My previous post was about un-installing Internet Explorer 8 and after a little more digging it looks like IE is no the only application getting the un-install option. The Windows Engineering blog today has posted additional details about what other applications can be removed in the upcoming Windows 7 Release Candidate:
- Windows Media Player
- Windows Media Center
- Windows DVD Maker
- Internet Explorer 8
- Windows Search
- Handwriting Recognition (through the Tablet PC Components option)
- Windows Gadget Platform
- Fax and Scan
- XPS Viewer and Services (including the Virtual Print Driver)
As I covered in the uninstall of IE 8 they can’t perform a traditional uninstall due to other the applications having dependencies on their components and code base. While it might not be what everyone wants at least it is a good sign for future versions of Windows.
It does look like these removal options will only be available post-install as they felt it was more important to make the install less complicated. The idea of a less complicated install might sound good when talking to your average computer user but what about pleasing your toughest critics, the power users?
Check It Out> Engineering Windows 7
UPDATE:: I just realized that this is my 201st post! Not too bad for a little over 2 months of being live at
I don’t get why people are worked up over wanting to completely remove IE8 anyways? There are enough bad / lazy web designers out there that it is still a necessary component. Even IETab for Firefox still requires IE to be installed.
And no, the option to remove IE8 would not speedup standardization, since only power users (likely those that currently use Firefox or Opera anyways) would think to uninstall it.
Looks like this is more to appease Europeans with the manufacturers being able to uncheck certain programs for their builds.