I have been a long time user of most of the Windows Live tools, through various beta stages (and pre- Windows Live stages in the case of Foldershare/Live Sync).
I would like to give a brief overview of how I use these tools in my everyday activities.
Messenger
Windows Messenger/MSN Messenger/ Windows Live Messenger – whatever its guise, has always been a key program for me, as a youth of the “technical age” – I have spent many moons chatting away on Messenger, usually about rubbish to do with the usual school kid stuff. However since 6th Form and all the way through University so far it has been a useful tool in organising events, chatting to multiple people at the same time in order to meet at the right time at the right place.
It has also revolutionised group projects, where as before it would involve multiple telephone calls and having to meet up somewhere to discuss our ideas, again having a group chat enables everyone to work from home, and chat away, allowing everyone to get involved in the discussion, I have also seen it be beneficial for those that are not as confident at speaking within groups, and thus being able to contribute from a safe environment (such as home or a friends house) and type away their ideas online has been an amazing feeling.
The addition of sharing folders to Messenger made sharing files and work documents a doddle, so we could all work together on a document, and see what each of us was contributing, without having to rush around on the last day putting 3 or 4 peoples work together in one document.
Yes, I do realise that most of this could have been done via E-mail – but the whole point is that Messenger makes everything that bit more easy, and in real-time – thus increasing productivity, and as a student, the more work I can get done for as little effort as possible is always a bonus!
I love the fact I can handwrite messages within Messenger, sometimes its just nice to be able to write something to a 
friend, especially when I am working with my laptop in slate mode, I can just carry on writing without having to worry about getting to my keyboard, this is also useful when trying to share equations, as they are not the easiest thing to deal with in standard formatted text, the fact I can quickly switch to handwriting, write an equation to share, and then back to typing on the next line is ideal!
Messenger also works well when dealing with the family, as I moved out away from my parents it allows me to easily keep in touch with them, and with the benefits of webcam and microphones, I can keep in touch with all my family. Though being the IT guy in our family has led me to despise the Remote assistance application ;o)
Live Mail
I have always preferred to use a desktop application when dealing with my emails, Windows Live Mail has made the whole experience a breeze, allowing me to include both my Hotmail Account (Private) and my University Email accounts with ease. Live Mail is just as powerful as the old Outlook express, but its just so easy to use! Everything just seems to be where it oughta be.
I used to use Outlook for all of my email and scheduling (and on my desktop I still do) – but for my laptop I much prefer Live Mail due to its smaller footprint on the usage of my machine.
Live Mails integration with Live Contacts and Calendar are huge bonus – I am constantly updating my calendar with my University schedule, meetings with tutors and peers, but also my sporting activities etc. – the additon of being able to add things to my calendar when someone has sent me an email regarding an event is a lovely touch, and the sheer ease of sharing my calendar with friends etc.
I can see this becoming a huge feature for me with relation to Windows Live Events which I am not currently using to its potential (primarily because most of my colleagues are still using facebook…for now).
My contacts and calendar on my laptop are thus synced with the Live Servers, and by using Outlook Connector on my desktop – any changes I make on my laptop are eventually synced through to my desktop as well. The only reason I am still using Outlook for the time being is the lack of calendar sync available through Windows Live Moble (or Acive Sync with Live Mail). I love the fact that I have one contact list that spans over three devices (desktop, laptop, phone) – and thus I am never without the ability to get involved, check emails or update a contacts details – knowing that everything will sync up by the time I get home. I really hope the calendar function is brought to Windows Mobile so I can ditch Outlook altogether.
Keeping up with feeds certainly keeps me busy throughout the day, totally geek, totally worth it – I am always keeping an eye out for the newest crazes in technology, especially when related to tablet PCs. Windows Live Mail gives me the chance to view these along side my emails, keeping my major forms of communication in one window, keeping the resources used down, and my productivity up.
Live Sync
I have been a long time favourite of this program, using it years ago when it was still Foldershare. As i am constantly using two
different machines, It is nice to know that I can back up all of my university documents, and have them accessible at both locations. I am often working on a document while at Uni, and when I’ve finished up and got home, I can go straight back to my desktop and getting working straight away from where i left off on the previous machine! Again, it is not too much effort to send the file to myself or transfer via a USB stick, but the fact I dont have to even think about that is always going to be a bonus!
I can only imagine the trouble I would be in if Live Sync didn’t include the option of remotely accessing my files, on the occasions where I have travelled somewhere (Univeristy, or a friends house) and not brought my laptop with me containing a file we need to work on, I know I can just log in to Live Sync webpage and remotely access the file from my desktop at home. genius! a quick download and magic the file is there and ready to rock.
Sky Drive
I haven’t used this as much as I though I may have, but certainly the sheer size of the storage is amazing, 25gb of space for me to use, for free! awesome! I have my most recent photos of my holiday trips saved to skydrive/spaces – along with the odd public document relating to a charity event I am trying to organize etc. I love the fact that I can change the permissions, so the photo’s of the other nights drunken night out can be shared only with specific people, or among friends, and the general public never have to know, they can just browse my holiday photos instead ;o)
If I only had the one machine, I can assure you I would be backing all my work to skydrive in the rare occasion that something terrible happened to my only working copy, but as most of my files are backed up between two machines, I have never really required Skydrive as a cloud space.
Live Photo Gallery
What a wonderful program, so easy to use, yet so powerful at the same time! I remember Using Microsoft’s Digital Image a few years ago, and I love how similar Live Photo is – yet it is totally free! The fact that there are addins for simply uploading to facebook and other sites as well as Live Spaces shows how integral this has become when sharing photos! What with the photo stitching for amazing panoramic views as well? Being able to tag photos, and tag people in photos! makes the whole sharing experience so much more fun. Check out Live Upload 2.0 for even better integration with Facebook too!
Live Spaces
Well, if it wasnt for these, I wouldn’t be writing this story up now! Live spaces has recently become such a favourite of mine, possibly
more than facebook etc, just because of its sheer integration with the rest of the live services! Being able to see whats going on with my mates through the What’s New feature in Messenger, or updating my own status through messenger also! Having a blog where I can ramble away next to my public files and photos gives people access into my life, (permissions allowed) – and I have full control of what is available to everyone! I recently read somewhere that Live Spaces would include more integration with facebook in the form of web events on my homepage just shows how much work the live team are putting in for a world wide access and community regardless of the preffered platform that you or your colleagues use.
Even when I am away from my own machine and have to log on to a machine, at a friends or in a library, the Windows Live homepage gives me access to me emails, what my friends are doing, everything is presented clean and simple so I can get everything I need to know at first glance.
Overall
I have not mention Live Mesh in this particular instance as I currently do not use that service, though I will further discuss in another post how important I think Live Mesh could be in the future!
I think the guys at Windows Live deserve the greatest credit as the work they are putting into these products is obvious, and they are certainly buidling a tight integrated set of tools that I personally feel I would struggle without, I mean I know that all of the programs available have alternatives from third parties, but there is no chance they would work as well as the Windows Live products do together, so I have no need to try them as everything works just as I want…..with the exception of the calendar sync with Windows phones. I feel that if they could integrate that in the next build, I would certainly be one of their biggest fans, I cannot see why it can’t be done, and it seems such a shame that it is not included already. One can only hope!
I know this is quite a long post, I haven’t touched upon all of the services Windows Live produce, but hopefully this can give an insight into how Windows Live works for me, and maybe inspire others to use it in a similar way.
Oh – and all my posts are witten using Windows Live Writer, but maybe I will save that story for another day!
