Smart Tags are actually a very neat feature. I wish Microsoft hadn't pulled them from IE6. Basically, it adds links to certain words or phrases. The best example of this is in Office XP, which contains Smart Tags. If there is an address in a document, you can select the Smart Tag and have Expedia give you directions to it. Or you can add a person't name into your Outlook Contacts. Another neat one is being able to look up stock information if the stock symbol appears in a document. Out of the box, the Smart Tags that exist in Office XP all point to Microsoft sites. But you can download several others that were created by different companies. Apparently, Mercedes has made one that links to their site. If you see the name of a Mercedes car in a document (or website if they add it back to IE) it will link you to a site that gives you more information about it.
 
A Smart Tag is just an XML script. IT is a very simple thing to create, and Microsoft has published how to do it. Any company can create Smart Tags that you can install. So, it you want a MapPoint Smart Tag instead of an Expedia Smart Tag, you can install one. Directions will now link to MapPoint (if they create a Smart Tag.) Want any financial phrases to link to Morgan Stanley? Use their Smart Tag. The possibilities are pretty much endless. Think about having the ability to find more information about obscure law jargon, medical lingo, or techie speak. Think how helpful something like this would be if a doctor could click on the name of a disease and it would link to a CDC website that had information about it.
 
The only reasons that this new feature is controversial are: a.) The initial Smart Tags link to Microsoft sites (well, duh!) and b.) it means that web developers will have to actually provide decent content in order to keep people at their sites.
 
Smart Tags actually bring the Internet a lot closer to what it should be: a source of easy to find information.
 
The funny thing its, they were turned off by default. Most users would probably never think to turn them on. So all of the whining was pretty much for nothing.

I liked the smart tags in internet explorer
i was sad to see them go

Thanks for the Feedback 'OLEerror' yeah i wasn't quit sure of the benefits of smart tags untill your post.
 
I also didn't know that they are actually turned off by default & that they aren't infact included in IE6, i guess the sources which i read about it probably are a little biased(Anti-M$) or something.
 
It looks like it was probably a good idea.
 
Cheers,

It can also be that some people don't like certain features, and aren't necessarily anti-MS.
I can give you plenty of reasons why I don't like about Windows, but I'll just name a few.
--Movie Maker, it's an optional component that MS gives no choice.
--DVD Player, requires an MPEG decoder card--which a majority of users don't have, or a software decoder--makes DVD Player pretty stupid considering that's what you're using it for. Video cards today are quite capable of running a DVD full-screen without hiccups.
 
--Autoplay, Autorun. No actual way to disable without installing TweakUI or other tweakers, or making the changes in the registry.
--Personalized menus. Annoying in Windows, but it's easier to disable. In Office 2000, it's more of a pain to disable.
--Office assistants. Microsoft Bob reincarnated.
 
I don't know about you, but MS, as well as other companies and their products (Adobe Acrobat, anyone) seem to become more of a pain in the neck with each subsequent releas, at least as far as the vets go.
 
Again, personal preferences don't necessarily mean you're against the company and/or all it's products.

Quote:
--Autoplay, Autorun. No actual way to disable without installing TweakUI or other tweakers, or making the changes in the registry.
--Personalized menus. Annoying in Windows, but it's easier to disable. In Office 2000, it's more of a pain to disable.
--Office assistants. Microsoft Bob reincarnated.

I don't know about you, but MS, as well as other companies and their products (Adobe Acrobat, anyone) seem to become more of a pain in the neck with each subsequent releas, at least as far as the vets go.

Again, personal preferences don't necessarily mean you're against the company and/or all it's products.
true, true. There is a way to diable autorun but win9x made it 1000x times easier than it is in 2k or xp. Personalized menues are an unnecessary PITA. This is probably the dumbest feature yet. Don't forget about the brown dog in the new file finder. Seriously, I don't consider myself a windows vet (less than 3 years of PC use) but i think that win2k will probably be the best OS ever made by MS since it has a pretty good balance between the ease of use (most win9x newbies should have no trouble using win2k) and user control without excessive dumbing-down we see in xp. just check the users'n'passwords control panel in xp.

Hello? Anyone home? You can turn off the new logon screen and make it like Win2K. Also all the new "dumbing down" features can be turned off too. Windows XP isn't just about looks it's 45% faster than all the other versions of Windows including 2000 and Me, and that's been proven by an independent testing facility. Just check out the article on NeoWin.net.

Ummm... what does that have to do with this discussion?

Sorry, Anti-MS was the wrong word, what i really meant was that many articles i have read on Smart-Tags for IE are rather narrow veiwed, they only look at the negative aspects. When obviously now i understand that in some (Not all cases) Smart-Tags could have been beneficial to many internet users, to find information in a logical kinda way i suppose.
 
Now BrianF, allthough a little of the topic, i agree with you M$ can really be a pain in the arse, forcing you to have moviemaker installed with ME & XP, when 90% of computer useres probably don't have the hardware to make movies, and the 10% that do 70% would buy "Real" video editing software.
Media Player 6.4 is just fine and dandy, i hate media player 7 (Bloated Garbage).
Office assistants give me the sh!ts.
 
As for Adobe acrobat reader, i hate that you can't scroll using the mouse wheel in the same way you would on a web page, plus you can't scroll using arrow keys:(
 
Anyway i'm getting a bit of the topic now,
Cheers.

I agree that WMP7 is fairly cruddy. I liked the beta version better than the final release. But, surprisingly, I really like WMP for XP. Extremely stable. Loads fast. And the interface changes they've made are nice.

wmp 6.4 is probably the best player out there-it starts up fast and it only does what it was designed to do.
 

Quote:Hello? Anyone home? You can turn off the new logon screen and make it like Win2K. Also all the new "dumbing down" features can be turned off too. Windows XP isn't just about looks it's 45% faster than all the other versions of Windows including 2000 and Me, and that's been proven by an independent testing facility. Just check out the article on NeoWin.net. 
45% faster? What have you been smoking? I actually don't think there is any standard unit of measuring performance apart from a few benchmark apps that can let you compare how different OSes behave in certain environments or situations. Same way, you can't judge PIV, Athlon, and Macintosh boxes solely based on the clock speed.

45% faster is completely false. Even the startup and shutdown have not been sped up by that much. Microsoft has even shown that XP is slightly slower (not enough to be noticable) than 2000 in some tasks. Of course, it is slightly faster in others. Speed-wise, 2000 and XP are basically even. Most of the speed increase people talk about in XP are only perceived increases. Due to how it handles services and loads programs it appears faster. In all reality, it is about the same as 2000. It does hold enough advantages over 2000 that I will be upgrading to it on both of my faster home machines. And I'll be upgrading both my parents and the in-laws to it (from 98SE) as well. After running XP since Beta 2, Windows 2000 will probably never find a place on my computers again. And I was an early adopter and supporter of 2000.

No one said the startup and shutdown process was 45% faster. Did you read the article?

Quote:
Microsoft has even shown that XP is slightly slower (not enough to be noticable) than 2000 in some tasks.

What a load of crock. Prove it. I posted my source, now you post yours.

here you are sir: http://www.zdnet.com/products/stories/reviews/0,4161,2808643,00.html
 
Does anyone have similar benchmarks with lower end machines?