Hello Windows Insiders, today we are releasing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22621.2048 and Build 22631.2048 (KB5028247) to the Beta Channel.

• Build 22631.2048 = New features rolling out.
• Build 22621.2048 = New features off by default.

The new version include the Gallery photo feature in File Explorer, along with a number of improvements and bug fixes. It also includes a new version of the Microsoft Store that went into testing for all Insider channels earlier this week.

Here is the changelog:

What’s new in Build 22631.2048

Gallery in File Explorer

We are introducing Gallery, a new feature in File Explorer designed to make it easy to access your photo collection. The set of content shown in Gallery is the same as what you’ll see in the All Photos view in the Photos app.

Gallery in File Explorer.

Gallery is optimized for accessing your most recently taken photos. If you have OneDrive Camera Roll Backup set up on your phone, photos you take will show up automatically at the top of the view. You can choose which folders are shown in Gallery through the Collection dropdown. You can also add subfolders of existing sources to filter to a subset of your content, such as desktop backgrounds and SD card/camera imports.

Gallery also works from the file picking dialog, bringing that same ease of use to situations such as inserting attachments, building a PowerPoint deck, or crafting social media posts.

Gallery in the file picking dialog.

There is also a new button in the Command Bar titled “Add Phone Photos” that will help with setting up your PC to be ready to show these photos in Gallery. Clicking this button today will open a URL with a QR code that you can scan with your phone to get started.

Add Phone Photos option on the command bar in File Explorer.

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Files, Folders, and Online Storage > File Explorer.

Changes and Improvements in Build 22631.2048

[General]

Windows Insiders on Build 22631 will see the versioning updated under Settings > System > About (and winver) to version 23H2. This denotes that Windows 11, version 23H2 will be this year’s annual feature update which will be delivered to customers similar to the most recent Windows 10 feature updates. As mentioned here, Windows 11 will have an annual feature update cadence that releases in the second half of the calendar year. For more information, see this blog post here.

[Taskbar & System Tray]

After updating to this build, the ability to end task when right-clicking an app on the taskbar may appear, however this feature currently does not work correctly and will be fixed in a future flight in the Beta Channel. The setting for it under Settings > System > For developers also currently does not show.

[File Explorer]

We have added the ability to tear out and merge tabs in File Explorer.

[For Developers]

We are moving the “For Developers” settings page from Settings > Privacy & security to now be under Settings > System.

Fixes in Build 22631.2048

[Taskbar]

Fixed an issue which could cause the taskbar to hang during initialization and not complete loading.

[File Explorer]

Fixed an issue which could lead to explorer.exe crashes when opening a folder containing .WEBP files.

Did some work to help address an issue where File Explorer might hang when browsing network shares.

[Notification]

Fixed an issue where you might unexpectedly see a suggestion to turn off notifications that you regularly interacted with.

You can check out the full blog post here.

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Windows 11 build 25905, currently available for testing in the Canary Channel, has a feature Microsoft did not announce: the ability to repair the installation using Windows Update. The toggle does not require enabling a specific ID, and it is available for all insiders with the latest build.

In-place repair using Windows Update works by downloading the latest available build and installing it on top of your current installation while preserving all your apps, games, files, and settings. Once the process is done, you should get a relatively "clean" system with software bugs resolved.

To check the new repair system, head to Settings > System > Recovery and click the Reinstall now button. After that, Windows will prompt you to confirm the action (enjoy another Windows 8-era dialog window) and switch to Windows Update to find and download the build matching your current installation (it will have a "repair version" tag). From there, it all feels like your standard build upgrade in the Windows Insider program or a feature update for a stable release.

The in-place repair option will be a fantastic troubleshooter for those without a bootable USB drive. That is assuming your installation is not broken beyond being able to download and install a build using Windows Update. Therefore, you better have a spare USB with a Windows ISO for peace of mind.

Credit for the finding goes to @XenoPanther

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There is also one important change for those using Windows computers with ARM processors: starting with build 25905 (full release notes available here), Windows 11 no longer supports arm32 Univeral Windows Platform (UWP) applications.

Starting in this Insider Preview build in the Canary Channel, we have removed support for Arm32 UWP applications from Windows on Arm, as documented here: Windows 11 Specs and System Requirements. After the OS upgrade, any installed Arm32 applications will no longer launch on your device.

According to Microsoft, updating an ARM-powered Windows PC to Windows 11 build 25905 will prevent installed arm32 UWP applications from running. The change does not affect arm64 apps, plus users can take action to ensure their favorite programs continue operating after upgrading to build 25905 and newer.

Microsoft recommends Windows on ARM users install available updates from the Microsoft Store before upgrading to the latest Canary build. Also, during setup, Windows will display a list of currently installed arm32 applications you will not be able to open once the installation process is over. You can resolve this problem by deleting arm32 programs and reinstalling them using compatible binaries (if available) from the Microsoft Store.

You can check what platform your apps use by heading to Task Manager > Details > Architecture.

In case you missed it, Microsoft recently released firmware updates for the Surface Pro X device family with ARM processors. It aims to resolve camera issues first reported in May 2023. You can find more details about the latest Surface firmware here.

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Alongside all those announced changes, the Redmond giant is also working on a new TPM troubleshooter option inside the Windows Security app. The image below on the left shows the Security processor troubleshooting menu inside a previous build, 25314. The one on the right though is the newer one on build 25905 and as you can see, there is a new "TPM troubleshooter" section right under the Error messages section.

Hence, in case of error messages, like the one you can see on the left which says "Can't get TPM information. Contact your device manufacturer", the troubleshooter will provide with possible solutions to resolve the error. The option wasn't available on our updated system so it is likely rolling out gradually.

TPM and the general system requirements of Windows 11 have often been a bone of contention. Microsoft has in the past explained in detail the benefits of features like TPM 2.0 and VBS (Virtualization-based Security). The company also presented a demo to explain how such features can protect against cybersecurity threats like hacking.

Security researchers recently pointed out a new vulnerability dubbed "faulTPM" which can lead to bypassing fTPM on AMD Ryzen systems. And sometimes, bugs in Windows components like Defender can lead to the system not detecting the TPM itself. And as well as those, TPM attestation bugs exist too.

Interestingly, very recently, a senior Microsoft exec suggested that future Windows 11 versions might sport more such TPM-like security processors. It is unclear at this point what exactly these chip-level security options will be.

While we are on the topic of troubleshooters, Microsoft also updated the Windows 11 activation troubleshooter recently to make it more consistent with the Windows 11 look and feel.

Via: PhantomOcean3 (Twitter)

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The new release is not yet available via the built-in updating functionality of the email client, and it may take a while before the upgrade is enabled. Some users noted that some of their extensions stopped working in the new Thunderbird and there are issues to be sorted out first.

Support for older versions of Windows and macOS

Thunderbird 115 will be the last version that is compatible with Microsoft's Windows 7, 8 and 8.1 operating systems. It furthermore is also the last version compatible with Apple's macOS 10.12, 10.13 and 10.14 systems.

Microsoft ended support for Windows 7 and 8.1 in January 2023. These operating systems are no longer supported by Microsoft. Similarly, Apple does not support the older macOS versions anymore.

Most Windows 7 and 8.1 devices can be upgraded to Windows 10, a version of Windows that is supported until October 2025. Microsoft did not change the system requirements between the older versions of Windows and Windows 10.

Thunderbird 115 supports the operating systems. The email client will be supported until late 2024, just like Mozilla Firefox 115 ESR.

Thunderbird users on these operating systems will receive the update to Thunderbird 115 eventually, just like users on newer systems. The email client will then receive regular updates throughout 2023 and most of 2024 on the older systems.

Users on these systems can't install newer versions of Thunderbird anymore, however. Thunderbird 116, which is available as a Beta currently, won't install on these systems anymore.

Closing Words

Windows 7 and 8 users, and macOS 10.14 and earlier users, may continue using Thunderbird until late 2024. This should give most users ample time to move on to a new operating system on the same device or another device.

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NoteookLM (LM is short for Language Model) is being designed as a way for people to not only organized their online notes, but also to ask questions that could be answered from those notes. In a blog post today, Google stated:

A key difference between NotebookLM and traditional AI chatbots is that NotebookLM lets you “ground” the language model in your notes and sources. Source-grounding effectively creates a personalized AI that’s versed in the information relevant to you. Starting today, you can ground NotebookLM in specific Google Docs that you choose, and we’ll be adding additional formats soon.

NotebookLM can automatically generate a summary of your notes in Google Docs. It can also create key topics from those notes, and questions that could be asked by the user to the AI. The blog post offers a couple of examples of how this might work:

• A medical student could upload a scientific article about neuroscience and tell NotebookLM to “create a glossary of key terms related to dopamine”

• An author working on a biography could upload research notes and ask a question like: “Summarize all the times Houdini and Conan Doyle interacted.”

Google says that any notes uploaded to NotebookLM will only be seen by the person who uploaded the content and any questions to the AI will also not be seen by others. Google says no data from this tool will be used to train other AI language models that the company is developing.

You can sign up to be put on the waitlist for NotebookLM right now.

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Microsoft says that this build also restores the desktop watermark to RS_PRERELEASE. This also means that some features that were removed when it switched to the ZN_RELEASE label are now back.

Microsoft also releases a new version of the Microsoft Store for all Windows Insider Program channels, and you can check out the details in this post.

The changelog for the new Canary build is below:

What’s new in Build 25905

New features from the Dev Channel

This build includes new features from the Dev Channel, such as Dev Drive, Backup and Restore improvements (Windows Backup), Dynamic Lighting, the Windows App SDK version of File Explorer and Gallery, and more.

Rust in the Windows Kernel

Rust offers advantages in reliability and security over traditional programs written in C/C++. This preview shipped with an early implementation of critical kernel features in safe Rust. Specifically, win32kbase_rs.sys contains a new implementation of GDI region. While this is a small trial, we will continue to increase the usage of Rust in the kernel. Stay tuned!

[We are beginning to roll this out, so the experience isn’t available to all Insiders in the Canary Channel just yet as we plan to monitor feedback and see how it lands before pushing it out to everyone.]

Arm32 UWP App deprecation

Starting in this Insider Preview build in the Canary Channel, we have removed support for Arm32 UWP applications from Windows on Arm, as documented here: Windows 11 Specs and System Requirements. After the OS upgrade, any installed Arm32 applications will no longer launch on your device. Note that this does not affect Arm64 applications.

During setup, you will see a message with a list of applications that are currently Arm32 installed on the system.

In many cases, the list of impacted applications will be reduced by manually forcing the Microsoft Store to install any pending application updates prior to the OS upgrade. To do this, launch the Microsoft Store application, choose “library”, then click on the “Get Updates” button.

After the OS upgrade is complete, to fix any Arm32 applications, you will need to manually uninstall then reinstall those applications from the Microsoft Store. By doing so, you will install a compatible version that will run on your device.

New PostAuthenticationAction support for terminating individual processes in Windows LAPS

Thank you everyone who gave us feedback on the new Windows Local Administrator Password Solution feature which we shipped a few months ago. Several customers pointed out that the new Post Authentication Actions feature (PAA) only handled termination of interactive logon sessions. This meant that PAA was not able to terminate specific individual processes that were launched in an OTS (over-the-shoulder) elevation scenahttps://learn.microsoft.com/windows-server/identity/laps/laps-concepts#password-reset-after-authenticationrio, for example using runas.exe. We are announcing an improvement with this build that addresses this feedback on that limitation. A new option has been added to the PostAuthenticationActions Group Policy in this Insider Preview build:

Enable the new PostAuthenticationAction setting.

The new option is described as “Reset the password, logoff the managed account, and terminate any remaining processes”. This new option is basically a superset of the previous “Reset the password and logoff the managed account” option. When the new setting is configured, PAA will first notify and then terminate any interactive logon sessions, followed by enumerating and terminating any remaining processes that are still running under the Windows LAPS-managed local account identity. No notification precedes this termination.

In addition, we’ve greatly expanded the event logging messages that are emitted during post-authentication-action execution, to give you deeper insights into exactly what was done during the operation.

Note: “Reset the password and logoff the managed account” remains the default PAA action.

Please try out this new feature and let us know what you think here on the Windows LAPS feedback page.

Changes and Improvements

[Emoji]

With the update of our colour font format to COLRv1, Windows is now able to display richer emoji with a 3D like appearance with support coming soon to some apps and browsers. These emoji use gradients to bring the design style that our customers have been asking for. The new emoji will bring more expression to your communications.

Before and after of the updated colour format for emoji.

[Zune]

In celebration of Marvel Studio’s Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3, we temporarily re-launched Zune.net last month. We also took the opportunity to fix an issue that was causing some challenges in getting the original Zune drivers to install in Windows 11 with this build in the Canary Channel. So now it should be easier to use your (totally unsupported and still discontinued) Zune on Windows 11. Over time, the fix will make its way through the Insider Channels and eventually to all Windows 11 customers. For fun, check out how Scott Hanselman brought a few Zunes back to life.

Known issues

[NEW] This build will not be offered to ASUS devices or PCs with ASUS motherboards.

[NEW] Ethernet-connected devices may lose network connectivity after updating to this build. Unplugging the ethernet cable and re-plugging the cable in should resolve the issue.

You can check out the full blog post here. You can also download the ISO file for this build as well.

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In a Twitter post made on Tuesday night, NTDEV showed a screenshot of the Windows 11 Performance tab in Task Manager, showing that it was running on just 176MB of RAM. He stated that this was due to running a "heavily trimmed down image of tiny11." He added, "Pointless and unnecessary? Absolutely! Impressive? You tell me."

He also posted a video on YouTube showing the PC running on that minuscule amount of RAM. The post also offered a bit more info on how he was able to accomplish this task:

This possible world record has been made possible through extensive trial and error, by seeing which drivers and services are absolutely the ones for required to Windows 11 to boot. The base system is a heavily (even more so) trimmed down image of tiny11. Even things like which disk drive interface was used were taken into consideration (I used IDE instead of the more recent SATA or NVMe so that it wouldn't need as many drivers to boot).

If you want to try out Tiny11 for yourself, it's available for download from the Internet Archive. Keep in mind that you will still need a valid Windows 11 key from Microsoft to run this version. Also, installing a modified Windows 11 ISO could create lots of issues in your PC, so you should download this version at your own risk.

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When composing an email, there is now a Calendar icon among the various options present at the bottom. The first option it offers, called 'Offer times you're free,' will open Google Calendar within Gmail from where you can insert available time slots.

The email recipient can select the desired timing from those time slots to automatically get an email with a calendar invite. To accept a proposed meeting time, you can click on a time in the email and confirm your name and email address. Google said that time suggestions currently work with 1:1 meetings and your primary calendar only.

The other one is a relocated existing option called 'Create an event' that lets you create a Google Calendar event without leaving Gmail. It can pick the event title and recipients from the email and also automatically insert a summary in the email body.

Gmail's new scheduling feature is available to all Google Workspace and personal Google accounts. However, it might take a few weeks for the feature to arrive on all accounts. Google said the 15-day rollout for Rapid Release domains has already begun and it will start on July 31 for stable release domains.

The company added that the ability to insert proposed meeting times can be helpful when setting up meeting with customers or people whose calendars you can't access. Nonetheless, this adds to the list of recently introduced features such as the ability to set working locations for specific portions of the day. Last month, Google rolled out its email drafting AI tool called Help Me Write for Android and iOS devices.

Via TechCrunch

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Proton, the company that is known for its highly secure software services including Proton Mail, is now offering Windows users a way to upload their files to the cloud with full end-to-end encryption support.

Today, after an extensive beta period, the new Proton Drive Windows app is now generally available for download. Proton's blog post states that it works with Windows 10 and 11, and allows users to back up their PC's content to the cloud and access them from any device.

The blog post stated:

Proton Drive for Windows also preserves our unique end-to-end encryption, meaning no one else, not even Proton, can decrypt your synced files. This encryption doesn’t just cover your files’ contents but also their metadata, including file and folder names, file sizes, dates uploaded, and more.

The app will let users upload and sync up "any folder on your computer without restriction", according to Proton.

The blog post also offers up more info on how Proton Drive's files will interact with your PC's storage:

Unlike regular files, files in the Proton Drive folder on your computer don’t automatically take up any space on its hard disk. They’re only downloaded to your device when you access them, providing an “on-demand” sync. Proton Drive will also intelligently cache files you’ve accessed recently or access often, so they don’t need to be re-downloaded. If you only need these files once, you can adjust your computer settings so that Proton Drive automatically switches unopened files back to online-only storage after a set amount of time.

The service offers 1GB of free cloud storage space, but you can boost that amount to 200GB if you sign up for the standard Proton Drive subscription which costs $3.99 per month.

You can also get up to 500GB of cloud storage with the $9.99 monthly Proton Unlimited plan. That also gives users premium access to all of the company's other secure software services, including its Mail app, It also provides access to the recently launched Password Manager.

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What's the problem

According to reports from users, Chromium-based browsers such as Vivaldi stopped rendering web pages. They didn't stop loading the page, it's just that the visual elements on the site are invisible. So they just display blank pages. Usually, when such glitches happen, it is often considered as a problem with the graphics driver, and that one may need to uninstall and reinstall them. But that does not seem to be the case here, as none of the users seemed to have faced a problem with other apps.

Even the fact that the icons appear on the panel at the top in the screenshot indicates that this is not a GPU related issue. This is likely a software bug, which some users have attributed to Ubuntu's LLVM.

I came across the issue on Vivaldi's subreddit and the company's own community forums, but the issue is not exclusive to the browser. Users on the Linux Mint forums and the distro's reddit, have reported that this bug also affects Google Chrome and Brave as well. The problem is also present on Ubuntu. Don't worry, there are a couple of workarounds that you can try to solve the issue. The first thing is to disable hardware acceleration in the web browser's settings, which seems to fix the rendering problem. You may also want to try adding the following parameter to the browser's shortcut: --use-gl=desktop. Both of these workarounds could have a performance impact on your browsing experience.

There is another fix, which is a more effective solution, and that is to delete the web browser's GPUcache folder. Here is how to do it.

How to fix blank page issue in Vivaldi, Brave and Chrome in Linux Mint

1. Close the browser.

2. Open the File Manager and go to your /.config/ directory.

For example, mine is under: /home/ash/.config

3. Look for your browser's folder in the config directory.

They may have names like these: BraveSoftware or google-chrome or vivaldi.

4. The app's folder should have various subdirectories in it, look for the one that has GPUCache in the name.

The common locations to look for are under:

.config/BraveSoftware/Brave-Browser/Default/GPUCache

.config/google-chrome/Default/GPUCache

.config/vivaldi/Default/GPUCache

5. Delete the contents that are inside the GPUCache folder.

6. Start your browser, and it should now work normally as before.

Note: If the above steps didn't fix it, there is a chance that your browser may have multiple GPUCache folders inside various subdirectories. If that is the case, use the Find tool in the File Manager to search for the other folders and delete their contents. You can also try re-installing the web browser from scratch after removing it, but please be aware that this could result in a loss of other data.

Alternatively, you can use Timeshift to roll back to a previous snapshot of the operating system which has the old version of LLVM. But this is a bit of a hassle.

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At some point in your career as a developer, you’re going to have to map an IP address to a hostname in Linux – this might happen when you’re deploying a Kubernetes cluster or a Docker Swarm. Or maybe you want to make it easier for you to point a web browser to an internal site or service.

Instead of typing 192.168.1.11, you could type the hostname you’ve mapped in /etc/hosts. Although this is a pretty basic idea, it’s one that you’ll use quite a bit as an admin or a developer. Let me show you how it’s done. Note: You’ll need a running instance of Linux and a user with sudo privileges.

The first thing you’ll do is log into Linux and then open the necessary file for editing with the command sudo nano /etc/hosts. When prompted, type your sudo password.

You’ll already see a few entries in place. The two at the top are for IPv4 addresses that map the loopback address to localhost and your hostname; the entries below that are the same but for IPv6. At the bottom of the file is where you’ll add new entries.

Let’s add an entry that maps IP address 192.168.1.11 to the invoiceplane name. That entry will look like 192.168.1.11 invoiceplane. What we’ve done is mapped the IP address to a hostname. You can also add a fully qualified domain name after the hostname such as 192.168.1.11 invoiceplane invoiceplane.monkeypantz.lan or whatever FQDN you need. Save and close the file.

You can verify it’s working by issuing the command ping invoiceplane, which should ping the address 192.168.1.11. You can even use the nickname mapped in /etc/hosts in your web browser by pointing it to http://invoiceplane or, in my case, http://invoiceplane/invoiceplane.

And that’s all there is to editing the Linux hosts file and mapping IP addresses to names that wouldn’t otherwise have been visible via regular DNS.

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The official release notes of Thunderbird 115 are massive, listing dozens of new and changed features. Considering that Thunderbird 115 is just the first step in the modernization of the email client, users can expect that additional features and changes are implemented in coming updates as well.

Note: Thunderbird 115 is not yet available via the email client's automatic updating functionality. Interested users need to download the Thunderbird 115 installer from the official website to install it manually on their devices. Thunderbird 102 continues to be fed with security updates in the meantime. Users who upgrade may want to create backups first before they do so.

Thunderbird 115

The first thing that Thunderbird users may notice is that the interface has changed. Thunderbird 115 features a three column design by default, a new set of icons and graphics, a new toolbar at the top, and a sidebar on the left side of the browser window.

Note that the default design is only default for new installations. Users who upgrade from an earlier version of Thunderbird retain a design similar to the one they had used prior to the update.

The new three-pane design displays the new Unified Folders and Tags pane on the left side, the list of emails in the middle pane and the selected email on the right pane. The new universal search option is displayed above all panes.

Good news is that Thunderbird 115 includes lots of customization options to change the look and feel of the client. Select Menu > View and then Toolbars, Layouts or Folders to get customization options. Want to bring back the Menu bar? You can do that there. Dislike the new layout of panes? You can restore the classic view. Want the table design of emails? You find that option there as well so that switching from Cards view is just a matter of a few clicks.

Folders allow you to display the classic per-account folder structure, a unified folder structure or several others. One interesting aspect here is that you can display multiple folder views and sort them based on your preferences. Display the unified folder view at the top and below that the individual accounts that you have added to the email client.

Especially the unified folder view can be a game changer for users who have added multiple email accounts to Thunderbird.

The main toolbar can also be customized. You can select the customize option to remove items from it that you don't require, e.g., Chat or Tasks, if you don't use those, and add others to it, such as Reply, Next Unread or Print.

Speaking of customization options, selecting the three dots displayed in the folder pane displays options to remove the awkwardly looking "new message" button there among other things. It is even possible to remove the entire folder pane header to free up room for the folder listing.

Here is a screenshot of a customized interface after playing around with the options for about a minute.

The new main menu offers several new features. There is a new density option, which you may use to increase or decrease the use of whitespace in the email application.

The interface is not fully customizable using the available Settings and options, but it offers a lot of options to adjust the interface to your needs. While there has been an extensive beta period, early adopters may encounter bugs or issues. One issue that I noticed was that I could not hide the Menu Bar anymore after a while. A restart of the email client resolved that issue.

The team highlights other areas of improvements in the official release notes. Here is an overview of important changes in Thunderbird 115:

• Sortable Folder Modes to move folders up and down easily in the sidebar.
• Tags View is a new view of the Folder Pane.
• Cards View designed for "people used to modern webmail". It "emulates a mobile interface list with multi-line support.
• Further improved address bar featuring a new tabular view, improved Edit view and more.
• Improved accessibility by introducing keyboard navigation options and screen reader accessibility across the entire application. The Tab-key and left and right arrow keys may also be used widely for navigating mail content.
• Calendar's design was improved, featuring a new month layout, an improved day, week, month grid and more.
• Encryption and OpenPGP improvements, e.g. support for user-designed OpenPGP passphrases.
• OAuth2 support for Fastmail added.
• Minimal user agent is sent by default now.
• New option to always show the system tray icon.
• Remote calendars may be reloaded individually now.

Closing Words

Thunderbird 115 is a big release for the team. Some users may have mixed feelings about the release, some may decide to wait with the upgrade to see how it evolves over the coming weeks and months, and others still may want to try it right away.

It is too early to give it a final verdict, considering that it has been out for less than an hour right now.

Now You: what is your take on the new Thunderbird so far?

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Highlights

• This update addresses security issues for your Windows operating system.
• New! This update expands the roll out of notification badging for Microsoft accounts on the Start menu. A Microsoft account is what connects Windows to your Microsoft apps. The account backs up all your data and helps you to manage your subscriptions. You can also add extra security steps to keep you from being locked out of your account. This feature gives you quick access to important account-related notifications.
• New! This update improves the sharing of a local file in File Explorer with Microsoft Outlook contacts. You now have the option to quickly email the file to yourself. In addition, loading your contacts from Outlook is better. This feature is not available for files stored in Microsoft OneDrive folders. OneDrive has its own sharing functionality.
• New! This update adds live captions for the following languages:
  • Chinese (Simplified and Traditional)
  • French (France, Canada)
  • German
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Portuguese (Brazil, Portugal)
  • Spanish
  • Danish
  • English (Ireland, other English dialects)
  • Korean

To turn on live captions, use the WIN + Ctrl + Lkeyboard shortcut. You can also use the Quick Settings accessibility flyout menu. When you turn it on for the first time, Windows will ask you to download the required speech recognition support. Speech recognition support might not be available in your preferred language, or you might want support in other languages. You can download speech recognition support from Settings > Time & Language > Language & region. To learn more, see Use live captions to better understand audio.

• New! This update redesigns the in-app voice access command help page. Every command now has a description and examples of its variations. The search bar allows you to quickly find commands. The new categories provide further guidance. You can access the command help page on the voice access bar from Help > View all commands or use the voice access command “what can I say?” Note that the help page might not include all commands. Also, the supplementary information might be inaccurate. We plan to update this in the future. For a list of all Voice Access commands, see Use voice access to control your PC & author text with your voice.
• New! This update adds voice access command support for the following English dialects:

• English (United Kingdom)

• English (India)

• English (New Zealand)

• English (Canada)

• English (Australia)

When you turn on voice access for the first time, Windows will ask you to download a speech model. You might not find a speech model that matches your display language. You can still use voice access in English (US). You can always choose a different language from Settings > Language on the voice access bar.

• New! This update adds new text selection and editing voice access commands.
• New! This update adds a VPN status icon, a small shield, to the system tray. It displays when you are connected to a recognized VPN profile. The VPN icon will be overlayed in your system’s accent colour over the active network connection.
• New! You can now choose to display seconds in the clock on the system tray. To turn this on, go to the Taskbar behaviors section in Settings > Personalization > Taskbar. You can also right-click the taskbar to quickly get to taskbar settings.
• New! This update provides a copy button for you to quickly copy two-factor authentication (2FA) codes. These are in notification toasts you get from apps installed on your PC or from phones linked to your PC. Note that this feature only works for English.
• New! This update adds access key shortcuts to File Explorer’s context menu. An access key is a one keystroke shortcut. You can use it to quickly run a command in a context menu using your keyboard. Each access key corresponds to a letter in the display name of the menu item. To try this out, you can click on a file in File Explorer and press the menu key on your keyboard.
• New! This update adds multi-app kiosk mode, which is a lockdown feature. If you are an administrator, you can specify the apps that can run on a device. Other apps will not run. You can also block certain functionalities. You can configure distinct types of access and apps to run for different users on one device. Multi-app kiosk mode is ideal for scenarios in which multiple people use the same device. Some examples are frontline workers, retail, education, and test taking. Some lockdown customizations include:
  • Limit access to Settings, except certain pages, such as Wi-Fi and screen brightness
  • Show only the apps that are allowed on the Start menu
  • Block certain toasts and pop-up windows

Currently, you can enable multi-app kiosk mode using PowerShell and WMI Bridge. To learn more, see Set up a multi-app kiosk on Windows 11 and AssignedAccess CSP. Support for Microsoft Intune, mobile device management (MDM), and provisioning package configuration is coming soon.

• New! This update introduces live kernel memory dump (LKD) collection from Task Manager. Using LKD, you can gather data to troubleshoot an issue while the OS continues to work. This reduces downtime when you must investigate an unresponsive program or high-impact failures. To learn more, see Task Manager live memory dump.

To capture an LKD, go to Task Manager > Details. Right-click the System process. Select Create live kernel memory dump file. This capturesa Full live kernel or Kernel stack memory dump. The dump will be written to a fixed location: %LocalAppData%\Microsoft\Windows\TaskManager\LiveKernelDumps. You can also go to the Task Manager Settings page to view or edit the settings for live kernel memory dumps.

• New! This update replaces the settings for Show the touch keyboard when there’s no keyboard attached. These are located at Settings > Time & language > Typing > Touch keyboard. A new dropdown menu gives you three options to control whether tapping an edit control should open the touch keyboard. The options are:
  • Never. This suppresses the touch keyboard even when no hardware keyboard is attached.
  • When no keyboard attached. This shows the touch keyboard only when you use the device as a tablet without the hardware keyboard.
  • Always. This shows the touch keyboard even when the hardware keyboard is attached.
• New! This update enables Content Adaptive Brightness Control (CABC) to run on laptops and 2-in-1 devices. This feature dims or brightens areas of a display based on the content. It tries to strike a balance between saving battery life and providing a good visual experience. You can adjust the feature setting from Settings > System > Display > Brightness & colour. Thedrop-down menu gives you three options: Off, Always, and On Battery Only. For battery powered devices, the default is On Battery Only. Because the device manufacturer must enable CABC, the feature might not be on all laptops or 2-in-1 devices.
• New! This update adds a USB4 hubs and devices Settings page. You can find it at Settings> Bluetooth & devices > USB > USB4 Hubs and Devices. This new page provides information about the system’s USB4 capabilities and the attached peripherals on a system that supports USB4. This information helps with troubleshooting when you need manufacturer or system administrator support. Some features include:
  • You can view the tree of the connected USB4 hubs and devices.
  • You can copy details to the clipboard to share them.

If your system does not support USB4 with the Microsoft USB4 Connection Manager, this page will not appear. On systems that support USB4, you will see USB4 Host Router in Device Manager.

• New! This update adds a presence sensor privacy setting in Settings > Privacy & security > Presence sensing. If you have a device that has compatible presence sensors, you can now choose the apps that can access those sensors. You can also choose the apps that do not have access. Microsoft does not collect images or metadata. The device hardware processes your information locally to maximize privacy.
• New! This update improves the performance of search within Settings.
• New! This update changes the default print screen (prt scr) key behavior. Pressing the print screen key opens the Snipping Tool by default. You can turn off this setting from Settings > Accessibility > Keyboard. If you have previously changed this setting, Windows will preserve your preference.
• New! This update introduces a limit of 20 most recent tabs in Settings > Multitasking. This affects the number of tabs that appear when you use ALT + TAB and Snap Assist.
• New! This update improves the cloud suggestion and the integrated search suggestion. This helps you to easily type popular words in Simplified Chinese using the Input Method Editor (IME). The cloud suggestion adds the most relevant word from Microsoft Bing to the IME candidate window. The integrated search suggestion gives you additional suggestions that are like what you see on a Bing search page. You can insert a suggestion as text or search for it directly in Bing. To turn on these features, select a chevron button in the upper right of the IME candidate window. Then select the Turn on button.
• New! This update improves your computer’s performance when you use a mouse that has a high report rate for gaming. To learn more, see “Reduced game stutter with high report rate mice” in Delivering Delightful Performance for More Than One Billion Users Worldwide.
• This update addresses an issue that affects the on-screen keyboard. The issue stops it from opening after you lock the machine.
• This update addresses an issue that might affect your computer when you are playing a game. Timeout Detection and Recovery (TDR) errors might occur.
• This update addresses an issue that affects certain apps. In some instances, video flickering occurs.
• This update addresses an issue that affects File Explorer (explorer.exe). It stops working.
• This update addresses an issue that affects some earbuds. They stop streaming music.
• This update addresses an issue that affects the Recommended section of the Start menu. When you right-click a local file, it does not behave as expected.

Improvements

This security update includes improvements that were a part of update KB5027303 (released June 27, 2023). When you install this KB:

• This update makes miscellaneous security improvements to internal OS functionality. No additional issues were documented for this release.

Known issues

To get this update, just run Windows Update and apply the latest updates. If you want to install this on an offline machine then you can download it from the Microsoft Update Catalog.

The release notes above are for Windows 11 22H2, if you have 21H2 then you’re going to get KB5028182 and just include security fixes. You can get it through Windows Update or from the Microsoft Update Catalog.

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The major highlight of the release as usual is security updates for Windows 10.

Highlights

This update addresses security issues for your Windows operating system.

And as is generally the case, the Redmond company has also listed the known issues in the update, which is always handy. Here are the symptoms and their respective workarounds:

Some of the older Windows 10 versions have also received updates today which have been listed below with their respective release notes (KB) linked as well as links to download them at Microsoft's Update Catalog:

It is noteworthy here that Windows 10 20H2 and Windows 10 1909 reached the end of servicing.

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Firefox 115.0 and Firefox 115.0.1 were both released last week.

The latest version of Firefox is available via the web browser's automatic updating feature already. Selecting Menu > Help > About Firefox displays the current version of the browser. Opening the about page launches an automatic check for updates as well; the new version should be picked up by Firefox then.

Users may also download it directly from the official Mozilla Firefox website if they prefer to do so.

Firefox 115.0.2 and 115.0.2 ESR address a single security issue in the web browser. The security advisories page lists one security issue that addresses a use-after-free vulnerability in workers. The severity rating of the vulnerability is moderate, a fairly low rating. The overall rating of the update, however, is set to high. It is unclear whether this is an error on Mozilla's behalf or if some information has not been added to the security advisories yet.

The official release notes list several crashes, all of which affect Firefox on Windows systems. The first crash affects Firefox on Windows 7 systems only. Mozilla reveals that it is a crash related to the browser's DLL blocklist feature, but does not provide specifics.

Mozilla introduced capabilities recently that allow Firefox users to block third-party DLL injections in the browser.

The second crash fix addresses an issue that "some" Windows users experienced after Firefox blocked "instances of a malicious injected DLL".  The bug report on Bugzilla lists Windows 10 as the affected operating system. Mozilla notes there that the crash is, likely, caused by malware that is installed on the user's device.

The release notes list three additional bugs, all non-security, that Mozilla addressed in Firefox 115.0.2:

• A bug with audio rendering on some sites has been addressed.
• A patternTransform translate bug using the wrong units has been addressed.
• Fixed a caret displaying bug in "some text editors on some websites".

Firefox users may want to install the update as soon as possible to protect the browser against potential attacks targeting the security vulnerability. Those affected by crashes may also want to patch early. Users who may have malware on their devices that has been causing the crash of Firefox need to scan their devices using up-to-date security software.

Windows Defender is installed on Windows 10 devices by default, but there are other options, including Bitdefender Antivirus Free.

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Mozilla has announced a new feature for its Firefox web browser which will mean some extensions blocked from certain sites.

In the release notes for the latest version of Firefox, 115.0, Mozilla stated that the Quarantined Domains tool will "only allow some extensions monitored by Mozilla to run on specific websites for various reasons, including security concerns."

In another blog post further explaining why some extensions will no longer work on certain sites, the company said that having an open ecosystem of add-ons, which is good for developers, can also be good for threat actors too. It added that reviews and user reports are not always enough to find and prevent malicious add-ons.

Add-off

"[Quarantined Domains] allows us to prevent attacks by malicious actors targeting specific domains when we have reason to believe there may be malicious add-ons we have not yet discovered," it said.

However, users can disable the new feature if they so choose, by typing "about:config" in the address bar and setting "extensions.quarantinedDomains.enabled" to false. Mozilla also says that it will be improving this feature as time goes on, and expects Firefox 116 to allow users to control the behavior for each add-on they have.

The warning for potentially bad add-ons appears in the Extensions popup rather than the icon, so such alerts are not displayed the pinned toolbar of extensions when they are added.

Jeff Johnson, a researcher and developer of a privacy-focused extension, noted that, "the quarantined domains warning no longer appears in the Extensions popup either. In fact, there's no longer an Extensions popup: clicking the Extensions toolbar icon simply opens the about:addons page, which doesn't show the quarantined domains warning anywhere."

"This is a terrible user interface design for the new so-called 'security' feature, silently disabling extensions while hiding the warning from the user," they added.

The new feature comes soon after Mozilla took a stance on a proposed bill in France that would block certain websites contained on a government list. It said that, "such a move will overturn decades of established content moderation norms and provide a playbook for authoritarian governments that will easily negate the existence of censorship circumvention tools."

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While it has been close a couple of times, the trend according to their stats is pretty clear that Linux use has been slowly rising over the last few years. This does not include ChromeOS, even though it's based on Linux, as they track that separately so this is just plain desktop Linux.

As always, keep a big pinch of salt ready though for any such survey. Statcounter gather this data from around "1.5 million sites globally". Still, just like the Steam Survey that we regularly look at for trends, it's an interesting measure to keep an eye on for the overall picture.

Across this year their stats show for Linux:

    January - 2.91%
    February - 2.94%
    March - 2.85%
    April - 2.83%
    May - 2.7%
    June - 3.07%

See the stats on Statcounter.

What are your thoughts? Be sure to leave a note in the comments!

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Aside from those changes, the new version also brings support for ZIP64, which means users can now extract .zip images that are larger than 4GB. It's now also possible to add or restore disks as compressed Virtual Hard Disk v2 (VHDX) images, as well as experimental support for Full Flash Update (FFU) images.

FFU is sector-based unlike file-based WIM (Windows Imaging file format) which means the deployment of FFU is faster, though you do end up with bigger file sizes as a result.

The full changelog for Rufus 4.2.4070 Beta is given below:

• Add detection and warning for UEFI revoked bootloaders (including ones revoked through SkuSiPolicy.p7b)

• Add ZIP64 support, to extract .zip images that are larger than 4 GB

• Add saving and restoring current drive to/from compressed VHDX image

• Add saving and restoring current drive to/from compressed FFU (Full Flash Update) image [EXPERIMENTAL]

• Fix a crash when trying to open Windows ISOs, with the x86 32-bit version

• Increase ISO → ESP limit, for Debian 12 netinst images

• Make sure the main partition size is aligned to the cluster size

   

You can download Rufus 4.2 beta either from Neowin, or from the official website, or from its GitHub page.

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This applies to Windows 11 21H2 editions released in October 2021: Home, Pro, Pro Education, and Pro for Workstations.

"These editions will no longer receive security updates after October 10, 2023," Microsoft announced Monday.

"Customers who contact Microsoft Support after this date will be directed to update their device to the latest version of Windows 11 to remain supported."

After the end-of-service date, Windows 10 21H2 devices running the above Home and Pro editions will no longer receive security and monthly quality updates with fixes and patches for newly discovered bugs and security issues.

Multiple editions of Windows 10 21H2 (the Windows November 10 2021 Update) also reached EOS earlier this month.

Microsoft also provides users with a list of all products that will reach the end of their support or be retired in the coming months.

Customers can refer to the Windows Lifecycle FAQ and the Lifecycle Policy search tool for further information regarding the specific end-of-service dates for Windows.

Windows 11 2022 Update now force-installing on some devices

Windows 11 22H2 (aka the Windows 11 2022 Update) has entered widespread availability for Windows devices meeting the eligibility criteria since October.

You can confirm Windows 11 upgrade eligibility by checking the Windows 11 specs, features, and computer requirements or with the help of the PC Health Check app.

Notably, Microsoft is also force-installing this update on systems currently running Windows 11 21H2, which is rapidly approaching its EOS date.

"In January 2023, Home and Pro consumer and non-managed business devices running Windows 11, version 21H2 started to automatically update to version 22H2," Microsoft says on the Windows release health dashboard.

"Since Windows 10, we've been helping Windows users stay up to date and secure with supported versions of Windows through automatic updates.

"We're using the same approach for Windows 11 to help you stay protected and productive. And remember: you can choose a convenient time for your device to restart and complete the update."

Microsoft also provides this support document and a guided walk-through to help resolve any issues experienced during the Windows 11 22H2 upgrade.

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In February 2022, Microsoft launched the Amazon Appstore for Windows 11 in a preview version. Last week, Amazon quietly revealed that the Appstore is now generally available for Android developers to submit their apps to run on Windows 11.

In a blog post, Amazon stated:

In partnership with Microsoft, we utilized the Windows Subsystem for Android (WSA) to provide a first-class experience for running Android apps available in the Amazon Appstore. Popular Android apps and games—including Audible, TikTok, Lords Mobile, Hungry Shark Evolution, and Epic Seven—are now reaching new users on PCs without having to create a separate desktop version for Windows.

Any Android apps that are submitted to the Amazon Appstore for Windows 11 for approval must have the following system requirements:

• RAM: 8 GB (minimum) 16 GB (recommended)
• Storage type: Solid State Drive or SSD (recommended)
• Processor architecture: x64 or ARM64
• Virtual Machine Platform: This setting needs to be enabled. For more info, go to Enable virtualization on Windows 11 PCs.

Android app developers can also access other tools to have their apps run well on Windows 11. One of them is the Amazon Input SDK. Developers can use it to quickly create an overlay to display the keyboard and mouse controls for their app or Android game.

Amazon is promoting the use of its Windows 11 Android appstore as a way for developers to expand their audience. In a separate blog post, Smilegate Megaport stated it was able to port their Android game Epic Seven to run on Windows 11 via the Amazon Appstore. It stated:

With Amazon Appstore’s developer tools, Smilegate Megaport was able to save hundreds of hours of development time by launching Epic Seven for Fire OS directly on Windows 11. Thanks to thorough in-house QA and Amazon's pre-submission Live App testing (LAT) service, they delivered a fluid and responsive gaming experience for both tablets and PCs.

Microsoft recently updated its Windows Subsystem for Android in its preview channel with a number of new features and improvements.

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After all the press for Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk potentially taking it to each other in the octagon, the only analog we’re likely to see is Twitter versus Meta’s new darling–Threads. The platform has picked up 70 million sign-ups in the first couple of days, and it shows no sign of slowing down. The only trouble is that, right now, it’s mobile only. You can view individual posts in a browser, but you can’t post or read your whole feed.

Personally, my relationship with the blue bird has been in sharp decline over the last few months, so I decided to give Threads a try. The best way I can describe it is, it's like rerolling a new character class in a game after having already been through the endgame content. You know, kind of refreshing.

Threads still falls behind because it’s mobile locked to Android and iOS devices, so I can’t really use it on anything other than my phone and tablet. But if you’re running Windows 11, there’s a quick path around that restriction using the Windows Subsystem for Android.

It all hinges on the Amazon Appstore and activating the ability to sideload Android APKs with the flick of a few switches. So this guide isn’t just for Threads, but more of a … meta guide for most Android apps that have available APKs. (I hope you see what I did there.)

Before We Begin

• Have Windows 11 installed.
• Have the latest Windows updates installed.
• Make sure Microsoft supports Amazon Appstore in your country or region. (Check here.)

Install Amazon Appstore/Windows Subsystem for Android

• Open the Microsoft Store and search for Amazon Appstore. Click Install or Get to begin the download.
• This will start you through a three-step setup process—just follow it through. It will ask for permission to make changes to a couple of utilities—allow them, and you’ll soon be prompted to restart your computer.
• When it comes back from restart, your PC will automatically begin installing the Windows Subsystem for Android. When that’s finished, you’ll be prompted with an Amazon Appstore login screen. (You don’t have to log in.)
• You’ll now be able to find Windows Subsystem for Android in your Start menu. Open it and select Advanced settings on the left, then toggle the Developer mode slider to the right.

Download the Threads APK

There are multiple options for downloading Android app APKs, but if you don’t know where you’re going, you can end up in some unsavory corners of the web. One of the safest in my experience is APKMirror.

• Get the Threads APK using the APKMirror link here.
• By default this will go into your Downloads folder.

Install WSATools

While there are several options for apps that allow installation of Android APKs once the Windows Subsystem for Android is installed, WSATools is one of the simplest and most straightforward, and it's another pickup from the Microsoft Store.

• Open the Microsoft Store and search for WSATools. Install it.

Install Threads

All the pieces are in place, let’s go!

• WSATools will now be available on your Start menu. Open it up.
• Click Install an APK. This will tell you the ADB is missing the first time you run it. Click Install and select or make a folder to install it into. Personally, I just made C:\ADB to be simple. (You’ll never have to do this again.)
• Once that’s done, you’ll get another prompt to find your file. Go to your Downloads folder and select our freshly downloaded Threads APK.
• Click Install when it shows the Threads icon and information.
• It is possible that it will ask permission for ADB Debugging. If so, click yes.

If this doesn’t work, or it says it can’t access the WSA, restarting your machine to try again will do the trick.

And that’s it! Threads should now be available in your Start menu, so when you’re at your desk at work or on your gaming rig taking a break between runs, you can open Threads on your Windows 11 PC with the same ease as Microsoft’s Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram Windows apps. Happy spooling! (Is that what we’re calling it?)

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