CA2568975A1 - System and method for improving the efficiency, comfort, and/or reliability in operating systems, such as for example windows - Google Patents

Abstract

ABSTRACT

Although MS Windows (in its various versions) is at present the most popular OS
(Operating System) in personal computers, after years of consecutive improvements there are still various issues which need to be improved, which include for example issues of efficiency, comfort, and/or reliability. The present invention tries to solve the above problems in new ways that include considerable improvements over the prior art. Preferably the system allows for example a "Reset" function, which means that preferably an Image of the state of the OS (including all loaded software) is saved immediately after a successful boot on the disk or other non-volatile memory and is preferably automatically updated when new drivers and/or software that change the state after a boot are added, so that if the system gets stuck it can be instantly restarted as if it has been rebooted. Other features include for example solving the problem that the focus can be grabbed while the user is typing something, allowing the user to easily define or increase or decrease the priority of various processes or open windows, a powerful undo feature that can include preferably even any changes to the hard disk, improved undo features in word processing, improved file comparison features, being able for example to track changes retroactively, improved backup features, and many additional improvements. The application covers also improvements that are related for example to Word processing (since for example in Microsoft Windows, Word behaves like an integral part of the system) and things that are related to the user's Internet surfing experience (This is important since for example in Microsoft Windows, Internet Explorer is practically an integral part of the OS). The invention deals also with some preferable improvements in the performance of the hard disk and also with some other smart computerized devices.

Claims (49)

1. A System for improving the efficiency, comfort, and/or reliability in Operating Systems, comprising at least one of:
a. A mechanism for instant Resetting of the OS into the normal state it would be in after a successful boot, without the need to boot at all;
b. A mechanism for automatically scanning the nonvolatile memory in the background without significantly slowing down the computer after a boot or a Reset while allowing the user to immediately start working after the boot or Reset;
c. A mechanism for preventing other programs from snatching the focus while the user is typing;
d. A mechanism for allowing the user to install a new Operating System in another partition or directory with copying the desktop of the original system to the new system and automatically converting as many programs as possible to work in the new system;
e. An automatic rollback feature that is adapted to enable undoing any changes on the non-volatile memory;
f. Independent access mechanisms to at least one rollback area, so as not to adversely affect speed of access to the normal data areas;
g. Independent access mechanisms to at least one FAT area, so as not to adversely affect speed of access to the normal data areas;
h. Improved versions of at least one of Word processors and Internet browsers and/or other applications.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein an Image of the state of the OS is saved immediately after a successful boot on non-volatile memory and is automatically updated when new drivers and/or software that changes the state after a boot is added.

3. The system of claim 2 wherein more than one Image can be saved, so that the system can preferably go back also to the previous Image when needed.

4. The system of any of the above claims wherein whenever the system gets stuck and/or the user wants to clear the computer's memory and go back to a state like after a normal boot, the user can cause the computer's memory to instantly Reset from the saved Image, without a need to go through a boot sequence at all.

5. The system of claim 4 wherein for activating said Reset, the user's request is sensed by at least one of: Hardware, and Some process that runs below the Operating system and thus in not affected even when the system becomes stuck.

6. The system of any of claims 2-5 wherein at least one of the following features exist:

a. Any cut & paste buffers are automatically saved also on the disk or other non-volatile memory, so that they can be immediately available on the next boot or after the next Reset;
b. Any currently edited files or windows are automatically saved on the disk or other non-volatile memory after sufficient minimal changes have accumulated, so that they can be immediately available on the next boot or after the next Reset;
c. After a fast-boot or Reset that uses the memory Image, and/or even during or after a normal boot, if the FAT of the disks or other non-volatile memory needs to be checked, it is done in the background and without significantly slowing down the disk or the CPU, after the user can already start working;
d. The disk or other non-volatile memory scanning software is backed up by hardware, by using special area or areas dedicated for FAT
information, and independent access means are used for read and write in those areas;
e. Any reading or writing of files is done with the aid of using separate access means to access the FAT area or areas.

7. The system of any of the above claims wherein when the user is in the middle of typing something, the focus can be automatically snatched away by another program only under at least one of the following limitations:

a. The change of focus can occur only after the user has stopped typing for a certain minimal period;
b. The focus can be snatch by other programs only in case of emergency, c. The focus can be snatched by other programs only in case of emergency, and such emergency can be decided only by at least one of: The OS, the security system of the computer, the firewall, and any other software which has been given explicit permission by the user to have such rights;
d. Programs are not allowed to snatch away the focus while the user is in the middle of typing something, but in case of emergency, instead of snatching away the focus, important messages can be displayed by flashing a message and/or other conspicuous visual means and/or by audible sound, so that the user's attention can be immediately grabbed, without automatically disturbing his typing efforts;

e. If the focus is snatched while the user was typing, his keystrokes continue to be kept in a buffer, so that when the user notices that the focus has changed and goes back to the original window where he was typing, the keys that he typed while the focus has changed are again available.

8. The system of any of the above claims wherein when installing a new OS in a new directory or partition, the new system copies the desktop configuration and links from the old system into the desktop of the new system, and at least one of the following is done in order to enable the links in the new desktop to work in the new OS:

a. During installation of the new system, the system tries to automatically convert components that are different between the two systems to work on the new system;
b. During installation of the new system, the system tries to locate the original files which were used for the installation and then tries to reinstall automatically the correct drivers or components that are needed for the new system;
c. Each Windows system keeps information about the path and name of the original file from which it was installed in at least one of: The registry, and At least one directory where the installed program or component or drivers resides;
d. If the system does not success in converting the relevant links to work on the new system, then the system does at least one of the following:
1. The system marks the relevant links on the new desktop as non-operational and encourages the user to look for other versions of those programs that are fitted to work on the new system, and 2. The system allows the link to activate the version that runs under the old system or creates another copy of it, and uses emulation of the old system when needed in order to let it run;
e. A new protocol for installing programs is implemented so that each installation of new software installs both the appropriate drivers or components and at least one set of alternate drivers or components for additional OS, and each time the program is loaded into memory the appropriate set of drivers or components is automatically chosen by the OS, and the parts of the installation that require updating registries and/or installing various components in system directories are suspended and are executed automatically when the new OS is activated for the first time.

9. The system of any of the above claims wherein changes that happen on at least one of {the hard disk, other non-volatile fast access memory, and other connected writeble media} are completely undo-able at least for a certain time period or as long as there is sufficient room for saving the info needed for the undo, by using at least one hardware supported rollback area.

10. The system of claim 9 wherein the undo feature is accomplished by at least one of the following features:
a. At least one rollback buffer is kept and is encrypted and is highly guarded and/or is kept also in more than one place;
b. Even commands such as format or re-partition or even low-level format are not able to destroy the at least one rollback area, so at least a certain percent of the non-volatile memory is always reserved for the rollback info;

c. The rollback logs or at least the most recent changes in them are always backed up in at least two or more separate places and/or also protected by additional encryption and/or redundancy data, so that damages can be fixed;
d. Only an explicit command by the user entered directly by the user to the operating system through a direct command can restore changes from the rollback, so no malicious program can activate the command;
e. When the user requests to restore things from the rollback, the log is still kept, so that the user can also redo the "undo" by simply moving again forward on the rollback log, thus reinserting the cancelled changes, and new changes to the rollback from that point on are kept on a separate part or buffer or branch, so that making additional changes from that point on will not overwrite the original "forward"
part of the rollback;
f. When going again forwards the user is shown the various branches that exist and can choose the appropriate one;
g. The rollback file or files use one or more circular buffers, so when it is full the oldest changes logged are deleted by overwriting them with the new data, and pointers to the logical beginning and end of each circular buffer are updated accordingly;
h. If the hard disk senses that the boot was not made from it, it will block all further changes after the log file becomes too full, and request the user to boot from the hard disk;
i. There are two types of low-level write commands, one with rollback enabled and one without, so that the rollback enabled write is used for important data and the normal write is used for at least one of unimportant data, temporary file areas and swap file areas;
j. At least one of the operating system and the computer's security system decide when to use the rollback enabled write and when to use the normal write;
k. If a malicious program tries to create suspicious massive changes on purpose in order to fill the rollback buffer, it is intercepted as highly suspicious behavior.

11. The system of any of the above claims wherein the hardware supported undo can be used also for each file separately, by at least one of:

a. Saving a separate rollback buffer or entry for each file;
b. Each log entry contains also the name and full path of the relevant file, so that the user can choose if to use an "undo" on the entire disk or only on a specific file or directory or group of files or group of directories;

c. Said path info changes only when the changes start referring to a separate file, so as long as the changes are in one file, no overhead of repeating the path is needed.

12.The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one separate FAT
area on the non-volatile memory is used with independent access that does not slow down access to normal data areas.

13. The system of any of the above claims wherein said non-volatile memory is at least one hard disk and said independent access is based on at least one independent read/write head for accessing the at least one separate FAT area.

14. The system of any of the above claims wherein said non-volatile memory is Magnetic RAM and said independent access is based on at least one of independent communication channel, and independent processor.

15. The system of any of the above claims wherein said non-volatile memory is at least one of writeable or rewriteable CDs or DVDs and at least two separate laser beams are used - at least one for the normal data and at least one for the at least one special FAT area.

16. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of separate FAT

area access and separate Rollback area access are enabled, by at least one of:

a. Using a separate access to the at least one separate rollback area and a different separate access to the at least one separate FAT area;
b. Using the same at least one special area with special access for both the rollback and the FAT;
c. The disks or other non-volatile memory contain also one or more processors that can themselves conduct the comparison between the files and the FAT, so that it can be done in the background even with little or no consuming of CPU resources from the computer itself.

17. A method for improving the efficiency, comfort, and/or reliability in Operating Systems, based on at least one of the following steps:

a. Providing a mechanism for instant Resetting of the OS into the normal state it would be in after a successful boot, without the need to boot at all;
b. Providing a mechanism for automatically scanning the nonvolatile memory in the background without significantly slowing down the computer after a boot or a Reset while allowing the user to immediately start working after the boot or Reset;
c. Providing a mechanism for preventing other programs from snatching the focus while the user is typing;
d. Providing a mechanism for allowing the user to install a new Operating System in another partition or directory with copying the desktop of the original system to the new system and automatically converting as many programs as possible to work in the new system;
e. Providing an automatic rollback feature that is adapted to enable undoing any changes on the non-volatile memory, f. Providing independent access mechanisms to at least one rollback area, so as not to adversely affect speed of access to the normal data areas;
g. Providing independent access mechanisms to at least one FAT area, so as not to adversely affect speed of access to the normal data areas;
h. Providing improved versions of at least one of Word processors and Internet browsers and/or other applications.

18. The method of claim 17 wherein an Image of the state of the OS is saved immediately after a successful boot on non-volatile memory and is automatically updated when new drivers and/or software that changes the state after a boot is added.

19. The method of claim 18 wherein more than one Image can be saved, so that the system can preferably go back also to the previous Image when needed.

20. The method of any of the above claims wherein whenever at least one of {a.
The system gets stuck, b. The user wants to clear the computer's memory and go back to a state like after a normal boot), the user can cause the computer's memory to instantly Reset from the saved Image, without a need to go through a boot sequence at all.

21. The method of claim 20 wherein for activating said Reset, the user's request is sensed by at least one of: Hardware, and Some process that runs below the Operating system and thus in not affected even when the system becomes stuck.

22. The method of any of claims 18-21 wherein at least one of the following features exist:
a. Any cut & paste buffers are automatically saved also on the disk or other non-volatile memory, so that they can be immediately available on the next boot or after the next Reset;
b. Any currently edited files or windows are automatically saved on the disk or other non-volatile memory after sufficient minimal changes have accumulated, so that they can be immediately available on the next boot or after the next Reset;

c. After a fast-boot or Reset that uses the memory Image, and/or even during or after a normal boot, if the FAT of the disks or other non-volatile memory needs to be checked, it is done in the background and without significantly slowing down the disk or the CPU, after the user can already start working;

d. The disk or other non-volatile memory scanning software is backed up by hardware, by using special area or areas dedicated for FAT
information, and independent access means are used for read and write in those areas;
e. Any reading or writing of files is done with the aid of using separate access means to access the FAT area or areas.

23. The method of any of the above claims wherein when the user is in the middle of typing something, the focus can be automatically snatched away by another program only under at least one of the following limitations:

a. The change of focus can occur only after the user has stopped typing for a certain minimal period;
b. The focus can be snatch by other programs only in case of emergency;
c. The focus can be snatched by other programs only in case of emergency, and such emergency can be decided only by at least one of: The OS, the security system of the computer, the firewall, and any other software which has been given explicit permission by the user to have such rights;
d. Programs are not allowed to snatch away the focus while the user is in the middle of typing something, but in case of emergency, instead of snatching away the focus, important messages can be displayed by flashing a message and/or other conspicuous visual means and/or by audible sound, so that the user's attention can be immediately grabbed, without automatically disturbing his typing efforts;
e. If the focus is snatched while the user was typing, his keystrokes continue to be kept in a buffer, so that when the user notices that the focus has changed and goes back to the original window where he was typing, the keys that he typed while the focus has changed are again available.

24. The method of any of the above claims wherein when installing a new OS in a new directory or partition, the new system copies the desktop configuration and links from the old system into the desktop of the new system, and at least one of the following is done in order to enable the links in the new desktop to work in the new OS:

a. During installation of the new system, the system tries to automatically convert components that are different between the two systems to work on the new system;

b. During installation of the new system, the system tries to locate the original files which were used for the installation and then tries to reinstall automatically the correct drivers or components that are needed for the new system;

c. Each Windows system keeps information about the path and name of the original file from which it was installed in at least one of: The registry, and At least one directory where the installed program or component or drivers resides;
d. If the system does not success in converting the relevant links to work on the new system, then the system does at least one of the following:
1. The system marks the relevant links on the new desktop as non-operational and encourages the user to look for other versions of those programs that are fitted to work on the new system, and 2. The system allows the link to activate the version that runs under the old system or creates another copy of it, and uses emulation of the old system when needed in order to let it run;
e. A new protocol for installing programs is implemented so that each installation of new software installs both the appropriate drivers or components and at least one set of alternate drivers or components for additional OS, and each time the program is loaded into memory the appropriate set of drivers or components is automatically chosen by the OS, and the parts of the installation that require updating registries and/or installing various components in system directories are suspended and are executed automatically when the new OS is activated for the first time.

25. The method of any of the above claims wherein changes that happen on at least one of {the hard disk, other non-volatile fast access memory, and other connected writeble media} are completely undo-able at least for a certain time period or as long as there is sufficient room for saving the info needed for the undo, by using at least one hardware supported rollback area.

26. The method of claim 25 wherein the undo feature is accomplished by at least one of the following features:
a. At least one rollback buffer is kept and is encrypted and is highly guarded and/or is kept also in more than one place;
b. Even commands such as format or re-partition or even low-level format are not able to destroy the at least one rollback area, so at least a certain percent of the non-volatile memory is always reserved for the rollback info;

c. The rollback logs or at least the most recent changes in them are always backed up in at least two or more separate places and/or also protected by additional encryption and/or redundancy data, so that damages can be fixed;
d. Only an explicit command by the user entered directly by the user to the operating system through a direct command can restore changes from the rollback, so no malicious program can activate the command;
e. When the user requests to restore things from the rollback, the log is still kept, so that the user can also redo the "undo" by simply moving again forward on the rollback log, thus reinserting the cancelled changes, and new changes to the rollback from that point on are kept on a separate part or buffer or branch, so that making additional changes from that point on will not overwrite the original "forward"
part of the rollback;
f. When going again forwards the user is shown the various branches that exist and can choose the appropriate one;
g. The rollback file or files use one or more circular buffers, so when it is full the oldest changes logged are deleted by overwriting them with the new data, and pointers to the logical beginning and end of each circular buffer are updated accordingly;

h. If the hard disk senses that the boot was not made from it, it will block all further changes after the log file becomes too full, and request the user to boot from the hard disk;
i. There are two types of low-level write commands, one with rollback enabled and one without, so that the rollback enabled write is used for important data and the normal write is used for at least one of unimportant data, temporary file areas and swap file areas;

j. At least one of the operating system and the computer's security system decide when to use the rollback enabled write and when to use the normal write;
k. If a malicious program tries to create suspicious massive changes on purpose in order to fill the rollback buffer, it is intercepted as highly suspicious behavior.

27. The method of any of the above claims wherein the hardware supported undo can be used also for each file separately, by at least one of:
a. Saving a separate rollback buffer or entry for each file;
b. Each log entry contains also the name and full path of the relevant file, so that the user can choose if to use an "undo" on the entire disk or only on a specific file or directory or group of files or group of directories;
c. Said path info changes only when the changes start referring to a separate file, so as long as the changes are in one file, no overhead of repeating the path is needed.

28. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one separate FAT
area on the non-volatile memory is used with independent access that does not slow down access to normal data areas.

29. The method of any of the above claims wherein said non-volatile memory is at least one hard disk and said independent access is based on at least one independent read/write head for accessing the at least one separate FAT area.

30. The method of any of the above claims wherein said non-volatile memory is Magnetic RAM and said independent access is based on at least one of independent communication channel, and independent processor.

31. The method of any of the above claims wherein said non-volatile memory is at least one of writeable or rewriteable CDs or DVDs and at least two separate laser beams are used - at least one for the normal data and at least one for the at least one special FAT area.

32. The method of any of the above claims wherein at least one of separate FAT

area access and separate Rollback area access are enabled, by at least one of:

a. Using a separate access to the at least one separate rollback area and a different separate access to the at least one separate FAT area;
b. Using the same at least one special area with special access for both the rollback and the FAT;
c. The disks or other non-volatile memory contain also one or more processors that can themselves conduct the comparison between the files and the FAT, so that it can be done in the background even with little or no consuming of CPU resources from the computer itself.

33. The system of any of the above claims wherein any changes in the entire hard disk or other types of preferably fast mass storage non-volatile memory after or during installation of new software, are completely undo-able at least for a certain time period by using a rollback buffer.

34. The system of any of the above claims wherein each program or each installation directory has by default only up to a certain percent of the rollback areas allocate to it, so that it cannot take up too much of the rollback resources unless given explicit permission by the user.

35. The method of any of the above claims wherein any changes in the entire hard disk or other types of preferably fast mass storage non-volatile memory after or during installation of new software, are completely undo-able at least for a certain time period by using a rollback buffer.

36. The method of any of the above claims wherein each program or each installation directory has by default only up to a certain percent of the rollback areas allocate to it, so that it cannot take up too much of the rollback resources unless given explicit permission by the user.

37. The system of any of the above claims wherein the system runs a minimal scandisk in advance at most only on the area where the image itself is stored or does that only if there is some CRC problem when trying to get the image, since only that area might have to be scanned before the boot or Reset if there is a problem.

38. The system of any of the above claims wherein clicking with the mouse on any part of the desktop and/or pressing Alt-Tab until a clear-desk-top icon is selected and/or pressing one ore more special keys will immediately bring the desktop fully into the foreground so that other windows that cover parts of it move down to the task bar.

39. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exist regarding priority of processes:
a. The user can easily define the desired priority level for a processes by clicking on the place where the priority is indicated at or near the taskbar and/or on the window of the process, by at least one of:
Defining percentages, Increasing or decreasing some default values in discrete steps, and Using more general definitions, such as "Very high, high, medium, low, very low";
b. The OS indicates to the user clearly the priority level of each process, at or near the task bar and/or at the top line of the window of the process, by at least one of Colors, numeric values, textual values, and appropriate icons, the level of priority that has been given to each process, by indicating it near or on each square in the taskbar that shows active processes or elsewhere;
c. The OS remembers the priorities given by the user to various processes and uses these defaults or at least takes them into consideration for assigning automatically the priorities the next time the user does similar things or activates the same processes, unless the user again changes the priorities;

d. The taskbar can show automatically how much percent of CPU is being used on average by each open process;

e. The priority of background and/or foreground processes is automatically dynamically increased according to the type of the work the user is doing in the foreground window;
f. If the user changes the priority by clicking on something on the process window itself, the user is asked if to keep a high priority for this process also when it is in background, or this is the assumed default and the user has to indicate if he wishes otherwise;

g. If the user changes the priority by clicking at or near the taskbar then preferably the system assumes automatically that this refers to the process when running in background;

40. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exist regarding resetting the state of the peripheral devices during Reset or during an instant boot:

a. Peripheral devices can be instantly reset to their original status as it would exist after a normal boot by improving the standard protocol of drivers so that they have a function for instant reset;
b. Device drivers can instantly query the device to see if it is in a proper state or needs to be reset;
c. The system constantly updates some area in non-volatile memory or some buffer or stack with the current state of the devices, so that it can be instantly determined if any of the devices was involved in a crash or needs reset;

d. At least one or more of the devices can be kept in its current state if the user so desires instead of resetting;
e. During or after the reset the system asks the user if he wants various devices to remain in their previous states, or it is defined as default before any reset is needed and the user can change it;
f. If any tests or resets are still needed in one or more devices which cannot be done instantly, the system can automatically decide which devices are not critical and can therefore be dealt with in the background after the user can already start working, in a way similar to postponing the disks scan;
g. When a restore or an instant boot is performed, the image is first reloaded into memory including all the drivers as if they have already checked and/or reset the relevant devices, and then the drivers are instructed to activate the instant actual reset on the actual devices, so that the state of the device conforms to the state that the driver is supposed to represent;
h. The data on the status of any peripheral devices that can be saved in the image includes also any plug and play data for such devices and/or for any other card or relevant elements in the computer, so that no plug and play automatic tests are normally needed during booting;
i. At least during any boot or reset that is not based on turning off and turning on again the computer (cold boot) the system can automatically identify if it is being reset or rebooted without a cold boot, and if so, it simply uses automatically the plug-and-play solution or configuration that was used last time as saved in the image;
j. Even if a cold-boot is done, the system can check instantly if the configuration of devices and/or cards and/or other relevant elements has changed or is the same as the last image, and thus avoid any unnecessary plug-and-play checks and instantly choose the configuration used last time.

41. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exist:
a. The user can define or save the normal task bar itself or parts of it, so that upon any boot it is available again by default;
b. The user can for define group-icons, which means that a single icon can connect a number of icons so that when the user clicks the group icon a number of applications will open automatically, with or without restoring also their exact arrangement of the desktop.

42. A System for improving the efficiency, comfort, and/or reliability in Operating Systems, wherein in at least one word processor at least one of the following features exist:
a. New changes after an undo are kept on a separate part or buffer or branch, so that making additional changes from that point on will not overwrite the original "forward" part of in case the user wants to redo it again, and when going again forwards the user is shown the various branches that exist and can choose the appropriate one;
b. If the user types something by mistake while "overwrite" is pressed when he actually intended to use normal insert mode, the overwritten part is always saved automatically in some buffer and the user can press a button or buttons which instantly restore the lost text as if the mode has been "insert" instead of "overwrite";

c. The Undo in word processors is also improved so that even deleting the entire contents of the file and saving it is undoable;
d. There is a file-compare feature that can show exactly the textual differences between two or more files while disregarding irrelevant data such as line breaks and fonts.

43. The method of any of the above claims wherein the system runs a minimal scandisk in advance at most only on the area where the image itself is stored or does that only if there is some CRC problem when trying to get the image, since only that area might have to be scanned before the boot or Reset if there is a problem.

44. The method of any of the above claims wherein clicking with the mouse on any part of the desktop and/or pressing Alt-Tab until a clear-desk-top icon is selected and/or pressing one ore more special keys will immediately bring the desktop fully into the foreground so that other windows that cover parts of it move down to the task bar.

45. The method of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exist regarding priority of processes:

a. The user can easily define the desired priority level for a processes by clicking on the place where the priority is indicated at or near the taskbar and/or on the window of the process, by at least one of Defining percentages, Increasing or decreasing some default values in discrete steps, and Using more general definitions, such as "Very high, high, medium, low, very low";
b. The OS indicates to the user clearly the priority level of each process, at or near the task bar and/or at the top line of the window of the process, by at least one of: Colors, numeric values, textual values, and appropriate icons, the level of priority that has been given to each process, by indicating it near or on each square in the taskbar that shows active processes or elsewhere;
c. The OS remembers the priorities given by the user to various processes and uses these defaults or at least takes them into consideration for assigning automatically the priorities the next time the user does similar things or activates the same processes, unless the user again changes the priorities;

d. The taskbar can show automatically how much percent of CPU is being used on average by each open process;

e. The priority of background and/or foreground processes is automatically dynamically increased according to the type of the work the user is doing in the foreground window;
f. If the user changes the priority by clicking on something on the process window itself, the user is asked if to keep a high priority for this process also when it is in background, or this is the assumed default and the user has to indicate if he wishes otherwise;
g. If the user changes the priority by clicking at or near the taskbar then preferably the system assumes automatically that this refers to the process when running in background.

46. The method of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exist regarding resetting the state of the peripheral devices during Reset or during an instant boot:
a. Peripheral devices can be instantly reset to their original status as it would exist after a normal boot by improving the standard protocol of drivers so that they have a function for instant reset;
b. Device drivers can instantly query the device to see if it is in a proper state or needs to be reset;
c. The system constantly updates some area in non-volatile memory or some buffer or stack with the current state of the devices, so that it can be instantly determined if any of the devices was involved in a crash or needs reset;
d. At least one or more of the devices can be kept in its current state if the user so desires instead of resetting;

e. During or after the reset the system asks the user if he wants various devices to remain in their previous states, or it is defined as default before any reset is needed and the user can change it;
f. If any tests or resets are still needed in one or more devices which cannot be done instantly, the system can automatically decide which devices are not critical and can therefore be dealt with in the background after the user can already start working, in a way similar to postponing the disks scan;

g. When a restore or an instant boot is performed, the image is first reloaded into memory including all the drivers as if they have already checked and/or reset the relevant devices, and then the drivers are instructed to activate the instant actual reset on the actual devices, so that the state of the device conforms to the state that the driver is supposed to represent;
h. The data on the status of any peripheral devices that can be saved in the image includes also any plug and play data for such devices and/or for any other card or relevant elements in the computer, so that no plug and play automatic tests are normally needed during booting;

i. At least during any boot or reset that is not based on turning off and turning on again the computer (cold boot) the system can automatically identify if it is being reset or rebooted without a cold boot, and if so, it simply uses automatically the plug-and-play solution or configuration that was used last time as saved in the image;
j. Even if a cold-boot is done, the system can check instantly if the configuration of devices and/or cards and/or other relevant elements has changed or is the same as the last image, and thus avoid any unnecessary plug-and-play checks and instantly choose the configuration used last time.

47. The method of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exist:
a. The user can define or save the normal task bar itself or parts of it, so that upon any boot it is available again by default;
b. The user can for define group-icons, which means that a single icon can connect a number of icons so that when the user clicks the group icon a number of applications will open automatically, with or without restoring also their exact arrangement of the desktop.

48. A method for improving the efficiency, comfort, and/or reliability in Operating Systems, wherein at least one of the following features exist:

a. New changes after an undo are kept on a separate part or buffer or branch, so that making additional changes from that point on will not overwrite the original "forward" part of in case the user wants to redo it again, and when going again forwards the user is shown the various branches that exist and can choose the appropriate one;
b. If the user types something by mistake while "overwrite" is pressed when he actually intended to use normal insert mode, the overwritten part is always saved automatically in some buffer and the user can press a button or buttons which instantly restore the lost text as if the mode has been "insert" instead of "overwrite";
c. The Undo in word processors is also improved so that even deleting the entire contents of the file and saving it is undoable;

d. There is a file-compare feature that can show exactly the textual differences between two or more files while disregarding irrelevant data such as line breaks and fonts;
e. Switching the dictionary also automatically switches the language correspondingly in the small window or area where the word has to be entered;
f. When using the dictionary the user can use also forward and/or backwards movement, so that he can go back or forward to previously checked words;
g. If there is a digit in the middle of a word (and/or if it is attached at the beginning of the word) it is at least marked as a possible error;
h. When opening files with the windows dialogue box the dialogue box automatically adjusts its size to a size that is sufficiently large to display the full file name if one or more of the file names that are displayed is longer than the default, and/or a slide bar is added (for example at the bottom) that allows the user to scroll and see the full name;
i. If a file name is even too long to fit the line even when the dialogue box is in full size and/or to fit the top line of the Word Window and/or the window of other applications and/or the explanation box, the filename is preferably automatically wrapped into two or more lines and/or the font that displays the file name is automatically reduced in size by making it smaller and/or by making it thinner, and/or the user can click or otherwise jump to the end of the line and see the rest of the file name and/or cause the filename to scroll;
j. When deleting a file in the dialogue box that displays existing file names, by default immediately after the deletion the display is updated so that the list of files is displayed more or less in the same position.

49. An Operating System wherein in at least one word processor at least one of the following features exists:
a. Two files can be merged into a single file with highlighted changes just as if one of the files was created out of the other while keeping the "highlight changes" option to On;
b. Cut & paste of one file over another file and/or cut & paste of any section over another section when "highlight changes" is set to ON

automatically generates the highlighted changes between the two sections as if they were made by actually changing one to the other;
c. The word processing program behaves consistently with cut & paste where Internet pages are involved, so that if the links are to local images then they are automatically inserted into the document file itself, and if they are based on links to the actual Internet then they are included internally in the document and/or are saved as links, and/or the user has a choice about this;
d. The word processing program remembers automatically in the "Open file" dialogue box and/or in the "Save" dialogue box if the user typed last time a filename (or path) in English or in another language and leaves this as the default for the next time;
e. The user can undo the last changes even after closing and reopening a file, and this enabled by saving the undo data in the file itself, or by saving it in another local file, so that the original file only contains a link to the associated local undo file;
f. The word processor program allows the user also options of searching and/or substituting based on or including style and/or shape and/or size and/or color instead of just character strings;

g. The word processor program allows the user also options of searching for the next marked changes;
h. Combining two paragraphs or deleting the empty line between them does not change the fonts or style of the first paragraph, and fonts and/or style in the 2nd paragraph change after connecting it with the 1st paragraph only if the user allows this by default or requests this specifically;
i. If the user wants to mark large areas with the mouse, while the mouse key is still pressed, the user can use other location commands instead of waiting for the pages to scroll, and then the entire area till the next location becomes marked;

j. If the user wants to mark large areas with the mouse, pressing some key can significantly increase the speed of the scrolling;
k. If the user wants to mark large areas with the mouse, moving the mouse further to a more extreme position significantly increases the speed of the scrolling;
l. If the user wants to mark large areas with the mouse, moving the mouse further to a more extreme position significantly increases the speed of the scrolling and said effect is at least one linear and exponential;
m. If the user already marked a section for example with the mouse and then uses the mouse to click on something else and then wants to go back and increase or decrease the marked area, he can still use the mouse and/or other keys to go back and extend or reduce the section without having to start marking again from the beginning;

n. If the user first marks the entire file he/she then use the mouse and/or other keys to reduce the marked section or remove parts of it;
o. The user can choose a specific font color and/or font attribute, which is kept automatically until changed again, so that this text appears wherever the user adds it to previous text, regardless of the color or other attributes of the previous text where the new text is inserted;
p. The user can also search for numbers or letters of logical paragraph numbering;

h. The word processor program allows the user also options of searching for the next word marked as possible error;
i. Combining two paragraphs or deleting the empty line between them does not change the fonts or style of the first paragraph, and fonts and/or style in the 2nd paragraph change after connecting it with the 1st paragraph only if the user allows this by default or requests this specifically;
j. If the user wants to mark large areas with the mouse, while the mouse key is still pressed, the user can use other location commands instead of waiting for the pages to scroll, and then the entire area till the next location becomes marked;

k. If the user wants to mark large areas with the mouse, pressing some key can significantly increase the speed of the scrolling;
1. If the user wants to mark large areas with the mouse, moving the mouse further to a more extreme position significantly increases the speed of the scrolling;

m. If the user already marked a section for example with the mouse and then uses the mouse to click on something else and then wants to go back and increase or decrease the marked area, he can still use the mouse and/or other keys to go back and extend or reduce the section without having to start marking again from the beginning;
n. If the user first marks the entire file he/she can then use the mouse and/or other keys to reduce the marked section or remove parts of it;

o. The user can choose a specific font color and/or font attribute, which is kept automatically until changed again, so that this text appears wherever the user adds it to previous text, regardless of the color or other attributes of the previous text where the new text is inserted;
p. The user can also search for numbers or letters of logical paragraph numbering;
q. The user can automatically reformat all the logically numbered paragraphs globally or in a marked section that contains multiple indentation levels, by at least on of: defining the indentation for each level, and defining general incremental indentation rules;

51. A System for improving the efficiency, comfort, and/or reliability in Operating Systems, comprising at least one of:
a. A mechanism for allowing the user to define at least one User which the system will enter by default and without a password if the user does not request to enter a particular User after a certain time;
b. A mechanism for allowing the user to define at least one User which the system will enter by default and without a password if the user does not request to enter a particular User after a certain time, and wherein if the system enters the User without password, it enters a limited mode where it takes no commands from the keyboard or mouse or has other limitations until the user enters some password;

c. A mechanism by which backup software can automatically rename the older versions of the same back-up-files on the backup media with some automatically sequenced extension, so that the user can automatically keep and track also older versions this way;

d. A mechanism for automatic backup of important files to the default backup directory and/or drive, so that each relevant file that has been created or changed and has not been updated for more than a certain time period, and/or after a certain threshold amount of change even if less time has elapsed, is automatically backed-up on the default back--up media;
e. A mechanism wherein during each boot the system keeps a log of all successful steps in the boot, and so even if a certain step causes a crash so that the system can't even report the problem, in the next boot the system knows by the incomplete step in the log exactly where it crashed the last time and can automatically complete the boot this time without the problematic step and can report to the user exactly what the problem was and/or can automatically remove the problem and/or offer the user to chose among a few possible corrections to the problem;
f. A mechanism for allowing the user to execute files in DOS mode also by clicking on or near their name instead of having to type it.

52. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:

a. If at least one of two compared files already contains marked changes, a different indication is used between the old changes and the new changes generated by the comparison;
b. If at least one of two compared files already contains marked changes, a different indication is used between the old changes and the new changes generated by the comparison, and said different indication is by at least one of: Using additional colors, using different special icons and/or marks near the old changes and/or near the new changes, using different special squares and/or other frames around the old and/or the new changes, using special fonts and/or other font characteristics, and marking the old changes are automatically by more faded or less lit colors;
c. When making file comparisons the system uses various heuristics in order to extract from the document important information about its structure, based on at least one of identifying headlines and identifying other different characteristics of various sections, and uses these cues to try to avoid erroneously mixing between sections;

d. When comparing files, if the user sees that one or more parts of the documents have not been properly merged, the user can mark the problematic section and tell the system to try again to merge more properly the problematic section or sections;

e. The system allows to compare also more than two files in each step, and so in the merged file of more than files changes that come from different files are marked in different colors or marked differentially by other methods;
f. When the track changes feature is On and the user breaks an automatically numbered paragraph, only the new break and the change in subsequent renumbering are shown, and the part after the break is not marked as new text, and when comparing files the same consistent difference is shown;

g. When a text is marked as deleted as a result of track changes or of file comparison the user can mark the deleted text or part of it and press a key or button or otherwise execute a command which can instantly undelete it;

h. The user can mark and copy text that is marked as deleted or any part of it and can paste it back at the same place or elsewhere as normal text;
i. The user can use a command that fades (or otherwise changes) the color of the older changes so that all the new changes from that point on will stand out;

j. The user can define separate colors for displaying the changes on the screen and when printed;
k. The user can define separate colors for displaying the changes on the screen and when printed, and by default the on-screen display is the automatic colors, and the printing by default in black if a black and white printer driver is used;
1. When comparing a group of two or more files, a summary table or other type of index can be automatically generated so that the table or index indicates which color was added on which date, so that the user can clearly see which change was entered at each date;
m. When comparing a group of two or more files, the date in which each section or element was added or changed is automatically indicated near the relevant text;
n. When comparing a group of two or more files, the files are automatically sorted by date before creating the comparison, and each new section or element is dated automatically according to the first time it appeared.

53. The system of any of the above claims wherein in a word processor URL
links are automatically and dynamically broken and restored between the lines as the paragraph changes, according to slashes and/or underlines and/or dots and/or other special characters, and when the user presses the link, it is treated as one consecutive link regardless of this automatically changing break between the lines.

54. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The word processor can allow the user to define page numbering that starts from a certain value other than 1;
b. The word processor can allow the user to define page numbering that starts from a certain value other than 1, by letting the user use a formula, so that the user can specify a variable that represents the page number plus some additional number;

c. Commands such as for example "copy" are extended so that multiple destinations can be used, so that for example copy "bet*.doc1:n:" will copy all the relevant files to both destination drives/directories;

d. When copying a large group of files the user also has an option of "No to all" if he is asked if to overwrite files with the same name;
e. When the user searches for files on the computer the "find files"
window allows him/her to enter also more than one file name at the same time, so that all the files can be searched for during the same disk access.

55. The system of any of the above claims wherein in statistical packages when correlations or other types of output are displayed for a large number of variables, at least one of the following features exists:
a. The user can instruct the system to automatically mark for him/her the most significant correlations and/or other result types;
b. The user can instruct the system to automatically mark for him/her the most significant results, and the criteria for which correlations and/or other result types are sufficiently significant can be at least one of Some default criteria defined by the user and/or automatically by the system, such as for example only correlations above a certain value and/or significance above a certain value, or the cutting points automatically and/or by user definition can change dynamically according to the results, and/or the best results are marked or displayed according to a certain top percentage;
c. The user can mark one or more sections of the results so that these automatic marking or statistics will be run only on parts of the results;
d. The system can report various meta-statistics, wherein said meta--statistics include at least one of: what percent of the correlations are beyond certain cutpoints, what is the significance of these meta--results, what number of results was marked out of what total, what percent it is, and what is the chance of having such a meta-results by chance;

e. The system use more than one type of mark, so that 2 or more levels of significance are marked differently, more conspicuously and/or with different colors;

f. The system can automatically sort the results according to their value and/or importance and/or significance;
g. Instead of marking correlations or other results, only the relevant results that fit the criteria and/or would have been marked are printed, thus saving paper and time;
h. Instead of marking correlations or other results, only the relevant results that fit the criteria and/or would have been marked are printed, thus saving paper and time, and this is accompanied by meta-statistics that refer also to the non-printed results;
i. The system can automatically and/or by user request generate also various graphs for visually displaying said meta-statistics;
j. For the marking and/or sorting and/or meta-statistics the system can automatically ignore at least one of: All the correlations of variables with themselves, and any other correlations that the user marked as less meaningful and/or that the system can automatically determine as being less meaningful;
k. The user can request to run various procedures also on lists of variables defined by exclusion;

1. The user can choose if the correlations will be sorted by absolute correlation, with negative correlations mixed with positive correlations, or the negative correlations appear separately;
m. The user can request that the sorting by correlation level be done separately automatically for each variable, so that for each variable the correlations are automatically sorted;
n. The user can request a combination, so that there is a sorting within each variable, but the variables themselves are automatically sorted so that the variables that have the highest correlations in general appear first.

56. The system of claim 55 wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. These automatic markings and/or meta-statistics can be applied for each statistical procedure or command separately or for to the entire set of procedures or commands on the same Run;
b. The system can automatically run the tests also on automatic randomly divided sub-samples, and the number and/or size of the sub-samples is determined automatically according to various rules and/or according to various parameters of the actual data;
c. The correlations (or other statistics results) can also be marked differently and/or displayed in a different section if they are more stable across random sub-sample tests, and/or their sorting can take these stability results also into account;

d. For defining automatic random sub-samples the user may choose among a number of pre-defined sets of rules or define his own rules, and these definitions can then be applied automatically to any of the normal statistical procedures that are used for that run.

57. A System for improving the efficiency, comfort, and/or reliability in Operating Systems, wherein at least one of the following features exists in Internet browsers and/or other programs that access the Internet:
a. The browser can request from the server also to retrieve just a part of an Internet page, as defined by a certain line and/or the value near certain words or areas or fields in the page, and this is supported by the server being able to search also normal web pages and send back just the desired data in response to such a request;

b. The user can mark a group of links in the history list and/or in the bookmarks list of the browser, and/or in any web page that contains links, so that after the user marks the desired group or groups of links, the browser can automatically open multiple windows so that each window accesses automatically one of the marked links and/or the browser can save multiple files automatically;

c. If multiple files are saved automatically, they are saved by default with their original names, or the user can define a group name which is incremented automatically to differentiate between the files in the group, and/or the system can automatically read he title in each of the files or web pages and use that as the name;
d. The user can easily reduce or increase the size of the printed fonts, by at least one of: A specific command when printing, and reducing or increasing the size of the fonts on the screen so that this affects automatically also the printing;

e. Reducing or increasing of fonts can be also done for a specific web page and/or for a specific site instead of Globally, since for example in Netscape the changed size remains also when;

f. The same command that reduces or increase the font size on the page (and/or another command) can cause also the images to automatically grow or shrink in addition to or instead of the fonts, and this can be done independently of changing the size of the Window;
g. The http protocol is improved so that images are automatically saved by web servers in more than one size and the browser can automatically request the same image again with some parameter that tells the server to send it in a larger size and then the server automatically sends again the same image in a larger size;

h. The user can mark a group of links in the history list and/or in the bookmarks list of the browser, and/or in any web page displayed by the browser that contains links, and can automatically print the group;
i. In sites where the user has to print separately each page in a document, the browser can allow the user to define a set of steps to be performed automatically, such as pressing the icon or link that leads to the next page and then printing it, so that after pressing the "next page" link and printing it, the user can activate a command that tells the browser for repeat the last N actions an additional M times and/or until it is no longer possible;
j. When pressing a Javascript button which designates a link with the right mouse key, the same options are available as when pressing the right mouse button over normal links, such as Open in a new Window instead of in the current window, or Save the link target instead of opening it;
k. When typing one or more words or part of a url address in the location window of the browser, the browser does not attempt to go automatically to the ".com" address, but can check also if the address can be resolved also to other Top Level Domains or domain extensions, and then preferably the browser opens e a scroll Window of the existing addresses and lets the user choose the desired one., and/or the browser can also check automatically in the background, which of these possibilities shows up higher and then sort the options by popularity or even choose automatically the most popular option;

l. The user can tell the OS and/or the browser and/or the service that the user acquired domain names from, to automatically perform all the actions necessary to renew one or more specific domains on time even if the user forgets to do it, by at least one of the following methods: 1.
The browser can automatically login to the site and perform the necessary actions for renewal, 2. The service is instructed to renew it automatically like a subscription if the user does not cancel the automatic renewal until the automatic renewal time;
m. The OS and/or the browser can automatically sense the width or size of the screen and/or the resolution and/or number of fonts available, so that if a table does not fit in the page and necessitates creating automatically a horizontal scroll bar, the browser and/or the OS can decide automatically to reduce the font size accordingly so that the scroll bar is not needed and/or reduce only the width of the fonts, so that the fonts become thinner.

58. A computer system wherein the speed of the hard disk is increased and/or its power consumption is reduced, by at least one of the following features:
a. Adding at least one fork with an additional head to the rotating arms that contain the read/write heads, so the each arm now only needs to move part of the way in order to reach any desired track;

b. Adding at least one fork with an additional head to the rotating arms that contain the read/write heads, so each arm now only needs to move part of the way in order to reach any desired track, and both heads can read/write data simultaneously, thus increasing also the data transfer rate;
c. Using multiple independent arms (so that there are multiple hinges of arms sets instead of one;
d. Using multiple independent arms (so that there are multiple hinges of arms sets instead of one), in combination with access order optimization, such as NCQ & TCQ.
e. Using at least one stationary arm that reaches more or less the middle track, and carries an additional rotating plate which contains multiple read-write heads, so that considerably less movement is needed to reach any track;
f. Using at least one stationary arm that reaches more or less the middle track, and carries an additional rotating plate which contains multiple read-write heads, so that considerably less movement is needed to reach any track, and the heads can read/write data simultaneously, thus increasing also the data transfer rate;
g. Using at least one rotating plate with a hub outside the area of the disk's rotating plates, wherein said plate contains multiple read-write heads, so that considerably less movement is needed to reach any track;
h. Using at least one rotating plate with a hub outside the area of the disk's rotating plates, wherein the plate contains multiple read-write heads, so that considerably less movement is needed to reach any track, and the heads can read/write data simultaneously, thus increasing also the data transfer rate.

59. The system of claim 58 wherein the shape of the plate and/or the positions of the heads on it is specially designed to correct for non-linearity effects, so that the range of movement between tracks covered by each head is more or less the same.

60. The system of any of the above claims wherein when Internet pages are printed, the browser and/or the OS and/or the printer driver automatically check if lines are about to be truncated in the printing and, if so, this is automatically prevented by at least one of:
a. Automatically converting to landscape mode;
b. Automatic additional line wrapping if possible;

c. Automatically reducing the left and/or right page margins;
d. Automatically reducing the font size;
e. Informing the user about the problem and asking him to choose from a number of possible solutions;

f. Allowing the user to decide to truncate less important parts on the left of the pages;
g. The user can mark just part of the displayed HTML page and then use a command that prints only the marked area.

61. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:

a. The user can disable the Autorun feature that enables programs on CD's to start running automatically when the CD is inserted into the computer, without having to disable for that the Auto insert notification for that drive;
b. When printing Internet pages the browser or the printer driver shows the number of pages that will be printed before the user starts the actual printing;

c. The user can logically disable or change the function that pressing various keyboard keys has on the OS and/or on any programs that are running;
d. The dynamic linking possibilities are improved so that the user can call and use any Windows DLL from a DOS program and/or vice versa, so that Windows modules and DOS modules can transfer data between them without having to use intermediary file storage;

e. The dynamic linking possibilities are improved so that the user can call and use any Windows DLL from a DOS program and/or vice versa, by defining appropriate stubs and/or API interfaces that bridge between the two types, including any necessary conversions that are needed for compatibility, and/or using sockets and/or client/server connections within the same computer;

f. When the user searches for programs in the "Start menu" the user can request the System to automatically sort the list of installed programs in the start menu by alphabetic order, or to jump automatically to a given program in the list by typing the first letters of its name and/or a search string that is at least similar to the desired name.

62. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists regarding changing the size of fonts and/or icons and/or images:
a. The user can reduce the size of fonts and/or icons and/or images on the computer's desktop by a command that affects the entire desktop and/or a marked section in it by any desired factor, and without having to restart the computer to see the change, and the change is seen instantly, like when increasing or reducing the font size in the browser;

b. If increasing the size of fonts and/or of icons on the desktop causes a problem that some icons no longer fit on the desktop, this is automatically handled by at least one of: 1. Creating vertical and/or horizontal scroll bars at the edge of the desktop, like in a normal directory window in which there items that don't fit in the Window, so that the user can drag items back in and/or resize the desktop in order to get rid of the scroll bars; 2. The system can automatically reduce spaces between icons and/or recommend to the user the maximum size that can be used without problems;

c. The OS supplies the user with an Undo command and/or a Redo command for changes in the desktop icon sizes and/or for moving icons;
d. The OS supplies the user with an Undo command and/or a Redo command for changes of moving and/or resizing icons in a directory and/or in other windows;
e. The undo of moving and/or resizing icons is incremental, so that the user can roll back till the start of the changes;

f. The OS automatically prevent the possibility that reducing the resolution and/or increasing the system font size can cause the window that asks if to keep the new resolution to appear outside of the desktop and/or cause the text is various system message windows to appear truncated, by automatically calculates the new size and ratios and thus makes sure that all the message windows appear in a visible area and that the text size in them fits the message window;

g. If the user changes the screen resolution, the fonts and/or icons on the desktop and/or in other places or applications by default remain more or less the same size, by automatically correcting for the changes caused by the changed resolution, so that if the user increases the resolution the fonts and/or icons and/or images can be automatically increased in size to compensate for this and if the user decreases the resolution the fonts and/or icons and/or images can be automatically reduced in size to compensate for this, with or without keeping the aspect ratio between height and width;

h. The user can also undo or redo changes such as for removing or adding or changing the position of items that constantly appear near the task bar;
i. By default at least the distances between the icons are corrected in each direction by its appropriate ratio of change.

63. The system of any of the above claims wherein in Tablet PC's and/or similar devices and/or other devices that accept direct input by handwriting, when the user enters text in handwriting, the system automatically solves the problem of insufficient room in a text input box or window by at least one of the following ways:
a. Letting the user continue his/her writing even beyond the edge of the input box, and then the Operating System and/or the browser or other application automatically knows from the continuity of the written text and/or from the continuity in time that this is the continuation of the same text, and therefore interprets it correctly as if it is still in the input box even if its spills out;

b. If the user runs out of space in the input box, the System and/or the browser and/or other relevant application automatically extends the box to the appropriate direction;
c. The area where the user is writing can automatically be zoomed in, however this automatic zoom does not effect the user's hand writing itself, so that the handwriting can remains at the same size and position;
d. At least the part of the handwriting that spills out of the input box is at least partially transparent and/or is visible only when the user hovers or positions the pen and/or cursor and/or mouse near it;
e. If the user for example is entering text by handwriting in some open text window and his handwriting exceeds the edge of the window, the System automatically recognizes by the continuity of the hand writing and/or of the temporal sequence that this belongs to the same text and thus the system keeps the focus in the current application even if the user for spills letters on another nearby window of another application.

64. The system of any of the above claims wherein the installation disk of the OS
contains also one or more typical usable disk images, so that the system can be instantly installed from the most appropriate image, and then the system automatically determines the actual computer's configuration and simply corrects and/or adds appropriate device drivers and/or makes other necessary adjustments, as if the system was already installed on that computer and the hardware was later changed.

65. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists in at least one word processor:
a. The user can mark one or more areas in which track changes is marked as On or Off, so that different areas can be with the track changes On or Off at the same time;
b. The user can use a mode which automatically adds the words "(Currently amended)" when the user makes changes in a claim, and the words "(Currently amended)" are automatically added without track changes;

c. The user can use a mode in which deleting an entire claim automatically causes the deleted text to disappear, and the word "(Canceled)" to automatically appear instead, as if track changes has been temporarily suspended;
d. The user can use a mode in which when adding new claims at the end of the claims section, the track changes is automatically set to Off and the word "(New)" is automatically inserted at the beginning of the new claim;
e. The user can mark any area in an image or part of it and at least one of: delete it, copy it, move it, and rotate it so that all the elements in the marked section are rotated in synchrony, etc.;

f. The copy command can also be activated cumulatively, so that a sequence of copy commands can create a cumulative buffer of consecutively pasted texts, so that afterwards for example pasting at a certain position will paste back the consecutive group of pasted texts as one sequence;

g. in searching the dictionary and/or the thesaurus the user can search for synonyms of words with a specific pattern or length, or for the word itself when partial data exists, so that for example the user can use question marks or other designation to designate unknown characters.

66. The system of any of the above claims wherein in at least one of word processing programs and/or Internet browsers and/or other software the user can move any icon and/or any menu item and/or sub-menu item to any desired position by dragging it with the mouse and at least one of the following features exists:

a. The same icon and/or menu item automatically continues functioning on the new position;

b. This new position is saved automatically also after the user closes the application;
c. The user can also undo any such changes;

d. The user can also undo any such changes even after the application has been closed and reopened;
e. This feature is supported automatically for by compilers, so that the programmer does not have to do almost anything in order to enable it.

67. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. When opening additional pages in the browser as additional tabs within the same window, the browser and/or OS are changed so that Alt-F4 closes only the current page (tab) and/or Alt-Tab switches also between the tabs, and/or when closing a tab page by Alt-F4 the browser or the OS warns the user or asks if he/she wants to close just that page or the entire browser window with all the open tabs;
b. There is a command which allows moving only between the windows of the same group, unlike alt-tab which moves also between the other open windows.

68. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. When more than one OS is installed on the same computer the user can switch the default OS to whichever option he/she wants and/or change the order of the options (where typically the first option becomes the default) by letting the user drag an option line with the 321, mouse to a different position in the screen that asks which system to boot;

b. When more than one OS is installed on the same computer the system automatically remembers the boot option that was last chosen and makes it automatically the default for the next boot until the user changes it;
c. When more than one OS is installed on the same computer the system automatically makes the chosen option in the boot menu into the first choice on the boot menu on the next boot;
d. Network computers in wireless networks use also automatic triangulation of the source of transmissions, so that the coordinates of the allowed space are entered into the system and/or only specific locations of known devices are white-listed, and so any intruder from an outside position cannot pretend to be an authorized user even if he succeeds in finding a vulnerability in the encryption.

69. The system of any of the above claims wherein in order to save bandwidth when looking for updates, at least one of the following is done in browsers and/or the html protocol is changed:
a. The html protocol is changed so that it is possible to define "refresh on a need basis", which means that the refresh command is initiated automatically by the site when there is any change in the page, so that the browser can get a refresh even if it didn't ask for it;
b. The html protocol is changed so that the browser asks for refresh more often, but if nothing has changed then the browser gets just a code that tells it to keep the current page or window as is;

c. When the refresh is sent, it can be a smart refresh, which tells the browser only what to change on the page instead of having to send the entire page again;
d. The page or part of it can remain open like a streaming audio or video so that the browser always waits for new input but knows how to use the new input for updating the page without having to get the whole page again and doesn't have to do anything until the new input arrives.

70. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. When the user enters the task manager he/she can mark multiple programs and then tell the OS to close all of them at once;
b. When the user tries to force the closing of an application through the task manager and/or in other contexts, in case said application hasn't been closed, the OS automatically tries again repeatedly to close it at least for a certain number of times and/or till a certain time limit.

322, 71. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists in at least one word processor:

a. If track changes is used and the strikeout text contains letters on which it is hard to notice the strikeout, the strikeout line is automatically moved higher or lower on such characters, and/or for strikeout line is automatically made of a different thickness and/or length and/or angle and/or color;
b. Striked-out words behaves like normal words on the dictionary;
c. The user can mark one or more areas in the file and activate the "accept changes" command and then the "accept all changes" can be automatically done only in the marked areas;

d. When there are different sets of marked changes, the user can instruct the word processor to automatically accept all the changes but only from a certain date or dates or a certain source or sources;
e. The dictionary allows the users to use back arrows in order to go back to previous points in the dictionary. Another preferable improvement for example in words processors, and especially for example;
f. When the user wants to correct intermittently two or more sections in the same file, the user can press a key or combination of keys which causes the position in the word processor to jump automatically between the various last edited sections;
g. The word processor automatically checks the date in the system in short intervals and thus updates the date field automatically whenever it has changed, and not just if the user reopens file or prints it;
h. The user can mark with the mouse more than one area at the same time by pressing some key that tells the application not to remove the mark from the previous marked area or areas;

i. When track changes is used and a section is deleted and then reentered next to the deleted text, the word processor can automatically integrate then by removing the deleted redundant part;
j. Word processors and/or other applications and/or the dialogue box can remember and display automatically the last requested file pattern when the user tries to open a new file and if the user presses Enter then this last pattern is used;
k. When the user tries to make a repeated change but confirm it at each step (instead of just global change), the position of the search-and-replace dialogue box is always kept constant and the text itself is automatically always scrolled so that the relevant part is visible;
l. When the user tries to make a repeated change but confirm it at each step (instead of just global change), the position of the search-and-replace dialogue box can move, but when it moves the mouse cursor automatically jumps with it, so the user does not have to move the mouse to correct for the change is the position of the search-and-replace dialogue box;
m. If the user copies and pastes a new http link over a previous http link, the word processor (or other application) automatically replaces also the internal link to automatically comply with the visible link, or saves only the visible link and uses that information when the user tries to access the link;
n. When the thesaurus is used the dictionary shows near each newly found word of the thesaurus also its translation to the other language and/or a short description of its more precise meaning in a few words;
o. The thesaurus and/or the dictionary automatically takes into consideration the context in which the word exists in the file, so that when displaying semantic trees or groups of semantic branches the groups or branches are pre-sorted according to the most likely meaning when taking said context into consideration and/or only the most likely meaning branch is shown;
p. The automatic typing-error-correction system takes into account also the context, and at least one of: The system chooses the word most likely according to context when there is more than one reasonable correction and/or in cases the system is not sure it shows the user that there is more than one likely correct word and asks him/her to choose the preferred one;
q. The user can activate a command which automatically indicates all the words in which spelling errors were previously automatically corrected the word processor, so that the user can check specifically these words to see if there were any such errors of changing the word to something that was not indented by the user;
r. The user can change page definitions also for a single page or range of pages and not just automatically for all the pages;
s. When using cut & paste if the user presses by mistake again "~C"
(copy) instead of AV (paste), the user can press some undo key which brings back the previous copy buffer.

324, 72. A computer Operating System in which in word processors and/or in editors that are used for editing software programs the editor can mark automatically matching pairs of brackets in a way that the user can easily see the matching pairs and wherein said marking is done by at least one of a. Showing each pair in a different color;
b. Show the matching pairs in a different style or for in a different height.

73. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. In the dialogue box that allows the user to choose directories and files and/or in the explorer Window file extensions are shown even when the associated application is known;
b. In the dialogue box that allows the user to choose directories and files and/or in the explorer Window in addition to the icon that shows the associated application the window shows also an additional Icon that represents the general type of the file regardless of the associated application;
c. The user can change the position of the normal boxes on the taskbar that represent normally running programs by dragging them with the mouse, so that the user can conveniently re-arrange their position without having to close and reopen these programs.

74. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:

a. If the user aborts a virus scan and later wants to continue, the program can automatically continue from the last point reached;
b. The user can add to a portable computer a mini-keyboard which completes for the side keypad and/or any other keys in a way that tells the portable computer not to regard it as a replacement keyboard that disables the portable's built-in keyboard but regard it as adding certain keys to the internal keyboard;
c. The user can use the combined fax/printer/scanner and/or a normal scanner to send faxes directly through the Internet through the computer's Internet connection, which is enabled by a change in the device's firmware and/or by adding the appropriate software to the computer, so that the user can send faxes directly and instantly the same as he/she would be sending them through a normal phone line, except that the fax is sent through the Internet;
d. If the user closes an application window or tab he/she can still press some undo button which automatically reopens the last closed window or tab or file, and this is enabled by the relevant applications and/or the OS creating automatically a temporary backup of the open window or file;
e. When trying to delete a directory through a command prompt window the OS tells the user that it is a directory and tells him/her also the number of subdirectories and/or the total number of files in that directory tree and/or the total size;
f. The user can tell the OS not to enter sleep mode until a specific application has finished running;

g. The user can tell the OS not to enter sleep mode until a specific application has finished running by clicking on the applications window or for example on the square that represents it in the task bar and marking the relevant option in a menu;
h. If the user does not find a certain file name the OS automatically checks for similar names and shows the user the list of closest file names available, sorted by closeness;
i. If the user does not find a certain file name in the start menu or on the desktop the OS automatically checks for similar names and shows the user the list of closest file names available, sorted by closeness;
j. When an internal Window of a program is in front of a background window of that program and does not allow accessing the background window until the front window is closed, the OS automatically allows the user at least to move the previous window and/or perform at least other acts that do not change the way the software behaves but allows the user at least to control the view of the background window;
k. The fax logs automatically indicate near each communication also the resolution that was used in the transmission and/or if the fax was in B/W or in color;

1. The user can indicate example that the firewall should not close the web and/or the screen saver should not be activated until a certain application has finished performing some operation;
m. When a computer becomes compromised by a Trojan and becomes a spam-relay station, there are special sites or routers which identify the attacking computers and can send the users who's compromised computers have participated in the attack automatic warning messages, directly to their IP address or to their email;
n. IP addresses of compromised computers are automatically updated in one or more special URLs in real time and the OS and/or the browser automatically checks regularly in one of these official sources and sees if the IP address fits the real current IP address of the current user's computer and then warns the user;
o. There are on the internet databases which automatically link email addresses or other identity indictors with the current IP of the user, which are automatically updated each time the user connects or disconnects from the Internet and allow also efficient searching according to the IP, and they can be used for sending automatic email warnings to users who's computers have been compromised and have become spam relay stations;
p. The firewall and/or the Security system and/or the OS can also indicate to the user automatically whenever some application is trying to download a file, or the user is warned only if an apparently executable file is being downloaded;
q. The firewall allows the user to change the permissions of multiple applications at the same time in the firewall's table by marking entire columns or other areas and then changing automatically the permissions in the marked areas.

75. The method of any of the above claims wherein in order to market the OS in low-income countries without damaging sales in countries where a normal price can be charged, the OS is sold at the desired low-income countries at the low price with few or no limitations that result in reduced functionality to the user, at least one of the following steps is used:
a. Limiting these cheap versions so that at least part of the interface and/or some application works only in languages that are not useful to most people outside the cheap countries;
b. Displaying a warning whenever the OS is started that it is illegal to use this version of the OS in any either countries than the list of qualifying countries, unless the user has a citizenship of one of these countries and/or is resident there;
c. The OS checks automatically when the user connects to the internet if his/her IP address is in one of the qualified countries and, if not, require some certification to be filed which proves that the user is entitled to use that version of the OS outside of those countries and/or automatically stop working or start working with only limited functionality after a certain time period if said certification has not been filed;

76. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. If there are more than once CD and/or DVD installed on the same computer they can be connected to a common audio connector in parallel or with some multiplexor, or cables from more than one drive can lead to a common connector or multiplexor near or at the sound card;

b. No direct connection to the sound card is needed from any of the drives, and each CD or DVD that contains sound is played by activating the sound card directly through the software that plays the data, in the same way that the sound is played from an avi file on the hard disk.

77. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. When uploading a file while submitting a form in an Internet browser, the browser specifically warns the user about the file name and/or path and/or size, so that the warning is more specific about such files, instead of or in addition to the normal warning if the user really intends to submit the form itself;

b. When the user types text for entering in some field in a form, the browser and/or the OS can keep it automatically in some buffer, so that if the user starts to type before the actual form field is reached, the typing is not lost but is added automatically the browser or by the OS
to the beginning of the input line;

c. The user can perform commands that affect a group of open windows, such as entering a command that prints all of them or that saves all of them or that bookmarks all of them - by entering the global command in one of the open windows of the same application, or by marking multiple boxes in the task bar and then entering the command;
d. The user can perform commands that affect a group of open windows, and in this mode the user choose automatic carrying out of the global command or to be prompted for each of the windows with the option to choose yes or no in each case;

e. The internet browser lets the user to darken with the mouse a group of checkboxes and then with one command mark or unmark the entire group;

f. The internet browser lets the user drag the mouse over a group of checkboxes, so that dragging it with the left button pressed immediately marks each box on the way and dragging it with the other button pressed unmarks each checkbox on the way, or vice versa;
g. When the user presses the Shift key (or some other key), marking or unmarking 2 checkboxes also marks or unmarks all the checkboxes in between;
h. When the user is filling Online forms, the Internet browser can automatically take into account the language and/or the character set of the text near each form field and automatically accept by default the input in the appropriate language or character set;
i. The user can unmark a radio button by clicking on it again or by using another mouse key.

78. A computer system wherein at least one of the following steps is used to protect the user from phishing attempts:
a. The browser or the email client automatically indicates to the user and/or warns him/her when the real href is different from the http address that is visibly shown in a link, or warns the user about this after he/she clicks on the link and gives him/her a chance to cancel before actually going to the link, and/or warns him/her that the link is phony, and/or displays an explicit recommendation not to click on the link even before the user clicks on it;
b. The browser or email client automatically indicates to the user also the real url that is within the href in the normal display of the page - next to the link or superimposed on it;
c. The browser or email client automatically indicates to the user also the real url that is within the href in the normal display of the page - next to the link or superimposed on it, and the browser or other application makes sure that this is clearly visible and/or ignores any font size and/or font color command which might hide it and/or makes it automatically even more conspicuous than the normal text;
d. The browser automatically makes sure that the url in the location window and/or in the display of real url which is shown even before the user clicks on the link is indeed displayed exactly like the actual url that it connects to, and if there are unprintable characters then they are marked with some sign and do not effect the printing of the rest of the url;

e. If there is any attempt by Javasrcipt or Active-X or some other portable code or any other program on the user's computer to put other data on top of the location Window then this is automatically prevented by the browser and/or the OS and/or the computer's Security System;
f. If there is any attempt by Javasrcipt or Active-X or some other portable code or any other program on the user's computer to put other data on top of the location Window then this is automatically prevented by automatically preventing other programs from putting any windows in front of the browser window unless the user explicitly transfers the focus to them, and/or by automatically intercepting windows that have a suspect size or shape or location or that otherwise have suspicious or unusual qualities;

g. Email messages that contain clearly misleading hrefs where the visible link does not fit the real link can be automatically blocked by spam filters, thus not reaching the user at all;

h. Normal spam filters are also improved to identify automatically for example typical patterns of mixing digits with letters in a way that tries to bypass word filters;

i. When the browser enters a site and/or for even before the user presses the link, or when the mouse is near the link, the browser automatically checks also a relevant WHOIS database and displays to the user automatically also the name under which that domain is registered and/or the country and/or the length of time this domain has existed and/or other details that can easily indicate to the user if a site is phony;
j. If the browser and/or the OS and/or the security system and/or other software also checks in one or more databases for known phishing sites, it also identifies suspect servers which were known to host such sites before and/or also checks if the domain seems to be related in one or more ways to previously known phishing domains, such as being registered to the same people, having the same email of the technical contact or billing contact, etc.;
k. There is one or more database on the Internet which collects typical word combinations and/or other typical patterns of phishing email messages, which the browser and/or other application can consult automatically, and/or the browser and/or other internet application accumulates the typical wording patterns itself automatically when it identifies a phishing email by other methods, and thus the browser or other application can warn the user automatically of any email that seems like a typical phishing attempt;
l. The browser and/or other application and/or one or more internet database gather list of at least the most common organization names used m typical phishing attempts, so that the browser (or other application) gathers this lists by itself and/or gets it from one or more online database, and then warns the user automatically about urls which contain the name of the organization in suspicious places.

79. A portable computer wherein the computer and/or the OS and/or the relevant part of the hardware can automatically increase or decrease its power consumption according to sensing if the computer is currently connected to the network electricity or is currently running on the batteries and/or the user can request it explicitly for a short time, wherein at least one of the following is done:
a. The hard disk's speed can be considerably improved;
b. The disk has at least two sets of engines or at least two sets of coils, which are used at different combinations in order to work in the low speed or in the fast speed; and/or the disk's DSP automatically starts working at higher MHz when the wall power is sensed; and/or more than one DSP can be used in order to speed up the processing;
c. The speed of the CPU can be improved so that it consumes more power and works faster;
d. The brightness of the screen can be increased.

80. The method of any of the above claims wherein the automatic error checking of at least one word processor includes also at least some statistical and/or semantic checking of unreasonable words or word combinations that are probably a typing error even if there is such a word and/or even if it is grammatically possible.

81. The method of claim 81 wherein the word processor uses at least one of the following methods to check for such errors:
a. Using at least some taxonomy of semantic knowledge;

b. Using a database of typical texts in which words and/or word combination of up to a few words are indexed according to their frequency of appearance;

c. Learning from the user's own behavior when such errors are made and then corrected by user.

82. The system of any of the above claims wherein the user can use a fax card or a combined fax-scanner-printer which is connected to the computer in order to actually send digital data files eventhough the connection starts like a fax communication.

83. The system of claim 82 wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The sending device can send one or more pseudo fax images which are actually digital data, and when it is transmitted by Fax the sending device uses a special code to tell the receiving device that one or more pseudo page images are actually a digital file, and the receiving fax is either a computer with a fax/modem card or for example a combined fax-scanner-printer which is also connected to a computer and thus can transmit the digital file to the computer as a digital file;
b. The two devices can automatically recognize each other during the handshake as having more than Fax communication capabilities, and thus can automatically switch to some other electronic file transfer protocol between them for exchanging digital files.

84. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:

a. When the user asks Windows to create a restoration point, the user has a choice of indicating if he/she wants a normal restoration point or also creating a full snapshot of the main system and registry files and/or the user can define in general if and/or when snapshot or normal restoration point will be generated when the system automatically creates them and/or the system automatically creates the snapshot files whenever it is about to make highly significant changes for example in the system;
b. Rollback info is saved automatically in more than one place, together with a copy of a sufficient reference base-point, so that the system has a much better chance of restoring it even if the registry becomes seriously damaged;
c. The registry entries are made independent of each other so that even if part of the registry is damaged it will not effect anything else;
d. The system uses transaction sequences in the registry and/or in other important system files or system areas like in a normal database with automatic rollback in case the transaction has not been completed;

e. If when trying to boot the system discovers that the system needs to load a previous snapshot of the registry and/or other critical system files, during boot the user is advised of the situation and can automatically view a list of the most recent snapshots and/or otherwise possible restoration points and can choose the most preferred ones to attempt and then the system restores it automatically and continues to boot;
f. At least one of the registry and other critical system files that are needed for snapshots are always automatically kept in at least two copies so that if one copy becomes unusable there is always an immediate backup of the most up to date version;
g. During boot the system uses the wasted time on the part of the user to display to the user at least one of: Details about the number of safe restoration points that exist, various indicators of the health of the system, the current automatic back-up policy that exists, the amount of remaining free space on the disk, and the percent of disk fragmentation.

85. The system of any of the above claims wherein the system includes a firewall which allows giving specific applications differently rights for downloading and/or uploading information from the Internet and/or through all available communication channels or through specific communication channels.

86. The system of claim 85 wherein the different upload versus download permissions are enabled by at least one of:
a. Automatically showing the user the statistics of sending/receiving information near each application that has been allowed to access the Internet;
b. Defining a maximum ratio between upstream and downstream for each application;
c. Defining a maximum ratio between upstream and downstream for each application and automatically blocking excess uploading and/or warning the user and/or asking for his/her authorization;
d. Defining a maximum absolute amount of information that can be sent out per time;

e. Programs that the user wants to allow only to download data but not upload data are automatically prevented from any real access to the web, and the OS and/or the firewall and/or the security system intercept any attempt that these application make to contact the web and send the requests instead, and so only valid normal protocol requests for accessing web pages and/or for downloading data which are recognized by the firewall or other intermediate agent are allowed to go through;
f. The firewall or other agent for example cal also notice other suspect behaviors, such as requesting a web page with an unreasonable large parameters line or frequent repeated similar connections with parameter lines that keep changing.

87. The system of any of the above claims wherein the user can have two or more Operating systems running at the same time so that the user can jump between them by pressing some key or key combination or clicking on some icon, instead of having to shut down Windows and reboot, without using emulation.

88. The system of claim 87 wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. There is a mirror image of the loaded and running OS like in sleep mode, so that while the user is in one OS the other OS is dormant;

b. The user can switch between the OS's after entering sleep mode;
c. Both Operating systems can be actually running at the same time and one or more additional OS elements are operating below the two (or more) Operating Systems and are in charge of the resource sharing between them;
d. Both Operating systems can be actually running at the same time and in this mode certain functions are automatically disabled or are available to only one OS.

89. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The hard disk has one or more separate heads which are used only for checking the media for errors and move automatically all the time or periodically once in a while to check this without interfering with the normal function of the hard disk;
b. The task manager automatically shows near each process also to which program and/or path and file name it belongs;
c. The OS and/or the word processor can identify automatically incremental updates of the same file according to at least one of the beginning of the file name and/or sequential numbering and/or date and time and/or by keeping automatically a log of the sequence of updating a file incrementally, d. The OS and/or the word processor can use the knowledge of the update sequence of a series of files to search for each section or sentence when was the first time that it was entered;
e. The word processing program can ask the user automatically if various changes in the way the word processor operates are intended only for the current file or for all the files in the same directory or all the files of the same sequence or all files in general;

f. The word processor is improved so that when automatically saved files are offered after a crash, even if the user closes automatically offered files, he/she can still activate an option that restores them, even if the user in the meantime closes the word processor and then later reopens it;
g. The word processor keeps one or more buffers which point to the automatically saved files and has an indication which groups of files belong together and/or to which crash event they are related, and these files are kept in the original directories of the relevant files and/or in a special directory at least for a certain time period and/or as long as there is sufficient disk space and/or until their cumulative total space exceeds some value;
h. In the word processor the user can mark one or more sections and then toggle automatically between modes so that automatic numbers and/or letters can become manual letters and/or numbers and vice versa;
i. When the user searches for a specific file or file pattern in the windows explorer and/or in similar utilities either the files are displayed by default before the directory names or the user can easily indicate if he/she prefers the directory names before the file names or vice versa;
j. The word processor or browser can keep in memory different search strings in different open windows of the same application, so that the user indicates if he/she prefers sharing search strings between the open Windows or having one for all;
k. After the user makes changes in a certain position in the documents which causes jumping there he/she can also jump back to the position he/she was before the jump;
l. When copying text for example by copy & paste into an empty new file the headers and/or other file parameters can be automatically inserted into the new file automatically. Preferably the headers and/or other parameters are copied automatically but the user preferably can also choose for example to disable this feature or for example to disable parts of it;
m. When copying text for example by copy & paste into an empty new file the headers and/or other file parameters can be automatically inserted into the new file automatically, and the user can also choose example to disable this feature or to disable parts of it;
n. The user can simply jump between two places and then press some key (or click one of the mouse buttons) which marks the entire block between them;
o. The user can mark one place and then jump to another place and when reaching the desired destination press some key (or a mouse button) and the entire area between the two marks becomes marked;
p. The user can tell the browser to automatically merge two or more bookmark files while keeping the date of visiting and/or any other criteria as the ordering factor q. Copy & paste are automatically available from any messages displayed on the screen;
r. Copy & paste are automatically available from any messages displayed on the screen and/or the OS or some special application automatically allows the user to copy and paste from any text that appears on the screen, regardless of which program it belongs to.

90. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. After programs finish installing and request a restart, by default the OS automatically determines if a full restart is needed, and then the OS automatically performs just logoff and logon instead of a full restart whenever it can determine that this is sufficient;
b. Program installers are improved so that the software vendors can easily indicate if after installation logoff-logon is sufficient instead of full restart;

c. When the user himself/herself initiates a restart command, the OS
automatically asks the user if he/she really wants a full reboot and, if not, offers the user to automatically perform logoff-logon instead;
d. The logon/logoff is added also to the normal Restart/Turnoff menu, so that for instead of showing only 3 options (Standby, Turnoff and Restart) the option of fast Logoff/Logon is also added;

e. If the user chooses full reboot and/or even if he/she chooses just logoff and the system begins to close applications, first of all only user applications are closed and not system processes, and the user can still press some key if he/she changes his/her mind in order to abort the reboot, and then the attempt to reboot is aborted if it has not gone too far, and/or the system can automatically undo the process and even return the OS to the state it was before the reboot was requested.

91. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. DVDs and/or blue-ray or High Definition DVDs and/or other larger capacity drives support also smaller pocket-size DVD's as burn-able media and/or as ready pre-recorded media;
b. DVD capacity is further increased by using UV or extreme-UV lasers instead of red or blue;
c. The bookmarks list in the internet browser automatically shows also near each bookmark the date it was entered, and/or the bookmarks are automatically grouped by days, with a different color for each group and/or some border marked between the groups;

d. The Internet browser keeps in memory recent changes to various form fields in the same page and/or also on previous pages, so that jumping back to a previously filled field on the same page or also on a previous page or pages will still allow the user to undo changes in that field;

e. If the user wants to copy more than one application at the same time from the "all programs" pop-up list which is activated through the Start button, to the desktop, then the user can mark more than one item at a time and/or the list remains open even after dragging an item;
f. The user can drag a shortcut also from open applications on the taskbar and/or by dragging something from the top and/or other parts of an open window and/or from the file name as it appears in a DOS
or cmd window;
g. If the user wants to uninstall more than one program at the same time, the user can mark multiple programs and then all the marked programs are uninstalled automatically;

h. The user can activate a command which automatically jumps each time to the next window in the normal task bar on in the internal group of open windows that belong to the same application or between open tabs in the same application, so that each time the user moves to the next window systematically;

i. The user can define drives and/or directories to become shared when connected by cross-linked Ethernet cable between two computers so that they become automatically not shared when connected by normal cable to the Internet;
j. If the OS gets stuck during or after the boot, the system can automatically sense it after a short time and automatically identify the driver or application that caused it to get stuck and can automatically roll-back to the state it was in before the problematic driver or application was loaded and/or before the registry change or other relevant change and can automatically continue without the problematic driver or application and/or can for automatically search for a replacement driver or application and/or automatically instruct the user what to do in order to fix the problem;
k. At least part of the OS runs below the normal OS and contains also a knowledge base about known problem that can occur, with instructions on how to solve it and automatically tries to follow those self-repairing instructions whenever possible and involves the user only if for some reason it is unable to perform whatever is necessary;
l. At least part of the kernel and/or part of the OS, which is hardware independent, is able to boot properly even if there are a lot of hardware changes, so that any adjustment problems can then be fixed after this initial boot;
m. When the OS does not allow the user to access a file because it is locked by another process, the OS also lets the user know the identity of the clashing process and the clashed resource and allows the user also options such as terminate the clashing process or freezing it temporarily until the user releases again the problematic resource;
n. When there is more than one physical hard disk on the same computer and more than one partition on at least some of these disks, the OS automatically adds some mark to each drive name that indicates to which physical hard disk it belongs.

92. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. Fax machines are programmed by default (and/or at least the user can choose this option) to respond with fax sounds only if fax sounds are heard in the incoming phone call;
b. The receiving fax is improved so that it is preferably able to automatically identify voice calls and thus avoids making fax sounds if it identifies human voice and/or stops immediately and gets off the line even if it started making fax sounds, as soon as it identifies the human voice;
c. The ability of the scanner/copier to overcome wrinkles in papers or overcome the black stripe that appears when scanning or photocopying books when the user can't press the book down strongly enough - is improved by adding at least one more light source in the scanner, so that shadows are automatically reduced.

93. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The user is supplied with an electronic pen which can write on normal paper and at the same time both writes with visible ink on the paper and transmits the writing sequence to the computer, so that the user can write normally while also obtaining an automatic copy on the computer;
b. In tablet PC's and/or in digital book readers and/or in programs such as winamp or other software media players and/or in other gadgets for playing songs or films, the software and/or the device is able to measure automatically not only which songs or films or books (or other media) are more or less liked by the user, but also which parts or sections in them are the best and/or which parts are less good or problematic.

94. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The user can create a copy of the OS on another partition with an automatic command, and then the system with the installed programs is automatically copied to the new partition and the drive letter references in the new installation are automatically updated to refer to the new drive letter, and the choice of the new partition is automatically added to a boot selector;
b. The user can also change the name of a boot option and/or add comments to it, while booting and/or from one or more applications that are available after the boot;
c. Partitions can be identified also by names longer than 1 letter, so that these longer names can be used in the same ways that any 1-letter name partition can be used;
d. The user can also use an update or synchronize command, which automatically updates any differences between two or more such OS-installed partitions, so that the user can update the other partition according to additional changes made in the original partitions, and/or the opposite - automatically correct the original partition according to one of the backup partitions, and/or the user can also request automatic undo of such updates;
e. Even the new partition itself for the automatically copies OS
installation can be automatically created by the special copy command, if needed, so that the user does not even need to have a new partition ready before requesting the special OS-copy command;
f. The user can mark only one or more specific installed programs and/or drivers and/or other parts to be automatically copied to the other partition, instead of automatic full copy of all the installed elements into the other partition;
g. The user can automatically backup one or more installed programs to a back-up media, so that automatically the relevant registry entry is copied to the backup media and all the relevant components are automatically copied through the relevant registry information;
h. When activating for a command like SFC (which checks the integrity of installed system files and/or compares them to their source on the installation CD and restores them when needed), this or similar commands can be used also from another OS or another installation of the OS on another partition and/or from the installation CD or DVD itself.

95. The system of any of the above claims wherein in order to prevent debug features in motherboard bridges from being used for hardware-based attack below the OS, at least one of the following is done:
a. The motherboard chipset is changed so that such debug features and/or direct communications between hardware cards and the hard disk are enabled only if some hardware element allows it, such as a jumper or a switch which has to be manually enabled by the user;
b. The user can add a card to one of the PCI slots and/or add another external device which keeps sending commands to the bridges which can over-ride any attempt by other devices to tell the bridge to sniff on data or to communicate directly with the hard drive and/or the communication channels;
c. The OS and/or a software Security System is able, through the OS kernel or even below it, to take complete control of the bridge and give it instructions that override any undesired attempts by hardware elements to sniff data and/or access directly the hard disk and/or the communication channels;
d. If some devices need to be able to exchange data with the hard disk directly, at least any command sent from the device to the hard disk can be monitored and filtered by the OS and/or by a security system installed on the OS, so that the OS and/or the security system can control what files and/or directories can be accessed directly from the device and what commands can be transmitted to the hard disk;
e. The configuration can be set to enable such a debug feature only for one or more specific slots and/or one or more specific devices, and/or other limitations are enforced.

96. An improved computer system wherein computer cases are improved so that the same case can be used either in desktop position (lying in a horizontal orientation) or as normal tower (vertical orientation), thus giving the user more flexibility in choosing the most convenient orientation without having to buy different cases, and at least one of the following features exists:
a. The case is made strong enough to support even large screen on top of it when used in the desktop orientation;
b. At least the area that supports the external CD and/or DVD drives is rotate-able between two positions, so that the user can easily choose one of these two position, at least by screwing the part when the case is open, and/or the user can rotate the part even when the case is closed;
c. The frame that holds the 3.5 devices is also similarly rotate-able.

97. A method for avoiding "DNS poisoning" comprising at least one of the following steps:
a. Internet Browsers and/or other internet applications which need to access domains automatically query multiple DNS servers in different locations and if there is a mismatch between the IP address reported by them for the same domain then the browser (or other application) checks in additional DNS servers and chooses the one that appears in most places, and also warns immediately the user that there might still be a risk due to the mismatch;
b. The browser or other Internet application checks in one or more domain name registrars to see if the IP address given to the domain is compatible with the DNS servers that are associated with the domain's records;
c. The browser (or other Internet application) keeps historical data of IP
addresses of domains that the user has accessed and whenever there is suddenly a change performs automatically various checks;

d. The browser (or other Internet application) keeps historical data of IP
addresses of domains that the user has accessed and whenever there is suddenly a change performs automatically various checks, and said checks are at least one of querying multiple DNS servers, and checking in one or more domain name registrars;

e. The browser (or other Internet application) keeps historical data of IP
addresses of domains that the user has accessed and whenever there is suddenly a change performs automatically various checks and said checks are done before letting the user access the site;

f. The DNS servers themselves perform automatically similar checks to those described above, such as keeping historical data and checking with multiple sources;
g. The DNS servers themselves perform automatically similar checks to those described above, such as keeping historical data and checking with multiple sources immediately when there is a change, and/or checking with multiple sources whenever new data arrives;

98. A method for avoiding "DNS poisoning" comprising at least one of the following steps:
a. Using long encryption keys for any communication between DNS
servers;

b. The DNS automatically identifies "birthday attacks" (statistical bombardment with guessed session Ids in order to find the correct session Id) or other statistical based attacks by keeping track of multiple communication attempts with false session Ids purportedly coming from the same server;
c. The DNS automatically identifies "birthday attacks" (statistical bombardment with guessed session Ids in order to find the correct session Id) or other statistical based attacks by keeping track of multiple communication attempts with false session Ids purportedly coming from the same server and then automatically ignores any packets from the spoofed other DNS and automatically switches to other DNSs at least for a certain time;

d. The browser (or other Internet application) and/or DNS server automatically checks back any IP address in multiple reversed databases which find the domain name from an IP address;

e. The browser (or other Internet application) and/or or DNS server automatically checks back any IP address in multiple reversed databases which find the domain name from an IP address whenever giving it in a reply or when it changes;
f. The browser (or other Internet application) and/or NDS servers check how long the IP address has been associated with the domain according to registrar records, and if it has been associated for a short time below a certain threshold performs various checks and/or warns the user;
g. When an IP address changes, the browser (or other Internet application) and/or DNS server checks in one or more reversed Databases (which give the domain name from the IP address) if the original IP address now indeed points to a different domain, and if it is still pointing to the original domain then it is perceived as indication of possible DNS poisoning.

99. The system of any of the above claims wherein when the OS and/or various applications support 3D objects, at least one of the following features exists:
a. The objects can be resized or moved in various directions in a way similar to the current processing of 2d objects;
b. The objects can be resized or moved in various directions in a way similar to the current processing of 2d objects and size parameters are automatically updated and displayed;
c. A large taxonomy of object prototypes is available to choose from, and these objects or prototype objects can be dragged into position and then can be changed on the spot by fast scrolling over multiple objects of that prototype or sub-prototype, so that the object changes immediately in view, and/or this scrolling can be done also for modular elements of the objects;
d. A large taxonomy of object prototypes is available to choose from, and these objects or prototype objects can be dragged into position and then can be changed on the spot by fast scrolling over multiple objects of that prototype or sub-prototype, so that the object changes immediately in view, and/or this scrolling can be done also for modular elements of the objects, while the mouse drags a scroll bar next to it;

e. Various elements can be reshaped dynamically in a way similar to the Goo program, except that when pulling on a part only that part is reshaped without affecting the parts next to it.

100. An improved search engine which can automatically determine the information value of the search results wherein the search engine can determine if a web page is probably more scientific and/or has higher information value according to at least one of:

a. Using various heuristics for determining the information value of the search results and automatically improving the ranking of web pages according to their information value and/or indicating near each link its information value;
b. Diagnosing automatically whether it contains references and/or how many references and/or how scientific and/or of high information value are the sources that are included there;
c. Lexical and/or semantic analysis of the details about the author if such details exist;

d. Lexical and/or semantic analysis of the details about the author if such details exist such as if he/she has a PhD. title and/or has a background relevant to the field that the article deals with;
e. Determining if a web page is probably more scientific and/or has higher information value by link structure (incoming and/or outgoing) that indicate that the page (and/or the site in general) has links to and/or from other pages (and/or sites or for subdirectories in it) which are considered more scientific and/or of higher information value by the system;
f. Determining if a web page is probably more scientific and/or has higher information value by link structure in terms of percent of scientific or high information value incoming and/or outgoing links and/or in terms of absolute scientific or high information value incoming and/or outgoing links;
g. Determining if the site is on a university or in a government institute;
h. Determining if the site is on a university or in a government institute according to the top level domain;
i. Determining if the site is on a university or in a government institute and taking into account also how high the page is in the subdirectory structure of the domain;
j. If a page in a government site appears to deal with a scientific subject the search engine can assume that there is less chance for bias than if the subject is political.

101. The system of claim 100 wherein this is done in a way similar to the way that Google uses recursively the number of incoming and outgoing links to determine the authoritativeness of pages and/or sites (where authoritativeness is actually defined by popularity), except that in this case the recursion uses as criteria also various indications about the scientific or information value of the pages and/or sites and/or sub-areas in the sites.

102. The system of any of claims 100-101 wherein at least one of the following features exists:

a. Determining the initial indications can be according to various heuristics based on the content of the pages and/or additional indicators, such as starting out with known scientifically accredited sources;
b. These indicators are reassessed automatically again for each page and/or domain and/or directory tree or sub-tree, in order to avoid degradation of the information value score or scores as the recursion continues;
c. The taking into account of the information value can be applied automatically as an improvement of the results ranking algorithm;
d. The user can indicate that he/she prefers to take this into account by marking default preferences and/or by adding some special keyword or mark to the search string, and/or the search engine has a few search windows, so that one or more are defined in advance for searches for more official and/or authoritative and/or scientific information;
e. The search engine can decide automatically how much weight to give to the information value of the results according to the content of the search string itself and/or by letting the user use of semantic qualifiers;
f. The user can choose in advance more official and/or authoritative and/or scientific information by at least one of adding an indication and choosing the appropriate search window.

103. The system of any of claims 100-103 wherein the search engine can automatically ignore sources and/or results and/or pages and/or sites and/or domains and/or subdirectories in them which have an information value below a certain threshold, or mark or indicate the threshold so that results below the threshold are displayed in a separate section or window.
104. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists in at least one word processor:
a. When the word processor automatically offers the user automatically saved files, the word processor automatically runs file comparison between each such file and the equivalent last saved version and shows the user by track changes the differences between this and the saved version;
b. When the word processor automatically offers the user automatically saved files, the word processor automatically runs file comparison between each such file and the equivalent last saved version, and if there are no differences then the word processor automatically does not even offer that file;
c. When the word processor automatically offers the user automatically saved files, the word processor automatically runs file comparison between each such file and the equivalent last saved version and shows the user by track changes the differences between this and the saved version, and when showing automatically the differences, the word processor marks them differently from previous marked changes;
d. When the word processor automatically offers the user automatically saved files, the word processor automatically runs file comparison between each such file and the equivalent last saved version, and the word processor automatically indicates the amount of difference;
e. When the word processor automatically offers the user automatically saved files, the word processor automatically runs file comparison between each such file and the equivalent last saved version, and the word processor can let the user jump automatically to those sections where the changes are;
f. The system indicates to the user when he/she is about to undo things to a state before the last saved version of the file and asks for his/her confirmation for that;

g. The user can search for a specific text which has one or more specific attributes, such as underline, color, marked changes, marked new text, marked deleted text, or other attributes or styles;
h. The user can define or chose from a number of available options how marked text will be shown instead of being inversed;
i. When normally searching for text marked by track changes, the word processor does not mark the changed section in black but simply jumps to its beginning, since it is already marked anyway;
j. In Word 2003 the user can toggle between viewing track changes in the old or in the new format without affecting the way the headlines and page breaks and/or images are shown;
k. The user can automatically convert marked additions to normal underlines, and/or vice-versa - automatically convert underlined sections into sections marked with track changes;
l. When searching for word combinations the word processor has an option of automatically ignoring redundant spaces;
m. When the user saves a file under a different name the user has an option to request to automatically keep open also another window with the original file.

105. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. When the computer is in standby (hibernate) mode, even if the user turns the power off or even plugs the electrical wire out of the wall, when the user returns the power, the system still automatically tries to return from standby instead of normal boot;
b. When the user activates standby mode, the system first creates the image and then can for go into a mode where power is used only or mainly for keeping the RAM refreshed, and so if the power remains on, when waking up the system does not even have to restore itself from the image, and if power has been turned off then the system automatically checks first to see if there is a recent image and then recovers from the image if possible.
c. Word processors or browser or other application can remember the last search strings or search strings that were used the pervious time one or more windows of the application were open, and lets the user choose automatically the last search string or chose from a group of recent search strings;
d. Before sending an email with attachments the user can easily change the order within the list of attachments;
e. Before sending an email with attachments the user can easily change the order within the list of attachments by pointing the mouse to one of the attachments and dragging it to a different position in the list;
f. When printing pdf files from the Internet, the pdf viewer automatically adds the url info at least on the first page of the printing or on each page;

g. When saving web files the browser and/or pdf viewer and/or other applications automatically add the url info to the file, in the form of a comment or any other form which does not effect the way the file is displayed, or add it as a visible text on each page or at least on the first page;
h. The user can request to automatically reopen the entire set of windows and/or tabs that was opened last time when reopening the browser after previously closing it even after the user closes it normally;
i. Even after the user tells the browser to start from the beginning or closes the various windows or tabs, the user can enter some history list which contains the previous states of multiple browser windows and/or tabs, and thus the user can scroll back to previous sets of tabs and/or windows that were previously open together and can go back to that same state of multiple open windows and/or tabs.
j. When deleting directories the system automatically keeps a backup of the directory structure and/or a rollback log, so that if the user made a mistake the directory tree can be instantly restored;
k. When the user moves backwards and forwards with web browsers, if the user chooses a different link after going back to a previous page and then goes back again, the browser automatically displays the different paths available if the user moves forward again.

106. The system of any of the above claims wherein in 3D map applications at least one of the following features exists:
a. The 2D images are processed in advance to create extrapolated 3D
representations according to relevant visual cues, and/or by making the photographs in advance with two or more lenses or 2 or more cameras;
b. At least in popular public places, multiple photographs from multiple angles are added, which are automatically combined into the processed 3D representations and/or at least become automatically integrated when the rotation and/or angle is appropriate;
c. At least in popular public places, one or more local streaming video cameras are added, which broadcast real time streaming data, so that when the location and/or angle is appropriate the real time streaming data is automatically integrated;
d. The displayed normal images include special marks which indicate to user "hotspots" where addition 3D images are available and/or more details are available and/or live streaming data is available;
e. The displayed normal images include special marks which indicate to user "hotspots" where addition 3D images are available and/or more details are available and/or live streaming data is available, and the user can ask the program to automatically take him/her to such spots automatically;
f. When the user for example wanders sideways the program automatically guesses from the pattern and/or direction and/or speed of the user's movement where he/she is most likely to continue next and so the details for next area or areas are downloaded in advance before the user goes there, thus preferably reducing significantly the waiting experience;
g. If the user clicks on s point he/she is interested in and then continues with the zoom, the spot that was clicked upon is automatically moved by the application to the center so that is remains in focus;
h. The system can automatically predict the zooming sequence of the user, so that if a user is apparently trying to zoom into the marked spot, the system tries in advance to get each time the additional details at least one step before the user requests it.

107. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The user can indicate or mark to the OS a set or range of hours in which the computer will automatically go into sleep mode (hibernate) at a certain set of hours;
b. The user can change the size of all the open windows and/or tabs of the same application or make other format changes that affect automatically all of them;
c. If the user wants to print an article and does not notice that there is a link for a printer friendly version, the browser looks for this link automatically in the page and can ask the user automatically if he/she wants indeed to print the page as is or to use the printer friendly link;
d. web servers are improved so that if a page is not found the server itself offers a list of likely pages according to similar pages in the same directory and/or in similar directories;
e. The firewall protects also additional communication devices in addition to or apart from the network card or modem, and even when the user supposedly allowed such a device to be accessed, the user is given also a real time indication that the device is working;
f. When the webcam is filming and/or recording, the security system and/or the OS and/or some other software and/or and/or the webcam itself continuously flash some light and/or otherwise indicates to the user clearly that the webcam is currently filming and/or recording what is happening in the room;
g. In shopping meta-search the meta-search engine automatically deduces the user's country according to his/her IP and/or example asks the user about the country where he/she wants the goods shipped to, and can automatically mark near each shop alternative if it has shipments to the user's country and/or puts such shops in a separate group, and/or can exclude shops that don't ship to the user's county if the user requests that;
h. When searching for academic results, the user can request the search engine to show only results from articles from a certain date onward or before a certain date or within one or more range of dates;

i. When searching for normal web pages, the user can request the search engine to show only results from pages which were last updated from a certain date onward or before a certain date or within one or more range of dates;
j. The search engine uses its historical data to estimate if the amount of change and/or the type of change justifies regarding the page as recently updated;

108. The system of any of the above claims wherein a firewall and/or security system is used that protects against tempering with DLLs and/or other components that are used for accessing the web by at least one of:
a. Automatically checking for in certified database or databases the correct CRC or other fingerprint or fingerprints of the various known components and thus determining automatically if some component is suspiciously with a wrong fingerprint;
b. Lookup in encrypted database or databases of the OS, in order to check that relevant OS components have not changed;
c. When such a component is changed the firewall warns the user about it after the change or when they are changed and/or the next time the relevant application that uses the changed component tries to access the web;
d. When such a component is changed the firewall warns the user about it, and is also able to tell the user which application changed it and when;
e. Constantly monitoring the relevant components and intercepting at the moment that an application is trying to make a change and asking the user if to allow it and which program is trying to change the component.

109. The system of any of the above claims wherein accessing directories with a large number of files or sub-directories through the dialogue box is speeded up by saving automatically the structure of the current directory in at least one buffer in memory (and/or even in the disk) in the same sorted order in which it is displayed.

110. The system of claim 109 wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The at least one buffer is automatically updated in memory (and/or on the disk) when something changes in the directory;
b. This is done automatically for any directory recently accessed by the dialogue box, and/or the word processor (and/or other applications) can tell the OS already when they are activated to prepare the at least one buffer of their current default directory in memory;
c. An additional sorted copy of directory entries is saved automatically for directories anyway;

d. Changes in file names and/or additions and/or deletions of files are automatically updated in the at least one buffer by merging them with the already sorted directory, instead of re-sorting it again each time.
111. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. When open windows of the same application are shown in the lower task bar as one group, the other windows of the same group can be shown in another task bar;
b. When open windows of the same application are shown in the lower task bar as one group, the other windows of the same group can be shown in another task bar at the top of the screen and/or at least when the user is viewing at least one of the windows of the group, and/or within the typically blue top of the main open window of the group and/or at least the user can toggle into this mode;
c. When the user clicks on the icon of a group of windows in the lower taskbar, instead of a list of names in lines below each other, the group can automatically expand into small images of the relevant Windows;
d. When the user clicks on the icon of a group of windows in the lower taskbar, instead of a list of names in lines below each other, the group can automatically expand into small images of the relevant Windows and the size of the images is preferably automatically determined by the number of windows;
e. When the user clicks on the icon of a group of windows in the lower taskbar, instead of a list of names in lines below each other, the group can automatically expand into small images of the relevant Windows, and by clicking on any of these preview images the user can jump into it;
f. When the mouse is on top of an icon in the bottom task bar and a preview small image of the window is shown, if the icon is below a certain minimal width, the image is automatically made wider than the icon;
g. The user can choose the desired size of these preview windows so that by resizing such a window the other preview windows will be of the new size defined by the user, until he/she resizes it again, and/or at least as long as it is above some minimum size defined by the system;
h. As the user moves the mouse vertically up or down over the list of names in grouped items, a preview image of the window which the mouse is currently over its name appears near the item and/or near the list.

112. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least in the first few minutes after the boot the OS automatically gives higher priority to actions taken by the user by at least one of increasing the frequency of sampling for user input and/or increasing the priority to tasks which the user is interacting with.

113. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The user can mark one or more programs in the startup menu to have higher priority so that they are loaded first, and/or the OS monitors automatically what the user normally does and/or knows which programs need higher priority to load earlier;
b. The OS knows which programs need higher priority to load earlier by using a convention of type indicators for various applications and/or by monitoring their behavior;
c. When the user clicks on some application in order to activate, the newly clicked application gets higher priority for loading than other already running applications, and/or if there is some problem to open it fast enough then at least some window or message appears and informs the user that the OS is trying to open the specific application but there is a problem;
d. When the user clicks on some application in order to activate, the newly clicked application gets higher priority for loading than other already running applications, and/or if there is some problem to open it fast enough then at least some window or message appears and informs the user that the OS is trying to open the specific application but there is a problem, and the problem is described shortly or at least named and the OS shows an automatic estimate of how much time it will take till the application window appears.

114. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. When the system tells the user during boot that unless he/she presses some key a scandisk will start in N seconds, the system also gives the user an option to press a key that starts the disk scan immediately, thus saving an unnecessary wait;
b. The scandisk or similar disk-checking applications during boot and/or also when activated normally after boot, automatically leaves a log of what errors were found and what was done;
c. The OS keeps a table of all the files that have been truncated due to various scandisk operations, so that files that were truncated by scandisk or by similar programs are automatically marked as truncated files when the user sees them in the explorer or in the Save or Open dialogue box or when typing "dir" in a CMD or DOS window;
d. When there are problems found during the scandisk during the boot (and/or also when the user runs scandisk for normally after the boot) the system sounds an audible indication, so that the user can pay attention if he/she was concentrating on something else, and/or the OS also provides a vertical lever which the user can use to go back in the scroll-lines on the screen, and/or if errors were found the system waits for user input at the end of the scandisk before continuing with the boot, or after the boot is finished a message is displayed about the errors found during the scandisk during boot;

115. The system of any of the above claims wherein text or images displayed during the boot are presented at the refresh rate which the user last used before restarting the computer, or at least 75 Hz or more or 80 Hz or 85 Hz or more.
116.The system of claim 115 wherein this is done by at least one of:
a. Keeping the last used normal refresh rate and/or the monitor plug and play identifier and/or also the last used resolution in variables in a file which can be read during the boot so that, at least if the monitor has not been changed, the OS can be sure that the monitor is able to display this refresh rate and/or at least the parts of the driver that talk to the plug and play element on the monitor are loaded at the beginning of the boot, and/or during the boot the OS can assume that any normal monitor is capable of using at least a refresh rate of 85 Hz at the typically low resolution used during the boot or can protect itself by switching to a lower refresh rate automatically if it can't;
b. Loading the normal display driver in advance at the beginning of the boot, so that not only the correct refresh rate can be safely used at this stage but also the higher resolution which the user is used to;
c. If more than one OS is available, the last known refresh rate and the plug and play identifier of the monitor are available in a standard place for to all the OSs, or at least available to the boot selector, so that even the boot selector itself can be displayed that way;Of course various combinations of the above solutions can also be used;
d. The monitors themselves and/or for display cards are improved so that they automatically ignore or can be programmed to ignore commands for working at refresh rates below 85 Hz or below 75 HZ, (unless at the high resolution used the display card or the monitor is able to work only at a lower Hz, in which case it uses the next best available option), so that even if the OS
tells the monitor or the display card to work at 60 HZ, the display card or the monitor will ignore the command and work at a higher resolution.

117. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. If the display card has connectors for more than one monitor and the OS
and/or the display card driver or some other relevant application discovers that the monitor is now connected to the other connector and there is no monitor on the original connector, the display driver automatically switches to the connected connector, and/or the display card or the OS senses also if the monitor is turned on and takes this into account;
b. If the user switched between the two monitors and the OS discovers that their positions on the connectors are now reversed, the OS and/or the display driver or other application or service which is in charge of this automatically switches the resolution and/or refresh rate and/or color corrections and/or video overlay definitions, and/or other definitions between the two monitors so that the user does not have to do this manually.

118. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. When the user creates a System checkpoint the OS allows the user to choose each time if to create a full copy of the relevant system files or just a copy of the incremental changes;
b. If more than one set of heads is used (i.e. more than one independent arm) on the hard disk, this can also be used for creating more efficient defragmentation, so that one of the independent set of heads can be used for defrag while the user is working normally with another set of heads, thus not slowing down at all the performance while performing also defrag, and/or when the user is away or working on something that does not require intensive disk accessing, two (or more) independent sets of heads can work simultaneously in cooperation on defragmentation, thus saving the need for jump back and forth between two places when moving files;
c. The system can activate automatic defrag mainly or only on the files and/or directories which the user uses most often and/or on the free space, so that no or little time is wasted on defragmenting files which are only rarely or very rarely used, and/or their defragmentation is automatically set for lower priority;

119. The system of any of the above claims wherein the clear desktop view is automatically added to the list of available options when pressing Alt-Tab or other similar keys or controls for jumping between open windows or applications, so that the user can also jump to the clear desktop through this.

120. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The user can enable or disable Cleartype separately for various uses or contexts, and/or the user can define, in general or for each type of application or section or context, not only if to use Cleartype or not but also to what extent to use it;
b. For choosing these separate settings for cleartype these different options are added to the normal menu in which the user chooses between standard fonts or Cleartype, and/or by right-clicking on the text of an icon on the desktop or in other applications the user can change the Cleartype setting, and/or the user can toggle between Cleartype to standard fonts instantly without going through a menu;
c. The chosen mode of using or not using cleartype becomes the default also for other windows of the same application and/or for similar windows.

121. The system of any of the above claims wherein the user can increase or reduce the size of the icons and/or of their text by zooming in or out on the desktop.

122. The system of claim 121 where this is done by pressing control and moving the mouse wheel.

123. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The automatic typing-error-correction system in the word processor takes into account also the context and so preferably chooses the word most likely according to context when there is more than one reasonable correction, and the context can be based on pre-gathered automatic statistics from Internet knowledge bases and/or specifically from the user's files and/or from the specific file or similar files;
b. Automatic logging of the evolution of the file name can also be used to automatically increment the numbers and/or letters which the user has been incrementing, so that the save menu contains an option which automatically increments the correct element and thus saves the new version in a new file;
c. The user can mark the relevant area in the file name and right click with the mouse in order to choose a menu option that defines this as the area that should be incremented automatically;
d. The Internet browser can create an automatic increment of one or more numbers or letters in a url;
e. The browser can automatically learn from the user after a few manual increments what area needs to be incremented and automatically adds a "next page" (and/or also a "previous page") icon in this case (or these icons are there before but start working for that page only after the relevant area in the url has been automatically learned or has been defined by the user), or the user can explicitly mark the relevant area and right click with the mouse in order to choose a menu option that defines this as the area that should be incremented (or decremented) automatically;
f. The word processor does not block programs from accessing open Word files if they only open the file for reading, and/or after the file is saved with a new name the original file with which the word processor was opened is released;
g. The word processor enables the user also an option to save a currently open file under a new name without closing the original window (or tab - if tabs are also supported in the word processor.

124. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. Changing the language in the text in the word processor (for example from English to Hebrew or vice versa) is made independent from the text when the user saves or opens a file name;
b. Changing the language in the dictionary does not change the language in the text of the document or vice versa;
c. The user can copy words from the dictionary into the main text also by a single click instead of having to use cut & paste, so that by simply clicking on the word the word is copied to the current position of the cursor;

d. When the user requests in the word processor translation of a word which is in plural the translation can show the translated word also in the plural, in addition to or instead of showing it in the single form;
e. If the word is a verb in the present form (ending with "ing"), the Word processor's translation or dictionary can show also the translated form also in the present form in addition to or instead of showing it in the normal form, but preferably in addition);
f. The user can define separately if to report an error for cases where the digit or digits are at the beginning of the word before the letters, cases where the digits or digits are in the middle of the word, or cases where the digit or digits are at the end of the word after all the letters.

125. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. Error checking and/or automatic correction is also enabled by default when the user is writing an email message in the email client or in the browser, by including an error checking engine in the browser and/or the email client or the browser or email client can be configured to communicate with the error checker of the word processor.
b. Search engines automatically offer in cases of words that contain a digit or digits also the correct word or words without the digit.

126. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The word processor uses heuristics for catching grammatical errors, such as marking automatically as suspect cases where two verbs or two nouns appear one after the other, without a',' or '-' or '/' or other punctuation marks between them, or the combination of words like "the" followed immediately by a verb instead of noun or followed by a conditional like 'if ;
b. In cases of words that can be both a verb or a noun the word processor can avoid the marking as suspect error or take into account the likelihood of the combination according to the known statistics;
c. The word processor can automatically correct for cases of a comma appearing after a space, coupled to the next word, into appearing coupled to the previous word and followed by a space (and vice versa in Hebrew or other right to left languages), or at least mark these places as suspect errors;
d. The word processor can mark as suspect errors cases where a verb ends with an 's' after a noun in plural or without an 's' after a noun in single;
e. If the word processor is not sure enough for making an automatic correction for an error the user can press a control key or choose a menu option which automatically lists more than one possible corrections for the same word and then the user can choose the correct option.

127. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. When text marked with track changes is also underlined, an additional underline is added, and/or the underline becomes in a different color from the text to which it is coupled, and/or there is still only one underline but it becomes thicker and/or moves up or down at the area of the underlined text, or becomes with a different pattern or becomes split into two very thin lines in the place of the original line, and/or some other visual indication of the underline is given;
b. When searching for word combinations the word processor offers automatically also results with a dash between 2 words instead of a space or vice versa, and/or offers also results where two adjacent search words appear as a single word, and/or offers automatically also results with another order of the search words, and/or offers automatically also "Near" search;
c. When the user changes the left margin of the document (in left-to-right languages, and/or the right margin in right-to left languages), for the entire document or for one or more marked sections, by moving the border on the ruler, the entire structure of the paragraphs is moved right or left without changes in the structure itself.

128. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. Search patterns with a numeral of the words in between or a"NEAR"
operator and/or suggesting automatically also synonyms, are enabled also in the word processor;
b. Search patterns with a numeral of the words in between or a "NEAR"
operator and/or suggesting automatically also synonyms, are enabled also in the word processor, and then the word processor moves the user to the relevant area each time and/or automatically marks all the relevant words that were found in it and/or also the synonyms of these words if synonyms were also requested or offered automatically;
c. If the user searches for two or more words next to each other and no results or few results are found in the web search or in the word processor search, the search engine or the word processor can automatically offer to the user to perform a"near" search, and/or display already how many results will be shown in that case, and/or if there are no or too few results the search engine or word processor automatically shows also the results from "NEAR"
searches or moves the user directly to them;
d. When "near" search is used, the search results are automatically sorted at least partially according to the distance between the words;
e. The user can preferably use a search options in the word processor which can find automatically areas where the search word or words appear in the highest concentration absolutely and/or relative to the size of the section;
f. The word processor brings the user first of all to the area with the highest concentration and/or the word processor also marks the area and/or its borders automatically and also all the occurrences of the search words in that area, and when the user repeats the search he/she is brought to the next best area, or all areas with a concentration beyond a certain threshold are considered a correct results and the user is brought to them in sequential order each;

g. If a user clicks on a link in the results of a search engine, the browser automatically identifies this, and then, at least as an option which the user can enable or disable, the browser can automatically mark the words that the user searched for in the web page when displaying it;
h. The Desktop Search can be activated also on a specific document or can automatically react to currently open windows of documents which the user is currently editing and conduct for example the "near" search on them.

129. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. Upon reload the browser gives higher priority in download and/or in cache allocation to the tabs which the user most recently viewed before closing the browser the last time, and/or if the user after reopening the browser clicks on a certain tab handle or also if he/she merely hovers over it, the browser immediately gives download priority to that tab, and/or if the user opens a new tab that tabs gets the highest priory;
b. There is gradual change in priority after the tab that is in the user's immediate focus;
c. Similar priorities are automatically used if the user presses on a key which causes automatic reloading of all the tabs.

130. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. If the user presses by mistake the Reload-all control, the user can abort this by pressing Esc or some other control or clinking on some icon;
b. If the user presses by mistake the Reload-all control, the user can abort this, and for this the browser keeps a copy of the last version of each tab and does not erase it at least until the reload data of that page is complete;
c. When going back to a previous page in the browser the user has also an option of opening the "Go-back" in a separate tab;
d. The user has an option of duplicating one or more tabs, in which case a new tab (or tabs) is created and the history of the current tab (or tabs) is automatically copied to it, so that the user can then go pack to a previous page in either the copy or the original tab;
e. The browser also enables to open any button into a new tab or new window, and the user can choose this from a menu by right clicking on it with the mouse;
f. After the user has gone back one or more steps within the same tab, the user can also request to go forward into a separate tab even when the user previously was there in the same tab.

131. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The user can tell the browser to automatically reverse the text in pages with negative text to positive (i.e. cases where the background is more dark than the color of the text fonts, and/or this automatic correction of inverse text is automatically done by the browser by default;
b. This correction of inverse text is done without damaging or changing any other format and/or features in the page.

132. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. In the track changes in the word processor the user can change the color without changing the author.
b. Much more than 10 colors are available for track changes;
c. The user can also request that text of marked changes for a specific author and/or from a specific date and/or for all authors and/or dates will have a different design than normal text;
d. The user can indicate a time and date from which the new colors apply and/or until a certain time and date;
e. The user can change any color of tracked changes to any other color;
f. For changing the colors of text in track changes the user can use the search and replace command with the color as a parameter, and/or the user can right click with the mouse or use some other command or control on one of the sections with the old color and then choose the new color from a menu, so that all the tracked changes with the same color change into the new color;
g. The user can edit a table which lists all the current colors of tracked changes and can mark near each of them the new desired color and then click on an option which activates the changes;
h. The word processor saves also a code of the specific color used for each set of track changes and does not change it on its own;
i. Even with the method of having to change the user in order to change the color, more than 10 color are available and the word processor displays in advance all the available colors and the user names that can be associated with them;
j. The user can tell the word processor to avoid marking tracked changes on the page numbers and/or the date and/or this is the default;
k. When the user executes the "accept changes" command he/he can request to accept automatically (with or without individual confirmation for each change) only the changes of a specific authors and/or color and/or group of color and/or accept all changes except a specific color or colors, and/or accept all changes from and/or until a certain date of when the change was made, and/or similarly reject a specific set of changes selected this way and/or search text in a specific set of changes selected this way;
l. When the user chooses the relevant accept/reject changes menu he/she is offered the color options as color bars or squares which he/she can mark or not mark and/or the date options as fill-able fields or moveable dates;
m. The user can also activate a command which removes from a file all the text except the tracked changes or only a subset of the tracked changes, or can mark automatically all the tracked changes or a subset and then automatically copy only the tracked changes or a the subset of them to a separate file;

n. The user can change the author for only a specific document or specific group of documents.

133. The system of any of the above claims wherein at least one of the following features exists:
a. The user can tell the desktop search to move it's index to another drive or another partition;
b. If the free space on the partition becomes too small, the desktop search can automatically move at least part of the index to another partition;
c. The user can tell a newly installed OS to use another index which has already been created in another OS and/or when installing in the new OS, the desktop search application or the OS itself finds automatically if such an index exists already in one or more other partitions that belong to another OS and can automatically suggest to the user to use it, thus avoiding unnecessary re-indexing if the index was already created by a previous OS (thus saving both time and disk space), and so the new OS continues to update the same index while the new OS is run;
d. When the partition where the OS is installed becomes with too small free space the OS automatically transfers at least some of the restore points automatically to one or more other partitions;
e. The OS creates automatically for the restore points in the other partition a directory which contains in its name and/or in one or more files within it information about the partition of the installed OS which these restore points belong and/or other identifiers about this OS;
f. When showing the user the list of available restore points the OS indicates near each restore point the drive letter and/or the full path where it is stored, and/or the OS also enables the user to copy one or more restore points to any other drive and/or directory which the user desires, thus creating an additional backup;
g. The OS automatically moves the swap file or one or more parts of it to another partition if the partition on which the OS is installed becomes with too small free space, or notifies the user about the problem and asks the user to choose the partition;
h. The OS automatically starts installing by default new programs into a new "program files" folder in another partition when the free space on the OS
installation partition becomes too small.

134. The system of any of the above claims wherein if a search engine automatically tries first "and" relations and then also "or", instead of giving only the number of total results, the search engines gives also the number of results with only "And", and/or gives separately the number of results with only "And" and the number of additional results with "Or", and/or shows a numbers of statistics, such as the number of results with only "And", number of results with 1"Or", number of results with 2 "Or"s, etc., and/or a clear border is drawn between the area of results that have fulfill the full set of "And" and the area of results where at least one "And" was regarded as "Or", and/or near each item in the results the search engine displays also the number of "And" terms that were fulfilled in that link.

135.The system of any of the above claims wherein if the ribbon in the word processor is minimized and then expands, when the ribbon expands the text is automatically scrolled up or down as needed so that the section which the user was currently editing will still be visible, and/or the range of the elevator is automatically adjusted to move only in the new visible area.

136.The system of any of the above claims wherein merely hovering with the mouse on one of the tabs of the ribbon in the word processor automatically displays the options of that tab.

137.The system of any of the above claims wherein merely hovering with the mouse on one of the tabs of the ribbon in the word processor automatically displays the options of that tab, so if the ribbon is minimized in Microsoft's way then hovering over one of the tabs also automatically expands the ribbon without the user having to click on it.