What you need to know

• Google announced the transition from the Manifest V2 framework to the Manifest V3 framework for privacy and security reasons, cutting support for Manifest V2-based extensions like uBlock Origin, leaving over 30 million users susceptible to intrusive ads.
• While there's a Lite version of the ad blocker, it misses crucial features that make the experience less effective.
• Opera recently announced that it'll continue supporting uBlock Origin running the Manifest V2 framework alongside its native ad blocker by making special modifications to Chromium's codebase.

Google's decision to transition from the Manifest V2 framework to the Manifest V3 framework on its Chrome browser has potentially left over 30 million users susceptible to intrusive ads, since the Chromium browser no longer supports extensions like uBlock Origin. 

Google confirmed to Windows Central that "over 93% of actively maintained extensions in the Chrome Web Store are running Manifest V3, and the top content filtering extensions all have Manifest V3 versions available - with options for users of AdBlock, Adblock Plus, uBlock Origin and AdGuard."

As you may know, the company unveiled a new version of uBlock Origin called uBlock Origin Lite, which meets Google's stringent Manifest V3 framework threshold. While uBlock Origin Lite supports core ad-blocking features like its predecessor, it falls short in key departments, as it doesn't support dynamic filters for blocking, scriptlet injection and more.

The news has been received with reservations, prompting some to claim they could transition to other browsers supporting uBlock Origin, including Brave. Brave touts its built-in ad and tracker blocker. It also plans to continue supporting uBlock Origin, potentially attracting Chrome's vast user base to its services. 

Opera will continue supporting uBlock Origin

• Microsoft shipped Windows 11 version 24H2 recently, which includes several fixes and new features.
• Among the changes are improvements to how Windows updates work.
• Following the installation of Windows 11 version 24H2, future updates will see a reduction in installation time, restart time, and CPU usage.

When Microsoft rolled out Windows 11 version 24H2 (also known as the Windows 11 2024 Update), the tech giant shipped several new features to PCs. The update also brought improvements to the underlying platform of Windows 11, resulting in significant performance improvements. While the immediate impact of the Windows 11 2024 Update will be performance and the new features, the update also improves the process of installing updates in the future.

Windows 11 version 24H2 improves the installation of monthly updates when compared to previous versions of Windows 11. How much better the update process will be depends on if your PC is well-maintained. Microsoft saw 45.6% faster installation, 39.7% faster restart time, and 15.3 less CPU usage using Windows 11 version 24H2 to install an update compared to Windows 11 version 22H2. In that test, the PC was well-maintained.

Performing the same test but with a device that was 18 months out of date saw slightly less significant improvements of 43.6% faster installation time, 33.5% faster restart time. Interestingly, CPU usage was reduced more when upgrading an out-of-date PC (25% less).

Microsoft outlined the improvements to Windows 11 updates:

• Parallel processing of component manifests. This complements the parallel hydration of newly serviced components using reverse and forward differentials first introduced in Windows 11, version 22H2.
• Optimized reading and parsing of component manifests. After reading and parsing the first time, we cache the results to use later in the process. This helps efficiency if the same component is referenced across multiple packages.
• Scalable use of available random-access memory (RAM). We use more RAM for storing the manifest cache if available and less if not.

Traditional feature updates are now also slightly smaller, though I'm not sure a 200 MB reduction will be noticed by many. That change comes from some inbox apps being updated through the Microsoft Store rather than managed through Windows monthly updates. If your system is already running the latest version of an inbox app, such as Mail, Calendar, and Notepad, a feature update will not include changes to those apps.

Windows 11 version 24H2

Our Senior Editor Zac Bowden has a full Windows 11 version 24H2 review. He broke down the following topics in that written review, as well as in his video review of the latest version of Windows 11.

Desktop & Start

• Phone Link is now integrated with the Start menu
• Taskbar system tray layout has been simplified
• Quick Settings has been rebuilt to be faster and more customizable
• Windows Spotlight image is now the default wallpaper setting
• Taskbar app preview thumbnails now have an animation
• You can now set HDR images as a desktop wallpaper

File Explorer

• File Explorer home tab now includes updated layout with shared documents
• You can now duplicate tabs by right-clicking the tab.
• Context Menu layout has been updated with better labelling to be easier to use.
• You can now create .7z and .TAR archive formats.
• You can view your Android phone's file system directly in File Explorer

Apps

• A new Outlook app for email, calendar, and contact is included
• Microsoft has updated Copilot as a standalone web app
• Photos now includes AI-enhanced generative erase and background editing
• Photos can now generate AI images based on user criteria (Copilot+ PC)
• A new Recall app uses AI to capture everything you do and makes finding things easier (Copilot+ PC)
• Paint now has built-in generative AI capabilities based on user drawn sketch (Copilot+ PC)

Settings & Misc

• Windows Update now supports checkpoints and hot patching for faster and less obtrusive updates
• Voice Clarity uses AI to remove background noise picked up by your microphone in supported apps
• Power settings for plugged/unplugged state can now be configured simultaneously
• A new Energy Saver mode replaces battery saver and applies to both laptops and desktops
• You can now configure mouse scroll wheel direction in Settings
• Wi-Fi 7 hardware is now supported
• New PRISM emulation layer makes x86 emulated apps run better on Arm
• Arm-based devices should now run smoother
• AutoSR uses AI to enhances the framerate and quality of games (Copilot+ PC)
• Live Captions can now translate languages into English in real-time locally (Copilot+ PC)
• Advanced Windows Studio Effects enhance your webcam with filters (Copilot+ PC)

You can still use the Copilot chatbot on Windows 11 (and 10), but with a different integration than the original release, and in this guide, I will explain how.

When Microsoft introduced Copilot on Windows 11, it was deeply integrated into the operating system to replace Cortana on laptops, tablets, and desktop computers. It was an experience planned to be something like an assistant you can interact with using natural language to answer any question from any topic with the ability to perform other tasks, such as changing system settings.

However, this experience never took off, and shortly after, the company removed the integration in favor of a web application since Copilot relies on the cloud to analyze queries and answer your questions using up-to-date information from the web. As a result of this change, there were no more side panels or the ability to change system settings through the chatbot.

On Windows 10, the story was different because Copilot was never integrated into the operating system. Instead, the chatbot has always been available as a web application with the ability to change system settings.

In this how-to guide, I'll review the Copilot experience you can access on Windows 11 and 10.

How to navigate on Copilot

On Windows 11, the Copilot experience is minimal and straightforward. You can access the chatbot in multiple ways and configure a few settings.

Launch Copilot

To launch the Copilot experience on Windows 11 (or 10), use these steps:

What you need to know

• Earlier this month, Microsoft unveiled a new benchmark called Windows Agent Arena, designed to provide a platform for testing AI agents in realistic Windows operating system environments.
• Early benchmarks show that multi-modal AI agents have an average performance success rate of 19.5% compared to the coveted average human performance rating of 74.5%.
• The benchmark is open-source and provides an avenue for deep research which could significantly enhance the development of AI agents. However, there are critical security and performance concerns abound.

With the emergence of generative AI and its broad adoption, the technology is rapidly transitioning from simple text and image-based prompts. NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang predicted that the next phase of AI would be dominated by self-driving cars and humanoid robots, and we've seen major tech corporations like Tesla make significant leaps on that front.

Over the past few weeks, we've seen Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff throw lethal jabs at Microsoft over claims that it has done a major disservice to the AI industry. "Copilot is just the new Microsoft Clippy," added Benioff. "It doesn't work or deliver value."

The Salesforce CEO also used the opportunity to tout the company as "the largest AI supplier in the world" with the capability of doing "a couple of trillion AI transactions per week." In case you missed it, Microsoft recently announced Copilot Studio will soon support the creation of autonomous agents. Like Salesforce's Agentforce offering, Microsoft's Copilot agents will help automate tasks across IT, marketing, sales, customer service, and finance.

Benioff viewed Microsoft's announcement as a sign that the company is panicking. "Copilot is a flop because Microsoft lacks the data and enterprise security models to create real corporate intelligence," added Salesforce CEO. "Clippy 2.0, anyone?"

More interestingly, Microsoft unveiled a new benchmark called Windows Agent Arena earlier this month. For context, the benchmark is designed to promote the testing of AI agents in Windows operating system environments. As such, the benchmark could potentially expedite the development of AI assistants with advanced and sophisticated capabilities to handle complex tasks across various applications.

According to research:

“Large language models show remarkable potential to act as computer agents, enhancing human productivity and software accessibility in multi-modal tasks that require planning and reasoning. However, measuring agent performance in realistic environments remains a challenge.”

New filters, including "Unread," "Chat," "Channels," "Meetings," and "Muted," will help users easily triage their messages. When returning to Teams after a break, they can simply click the "Unread" filter to catch up on all unread conversations across chats, channels, and meetings in one place.

The new @mention view brings together all messages directed at a specific user into a single interactive list. Instead of searching through multiple conversations for @mentions, users can now access them with a single click.

The new "Favorites" section in the left navigation bar is enabled by default, displaying all pinned chats and channels from the previous experience. New custom sections will allow users to organize conversations from chats, channels, meetings, Teams bots, or AI agents into one place. Microsoft Teams will support up to 50 sections and 50 items per section.

Sending a new message in channels is now easier. Users can create a chat or channel post from the same place, eliminating the need to navigate to the specific channel first.

Microsoft will not force this new combined chat and channel experience on users. Instead, it will offer controls allowing users to customize their experience based on their preferences. Users can choose to view chat and channels separately, see message previews, or display all channels in a single list.

This new chat and channel experience will be available on both desktop and mobile. Customers with access to the Microsoft public preview will be able to try out the new experience starting in November. You can learn more about this new experience in the video below.

Finally, Microsoft also revealed that it will begin testing threaded conversations with Teams users this quarter, expanding testing in early 2025. Threaded conversations will be broadly available in mid-2025.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

Apple Intelligence has finally arrived, and like most AI on smartphones so far, it’s mostly underwhelming.

 

The debut features of Apple Intelligence are all very familiar: there are glowing gradients and sparkle icons that indicate the presence of AI; writing tools that make your emails sound more professional; and an AI eraser in Photos that blots away distractions. It’s all here, and it all works okay. But none of it is even close to the time-saving computing platform shift we’ve been promised.

 

Essentially, there are two Apple Intelligences: the one that’s here now and the one we might see in the future. Even in today’s launch announcement, Apple is busy teasing the features that haven’t launched yet. What’s here today is a handful of tools that loosely share a common theme: helping you weed out distractions and find the signal in the noise. That’s the theory, anyway.

 

Apple uses AI to summarize groups of notifications so you can catch up on what you missed faster. You can summarize long emails and use a new focus mode that filters out unnecessary distractions. In practice, these things kind of work, though, after a week of using them, I don’t feel like I saved much time or energy.

 

In the Mail app, AI summaries appear where the first line of an email would normally show up when you’re viewing an entire inbox; there’s also an option to summarize individual emails. Maybe it’s a reflection of how useless email has become, but I didn’t find either of these features terribly helpful. You know what feature we already use that summarizes an email pretty well? The subject line. At least that’s true of most emails I get; they’re usually short and to the point. Maybe Tim Cook saves himself a lot of time reading long emails, but personally, I could live without a little summary of every email the DNC sends me asking for three dollars by midnight.

 

Notification summaries seem a little more promising to me — at the very least, it’s pretty funny seeing AI try to summarize a string of gossipy texts or a bunch of notifications from your doorbell. But it also surfaced a bit of important information in a string of texts from a friend, and had I not seen that summary when glancing at my phone, I might have read the messages much later. That was helpful.

 

Over in Photos, you’ll find the new Clean Up tool in your editing options. It’s designed to quickly remove objects from a scene; you can tap something that’s been automatically highlighted by the tool or outline something yourself that you want removed. It runs on-device, so you only have to wait a few moments, and you’ll see the selected object (mostly) disappear. 

 

I erased a table behind this kiddo with Google’s older

Magic Eraser tool in Google Photos.

 

Apple’s Clean Up does a better job of removing the table,

but it’s not exactly miles ahead of Google’s tool.

 

The tool does a good-enough job, especially for smaller objects in the background. But it’s only about as good as Google’s older Magic Eraser tool in Google Photos — occasionally, it’s better, but it’s not as good as Google’s Magic Editor, which uses generative AI for incredibly convincing object removal. That tool runs in the cloud, so it’s a little apples to oranges, but still. I can use Google Photos’ on-device Magic Eraser tool on my four-year-old iPhone 12 Mini, and the results are pretty close to what I get with Clean Up running on the iPhone 16 — not a great argument for the AI phone upgrade cycle. 

 

There’s also, of course, an upgraded Siri. Sure, it looks different, and typing queries is a handy addition, but you don’t have to use it for long to realize it’s basically the same old Siri with a new coat of paint. It handles natural language better and includes more product knowledge to help you find settings on your iPhone, but that’s about it right now. Apple has promised big updates for Siri down the road, and features like a ChatGPT extension are scheduled to arrive by the end of the year. But the big stuff — contextual awareness, the ability to take action in apps — is all planned for 2025.

 

Other features — like AI-generated photo memories and smart replies — do what they’re supposed to do but lack a certain human touch. I didn’t send any of the AI-suggested replies in my messages even though they conveyed the right sentiments. If I’m going to take the time to respond to a text, I might as well just write “That’s tough” myself rather than have AI do it, you know? Isn’t that part of the point of texting someone? I also prompted Photos to create a memory of moments of my kid, which it did but titled it the eerily impersonal “Joyous Moments with Child.”

 

Apple’s playing a little catch-up.

 

To be clear, criticism of Apple Intelligence is not an endorsement of other phones’ intelligences; they’re all varying degrees of unhelpful right now. If you want to make it look like a helicopter crashed in an empty meadow, then sure, there’s AI for that. But if you want help getting things done? That’s not quite ready. 

 

And in fairness, this is v1, and Apple has been pretty clear that its more impressive Intelligence features will drip out over the next year. But Apple also put a big, bright “Built for Apple Intelligence” bow on every new iPhone, iPad, and Mac it’s selling right now, suggesting we’d be sorry if we bought an Apple device that couldn’t handle AI. If Apple Intelligence is a letdown right now, it’s because Apple built it up to impossible heights.

 

There’s more to come, and some of it looks really promising. This first wave of AI features is Apple playing catch-up to Google and Samsung. But no phone maker has yet created a cohesive set of time-saving AI tools. Apple might be arriving late, but the game is just getting started.

 

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

The first set of Apple Intelligence features available today includes a more natural and conversational Siri, Systemwide Writing Tools, an updated Photos app with AI capabilities, and an AI-powered Notifications experience. Read about them in brief below:

• Systemwide Writing Tools: Users can rewrite, proofread, and summarize text they type from virtually anywhere, including third-party apps.
• Siri: Siri has a brand-new design with a glowing light that wraps around the edge of the screen when active on iPhone, iPad, or CarPlay. Users can now easily switch between text and voice. Siri can now follow along when users stumble over their words and maintain context to provide better answers.
• Photos: The Photos app now supports natural language search, allowing users to search for any content in photos and videos with a simple text description. Using the new Clean Up tool, users can delete unwanted objects in their photos. Finally, the Memories feature allows users to create the movies they want by simply typing a description.
• Notifications: Notification summaries will enable users to scan long or stacked notifications with key details.
• Notes and Phone: With the updated Notes and Phone apps, users can now record, transcribe, and summarize audio.
• Mail: The new Priority Messages section in the Mail app lists the most urgent emails. Also, users can see summaries for long email threads. Finally, Smart Reply provides suggestions for a quick response.

Apple Intelligence is now available on iPhone 16, iPhone 16 Plus, iPhone 16 Pro, iPhone 16 Pro Max, iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max, iPad with A17 Pro or M1 and later, and Mac with M1 and later with the device and Siri language set to U.S. English.

Apple will be rolling out more Apple Intelligence features, including Genmoji, Image Playground, ChatGPT integration, visual intelligence, and more in the coming months. In December, Apple will also be expanding Apple Intelligence to localized English in Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa, and the U.K. In April, Apple Intelligence will be available in Chinese, English (India), English (Singapore), French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Spanish, Vietnamese, and other languages.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

Now, a reminder feature is under development in the latest Android beta app. WABetaInfo has spotted an option that will send you a notification reminder if you have missed viewing status updates from your contacts. This new feature was spotted in the latest WhatsApp Android beta app version 2.24.22.21, which is available through the Google Play Beta Program.

If you are someone that opens WhatsApp, message or reply someone who have messages for you on the platform, and then exits the app without viewing status updates from contacts, then this feature is targeted to you. For users who don't regularly check the status update section of the app, the reminders option will send you occasional reminders about status updates that you haven't seen.

The feature will also send you notification reminders for new status updates, especially from the ones that the user interacts frequently or have marked as favorites. This can be a good option for those who have many contacts, as status updates disappear after 24 hours.

The WhatsApp reminders for status updates feature will be available inside Settings > Notifications, and is turned off by default. So, you have to manually turn this feature on to take its advantage and never miss out on any status updates. For now, this WhatsApp reminders for status updates feature is only available to a few beta testers of the app. It is expected to make its way to more users in the coming days.

Let us know in the comments section would like WhatsApp remind you about missed or new status updates or you think this is just another unnecessary notification to deal with.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

There have been times when it seemed like X Window System would be with us forever, even though it's more than 40 years old, and the last true version was issued in 2012. But with great effort, some organizations and operating systems have moved on. Raspberry Pi has now joined the forward momentum, with its latest release of Raspberry Pi OS swapping in Wayland—and it's hoping the change is hardly noticeable.

You might want to wait a moment before upgrading, though.

Simon Long wrote on Raspberry Pi's blog that the organization started thinking about switching to Wayland about 10 years ago, though it was "nowhere near ready to use" back then. Over the last few years, the Pi team has done some things to prep a real switch:

• Used mutter as an X window manager in 2021's Bullseye release because it could also be used as a Wayland compositor
• Switched from mutter to wayfire in 2023's Bookworm release and made Wayland the default for Raspberry Pi 4 and 5
• Switched one last time to labwc, which better fit Raspberry Pi's graphics hardware than wayfire

Because labwc is built on wlroots, a modular system that allows for building a Wayland compositor without whole-cloth reinvention, it was easier to adapt to Raspberry Pi's needs. After efforts throughout 2024, the team is ready to call it the year of Wayland on Raspberry Pi desktops.

"After much optimisation for our hardware, we have reached the point where labwc desktops run just as fast as X on older Raspberry Pi models," Long wrote. "Today, we make the switch with our latest desktop image: Raspberry Pi Desktop now runs Wayland by default across all models."

Those updating their Pi desktop after today (maybe with a bit of cautionary waiting) will receive a prompt notifying them of the option to switch to labwc, and the board maker suggests most people do so; there will be no more support or updates for the wayfire system in future updates. The only real change is the loss of "a couple of animations" not yet rebuilt for labwc. Older-model Pis should be OK, too, through use of a compatibility tool, Xwayland, running inside labwc. If something goes awry, the blog post has details on how to switch back to X.

In addition to that multi-year effort resulting in a single button click for users, Raspberry Pi claims to have significantly improved touchscreen support in the newest desktop releases. When a touchscreen is detected and text input is requested, the desktop should now show a virtual keyboard at screen bottom, or at least provide the icon in the upper-right taskbar. A long-press on a screen should also now automatically translate to a right mouse click, and double taps are double clicks.

Raspberry Pi's blog post has the full list of little updates beyond the big, quiet update. There are a number of people in the comments of Raspberry Pi's blog post saying that the earliest adopters were dropped back to a blinking cursor after upgrade due to an issue with lab-wc not being installed. A fix was in the works early on Monday.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

Microsoft places compatibility holds on specific devices using hardware or applications that may conflict with Windows 11 24H2, causing crashes, performance issues, freezes, or other unusual behavior.

These holds will prevent Windows 1 24H2 from being installed until these issues are resolved either through new drivers or software updates.

If you are prevented from upgrading to Windows 11 24H2 from Windows Update, you can click on the "Learn More" link, as described in this article, to see what compatibility holds are placed on your computer.

Below is a list of known compatibility holds and how to resolve them, if possible.

ASUS BSODs

For ASUS devices, particularly the X415KA and X515KA models, the update may lead to a blue screen error.

This issue, also confirmed by ASUS's support, affects these two specific models due to compatibility issues.

Microsoft has paused the update rollout for these devices, and you'll only see the update when ASUS rolls out a firmware update via Windows Update or its own app.

Voicemeeter app 

Additionally, if you use the Voicemeeter app, you might experience a blue screen with a MEMORY MANAGEMENT error when you open the app after installing Windows 11 2024 update.

This error stems from an incompatibility between the Voicemeeter driver and Windows 11's updated memory manager.

Microsoft has paused the update on installations with Voicemeeter. Again, this can be fixed only when VB-Audio Software rolls out a fix.

Integrated cameras

There's another weird bug where using integrated cameras is no longer possible after upgrading to Windows 11 24H2.

Users have reported issues with object or face detection features. This affects apps like the Camera app, Windows Hello facial recognition, and other third-party apps that use the integrated camera for detection purposes.

Microsoft has paused the update for these affected devices, but it's unclear how many devices are affected because integrated cameras are widely used in laptops.

Safe Exam Browser

Safe Exam is not your usual web browser but a third-party solution that allows universities and corporates, such as banks, to conduct their internal exams more securely. 

Unfortunately, for those using Safe Exam Browser, versions 3.7 or lower, the browser won't work after Windows 11 update. Specifically, these older versions of the app may run into issues following the 24H2 installation.

To help businesses and universities that rely on Safe Exam Browser, Microsoft is restricting such devices from receiving Windows 11 24H2. 

Easy Anti-Cheat BSOD

For devices running Easy Anti-Cheat, which is required by popular games like Fortnite, the update may lead to system crashes.

This issue affects devices with Intel's Alder Lake+ processors and vPro technology, specifically when using outdated Easy Anti-Cheat drivers.

To mitigate this, Microsoft has temporarily paused the update for devices with older drivers.

You can try updating your games or drivers to begin seeing the update.

Fingerprint sensors

Similarly, some users with fingerprint sensors may find these devices unresponsive after locking their systems.

Windows Hello fingerprint authentication will fail, and you'll need to unlock your PC using PIN or facial recognition.

Microsoft has applied a hold to prevent issues on devices with this configuration. The goal is to release a firmware update to fix this issue.

Wallpaper customization apps

Wallpaper customization apps are also blocking Windows 11 24H2.

That's because if you use wallpaper customization apps and install the update, you might run into several issues, including missing wallpapers to disrupted desktop previews and error messages within the apps.

Microsoft recommends people update their wallpaper apps to lift the compatibility hold.

Intel Smart Sound Technology

Compatibility issues between Windows 11 and Intel Smart Sound Technology are normal, especially after a major Windows Update.

This time, devices with SST drivers may also run into blue screen errors when updating to version 24H2. Microsoft and Intel have flagged driver versions 10.29.0.5152 and 10.30.0.5152 as incompatible.

To fix this, you can update the Intel SST driver versions to 10.30.00.5714 or 10.29.00.5714 or later.

It may take up to 48 hours after the driver update before the Windows 11 update becomes available.

Asphalt 8 (Airborne)

Windows 11 24H2 is also blocked due to Asphalt 8 (Airborne).

Some people may not even realize they have this game installed, but it's one of the reasons they might not receive the upgrade.

There's a bug in the update that can cause the game to freeze, requiring a restart to resume gameplay.

Microsoft has placed a hold on devices using Asphalt 8 to help you play the game.

What do you do if Windows 11 24H2 is paused on your device?

Microsoft recommends that users avoid attempting manual updates through the Windows 11 Installation Assistant or the media creation tool on devices affected by these compatibility holds.

Instead, check for new updates to the specific software or hardware drivers that may be causing the holds and see if they remove the block on the update.

Each hold will be lifted at some point in the future, and attempts to force the upgrade could cause significant issues, including blue screen errors.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

The integrated development environment (IDE) Rider by JetBrains is now available for free for the first time ever.

After trialing non-commercial free licenses with other products like RustRover and Aqua, JetBrains has introduced a similar option for Rider. It also says this is a permanent situation, not a limited-time initiative.

In a blog post announcing the change, JetBrains' Ekaterina Ryabukha acknowledges that there are numerous cases where people use an IDE without any commercial intent—for example, hobbyists, open source developers, and educators or students. She also cites a Stack Overflow survey that 68 percent of professional developers "code outside of work as a hobby."

Rider has always been a bit niche, but it's often beloved by those who use it. Making it free could greatly expand its user base, and it could also make it more popular in the long run because learners could start with it without having to pay an annual fee, and some learners go pro.

It's also good news for some macOS developers, as Microsoft not long ago chose to end support for Visual Studio on that platform. Yes, you can use VS Code, Xcode, or other options, but there were some types of projects that were left in the lurch, especially for developers who don't find VS Code robust enough for their purposes.

There is one drawback that might matter to some: users working in Rider on the non-commercial free license "cannot opt out of the collection of anonymous usage statistics."

There are some edge cases that are in a bit of a gray area when it comes to using a free license versus a paid one. Sometimes, projects that start without commercial intent can become commercial later on. JetBrains simply says that "if your intentions change over time, you’ll need to reassess whether you still qualify for non-commercial use."

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

Gurman, citing anonymous Apple sources (who requested anonymity since the project is a secret), claims that Apple tested the app on certain employees. These employees were asked to validate that they were prediabetic through a blood test by monitoring their blood sugar levels using various devices available on the market. The blood test confirmed that they are not currently diabetic but have an elevated risk of getting type 2 diabetes.

While there is no cure for diabetes as it can only be managed, prediabetes can be reversed through diet and proper exercise. This is where Apple's blood sugar monitoring app will come into play, helping users see how different food choices can impact their sugar levels so they can opt for healthier food options to avoid sudden blood sugar spikes.

Apple reportedly "doesn’t have plans to release the app, but rather to "eventually integrate the technology into future health products," such as a noninvasive blood sugar tracker. The report also notes that Apple's noninvasive blood glucose sensor would shoot a laser light into the skin and read the amount of glucose in the blood.

Initial versions of this technology would supposedly warn users if they are prediabetic with later versions helping them with their specific blood sugar readings. Apple has allegedly made good progress towards this tech, but it is still miles away from being market-ready. As for the current situation, Gurman notes that Apple has paused the testing of the app to focus on other health features.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

The Windows 10 update cliff is coming in October 2025. We've explained why that's a big deal, and we have a comprehensive guide to updating to Windows 11 (recently updated to account for changes in Windows 11 24H2) so you can keep getting security updates, whether you're on an officially supported PC or not.

But this is more than just a theoretical exercise; I've been using Windows 11 on some kind of "unsupported" system practically since it launched to stay abreast of what the experience is actually like and to keep tabs on whether Microsoft would make good on its threats to pull support from these systems at any time.

Now that we're three years in, and since I've been using Windows 11 24H2 on a 2012-era desktop and laptop as my primary work machines on and off for a few months now, I can paint a pretty complete picture of what Windows 11 is like on these PCs. As the Windows 10 update cliff approaches, it's worth asking: Is running "unsupported" Windows 11 a good way to keep an older but still functional machine running, especially for non-technical users?

My hardware

I've run Windows 11 on a fair amount of old hardware, including PCs as old as a late XP-era Core 2 Duo Dell Inspiron desktop. For the first couple of years, I ran it most commonly on an old Dell XPS 13 9333 with a Core i5-4250U and 8GB of RAM and a Dell Latitude 3379 2-in-1 that just barely falls short of the official requirements (both systems are also pressed into service for ChromeOS Flex testing periodically).

But I've been running the 24H2 update as my main work OS on two machines. The first is a Dell Optiplex 3010 desktop with a 3rd-generation Core i5-3xxx CPU, which had been my mother's main desktop until I upgraded it a year or so ago. The second is a Lenovo ThinkPad X230 with a i5-3320M inside, a little brick of a machine that I picked up for next to nothing on Goodwill's online auction site.

Both systems, and the desktop in particular, have been upgraded quite a bit; the laptop has 8GB of RAM while the desktop has 16GB, both are running SATA SSDs, and the desktop has a low-profile AMD Radeon Pro WX2100 in it, a cheap way to get support for running multiple 4K monitors. The desktop also has USB Wi-Fi and Bluetooth dongles and an internal expansion card that provides a pair of USB 3.0 Type-A ports and a single USB-C port. Systems of this vintage are pretty easy to refurbish since components are old enough that they've gone way down in price but not so old that they've become rare collectors' items. It's another way to get a usable computer for $100—or for free if you know where to look.

And these systems were meant to be maintained and upgraded. It's one of the beautiful things about a standardized PC platform, though these days we've given a lot of that flexibility up in favor of smaller, thinner devices and larger batteries. It is possible to upgrade and refurbish these 12-year-old computers to the point that they run modern operating systems well because they were designed to leave room for that possibility.

But no matter how much you upgrade any of these PCs or how well you maintain them, they will never meet Windows 11's official requirements. That's the problem.

Using it feels pretty normal

Depending on how you do it, it can be a minor pain to get Windows 11 up and running on a computer that doesn't natively support it. But once the OS is installed, Microsoft's early warnings about instability and the possible ending of updates have proven to be mostly unfounded.

A Windows 11 PC will still grab all of the same drivers from Windows Update as a Windows 10 PC would, and any post-Vista drivers have at least a chance of working in Windows 11 as long as they're 64-bit. But Windows 10 was widely supported on hardware going back to the turn of the 2010s. If it shipped with Windows 8 or even Windows 7, your hardware should mostly work, give or take the occasional edge case. I've yet to have a catastrophic crash or software failure on any of the systems I'm using, and they're all from the 2012–2016 era.

Once Windows 11 is installed, routine software updates and app updates from the Microsoft Store are downloaded and installed on my "unsupported" systems the same way they are on my "supported" ones. You don't have to think about how you're running an unsupported operating system; Windows remains Windows. That's the big takeaway here—if you're happy with the performance of your unsupported PC under Windows 10, nothing about the way Windows 11 runs will give you problems.

...Until you want to install a big update

There's one exception for the PCs I've had running unsupported Windows 11 installs in the long term: They don't want to automatically download and install the yearly feature updates for Windows. So a 22H2 install will keep downloading and installing updates for as long as they're offered, but it won't offer to update itself to versions 23H2 or 24H2.

This behavior may be targeted specifically at unsupported PCs, or it may just be a byproduct of how Microsoft rolls out these yearly updates (if you have a supported system with a known hardware or driver issue, for example, Microsoft will withhold these updates until the issues are resolved). Either way, it's an irritating thing to have to deal with every year or every other year—Microsoft supports most of its annual updates for two years after they're released to the public. So 23H2 and 24H2 are currently supported, while 22H2 and 21H2 (the first release of Windows 11) are at the end of the line.

This essentially means you'll need to repeat the steps for doing a new unsupported Windows 11 install every time you want to upgrade. As we detail in our guide, that's relatively simple if your PC has Secure Boot and a TPM but doesn't have a supported processor. Make a simple registry tweak, download the Installation Assistant or an ISO file to run Setup from, and the Windows 11 installer will let you off with a warning and then proceed normally, leaving your files and apps in place.

Without Secure Boot or a TPM, though, installing these upgrades in place is more difficult. Trying to run an upgrade install from within Windows just means the system will yell at you about the things your PC is missing. Booting from a USB drive that has been doctored to overlook the requirements will help you do a clean install, but it will delete all your existing files and apps.

If you're running into this problem and still want to try an upgrade install, there's one more workaround you can try.

1. Download an ISO for the version of Windows 11 you want to install, and then either make a USB install drive or simply mount the ISO file in Windows by double-clicking it.
2. Open a Command Prompt window as Administrator and navigate to whatever drive letter the Windows install media is using. Usually that will be 😧 or E:, depending on what drives you have installed in your system; type the drive letter and colon into the command prompt window and press Enter.
3. Type setup.exe /product server

You'll notice that the subsequent setup screens all say they're "installing Windows Server" rather than the regular version of Windows, but that's not actually true—the Windows image that comes with these ISO files is still regular old Windows 11, and that's what the installer is using to upgrade your system. It's just running a Windows Server-branded version of the installer that apparently isn't making the same stringent hardware checks that the normal Windows 11 installer is.

This workaround allowed me to do an in-place upgrade of Windows 11 24H2 onto a Windows 10 22H2 PC with no TPM enabled. It should also work for upgrading an older version of Windows 11 to 24H2.

Older PCs are still very useful!

Having to go out of your way to keep Windows 11 up to date on an unsupported PC is a fairly major pain. But unless your hardware is exceptionally wretched (I wouldn't recommend trying to get by with less than 4GB of RAM at an absolute bare minimum, or with a spinning hard drive, or with an aging low-end N-series Pentium or Celeron chip), you'll find that decade-old laptops and desktops can still hold up pretty well when you're sticking to light or medium-sized workloads.

I haven't found this surprising. Major high-end CPU performance improvements have come in fits and starts over the last decade, and today's (Windows 11-supported) barebones bargain basement Intel N100 PCs perform a lot like decade-old mainstream quad-core desktop processors.

With its RAM and GPU updates, my Optiplex 3010 and its Core i5 worked pretty well with my normal dual-4K desktop monitor setup (it couldn't drive my Gigabyte M28U at higher than 60 Hz, but that's a GPU limitation). Yes, I could feel the difference between an aging Core i5-3475S and the Core i7-12700 in my regular Windows desktop, and it didn't take much at all for CPU usage to spike to 100 percent and stay there, always a sign that your CPU is holding you back. But once apps were loaded, they felt responsive, and I had absolutely no issues writing, recording and editing audio, and working in Affinity Photo on the odd image or two.

I wouldn't recommend using this system to play games, nor would I recommend overpaying for a brand-new GPU to pair with an older quad-core CPU like this one (I chose the GPU I did specifically for its display outputs, not its gaming prowess). If you wanted to, you could still probably get respectable midrange gaming performance out of a 4th-, 6th-, or 7th-gen Intel Core i5 or i7 or a first-generation AMD Ryzen CPU paired with a GeForce RTX 4060 or 3060, or a Radeon RX 7600. Resist the urge to overspend, consider used cards as a way to keep costs down, and check your power supply before you install anything—the years-old 300 W power supply in a cheap Dell office desktop will need to be replaced before you can use it with any GPU that has an external power connector.

My experience with the old Goodwill-sourced ThinkPad was also mostly pretty good. It had both Secure Boot and a TPM, making installation and upgrades easier. The old fingerprint sensor (a slow and finicky swipe-to-scan sensor) and its 2013-era driver even support Windows Hello. I certainly minded the cramped, low-resolution screen—display quality and screen-to-bezel ratio being the most noticeable changes between a 12-year-old system and a modern one—but it worked reliably with a new battery in it. It even helped me focus a bit at work; a 1366×768 screen just doesn't invite heavy multitasking.

But the mid-2010s are a dividing line, and new laptops are better than old laptops

That brings me to my biggest word of warning.

If you want to run Windows 11 on an older desktop, one where the computer is just a box that you plug stuff into, the age of the hardware isn't all that much of a concern. Upgrading components is easier whether you're talking about a filthy keyboard, a failing monitor, or a stick of RAM. And you don't need to be concerned as much with power use or battery life.

But for laptops? Let me tell you, there are things about using a laptop from 2012 that you don't want to remember.

Three important dividing lines: In 2013, Intel's 4th-generation Haswell processors gave huge battery life boosts to laptops thanks to lower power use when idle and the ability to switch more quickly between active and idle states. In 2015, Dell introduced the first with a slim-bezeled design (though it would be some years before it would fix the bottom-mounted up-your-nose webcam), which is probably the single most influential laptop design change since the MacBook Air. And around the same time (though it's hard to pinpoint an exact date), more laptops began adopting Microsoft's Precision Touchpad specification rather than using finicky, inconsistent third-party drivers, making PC laptop touchpads considerably less annoying than they had been up until that point.

And those aren't the only niceties that have become standard or near-standard on midrange and high-end laptops these days. We also have high-resolution, high-density displays; the adoption of taller screen aspect ratios like 16:10 and 3:2, giving us more vertical screen space to use; USB-C charging, replacing the need for proprietary power bricks; and backlit keyboards!

The ThinkPad X230 I bought doesn't have a backlit keyboard, but it does have a bizarre little booklight next to the webcam that shines down onto the keyboard to illuminate it. This is sort of neat if you're already the kind of person inclined to describe janky old laptops as "neat," but it's not as practical.

Even if you set aside degraded, swollen, or otherwise broken batteries and the extra wear and tear that comes with portability, a laptop from the last three or four years will have a ton of useful upgrades and amenities aside from extra speed. That's not to say that older laptops can't be useful because they obviously can be. But it's also a place where an upgrade can make a bigger difference than just getting you Windows 11 support.

Some security concerns

Windows 11's system requirements were controversial in part because they were focused mostly on previously obscure security features like TPM 2.0 modules, hypervisor-protected code integrity (HVCI), and mode-based execution control (MBEC). A TPM module makes it possible to seamlessly encrypt your PC's local storage, among other things, while HVCI helps to isolate data in memory from the rest of the operating system to make it harder for malicious software to steal things (MBEC is just a CPU technology that speeds up HVCI, which can come with a hefty performance penalty on older systems).

Aside from those specific security features, there are other concerns when using old PCs, some of the same ones we've discussed in macOS as Apple has wound down support for Intel Macs. Microsoft's patches can protect against software security vulnerabilities in Windows, and they can provide some partial mitigations for firmware-based vulnerabilities since even fully patched and fully supported systems won't always have all the latest BIOS fixes installed.

But software can't patch everything, and even the best-supported laptops with 5th- or 6th-generation Core CPUs in them will be a year or two past the days when they could expect new BIOS updates or driver fixes.

The PC companies and motherboard makers make some of these determinations; cheap consumer laptops tend to get less firmware and software support regardless of whether Intel or AMD are fixing problems on their ends. But Intel (for example) stops supporting its CPUs altogether after seven or eight years (support ended for 7th-generation CPUs in March). For any vulnerabilities discovered after that, you're on your own, or you have to trust in software-based mitigations.

I don't want to overplay the severity or the riskiness of these kinds of security vulnerabilities. Lots of firmware-level security bugs are the kinds of things that are exploited by sophisticated hackers targeting corporate or government systems—not necessarily everyday people who are just using an old laptop to check their email or do their banking. If you're using good everyday security hygiene otherwise—using strong passwords or passkeys, two-factor authentication, and disk encryption (all things you should already be doing in Windows 10)—an old PC will still be reasonably safe and secure.

A viable, if imperfect, option for keeping an old PC alive

If you have a Windows 10 PC that is still working well or that you can easily upgrade to give it a new lease on life, and you don't want to pay whatever Microsoft is planning to charge for continued Windows 10 update support, installing Windows 11 may be the path of least resistance for you despite the installation and update hurdles.

Especially for PCs that only miss the Windows 11 support cutoff by a year or two, you'll get an operating system that still runs reasonably well on your PC, should still support all of your hardware, and will continue to run the software you're comfortable with. Yes, the installation process for Windows' annual feature updates is more annoying than it should be. But if you're just trying to squeeze a handful of years out of an older PC, it might not be an issue you have to deal with very often. And though Windows 11 is different from Windows 10, it doesn't come with the same learning curve that switching to an alternate operating system like ChromeOS Flex or Linux would.

Eventually, these PCs will age out of circulation, and the point will be moot. But even three years into Windows 11's life cycle, I can't help but feel that the system requirements could stand to be relaxed a bit. That ship sailed a long time ago, but given how many PCs are still running Windows 10 less than a year from the end of guaranteed security updates, expanding compatibility is a move Microsoft could consider to close the adoption gap and bring more PCs along.

Even if that doesn't happen, try running Windows 11 on an older but still functional PC sometime. Once you clean it up a bit to rein in some of modern Microsoft's worst design impulses, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

On Windows 11, the System Tray, also known as the notification area, is located on the right side of the Taskbar, and it can display various pieces of information and enables you to access different system functions and applications, such as the clock, network status, volume control, and more.

Since the operating system usually has some default configurations for the Taskbar, I will share with you the settings I typically change to optimize and declutter the System Tray space.

Some of these include removing the time and date (but recently, the operating system introduced an option to show an abbreviated version of the clock) and system icons, disabling notifications, and the option to show the desktop.

In this how-to guide, I will outline the different ways I customize the System Tray in the Taskbar for Windows 11.

How to hide time and date on Windows 11

On Windows 11, you can remove the time and date completely from the Taskbar or show an abbreviated version.

The option to show a shorter version of the time and date information may not be available for everyone, but it depends on when you're reading this guide.

Hide clock from Taskbar

To remove the clock from the Taskbar, use these steps:

You've heard it all before, whichever browser you choose to use. The running joke is always that people only use Microsoft Edge to download Google Chrome. There's obviously an element of truth in that, given Chrome's ridiculous share of the browser pie, but it doesn't have to be this way. And yes, I know a lot of people do actually use and love Microsoft Edge. It's a very good browser these days.

But whenever I see people say this, whether joking or not, there's one thing I always want to respond. You shouldn't even bother using Edge to download Chrome, or any other browser you'd prefer to use. Instead, there's a far better, quicker way to do it, than opening up Edge, going to a website, downloading an installer, and then installing the thing.

Use Windows Package Manager. My favorite Windows 11 tool. I'll keep talking about it until I've converted people. It's finally even working on my long-suffering colleagues. Forego using Edge to do it, and open the Terminal app instead.

Windows Package Manager? What on earth is that?

winget install google.chrome

Here is the complete changelog:

Changes and Improvements gradually being rolled out to the Dev Channel with toggle on

 

[Windows Studio Effects]

 

• Windows Studio Effects delivers AI-based camera and audio enhancements on devices equipped with a Neural Processing Unit (NPU). Today, you can access Studio Effects in Quick Settings from the system tray of the taskbar. To further streamline your experience, an icon will now appear in the system tray when using any application with a Studio Effects-enabled camera. Simply click on this icon to launch the Studio Effects page in Quick Settings. Additionally, hovering over the icon will display a tooltip indicating which application is utilizing the camera.

  

• New Studio Effects icon shown in system tray when using any application with a Studio Effects-enabled camera.

 

[Dynamic Lighting]

 

• When no compatible devices are attached, the Dynamic Lighting settings page will now show a placeholder message and Brightness and Effects controls are disabled.
• On the Dynamic Lighting settings page, we have added Forward, Backward, Outward and Inward direction options to the Wave effect, and added the Forward direction option to the Gradient effect.

 

Fixes gradually being rolled out to the Dev Channel with toggle on

 

[Start menu]

 

• Fixed an issue where if you clicked or tapped on a letter on Start menu’s All apps list, the All apps list may break.

 

[Taskbar]

 

• Fixed an issue where explorer.exe was crashing for some Insiders when hovering over certain open apps in the taskbar.

 

[Settings]

 

• Fixed an issue where there was a blank entry in Privacy & Security and clicking it would crash Settings.

 

[Input]

 

• Updated the mouse option “Show location of pointer when I press the CTRL key”, so that the circles displayed are now DPI-aware, and aren’t really small on high DPI monitors.
• Fixes for everyone in the Dev Channel

 

[Other]

 

• [Windows Kernel Vulnerable Driver Blocklist file (DriverSiPolicy.p7b)] Fixed: This update adds to the list of drivers that are at risk for Bring Your Own Vulnerable Driver (BYOVD) attacks.
• [HTML Applications (HTA)] Fixed: HTA optional components (OC) are now in ARM64 Windows PE.
• [Live kernel debug files (dumps)] Fixed: sys creates live kernel debug files when it should not.
• [User interface (UI)] Fixed: You cannot view some parts of the UI when you run certain apps.
• [Winlogon] Fixed: A stop error occurs during shutdown.
• [sfc /scannow command] Fixed: You get errors every time you run the command.
• [Windows Disk Cleanup app] Fixed: This update addresses some of the causes for the wrong free space estimates and improves its accuracy.

Here is the list of known bugs:

[Start menu]

 

• [NEW] You may see there is an unexpected amount of spacing between items in the Start menu apps list.

 

[Dev Drive]

 

• [NEW] We’re working on the fix for an underlying issue leading to Dev Drives potentially not being accessible within WSL.

You can check out the announcement post here.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

Here is the changelog:

Changes and Improvements gradually being rolled out to the Beta Channel with toggle on

 

[General]

 

If you hold Shift and CTRL when clicking on a jump list item in Start menu or taskbar, this will now launch that item as admin, just like if you were to do Shift + CTRL and click the app icon itself. For example, if you right-click on Windows Terminal, and hold Shift and CTRL when you click PowerShell, it would open a PowerShell window as admin.

 

[Dynamic Lighting]

 

• When no compatible devices are attached, the Dynamic Lighting settings page will now show a placeholder message and Brightness and Effects controls are disabled.
• On the Dynamic Lighting settings page, we have added Forward, Backward, Outward and Inward direction options to the Wave effect, and added the Forward direction option to the Gradient effect.

 

Fixes gradually being rolled out to the Beta Channel with toggle on

 

[Taskbar]

 

• Made another fix for WIN + not working in some cases in the latest flights.
• Fixed an issue where the X button to close an app window from the taskbar wasn’t working for some Insiders.

 

[Input]

 

• Fixed an underlying issue which could cause the mouse to unlock from a game window on a system with multiple monitors after opening and closing Game Bar, so you couldn’t use it within the game.

 

Changes and Improvements gradually being rolled out to everyone in the Beta Channel

 

[Settings]

 

• After disabling the ability to configure the Copilot key with Build 22635.4291, we are enabling this functionality again with refinements. We have limited the apps that can be launched by the Copilot key to those apps that have opted into this experience. This is to ensure apps targeted by the key know they will be used in this way and meet security and privacy requirements to keep customers safe. We will be publishing how apps can opt-in to this experience here in on this Microsoft Learn page soon. As a reminder, this setting can be found via Settings > Personalization > Text input.

 

Fixes for everyone in the Beta Channel

 

[Other]

 

This update includes fixes for the following issues:

 

• [Bluetooth] Fixed: An app stops responding because of a memory leak in a device.
• [Product activation phone numbers] Fixed: This adds new phone numbers for several regions.
• [Collector sets] Fixed: They do not close properly when an exception occurs during startup or while the set is active. Because of this, the command to stop a collector set stops responding.
• [Windows Kernel Vulnerable Driver Blocklist file (DriverSiPolicy.p7b)] This update adds to the list of drivers that are at risk for Bring Your Own Vulnerable Driver (BYOVD) attacks.
• [Windows Hello for Business] Fixed: PIN reset does not work when you select the “I forgot my PIN’ link on the credentials screen.
• [Multi-Function Printer (MFP)] Fixed: When you use a USB cable to connect to it, it prints specific network command text when you do want it to.
• [Microsoft Teams] Fixed: The issue stops you from joining Teams meetings when you select an Outlook meeting reminder.
• [Country and Operator Settings Asset (COSA)] Fixed: This update brings profiles up to date for certain mobile operators.
• [vmswitch] Fixed: A vmswitch triggers a stop error. This occurs when you use Load Balancing and Failover (LBFO) teaming with two virtual switches on a virtual machine (VM). In this case, one virtual switch uses single root Input/Output virtualization (SR-IOV).
• [WebView2 apps] Fixed: They do not detect input from Xbox 360 and Bluetooth controllers.

You can check out the full blog post here.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

Here is the changelog with new features:

• Get the latest updates effortlessly with instant update. Instant update in Microsoft Edge ensures you get the latest browser updates automatically, when you step away from your computer. You can keep browsing, knowing that you already have the latest updates to keep you safe online. For more information, see Get instant updates in Microsoft Edge - Microsoft Support. Note: This feature is in private preview for enterprise customers. Future feature updates will be available via Microsoft Edge release notes.
• Cancel dialog for beforeunload event. Microsoft Edge has changed the behavior of the cancel dialog for the beforeunload event. Calling event.preventDefault in a beforeunload event handler won't prevent the dialog from being shown. Instead, event.returnValue = '' needs to be called in the beforeunload event handler to prevent the cancel dialog. The BeforeunloadEventCancelByPreventDefaultEnabled policy is obsolete and no longer works after Microsoft Edge version 130.

More information about instant Microsoft Edge updates is available here.

If you want to know more details about the latest Edge 131 Beta release, check out more detailed release notes from the Dev Channel:

• Dev Channel update to 131.0.2863.0
• Dev Channel update to 131.0.2875.0
• Dev Channel update to 131.0.2889.0
• Dev Channel update to 131.0.2903.5

Edge 131 Beta also includes many website compatibility changes, which are described in the official release notes.

Finally, here are policy updates in Microsoft Edge 131:

New policies

 

• EdgeSidebarAppUrlHostAllowList - Allow specific apps to be opened in Microsoft Edge sidebar
• PrivateNetworkAccessRestrictionsEnabled - Specifies whether to apply restrictions to requests to more private network endpoints

 

Deprecated policies

 

• NewBaseUrlInheritanceBehaviorAllowed - Allows enabling the feature NewBaseUrlInheritanceBehavior (deprecated)
• RSAKeyUsageForLocalAnchorsEnabled - Check RSA key usage for server certificates issued by local trust anchors (deprecated)
• UserAgentClientHintsGREASEUpdateEnabled - Control the User-Agent Client Hints GREASE Update feature (deprecated)

 

Obsoleted policies

 

• BeforeunloadEventCancelByPreventDefaultEnabled - Control the behavior for the cancel dialog produced by the beforeunload event (obsolete)
• SignInCtaOnNtpEnabled - Enable sign in click to action dialog (obsolete)

Edge 131 Beta is available on the official Edge Insider website.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

According to the official release notes for Microsoft Edge 130.0.2849.56, the update fixes a problem that prevented extensions with certain APIs from working correctly. The API in question is chrome.storage.managed, which is a part of a broader chrome.storage API that provides a specific way for an extension to store user data and its state.

The chrome.storage.managed is responsible for extensions installed and managed by system administrators on managed devices. Therefore, regular users are unlikely to experience extension issues due to this bug.

As for security fixes, Microsoft Edge 130.0.2849.56 packs the following Chromium patches:

• CVE-2024-10229: Inappropriate implementation in Extensions in Google Chrome prior to 130.0.6723.69 allowed a remote attacker to bypass site isolation via a crafted Chrome Extension. (Chromium security severity: High)
• CVE-2024-10230: Type Confusion in V8 in Google Chrome prior to 130.0.6723.69 allowed a remote attacker to potentially exploit heap corruption via a crafted HTML page. (Chromium security severity: High)
• CVE-2024-10231: Type Confusion in V8 in Google Chrome prior to 130.0.6723.69 allowed a remote attacker to potentially exploit heap corruption via a crafted HTML page. (Chromium security severity: High)

You can update Microsoft Edge to the latest version by heading to edge://settings/help. Alternatively, you can continue using Edge as is, and it will update itself automatically in the background. Full release notes are available here.

In other news, in case you missed it, Microsoft recently announced new accessibility features for Microsoft Edge, which include custom page backgrounds and the ability to turn off custom scroll bars. You can learn more about those changes here.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

Here is the full changelog:

HIGHLIGHTS:

 

• Launch driver for Intel Core Ultra 200S Series with Intel Graphics.

 

Gaming Highlights:

 

Intel Game On Driver support on Intel Arc A-series Graphics GPUs and Intel Core Ultra with built-in Intel Arc GPUs for:

 

• Call of Duty: Black Ops 6

 

Game performance improvements on Intel Core Ultra Series 1 with built-in Intel Arc GPUs versus Intel 31.0.101.6127 software driver for:

 

• Diablo IV: Vessel of Hatred (DX12). Up to 11% average FPS uplift at 1080p with Medium settings.

The list of fixed bugs includes only one:

Intel Arc A-Series Graphics Products:

 

• Blender may experience application crash while rendering certain benchmark scenes.

Here are the known issues in the update:

Intel Arc A-Series Graphics Products:

 

• Doom Eternal (VK) may exhibit intermittent flickering corruption in the game menu and during gameplay.
• Topaz Video AI may experience errors when exporting videos after using some models for video enhancements.

 

Intel Core Ultra Series 1 with built-in Intel Arc GPUs:

 

• Horizon Forbidden West (DX12) may experience color corruption during gameplay.
• Adobe Premiere Pro may exhibit corruption in the output video after performing 8K AV1 Encode.
• SPECworkstation3.1 may exhibit system instability while running certain workloads.
• PugetBench for Davinci Resolve Studio V19 may experience errors intermittently with benchmark preset set to Extended.
• Davinci Resolve Studio v19.0 may experience errors while rendering OpenVino test scenarios.

 

Intel Core Ultra Series 2 with built-in Intel Arc GPUs:

 

• DirectML-based AI applications may experience slower first token latency.
• Adobe Premiere Pro may exhibit corruption in the output video after performing 8K AV1 Encode.
• Davinci Resolve Studio v19.0 may experience errors while rendering OpenVino test scenarios.
• Star Wars Outlaws (DX12) may experience crash or corruption around object edge in some scenes.

You can download driver 32.0.101.6129 WHQL from the official website. Full release notes for Intel's latest driver are available here (PDF).

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

This includes the new dynamic themes feature, tab splitting and recent tab highlighting, more AI functionality, and something that is easily overlooked in the long post on the Opera Software website: continued support for Manifest V2 extensions.

Here is what Opera says about extensions support: " In addition to that, Opera R2 will continue supporting Manifest V2 extensions, allowing you to continue using your favorite ad blocking and privacy-enhancing extensions just like before".

The post links to another one on the Opera website that provides additional details.

Opera plans to support Manifest V2 extensions independently of the development of Chromium, the source of Google Chrome and other browsers.

This means, that Opera users may continue to run and install Manifest V2 extensions, like uBlock Origin, in the web browser.

Now, the post is not very clear on the details. Opera Software mentions that it plans to contact extension developers to "determine the best and safest way forward".

Continued support would be remarkable at this point, as Google will remove code from Chromium next year. Up until then, policies exist to keep on using Manifest V2 extensions in Chromium-based browsers.

The removal of support of Manifest V2 has already started in Google Chrome for users who have not set the policies.

Up until now, only Brave Software announced that its browser, Brave, would support a few Manifest V2 extensions going forward.

Opera's commitment to all Manifest V2 extensions, if it is feasible for the company, ensures that users can continue using their favorite extensions and new Manifest V3 extensions. This would work similarly to Firefox, which also supports both Manifest V2 and V3 extensions.

Opera Software has one advantage over Brave Software and most Chromium-based browser makers (with the exception of Microsoft and Google). It operates its own extension store. While Opera users may also download and install extensions from the Chrome Web Store, users may also download and install extensions from the company's own store.

Brave Software does not operate its own store, which is probably the main reason why it decided to support only a few extensions. Google will remove Manifest V2 extensions from its web store next year when the policy option runs out.

Closing Words

Two Chromium-based browsers will continue to support Manifest V2 extensions by mid-2025 at the time of writing. That's Brave, which supports only a few, and Opera, which plans to support all of them.

It remains to be seen how this will work out and if other browser makers are also jumping on the bandwagon that separates them from main Chromium in a key aspect.

Have you tried Opera recently? What is your take on the company's plan to continue supporting Manifest V2 extensions after Google's deadline in mid 2025? Feel free to leave a comment down below.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

On October 23, 2024, all Windows 11 Development Environment virtual machines expired, which means if you still have one up and running, you will now face activation issues. Since Windows Development Environment does not support activation with product keys, expired virtual machines will turn their desktop background black and shut down every hour.

Microsoft does not say much about what happened to its virtual machines. All we have is a brief message on the official website that says the following:

Note: Due to ongoing technical issues, as of October 23, 2024, downloads are temporarily unavailable.

The last update for Windows 11 Development Environment virtual machine was released in July 2024. It was based on Windows 11 build 22621.3880 (July 2024 Patch Tuesday updates). In early August, Microsoft restored the previously missing virtual machines for VMware, thus bumping the expiration date to October 23. Now, with October 23 behind us, customers and developers can no longer download and properly use Microsoft's evaluation virtual machines.

For those unfamiliar, Windows 11 Development Environment was available in four configurations: Hyper-V, Parallels for Mac, VirtualBox, and VMware. They are prebuilt virtual machines based on Windows 11 Enterprise, and they pack all the tools one would need to start building Windows apps: Visual Studio 2022 Community Edition with UWP, .NET Desktop, Azure, and Windows App SDK for C#, Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 with Ubuntu, Windows Terminal, and Developer mode.

We will keep an eye on Microsoft's Windows 11 virtual machines and notify you once they are available for download once again.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

The full changelog is given below:

Highlights

Gradual rollout

 

These might not be available to all users because they will roll out gradually.

 

• [Notifications] New! You can now stop the suggestions to turn off notifications from certain apps. Select the ellipses (…) in the notification and turn it off. You can also go to Settings > System > Notifications and turn it off from there. Look for “Notification Suggestions” in the senders list. An entry will only appear in the list after you receive a notification.

• [Wi-Fi password dialog] New! The dialog now has the Windows 11 visual design. Go to Settings > Network & internet.

 

• [Narrator]

   

  • New! This update adds a new Narrator shortcut. Press the Narrator key + Ctrl + X to copy what Narrator last spoke to the clipboard. This shortcut is useful when you want to quickly copy some content, like codes or numbers for use.

  • New! It will now auto read the contents of an email message in the new Outlook. This is like the behavior in Outlook classic.

     

• [Gamepad keyboard] New! This update starts the roll out of a new Gamepad keyboard layout for the on-screen keyboard. With it, you can use your Xbox controller to move around the screen and type. Button accelerators are also available; these include the X button for backspace and the Y button for the spacebar. For better movement patterns, the keyboard keys are aligned vertically.

• [Start menu] New! “All apps” has the new name, “All.”

• [ALT + Tab] Fixed: The screen goes black on some PCs for a few seconds when you switch between certain windows.

• [Scanning apps] Fixed: They don't detect certain scanners although they are connected.

   

Normal rollout

 

• [Web sign-in] Fixed: You cannot sign in to your account from the web because the screen stops responding.

• [Copilot key settings] New! You can configure the Copilot key on the keyboard. On new devices, the key opens the Copilot app. If you sign in to your account using a Microsoft Entra ID, the key opens the M365 app. You can make the key open a different app or open Search. To do this, go to Settings > Personalization > Text input. To make the key open a different app, the app must be in a signed MSIX package. This ensures that the app meets security and privacy standards to keep you safe. If your PC’s keyboard does not have a Copilot key, changing this setting will do nothing.

• [WindowsDisk Cleanup app] Fixed: After you use this app, it might show the wrong amount of disk space that you can free up in the 'Windows Update Cleanup' category.

   

Improvements

 

This non-security update includes quality improvements. Below is a summary of the key issues that this update addresses when you install this KB. If there are new features, it lists them as well. The bold text within the brackets indicates the item or area of the change we are documenting.

 

• [Virtual hard disk (VHD/VHDx)] New! This update adds a detach virtual hard disk button to Settings. In the properties for your VHD or VHDx, go to Settings > System > Storage > Disks & Volumes. This might not be available to all users because it will roll out gradually.

• [Networking] New! If you use the netsh wlan show networks command, it can now read SSIDs that are encoded using UTF-8. This means that Wi-Fi SSIDs that have Unicode characters (like emoji) will display properly in netsh output. This might not be available to all users because it will roll out gradually.

• [Windows Sandbox Client Preview] New! This update adds the Windows Sandbox Client Preview. It includes:

   

  • Runtime clipboard redirection

  • Audio and video input control

  • The sharing of folders with the host at runtime

    To access these, select the ellipses (…) at the upper right on the app. This preview also includes a version of command-line support. (The commands might change over time). To learn more, use the wsb.exe–help command. You can find new updates for this app in the Microsoft Store. This might not be available to all users because it will roll out gradually.

     

• [User interface (UI)] Fixed: You cannot view some parts of the UI when you run certain apps.

• [HTML Applications (HTA)] Fixed: HTA optional components (OC) are now in ARM64 Windows PE.

• [Live kernel debug files (dumps)] Fixed: win32kbase.sys creates live kernel debug files when it should not.

• [Winlogon] Fixed: A stop error occurs during shutdown.

• [Windows Kernel Vulnerable Driver Blocklist file (DriverSiPolicy.p7b)] This update adds to the list of drivers that are at risk for Bring Your Own Vulnerable Driver (BYOVD) attacks.

• [sfc /scannow command] Fixed: You get errors every time you run the command.

• [Service for User to Self (S4U2self)] Fixed: Your device might have issues using S4U2self to authenticate. This occurs if Credential Guard is off, and the device joins an Active Directory domain that does not allow the RC4 cipher.

• [DirectAccess (known issue)] Fixed: After a clean install or an in-place upgrade to Windows 11, version 24H2, you might face issues using DirectAccess. The connection might not complete and stays in a ‘connecting’ state.

You can find the official support article here on Microsoft's official website. The update can be manually downloaded from here.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

In ablog post, Microsoft says it has made some accessibility improvements in Edge 130. Specifically, users can now customize the page colors in the browser. The blog post states:

Do you have trouble reading web pages due to their color schemes? Is the text too bright or too dark? Do links blend into the background? Or perhaps you want to change the way your browser looks. If so, try the new Page colors feature in Microsoft Edge.

 

The Page colors feature is especially useful for users who have vision impairments, color blindness, or light sensitivity. However, it can also help reduce eye strain and fatigue when browsing for long periods of time.

Edge 130 users can go into the Settings and more (…) menu and select the Settings option, followed by the Accessibility selection. They should then see the Page colors section. They can then pick from one of four page color options: Dusk, Desert, Black, and White. The Accessibility options part of Edge also allows users to exclude any websites from these new page color settings.

The other new feature in Edge 130 that was revealed today is the new Turn off custom scrollbars option. Microsoft says:

While many website authors customize scrollbars to achieve a unique style, we heard from users that not everybody likes using them. Certain users always prefer to see the default browser scrollbars as this improves consistency and accessibility for them. By making it possible for you to disable custom scrollbars, we aim to accommodate these preferences and enhance usability and accessibility.

Once again, Edge users can go to the Settings and more (…) menu, select the Settings option, and the Accessibility section. They, can then click the Turn off custom scrollbars setting.

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post.

Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years.

2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of September): 4,292 news posts

RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend