to them. I don't want to lend a co-worker a notebook and have them connect to my desktop but I may want to be able to connect to the loan notebook.
I'd also like to share Remote Desktop connections in the same way I can share Live Folders. I may for example want to allow my wife to connect to my desktop remotely whilst logged into her Live Mesh account (and have my desktop visible in her device ring) or allow a team manager to connect to a team member's desktop. - Device Icons.
I know this feature is on its way but I'm adding it here anyway. I'd like a notebook icon for my notebook and a few different desktop icons so I can have one icon for my personal desktops and a different icon for my work desktops. - Wake Up on LAN / Stand-by.
I'd like to reduce my electricity bill by either turning my devices off or leaving them in low power mode / stand-by mode when not in use but I often need access to these devices. It would be nice if I could wake these devices from Live Mesh, access them and then put them back to sleep again. - Permalinks.
Some form of permalink system so I can bookmark files and folders or email links to them. - Synced Settings.
I try and replicate favourites, settings and various other things between my computers so no matter where I am I have a similar experience. It would be nice if I could choose from a list of things I'd like to share, such as IE favourites, and which machines I'd like them synced on and when I add or change something on one device the changes are automatically made to all of them.
Jon
I second this. - Select / Deselect Folders and Sub-folders.
- iden32 said:this one can be done now... when you share a folder on your ring/cloud it will give u some options afterwords. Go to the file or folder you shared and right click it to "view mesh options" and then the option of "sync settings".
- Allow to sync (like foldershare) - without all the items using up my space on the cloud - so just sync between two machines, without going to the cloud also.
The option to do that is there but it is greyed out. - iden32 said:this one can be done now... when you share a folder on your ring/cloud it will give u some options afterwords. Go to the file or folder you shared and right click it to "view mesh options" and then the option of "sync settings".
- Allow to sync (like foldershare) - without all the items using up my space on the cloud - so just sync between two machines, without going to the cloud also.
I agree - Timo84 said:
1)Provide a client compatible with Windows Home Server
More info here : http://www.wegotserved.co.uk/forums/index.php?s=&showtopic=1983&view=findpost&p=11832
2)Upload status bar for individual folders on the live desktop
Currently there is no obvious way to tell how much of a folder has been synced up to the live desktop. A bar showing the overall percentage of file synced (i.e. 100% being the file is fully synced)
3)Make the mesh client work correctly with standard user accounts in vista home premium
Needles to say this is very frustrating.
4)I am also in favour of mesh recycle bin held in the cloud
I think foldershare has something similar.
5)Provide a mesh client for Linux!
I know this pretty unlikely, but I thought i’d mention it anyway. If you are going other premium services thorough mesh it makes sense to support all platforms. Especially with the rise of net-books using linux.
6)More space on the live desktop
I am a subscriber to hotmail plus, with 10GB of space, which I don’t use the majority of. Would like to be able to use that allowance with live mesh.
7)Another vote for file version control
I second all of these - Dom_Mitchell1 said:
Seeing what Apple are doing with their Mobile Me system has amde we want there to be Exchange like facilities within Mesh.
To have one system that allows me to have OTA syncing of files, contacts, calendars, email would be perfect. At the moment I have Mesh to share files (eventually to include my WinMo phone), Yahoo IMAP (when it wants to work) on my phone but only POP3 via my Outlook and my contacts and calendar in sync via WMDC but only when I plug it in/am in BT range of my desktop and laptop.
Without my phone there would be no way to keep my contacts in sync across my desktop and my lappie.
Push email via Mesh (if possible) would be brilliant. Being able to share a .pst would be a start but they're too big.
Oh for a fully functioning eco sysem where everything joins up!
I second this. "To have one system that allows me to have OTA syncing of files, contacts, calendars, email would be perfect. Push email via Mesh (if possible) would be brilliant. Being able to share a .pst would be a start but they're too big. " - TroyDavis said:
My Live Mesh wish list:
All current Mesh capabilities PLUS
E-mail, Contacts, Calendar, Tasks all in the Mesh and ability to move/send objects seamlessly to other users (like Exchange within a corp today)
Ability to store/access documents, photos, music, and videos with the ability to access from any connected device (including public PC with a browser, Mobile Phones, MIDs, etc.)
Ability to sync / use all of the above to a device for offline use and re-sync when re-connected, including smart conflict t resolution
Have the following functionality equivalents in the Mesh – accessible from anywhere (including public PC with a browser, Mobile Phones, MIDs, etc.): Stripped down Word, Excel (like EditGrid), PPT, Visio, Access (maybe like BLIST),simple personal finance app, Photo editing similar to Paint .NET, music player, video player, web clipping tool like OneNote or EverNote
IM (includes audio/video capabilities for up to 10 participants at a time) plus Sharedview capability for any of the apps for up to 10 users
Home page/portal with customizable/configurable widgets for all of the above plus RSS capabilities
Personal and Professional social pages / sites (think Facebook + LinkedIn)
Ability to integrate with corporate applications / serversIntegration with Windows Home Server
All of the above + 50 GB storage for $99 / yr … additional 5GB for $0.99 / month or $10/yr … unlimited bandwidth.
I second this all. - DakkonA said:
My wish list:
1. Sync exclusions. Some folders, particularly My Documents (XP)/Documents (Vista), there is a lot of crud and subfolders left by other programs (Visual Studio, Virtual PC, and so on) that I don't want to sync. And in XP, of course, it contains the My Pictures and My Music folders, which would make sense to synchronize separately. I suggest extension- and subfolder-based exclusions ("no subfolders" "include particular subfolders" "exclude particular subfolders"). Then I don't have to worry about synchronizing needless junk, or have to make custom folders on my computer just for documents I want to sync.
2. Intelligently lowering bandwidth usage when I'm trying to use the connection. When it's syncing, and there is a lot to sync, the internet becomes barely usable.
Great idea, i have this problem also. I second these. - TeaTotalin said:
Client app support for Windows Server 2003 and 2008. These are my primary OSs as I always develop on the target platform. Thank you!
I don't personally use them but I think it would be great for thoes that do. I second them. Oh and add Windows Home Sever intergradation, via an add-in maybe. - I think Tim agree's with everything mentioned ;) judging by the number of alerts I receive these days!!
Hopefully this will get seen in the middle....
What about a live mesh Printer? I would like the main printer in my house (always connected to main PC) as part of Livemesh? So things can be printed from anywhere for when i get home? (Like a VPN?)
That would be really useful for me! - lordabdul said:
There should be a way to ignore some file names or extensions. Some applications like Office create temporary files next to the working file for various reasons (recovery/backup, locks, etc.). These get created, updated, and deleted quite often, and it both wastes bandwidth and resources (syncing with the mesh) and clutters the news feed for the folder.
Also, be able to sync differently the contents of a folder. For example, say I've got a folder for a project that involves both media (videos or pictures) and text. The folder could be organized with several sub-folders for reference pictures, photoshop/illustrator files, exported JPEGs of the work in progress, and texts. On some devices (mostly mobile devices) I would want to only sync the JPEGs and the texts, and exclude the subfolders with the big files I wouldn't be able to open anyway. This way, I can work on the text while on the go.
Those rules would again probably be either extension based (exclude files of types you can't consume on your device) or folder/filename based.
I seccond that, it sure is a big waste of resources, and it wastefully takes away some of my download quotas. - Tim,
There really is no need to go through the entire thread seconding everything and agreeing. Intention appreciated but for those of us with alerts on it really does get annoying.
Surely just read through them all then post one message with a summary of your views?
Please - a0siris23 said:
Some features that would be great are:
1. Folder exclusion, the ability to not sync certain subfolders
2. Don't sync to the Live Desktop, just sync between devices
3. Sharing files with people who don't have a Windows Live ID
4. More than 5Gb, I currently pay $50 a year for 30Gb with SugarSync....thats the pricepoint we need.
Keep up the great work!
I second these. Oh and point 2 should be an option to not sync to the Live Desktop, just sync between selcted devices, that wy we have a choice. - D2 Graphix said:
I will 77th that wish for Wake on LAN. [i dont know if im number 77, its just a guess]/
I want it so bad, because I keep my pc at home asleep as much as possible.
D2
I 78th that, or whatever it's up to now. - John Cz said:
I'm liking what I see sofar and the future is pretty wide open. Here are some of the big ticket items I see that will help elevate Live Mesh...
Short Term Wish List
1. Drag-n-Drop: Within Mesh Desktop, it should provide better file/folder manipulation. In Windows, I often reorganize folders and files by draggring files/folders around to other folders/drives. Live Mesh Desktop currently wants you to reupload files.
2. Live SkyDrive: link it as a "Mesh Drive" accessible from within the Mesh Desktop and your Devices (PC, etc).
3. Office Live/Sharepoint: link document folder as a "Mesh Drive" (same as above).
4. Windows Home Server: alot could/needs to be done here. However, why upload/sync files from Windows Home Server when you have all that storage. Instead, Live Mesh (Hub) should be able to "tunnel" into Windows Home Server to access files.
5. Windows Mobile Device Support. Pretty much goes without say.
Long Term Wish List
Mid Term Wish List
- 6. Bake Live Mesh into OS (Vista, Server 2008, Windows 7 and Windows Home Server).
- 7. Work with Media Center and Zune teams to develop a future DRM scheme where download licenses are tied to Live Mesh (Hub)
instead of a single PC.
- 8. Start to get some Windows Application rewritten in Silverlight/MeshFX and available in Live Mesh (ex. Calculator, NotePad/WordPad, etc). Applications could be sync'd and cached on the local desktop.
- 9.Application Virtualization (SoftGrid). I'm still trying to wrap my ahead around what running applications on this platform will look like..and what is possible. Ultimately, I think we are talking about completely transforming the desktop environment.
...still thinking about that one
Great Great Great. I second them all. But my favourites for sooner implamentation are 1-5, 8&9 - Dom_Mitchell1 said:John Cz said:
I'm liking what I see sofar and the future is pretty wide open. Here are some of the big ticket items I see that will help elevate Live Mesh...
Short Term Wish List
Drag-n-Drop: Within Mesh Desktop, it should provide better file/folder manipulation. In Windows, I often reorganize folders and files by draggring files/folders around to other folders/drives. Live Mesh Desktop currently wants you to reupload files.
Live SkyDrive: link it as a "Mesh Drive" accessible from within the Mesh Desktop and your Devices (PC, etc).
Office Live/Sharepoint: link document folder as a "Mesh Drive" (same as above).
Windows Home Server: alot could/needs to be done here. However, why upload/sync files from Windows Home Server when you have all that storage. Instead, Live Mesh (Hub) should be able to "tunnel" into Windows Home Server to access files.
Windows Mobile Device Support. Pretty much goes without say.
Long Term Wish List
Mid Term Wish List
- Bake Live Mesh into OS (Vista, Server 2008, Windows 7 and Windows Home Server).
- Work with Media Center and Zune teams to develop a future DRM scheme where download licenses are tied to Live Mesh (Hub)
instead of a single PC.
- Start to get some Windows Application rewritten in Silverlight/MeshFX and available in Live Mesh (ex. Calculator, NotePad/WordPad, etc). Applications could be sync'd and cached on the local desktop.
- Application Virtualization (SoftGrid). I'm still trying to wrap my ahead around what running applications on this platform will look like..and what is possible. Ultimately, I think we are talking about completely transforming the desktop environment.
...still thinking about that one
I like the idea of Sky Drive integration here - there is a place for Skydirve and Mesh in the world, not everyone wants people to be able to have mesh like access to files, sometimes I ust want to give people an URL to download a template from. Same goes for Workspace.
On the WHS front - I like this idea as well. Possibly an application along the lines of Foldershare, allowing it to fit into your mesh from a remote access point of view rather than uploading a ton of data when, as you say, there's already all that storage there.
Mobile support - gotta happen! Pleas happen soon! I want my phone in my Mesh - would makemy commute so much more productive!
Yeah. It would be good if you could just mark a folder within Mesh as a SkyDrive folder and in SkyDrive you could mark a folder as a mesh folder. A little icon on the folder would let you know that it is both. It would also be good for SkyDrive and Mesh to share a storege space of 25gbs free & if you want more you could pay a subcription or one off fee. That way you could use Skydrive permitions to add non Live users and passwords to it, and email a link to that non live user with password and folder address. - Marauderz said:
Remote Desktop Connection To Support 8 bit color, ie. Slower connection speeds
Hi guys, the remote desktop connection feature is very cool, but please allow the remote image to be set to a lower quality (say 8 bit) cause we don't ALL have fast internet connections on the go. :P Cause I realized that unlike RDP which seems to be able to tell the other side "draw a window here" the mesh's rdp connection seems to work more like VNC in the fact that it's pushing back screen snap shots (i of course may be wrong at how RDP actually works but it's just a comparison)
Even RDP connections have variable quality settings so please have a low quality version for this as well, since it takes a LOOOOOONG while to transfer a 1080p screen in 32bit color :P And I'm only connecting through EDGE via a thethered phone so it don't work too fast.
I agree i have that problem of a slow live mesh remote desktop connection myself, even if both sides have broadband, let alone when they don't. Even logmein Free is faster. Otherwise it's great. - Big Nutter said:
I'd really like to give people, who I don't have their MSN/e-mail, temporary read-only access to certain folder/Files, including those who don't even have Live MESH on their PC/Mac. You get a link with gobbigdygook, to paste in to some chat or web page. How temporary? Should be User defined, I think 30 min is good for a Default setting.
As an Trainee/Artist, It really helps if I can send files to who can well see where I'm going wrong without setting up a VPN Remote Desktop.
Remote Desktop "invites" to other user is an something I'd like to see.
If both PCs are on the same LAN at the same time, cut out off the Internet. For both Folder and very much Remote Desktop.
Finally, I'd really like to be able to just share a folder with a fellow user and give them limited access. I really don't want to give them my files that they can edit on the fly.
I'm not sure, but this is more of a Office Live thing to me, being able to give limited access when sending out a file, such as only being able to add comments, to a Document. I know that Office 2007 does this with support of a Server PC. I really like to pass my document out and people comment on it.
I second this. - Dom_Mitchell1 said:
Tim,
There really is no need to go through the entire thread seconding everything and agreeing. Intention appreciated but for those of us with alerts on it really does get annoying.
Surely just read through them all then post one message with a summary of your views?
Please
I second this :P- Edited byan0 Friday, June 20, 2008 5:23 PMDidn't quote :(
Fantastic offering so far. Even in Mesh's infancy it offers features I could no longer live without. This is truly revolutionary stuff.
Votes for new or existing requests (high to low priority):
- Device to device syncing (exclude the cloud copy)
- Direct connections for same subnet (LAN) communication (both for syncing and RDP, in other words, anything on the Mesh platform), piping everything through the internet is just sloppy and slow ;).
- Dynamic bandwidth throttling during heavy sync periods.
- Ability to flag specific shared folders as publicly accessible (with permission settings) to anonymous internet users (i.e. no credentials). Essentially replacing Skydrive or integrating so well they don't seem like disparate and somewhat overlapping offerings.
- Granular control of synced folders/subfolders (exclusion rules, security, etc).
- Component and property level syncing for things like address books, favorites, OS/App preferences, etc. I realize this is a serious kettle of fish.
- Comprehensive software licensing and DRM integration. This, in the long term has GOT to be one of the biggest opportunities for Mesh.
- Device membership in multiple mesh's (something cleaner and easier for laypeople to understand than the device associated with Windows user ID thing) and/or ability to link Mesh's for at least modest interoperability (RDP would be a great example for those of us (all?) that act as the (whole) family Admins).
- Extensive integration with WHS (beyond a straight up W2k3 Mesh client). Others have already mentioned a few WHS proprietary "features" that could be implemented. You could really go nuts here and together make the two services/products twice as strong and appealing. I suppose applying the same great extended features to any Windows Server platform would have benefit, but I see home users (not the enterprise... yet) adopting Mesh first.
Thanks!
- "Extensive integration with WHS (beyond a straight up W2k3 Mesh client). Others have already mentioned a few WHS proprietary "features" that could be implemented. You could really go nuts here and together make the two services/products twice as strong and appealing. I suppose applying the same great extended features to any Windows Server platform would have benefit, but I see home users (not the enterprise... yet) adopting Mesh first"
I don't understand why people think WHS is so special. What features could be given to a WHS version that would not be same ones needed in a W2K or Vista version. I mean a share is share, a HD a HD... - I would love to see 64 bit XP support. I was kind of expecting this as a must so you could reach those who actually have taken the leap to 64 bit XP version. I see more and more PCs being phased into the 64 bit world although I understand your desires to target Vista as an operating system primarily I don't see how it would be that hard to recompile things for the XP 64 bit environment as well? Take it I'm not a windows developer but even if you allowed Livemesh to run in a 32 bit environment on XP 64 bit I would be happy, as I'm sure other Livemesh users would be too.
Then I could at least run it in on the WOW64 emulator. I have no intentions of updating to Vista any time soon so I'm a bit out lof luck of using Livemesh at the moment.
++++11111 for XP 64 bit support
- I think i would be useful to show how uploads are progressing.
For example I am currently uplaoding a >100mb file but have no idea when it will finish or if indeed it is progressing.
PS Thanks for providing this service- Edited byShadyA Monday, June 23, 2008 1:43 PMtypo
- WilliamStacey said:A couple of my initial thoughts. Windows Home Server is by nature an "always on" repository for the vast majority of the data in a home/life. A central place where previously complex tasks can be housed and managed, it even acts as a broker for outside-in secure communications. This sort of logical categorization (to me) has a lot in common with the Mesh cloud service and client, without a few of the cloud's drawbacks (as with everything, its not all roses, and there are some weaknesses compared to the cloud, but here are a few benefits - that I can imagine). One could utilize WHS as a cloud replacement, or a cloud augmentation (quick ideas):
"Extensive integration with WHS (beyond a straight up W2k3 Mesh client). Others have already mentioned a few WHS proprietary "features" that could be implemented. You could really go nuts here and together make the two services/products twice as strong and appealing. I suppose applying the same great extended features to any Windows Server platform would have benefit, but I see home users (not the enterprise... yet) adopting Mesh first"
I don't understand why people think WHS is so special. What features could be given to a WHS version that would not be same ones needed in a W2K or Vista version. I mean a share is share, a HD a HD...
- Storage space would not be an issue
- Quick LAN based routing of Mesh features and sync traffic
- Single point of entry into the home network via one UPnP opening from WHS only (broker for sync and RDP initially)
- A great way to integrate/manage LAN based RPC access to content and remote SSL based data presentation/access
- DRM integration for all that centrally stored content
- On demand media streaming from WHS to any device in your Mesh.
As you say though, one can see how these same features could be valuable in any version of Mesh on any platform, and I partially agree. I say partially because features like those I just mentioned, could very well require some extended configuration, something I think the Mesh team has tried to minimize for ease of use purposes - which is great, you want to be able to claim a mesh device and forget about it). However, if a person should like to leverage some extended functionality - that may require some configuration, a server (or WHS in this case) would seem a logical choice from which to manage/maintain it.
I like to think of the Mesh sync platform sort of like Active Directory (I'm not the first to make this comparison). Regular Mesh devices are like DC's - they sync miscellaneous stuff instead of AD partitions, but it seems analogous, both are multi-master systems... sort of. AD requires the FSMO roles to manage the DC's and provide certain extended features, Mesh requires the cloud. DC's are sort of set and forget things, but the FSMO's must be managed/housed somewhere.
A WHS mesh client could integrate well with the WHS Console (provide it's own "section/category") that would give a layman an easy interface for managing some sweet but potentially complicated functionality. Mesh, like WHS is so much more than a place to store and organize files, although I'm not sure if that's what you meant by "a share is share, a HD a HD..."
Other people have already mentioned how great it would be for the enterprise to run it's own Mesh service, I'm sure we can all see the draw to that. I think WHS would allow the private user some of the benefits of their "own" Mesh service, but minimize the complexity.
- Edited byJJdigsMS Monday, June 23, 2008 4:45 PMFormatting
- John West said:
- Zune integration, including Zune Pass Subscription music!
- Server integration!
- Desktop drive mapping!
To be fair, this is the wrong place to be asking for Zune integration. Go and ask the Zune team for that on the Zune Forums. Or do a search on the Zune Forums for "Mesh" and see who else has suggested ideas for how Mesh and Zune can work together. You might find something more specific than "zune integration" as well.For what its worth, my own wishes for Zune and Mesh are here: http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!550F681DAD532637!4911.entry
-Jamie
P.S. Timhock9206, kindly leave this thread.
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson Live Desktop Activity Indicator
I think it'd be best if there was some sort of an indicator when we're viewing our folders on the Live Desktop that it is still in the midst of updating the folder contents. It can get confusing with a slow connection when you open a folder... you see nothing in it.... then.. all of a sudden right as you hit the X button.. all the contents appear! :PHere's the scenario:
MachineA has a folder named Foo. It's added to Mesh and Syncs up to the cloud fine. 4 files in it replicate correctly.
MachineB has a folder also named Foo. It has 7 files in it. Adding this to Mesh gives a prompt that this folder already exists in the cloud and would I like to subscribe to it. Say No.
Live Desktop has 2 folders named "Foo" now. Identically named. News shows that I added 7 pictures to "Foo". (which one?)
Okay, since I can see instances where 2 folders may be named the same but separate entities (Invoices, Bin\Obj, what ever) can you add something to differentiate similar names?Secondly:
Can we get some ability for a heirarchy on the Live Desktop please? Mine's getting cluttered. Flat file systems died with the PDP-11. :)
Tags might also be cool, since it's all metadata in a feed. Tags could also be the differentiator for name collisions, killing 2 birds with 1 stone. It'd also help with Live indexing either with Windows Desktop Search or Live.com indexing our Live Desktops.- I know this has been mentioned a couple of times, but a SDK to access your cloud data would be great. You'd just have to upload the data (such as photos) once to the live desktop, then all your web apps could access it from there.
- I was just in Live desktop with a folder open. I clicked to see news and then back to Live Desktop again. The open folder had closed down.
It would be nice if Live Desktop "remembered" what you had open when you're clicking around other places in http://www.mesh.com
Even better would be if you remembered what we had open between different browser sessions. Its not inconceivable that there's one folder that is especially important to me and I always want it to be open.
-Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - I would like to see presence (using the IM control) integrated into Live Mesh desktop.
So, if I happen to be browsing a shared folder and I notice that someone else is "in" that folder then I would be able to open IM session with them (if they had opted to display their IM status of course).
Thanks
Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - JJdigsMS said:I think WHS would allow the private user some of the benefits of their "own" Mesh service, but minimize the complexity.
Is there really a need for a personalised Mesh service that the consumer hosts themselves? By its very nature Mesh is a personalised service and you can control exactly where your data goes (or you will be able to). I don't see any difference between:
- a personally-hosted Mesh service and
- a Microsoft-hosted Mesh service where you choose not to sync to the cloud.
Actually I take that back. I DO see differences because if you were to host it yourself you lose the benefits such as sharing and using applications that you browse for on the worldwide Mesh.
I can see the benefit of an enterprise hosting their own Mesh service but sorry...I don't get the value for consumers.
-Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - Jamie Thomson said: Is there really a need for a personalised Mesh service that the consumer hosts themselves? By its very nature Mesh is a personalised service and you can control exactly where your data goes (or you will be able to). I don't see any difference between:
- a personally-hosted Mesh service and
- a Microsoft-hosted Mesh service where you choose not to sync to the cloud.
Actually I take that back. I DO see differences because if you were to host it yourself you lose the benefits such as sharing and using applications that you browse for on the worldwide Mesh.
I can see the benefit of an enterprise hosting their own Mesh service but sorry...I don't get the value for consumers.
Hey Jamie,
I think I should clarify my position, I quoted "own" because I would never want an end user to host their own complete Mesh service, and upon further thinking about it, I'm really just into augmentation or maybe extension , not replacement (even though I wrote of both). What you mentioned is exactly what I talked about when I said it wouldn't be all roses. I think if I turfed the idea of replacement and stuck with augmentation, the downside would be minimized.
I'm all for syncing to the cloud, in fact, about the only things I would want to (use WHS to) augment the cloud for would be disk space and traffic flow.
At this point, choosing not to sync to the cloud, can only be talked about in terms of folders/files and in that context there is one big difference between syncing to the cloud, or not; the data will or will not be available from anywhere (via the Live Desktop). I figure if you could utilize the disk on WHS with or instead of disk in the cloud, one could in theory make that data available via the Live Desktop folders. Based on what I understand the future feature to exclude the cloud sync (or device to device sync) to be, you would not have access to that data unless you were on a device in your Mesh that was syncing. You might see a "shadow" folder in your Live Desktop, much like you do now on devices you exclude from a synced folder, but that data would not be accessible from there. Don't get me wrong, if they were to implement a feature like remote file system traversal/access to any device (or Meshified folder - whether synced or not) in your Mesh this would be a moot point (and maybe that's a better idea).
That takes me to traffic flow. Right now, and I admit it's early - every device in one's Mesh talks to the cloud directly for feeds and secure communication. I know this stuff is supposed to be smart enough to go full P2P aware and stay within the LAN, but things have to arrive at the LAN somehow. I imagine a WHS to be a great logical and single place to deliver that traffic for fan out to the lan, as well as a great place for the lan based Mesh devices to get their info out to the cloud. Similar to a "Zone Data Collector" if you've ever worked with Citrix. Who knows though, as the Mesh client gets smarter, it may (and probably should) be capable of handling routing like this on its own, similar to electing a segment master browser in the Windows networking world. I compared this to FSMO roles previously, but a Mesh of devices isn't exactly as high profile, and having that stuff jump around based on a sort of election wouldn't be a huge deal.
As I mentioned above, those are the things I can think of that would augment the cloud. Other things I mentioned in my previous post are just WHS proprietary features I think would be fun and elevate its use in visible ways that laypeople would care about. DRM and media streaming for that centrally stored content would be a blast :). I would never presume to say that you could only offer those features on a WHS client, but MS sells different products for different features that typically fit logically together, they could enable some/all of that functionality for WHS to grow the benefits column even further. Maybe that's a little more akin to how Apple does it though :) certain devices do certain things to minimize how much mixed and overlapping functionality (rope) an end user can hang themselves with.
Others have talked about WHS integration. I assume they have some good ideas as well - it would be nice to hear more of them.
Wether what I've rambled on about has merrit in the short/long term or not, I'm just happy a platform like this has finally come along and that we get to play a (small) part in shaping it. - JJdigsMS,
So if I understand you correctly you mean that your WHS shared folders which are currently available over the web would be available via Mesh?
If so, yeah, I like that idea a lot.
-Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - Along the idea of WHS integration, but simpler than that: Being able to set the default location for newly synced folders.
On MachineA I create a new LM folder "Foo". I set replication to sync with MachineB.
MachineB then gets a folder created at C:\Users\Me\Desktop\Foo.
If we could set where these folders are made, for the WHS box, I could set preferences that it'd be made under D:\Meshed\Foo without RDPing into the box. - Yeah, what WillFa said! +1 vote for some sort of default "Create mesh folders here" option that can be set on the machine BEFORE the first attempt at syncing anything. Having to remember that things will hit the desktop drives me bonkers at times.
- GuyWithDogs said:
Yeah, what WillFa said! +1 vote for some sort of default "Create mesh folders here" option that can be set on the machine BEFORE the first attempt at syncing anything. Having to remember that things will hit the desktop drives me bonkers at times.
That, my friend, is a great idea.
Mesh team..do it!! :)
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - I think Live Mesh is a winner and can be the one place for all things to all people so I 2nd every bit of feedback so far that people have posted here because I just want one place to put my files, not have worry about backing them up any more and be available anywhere, edit them and manage them without having to install a single bit of software (plug-in) into a PC that is not mine.
The idea of intergrating, Live messenger, Skydrive, Office Live, Hotmail, Home Server etc etc into a seemless environment accessable any in the world is great. Hopefully this can all be done without having to manually move files from one system to another as I have over 1500+ photos on my Live Space so I am not than keen to have to re-post them somewhere else :) just thinking about the 100+Gigs of data I have on my PC...having access to all of this and a automatic copy/backup of it somewhere else would give me piece of mind.
Cheers - When file is updated our newsfeed says something like:
Jamie Thomson updated file demo_package.dtproj.user in the folder Visual Studio Projects. 10:18 PM
That's very useful naturally. But I'm very surprised that you don't tell us which device it was updated on.
Knowing the device would be especially useful when resolving conflicts because its likely that we'd know which device contains the version we want to keep.
So the request is, please tell us which device a file was edited on. Especially in the conflict resolution dialog.
cheers
Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - I have one basic suggestion to add to my previous suggestions...rename "Live Mesh" to "Windows Live". This should also impact... http://windows.Live.com
- John Cz said:
I have one basic suggestion to add to my previous suggestions...rename "Live Mesh" to "Windows Live". This should also impact... http://windows.Live.com
Please don't. I love the Windows Live products but the "Windows Live" brand has been a disaster from start to finish.
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - Jamie Thomson said:John Cz said:
I have one basic suggestion to add to my previous suggestions...rename "Live Mesh" to "Windows Live". This should also impact... http://windows.Live.com
Please don't. I love the Windows Live products but the "Windows Live" brand has been a disaster from start to finish.
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson
I agree ... I'm confused by the "Live" itself. "Live" as opposed to "dead"? Is it "L-eye-ve" or "L-ih-ve"? I presume the former, as in "live broadcast" as opposed to "live free or die".
Or "Live" vs. "Taped/Recorded"? Or "Automated"? It can't be the latter - isn't this all mostly automated, and only those carbon-based leaf nodes (i.e. us users) are the "live" part?
Or is it "Live" meaning "Current"?
I'm confused... - Jamie Thomson said: Please don't. I love the Windows Live products but the "Windows Live" brand has been a disaster from start to finish.
Look I respect your opinion but I think its also fair to say that Windows Live as brand & service is still a work in progress. I agree they stumbled abit early on with too many betas and not a clear strategy (at least not to us). But they are starting to clean that up, consolidate and even dropping some services. Hopefully Wave 3 of Live services a further move in that direction. In any case, my reason for suggesting this is in the first place is because of Live Mesh's Desktop and future application support. I think that consumers are just going to relate/understand it better if they think of it as an extension of Windows ..instead of Live Mesh. - John Cz said:Jamie Thomson said: Please don't. I love the Windows Live products but the "Windows Live" brand has been a disaster from start to finish.
Look I respect your opinion but I think its also fair to say that Windows Live as brand & service is still a work in progress. I agree they stumbled abit early on with too many betas and not a clear strategy (at least not to us). But they are starting to clean that up, consolidate and even dropping some services. Hopefully Wave 3 of Live services a further move in that direction. In any case, my reason for suggesting this is in the first place is because of Live Mesh's Desktop and future application support. I think that consumers are just going to relate/understand it better if they think of it as an extension of Windows ..instead of Live Mesh.
I think that "Windows" was intentionally excluded from its name becuse its meant to be different platform instead of an extention to the Windows platform.
I think that the Live Mesh is its own platform that is going to join lots of other seperate platforms so things like Windows, Windows Mobile, Mac, Symbian etc. will all come together in one place. The Live Mesh platform.
If Windows is included in the name of the product then your already making some people think that the product is limited to the Windows platform.
(P.S. Just hoping on the symbian support as its not been confirmed so far)- Edited byComplete_Prat Saturday, June 28, 2008 3:21 AMAdded P.S.
- Well My 2 Ideas are
1) Anti Virus built into Mesh to stop virus/worms spreading
2) A 'Vault' so somebody could place a file in a secure folder (that does not get sync'ed) and is password protected. (Just in case you leave your PC logged and somebody else could come along and start up mesh and access your local/cloud information)
http://sqlservertipsandtricks.blogspot.com/ - GuyWithDogs said:
Yeah, what WillFa said! +1 vote for some sort of default "Create mesh folders here" option that can be set on the machine BEFORE the first attempt at syncing anything. Having to remember that things will hit the desktop drives me bonkers at times.
Yup, they should ask it before you start syncing ! Just like in FolderShare, that's a nice feature i love !
- I'm enjoying using live mesh and finding it really useful, thanks for the work so far to everyone who has worked on this.
One feature I would like would be to control the options for the RDP connection to machines. I have to connect to a machine which doesnt have high bandwidth so running the connection at 256 colours would be a lot quicker for me. - I also would like the option to sync from device to device, instead of through the live desktop. With the 5 gig limit, I want to sync more files, but find myself having to pick and choose to fit everything in my cloud more than I would like. I still want to use the cloud for documents and pictures, but my music files can't currently be part of my mesh even though I want them on both my computers because of the 5GB limitation.
Also, when it comes to connecting to a computer on my mesh, it seems to go out to the Internet first, then to the other device. If the two computers are on the same subnet, I would think you'd have a much better experience if it could connect locally.
And then there is the Skydrive service. I love the sharing features of Skydrive, but hate the file size limitations it has. Some kind of integration with mesh and skydrive would be interesting. - Can Livemesh be allowed to work with UAC.
My problem is the account i use on my desktop is not admin...
When I remote in and want to do something, UAC pops up...and then I cannot enter the password to carry on, thus rendering my connection useless!!
a tad annoying... - One of the biggest "wishes" I would benefit from is the ability to sync Mesh with SkyDrive.
Short, simple and to the point.
Not all those who wander are lost I have a Mesh folder with lots of sub-folders in it. I have created a shortcut to one of the files in one of these subfolders and placed the shortcut in another sub-folder.
This works perfectly well on this computer of course but due to the fact that the path ina shortcut is absolute and not relative that shortcut will not work on another machine unless I place the root Mesh folder in exactly the same place.
Hence, my request is that you allow us to have "Meshified" shortcuts. i.e. Shortcuts that work regardless of which machine the Mesh folder is synced to. It should work on Live Desltop too.
Thanks
Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson- It would be great to be able to access my Windows Home Server from the Mesh.
Thanks
.. Mike - I envisage that when people start sharing folders with people in earnest that eventually you'll run into a situation where the names of folders are the same. For instance, if I share my "My Pictures" folder with someone that is doing the same they will browse to Live Desktop and (I assume) see 2 foldes called "My Pictures" and they won't know which one is which. It would be much easier if my friend is able to call my "My Pictures" folder "Jamie's pictures" or something similar.
Hence, the request is that you allow us to define friendly names for folders that people are sharing with us.
Thanks
Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - Loving this product. Outlook PST sync is big on my wish list.
- +1 for XP x64 support!!!
I am currently forced to use Dropbox as Live Mesh won't install on my XP x64 installation (which I use to sync with a Win 2003 server.... so I guess having Win 2003 server support would also be a request)...
- ANOTHER +1 for Server 2003 x64 support (and XP x64 support, which is the same thing).
S03 SP2 is what I use as my dev box, and NOT having Live Mesh support really limits how useful Live Mesh is for me.
C'mon, folks... pretty please?? Is there a TECHNICAL reason that you're not supporting x64 prior to Vista, or is it just one of those PM decisions...
- Do not auto-create folder shortcut icons on desktop when new mesh folders are created.
- Delta updating
- "The ability to keep the sidebar minimized by default."
- "A more logical response by the taskbar icon to the mouseover -- right now, a tooltip AND the Live Mesh taskbar window appear on the mouseover. I'd rather have the tooltip appear on the mouseover and the taskbar window appear on a mouse click."
- A 'program settings' sync. Such as IE settings (favorites, history, trusted sites, restricted sites, pop-up allowed sites, etc), MSN messenger (startup settings, chat logs, etc), and Windows settings (task bar options, start menu options, desktop icon spacing, etc). Similar to a meshified 'files and settings transfer wizard' with check boxes for what you want synced.
- Run as a service, allowing each profile to be it's own "computer" in the cloud.
- Syncing of user-specified HKLM and HKCU keys (to allow advance settings meshing of un-meshed applications). With lots of warnings of course... the requisite when dealing with the registry.
- Read/Execute only syncing. IE "one-way sync", "guest sync", or "subscription sync". Would be great for family photo album type stuff that be distributed without going to the cloud.
- Jamie Thomson said:John Cz said:
I have one basic suggestion to add to my previous suggestions...rename "Live Mesh" to "Windows Live". This should also impact... http://windows.Live.com
Please don't. I love the Windows Live products but the "Windows Live" brand has been a disaster from start to finish.
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson
I agree. Live has become too diluted to the point that even www.live.com should be renamed to something that people would be able to remember more easily as being a search page. Right now there is Live Messenger, Live Photo Gallery, Live Mail, etc. etc. etc. But it doesn't seem like they have any common bond or heritage, just all have "Live" in their name.
I think Microsoft has a winner with Mesh.com as long as they dont start appending "mesh" to everything. Maybe a logo that says "Mesh enabled" or something but not "Mesh" in the product name (other than Mesh.com of course). They should not call it Live Mesh, but just Mesh instead. - Timhock9206 said:D2 Graphix said:
I will 77th that wish for Wake on LAN. [i dont know if im number 77, its just a guess]/
I want it so bad, because I keep my pc at home asleep as much as possible.
D2
I 78th that, or whatever it's up to now.
I don't think WOL is a possibility. Most users would be using a private address which Microsoft's servers would not be able to send a "Magic Packet" to. Due to the nature of WOL, I don't think it would be something the Mesh team would spend resources on. Maybe if there were Mesh enabled home routers that would be another story. They could tell the router to send the WOL packet on their behalf. - My Wishlist:
I'd like to see a Vista sidebar gadget that displayed the news. This would allow me to easily see when a meshed user adds/modifies a file at a glance. Also, a popup like the outlook notification would be nice to see realtime changes.
I know it has been mentioned 100 times, but file revisioning would be great!!!
The ability to sync without the cloud (so I can go past 5GB) otherwise, an unlimited cloud.
This one is a bit of a long shot, but I'd love to be able to have roaming system profiles between my laptop and a few home PCs, but still be able to select what is synced on each device.
Brad Sando- Edited byTriadX1 Thursday, July 10, 2008 4:43 PMFormatting
- Vote for some type of notification of new files - change of icon color in the tray would be good enough for me - just some type of notification at all would be good.
- Ability to control syncing to the Live Desktop from within the client software.
- It would be pretty cool if I could get a text or an email when a device becomes unavailable. Actually, it would be even cooler if I could set a couple of different events (like a shared folder that has been accessed or unavailable device) which would notify me when the event was triggered.
thanks. - ability to turn off turn start on at boot.
- With the new update yesterday I've noticed that if you choose not to sync a folder to the Live Desktop then you get a folder shortcut on the Live Desktop rather than a folder itself.
It would be really cool if double-clicking on the shortcut opened the folder on the device that you currently happen to be browsing the web with (if, of course, the folder has been synced to that device).
I would also like to be able to specify from the client that a folder should not be synced to Live Desktop. Currently I have to go to Live Desktop to specify that but in order to do THAT I have to first sync the folder to Live Desktop. That's very strange. In order to not do something I first have to do that thing???
-Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - Jamie Thomson said:
With the new update yesterday I've noticed that if you choose not to sync a folder to the Live Desktop then you get a folder shortcut on the Live Desktop rather than a folder itself.
It would be really cool if double-clicking on the shortcut opened the folder on the device that you currently happen to be browsing the web with (if, of course, the folder has been synced to that device).
I would also like to be able to specify from the client that a folder should not be synced to Live Desktop. Currently I have to go to Live Desktop to specify that but in order to do THAT I have to first sync the folder to Live Desktop. That's very strange. In order to not do something I first have to do that thing???
-Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson
Me too !
You should not have to go to the Live Desktop to change that setting.
It's okay that only the person who made the folder can edit the sync options (not the persons he invited into it) , but the person who made it should be able to change the via the client !
PS: the Live Desktop onliny is something I bearly use - Jamie Thomson said:
I would also like to be able to specify from the client that a folder should not be synced to Live Desktop. Currently I have to go to Live Desktop to specify that but in order to do THAT I have to first sync the folder to Live Desktop. That's very strange. In order to not do something I first have to do that thing???
Yeah, I'm going to have to third this one. I thought it was broken when I couldn't change the sync option. The fact that you currently have to start a sync with your live desktop to not sync with your live desktop is pretty counterintuitive. - I can think of 3 reasons for which I want to use LiveMesh: (in no particular order)
1- Share data with friends/family (photos...)
2- Have my private data accessible on all my devices
3- As a way to have backup for my data
For all of these features, and particularly for 2, privacy is important to me. Having the data synchronized to Live Desktop encrypted would be nice. When not using Live Desktop, having the filenames encrypted would be nice too.
I'm concerned about the 3rd scenario. I won't feel my data is backup safely if the deletion or the corruption of a file on one device ends up deleting or corrupting that file on every single device. I'm not sure what is the best way to mitigate that... One way would be to have file versioning built into LiveMesh (à la CVS/SVN), and I would love to have that!
Note that this feature would also be good for scenario 1 where I might want to have a shared folder with say my family where I can dump photos, but I would be nervous about somebody making a mistake and erasing/loosing data in that shared folder.
+1 for better News feed organization.
For example, right clicking to create a new folder, then type a name, press enter. This sequence actually generate two events "Add new folder 'New Folder'". and "Renamed folder "FolderName"". It should be just one event (Add folder "FolderName".) Similar things are happening with Moving file. (one delete, one add vs. one "move").
+1 for Delta Sync in general
+10 for Outlook Sync
+100 for Delta sync for Outlook PST files.
(it would be really really great for those of us who have multiple computers but don't have Exchange server to keep everything in line.)
+10 for Window Mobile (smartphones in particular)- REQ: being able to exclude a folder in a folder that is already synced with MESH
s>
- It would be useful if we had the option of allowing the news feed to record when devices when online or offline.
Great product!
However, I noticed that some notifications are not immediately clear.
For example, when adding an existing Live Mesh folder to an existing folder with that name (IE favorites for example! :) ), the question pops up whether to merge the two folders and sync the merged folder to all other machines and the Live desktop. However, I had to read it a few times before I understood it. Simply make the word merge bold, or put the question 'merge the Live Folder in ....?' in the pop up’s title bar (which is often shown in dialogs in Windows) would make it much clearer.
Even worse, when removing a folder from 'manage folders' in the client, a popup with the text 'removing folder from Live mesh' is shown. this is very confusing, as the folder is only removed from the computer not from the other devices.
I think dialogs are very important, especially when concerning the removal of your (personal) files - accurate information on the behavior of the client& Live Mesh is crucial!!!!
Thanks.- The Live Desktpo tells us how much data we storing in the cloud in total.
I've just been navigating my folders in Live Mesh using the navigation pane (which I've only just found. Is it new?). It would be really cool if, when we select a folder in the navigation pane, the total size of all the files in that folder were displayed in the detail pane. Also, tell us how many files there are in that folder. If we select a subset of the files tells us the total size of those files.
In short....make it like Windows Explorer.
Thanks
Jamie
http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ | http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson - Yes! I was trying to do this yesterday and expected the usual Windows behavior -- file select w/Shift and/or cntl would be very useful when adding files.
David
- Yes, I came across this yesterday. I expected to find the usual Windows behavior when adding files, but had to select them one at a time. Shift +/- CTRL would be very useful.
David
- I'd like to be able to use this on my Nokia E90 (on both screens, unlike some applications allowing you to only use the front screen or reduced size on the 2nd screen). Would be good to finally have some connectivity between the road and my PC's.
- I would like to see Live mesh integrate with Serach Folders. This way I can have a search folder that is automatically populated by a given set of criteria. Then those files could be synced with live mesh. Basically treat search folders like real folders. Just a thought.
- Here are my wish list for Live Mesh:
1. Client support for Windows Home Server
2. RSS feeds for folder updates w/o enclosures
3. Email/