Windows only: Glass Notepad extends the Aero transparency effect to the entire editing window—a slick replacement for the built-in Notepad utility.
There’s been plenty of buzz about Windows 7′s great new Aero Snap feature—and reader John makes it better with a tip to maximise windows vertically with nothing more than a double-click.
After we wrote about the All-Glass Firefox theme, reader bc//G_A wrote in with an even more impressive customisation that enables the Aero Glass effect across almost every UI element.
Windows only: All-Glass Firefox v2 extends the super-slick Windows Vista Aero transparency effects to almost every piece of the Firefox interface.
Windows only: Tiny application Glass CMD for Vista forces command prompt windows to use Aero’s glass transparency effect.
The default Firefox theme doesn’t match Windows Vista very well—but with a few extensions and a Stylish script, you can customise Firefox to use a slick, well-integrated look with Vista Aero transparency effects.
Sibling site Gizmodo rounds up the most noteworthy interface and productivity-minded changes in the Windows 7 Release Candidate. Most relate to Aero Peek, the taskbar, and other interface changes, but there’s also some User Account Control tweaks and new keyboard shortcuts. Got a suggestion for the Win7 developers on what else should change?
Windows Vista (with Aero running) only: Wheelie, a free beta app, can be used solely as a pretty neat application switcher at this point, but its developers seem to have much grander plans for the little utility. Once installed, you can flip through active window thumbnails with your mouse wheel by touching the top edge of the screen. Park the cursor there, however, type in a word or phrase, and your screen fills with results from (apparently) Google Image Search. It’s important to note that Wheelie takes up a serious chunk of memory in its current beta state, but it’s an intriguing experiment that at least offers an alternative to Alt-and-Tab-ing at this point. Wheelie is a free download for Windows Vista systems running Aero only. Wheelie [LectroMagnetic]
Windows Vista’s Aero looks and effects are generally nice to look at, but when you’re trying to squeeze the last bit of power and life out of a battery, or just running some memory-hungry stuff, you don’t always need them. Windows Vista Magazine details a registry hack you can make to add “Aero On” and “Aero Off” shortcuts to your desktop right-click menu, making it simple and quick to toggle the fancier stuff (it’s the second major tip, about 1/3 down the page). We’ve already shown how to disable Aero for particular programs, but this trick might work better for working on the go, gaming, or other situations where you need to cut out the whiz-bang stuff. PC Heaven [Windows Vista Magazine]
Windows XP only: The good news is, Shock Aero 3D is a free, easy-to-install app for Windows XP that gives you the same kind of 3D window-shuffling task switcher that Windows has with Flip 3D. The not-so-great news is that it’s not exactly a full replacement. The visual effects are both fast and pretty similar-looking, but you have to click on Shock’s taskbar icon to flip through windows, rather than just simply Win+Tab-ing until you hit what you want. For those seeking a little more flash while they’re still in XP, Shock Aero 3D sits nicely next to other XP “upgrades” like Vista cursors and a Vista-styled Start menu. Shock Aero 3D is a free download for Windows XP only. Shock Aero 3D [via Confessions of a Freeware Junkie]
