In a blog post, Brave says the milestone represents the fifth time the browser’s user base has doubled in as many years. The service also currently attracts more than 15 million daily active users, another high water mark.

Brave credits a range of new features and products for the continued growth, including an in-built crypto wallet and private search engine. But the company also acknowledged it has benefited from wider consumer trends.

“Users all over the world are looking for a private, safe and faster browsing experience, along with tools that give them independence from Big Tech. This long term and sustainable growth reflects that user desire,” said Brave.

A paradigm shift?

The uptake of privacy-centric browsers, VPNs, proxies, encrypted email and other privacy tools in recent years hints at a shift in attitudes that could have major ramifications for the largest technology companies in the world, whose businesses are predicated on the collection of vast amounts of data.

Since the Snowden leaks and Cambridge Analytica scandal in particular, public awareness of the importance of data privacy has risen steeply.

Generally, consumers are more wary about the information they share with Big Tech companies, and more savvy about how their information is used and monetized in the data economy.

We suspect this trend may begin to register more clearly in the web browser market soon. Currently, Google Chrome dominates the space with a 63.8% market share, followed by Apple’s Safari (19.6%) and Microsoft Edge (4%). However, privacy-centric services operated by smaller players are beginning to gather steam.

Although Brave’s 50 million-strong user base represents just 1% of the market, based on data on the total number of web users from Statista, its rate of growth will give the likes of Google pause for thought. And that’s despite the inherent inconveniences; this writer can attest that Brave frequently breaks website functionality as a result of its no-tolerance policy on cookies.

Although Google has made a show of improving its privacy practices and planning for the demise of third-party cookies, proposed alternatives like FLoC have been panned by privacy advocates, who say the solutions create as many problems as they solve.

There is also plenty of evidence Big Tech companies still cannot be trusted to protect the interests of users. This week, for example, both Google and Facebook were slapped with significant fines for cookie-related breaches of EU privacy laws. The patience of consumers is surely wearing thin.

Source

Back in October, we learned that Microsoft was busy working on a redesigned, revamped Notepad for Windows 11. And a month ago, the company publicly announced its arrival, although at the time it only became available to Windows 11 insiders in the Dev channel only. Today Microsoft has announced that it will also be rolling out to Insiders in the Beta channel, so for now still not general release for a dark mode on Windows 11.

Since the app has primarily been redesigned, the most expected and obvious change is the rounded corner style we have now become familiar with as a Windows 11 staple. There is also the addition of the Mica material theme.

The company says:

We know how important Notepad is to so many of your daily workflows, so we designed this modern spin on the classic app to feel fresh, but familiar.

Dark mode (image below on the right) has also been added and it will automatically be selected based on the system theme being used. However, it can also be set manually from the app's Settings.

A revamped Find and Replace option has also been added for improving the ease of working inside the Notepad.

Microsoft did not announce any changes from the Dec 7 release, so the new Notepad for Windows 11 still has a few known issues that it is working on. The known issues are presented below in bulleted points:

• Issues affecting keyboard access keys usage for when
  • switching between different input languages
  • while using Japanese IME
• Under certain circumstances, you may notice unexpected behavior when using shift-click to select text or when scrolling

Aside from that, Microsoft also states that it is optimizing the performance of the Notepad for "very large files". The company has urged users to provide feedback on Feedback Hub (under Apps > Notepad).

You can find the official updated press release here.

Microsoft announces redesigned Notepad for Windows 11 now in Beta Channel

The new Media Player comes with the look and feel of Windows 11, and it showcases your local music collections. The Media Player includes a full-featured music library that allows you to quickly browse and play music, as well as create and manage playlists. The music collection in Groove Music app will automatically migrate to this new app. You have a dedicated playback view that features album art and rich artist imagery, and features items such as a full screen and mini player options and graphics equalizer.

In addition to music, the Media Player includes full support for browsing, managing, and watching your local video collections. Microsoft has optimized this app for accessibility, with improved keyboard shortcut and access key support for keyboard users and with other assistive technologies.

Microsoft has promised that they will deliver new ways to browse your music and video collections and manage your play queue in the future updates.

via onMSFT

Microsoft replacing Groove Music player with Media Player app for Windows 11 for some Insiders

According to the Linux Mint Community ISO Images website, the latest set of images have been tested and are approved for release. They will now be distributed to each of the download mirrors and then the final announcement should arrive. The process of distributing the ISO images to mirrors has definitely begun because the ByteMark UK mirror already has the download available.

Lefebvre said today that the project would announce the ISOs and the upgrade path from older versions separately. In past updates, we’ve had to wait an additional week for the upgrade path to open up, however, this time around, the upgrade path will open up at more or less the same time which is nice for people on Linux Mint 20, 20.1, or 20.2 who want to upgrade to get the latest features.

With Linux Mint 20.3, users will get Cinnamon 5.2 which improves the calendar applet and a range of Mint’s home-grown Xapps will be improved – for example, Xreader will properly support manga. The appearance of the software is also improved with the introduction of larger title bar buttons, rounded window corners, and distraction-free accent colours.

Linux Mint 20.3 ISOs pass tests, due for release this week

Last year, Linux's source code came to a whopping 27.8 million lines of code. It's only gotten bigger since then. Like any 30-year old software project, Linux has picked up its fair share of cruft over the years. Now, after months of work, senior Linux kernel developer Ingo Molnar is releasing his first stab at cleaning it up at a fundamental level with his "Fast Kernel Headers" project.

The object? No less than a comprehensive clean-up and rework of the Linux kernel's header hierarchy and header dependencies. Linux contains many header, .h, files. To be exact there are about 10,000 main .h headers in the Linux kernel with the include/ and arch/*/include/ hierarchies. As Molnar explained, "Over the last 30+ years they have grown into a complicated & painful set of cross-dependencies we are affectionately calling 'Dependency Hell'."

To bring rhyme and reason to all this, Molnar is proposing to make 2,200 commit changes to the code. That's a lot of commits! Why so many? Well, Molnar continued, it turns out there's a lot more mess in all that code than he thought there was when he started his clean-up project in late 2020.

To be exact:

When I started this project, late 2020, I expected there to be maybe 50-100 patches. I did a few crude measurements that suggested that about 20% build speed improvement could be gained by reducing header dependencies, without having a substantial runtime effect on the kernel. Seemed substantial enough to justify 50-100 commits.

- But as the number of patches increased, I saw only limited performance increases. By mid-2021 I got to over 500 commits in this tree and had to throw away my second attempt (!), the first two approaches simply didn't scale, weren't maintainable and barely offered a 4% build speedup, not worth the churn of 500 patches and not worth even announcing.

- With the third attempt I introduced the per_task() machinery which brought the necessary flexibility to reduce dependencies drastically, and it was a type-clean approach that improved maintainability. But even at 1,000 commits I barely got to a 10% build speed improvement. Again this was not something I felt comfortable pushing upstream or even announcing. 😕

- But the numbers were pretty clear: 20% performance gains were very much possible. So I kept developing this tree, and most of the speedups started arriving after over 1,500 commits, in the fall of 2021. I was very surprised when it went beyond 20% speedup and more than arrived at the current 78% with my reference config. There's a clear super-linear improvement property of kernel build overhead, once the number of dependencies is reduced to the bare minimum.

So, today, his cleaned-up "fast-headers tree offers a +50-80% improvement in absolute kernel build performance on supported architectures, depending on the config. This is a major step forward in terms of Linux kernel build efficiency & performance."

A 50 to 80% improvement is well worth the time and trouble. These speed savings come from reducing the size of the default headers, which with the fast-headers tree will mostly include type definitions, by 1-2 orders of magnitude. 

But, wait, those 2,200 commits are only the tip of the iceberg. Those changes will affect almost every program in the Linux kernel. All together, Molnar estimates that "in addition to the aforementioned 25 sub-trees and 2,200 commits, the fast-headers tree modifies over half of all kernel source files in existence." It's going to change 25,288 files with 178,024 insertions and 74,720 deletions. In other words, "Yeah, so this is probably the largest single feature announcement in LKML's [Linux Kernel Mailing List] history. Not by choice! :-/"

On top of this, making these changes doable will require aggressive decoupling of high-level headers; type and API header decoupling; automated dependency addition to .h and .c files; and optimizing headers. This will not be easy. So, before pulling the trigger and starting to make these changes Molnar is gathering feedback from his fellow maintainers and, in particular, he'd loved to hear from "Linus [Torvalds] & Andrew [Morton] and the other maintainers of the biggest subsystems affected by these changes."

Greg Kroah-Hartman, the Linux kernel maintainer for the Linux stable branch, thinks "This is 'interesting,' but how are you going to keep the kernel/sched/per_task_area_struct_defs.h and struct task_struct_per_task definition in sync?" In short, who gets to bell the cat of maintaining all these changes? 

Molnar replied that he's willing to tackle this job and that he doesn't think it will be that much trouble. Kroah-Hatman then gave Molnar's efforts his blessings and remarked, "I'll leave all of this up to the scheduler developers, but it still looks odd to me. The mess we create trying to work around issues in C :)"

He's not wrong. This is one reason why there are efforts afoot to make Rust Linux's second language.

If adopted, users won't see any real changes. But Linux kernel and distro developers will be able to compile Linux faster than ever. The result will be to make it easier and quicker than ever to make improvements, patches, and add features to Linux.

Source

Most modern browsers have a password manager, that lets you log in to your favorite sites with ease. Not unlike standalone tools (which often require an extension), browsers offer to save the username and password when you sign in to a website. Allowing it to do so, provides a convenient auto-login option that is triggered the next time you visit the same website. Besides, you don't have to type the long passwords, or even remember complicated patterns/phrases.

The password manager has been a part of Microsoft Edge for quite a while, though it has been missing an important option, the ability to add passwords without the login process that I mentioned above.

For context, Firefox's password manager, Lockwise, has had this feature for a long time, but Google Chrome was a little late to the party, it recently added support for saving passwords manually.

Since Edge is based on the Chromium source code, it is not surprising that Microsoft has brought the option over to its browser. The feature, spotted by a redditor, is currently available for select users participating in the Microsoft Edge Canary channel. Screenshots reveal that the feature can be accessed from the Edge Settings > Profiles > Passwords page.

With the addition of the handy option, you will be able to click the Add Password button which will bring up a pop-up modal, that allows you to add the URL of the website's login page, the username and password, and save it to your browser's vault. It looks very similar to the Edit passwords panel.

This may not sound like a useful option if you are using a cloud-based service like LastPass or Bitwarden, or a standalone password manager like KeePass. But for people who rely on Edge's password manager, the option to save passwords manually can be a lifesaver. The only other way to add passwords to Edge is by importing logins from other browsers, or a HTML or a CSV file.

The new feature seems to be in A/B testing phase in the current build available for users in the Microsoft Edge Canary Channel, version 99.0.1124.0. Once it passes the checks, and gets a positive nod from testers, Microsoft will roll out the option to the stable channel.

This is the sort of feature that users need, not a shortcut to MSN Games or Loans and other nonsense. In case you missed it and are wondering what I'm talking about, I recommend reading Martin's article where he wrote about how the recent additions to Edge have cluttered the browser.

Personally, I prefer a standalone password manager or a dedicated cloud service, for the sake of cross-platform/device compatibility.  I use KeePass with a cloud service to synchronize the database across my devices, but also have Bitwarden as a partial backup.

Microsoft Edge is testing an option to allow users to save passwords manually

Chrome 97's release was delayed by weeks because of the Holiday period in many parts of the world.  Google Chrome 96, the last major stable release in 2021, was released on November 16, 2021.

The new version of Google Chrome launches with a controversial Keyboard MAP API. The API could not be used previously by certain web experiences because it could not be used inside iframes. Apps such as Microsoft's Office web applications could not make use of the API to detect key presses on keyboard layouts. Keyboard layouts differ depending on the region or language. The change makes the functionality available to web applications that are inside iframes.

Here is the official explanation of why the feature has been implemented:

getLayoutMap() used in conjunction with code solves the problem of identifying the actual key pressed in keyboard with different layout maps such as English vs French keyboards, but since getLayoutMap() isn't available in all contexts (can't be used inside iframes), Office web apps like Excel, Word, PowerPoint, etc. that show up as embedded experiences in Outlook Web, Teams, etc. and are running in iframes, can't use this API.
Adding keyboard-map to the allow attribute list solves this problem.

Mozilla, Apple, Brave and other browser developers voiced concerns. One key argument that the companies brought forth against the integration in their browsers was that sites could use the functionality for fingerprinting purposes.

Apple published a response on GitHub, stating:

As I've noted in person a while ago, the Keyboard Map API as proposed exposes a high entropy fingerprinting surface. This is not acceptable from privacy perspective. As a result, the WebKit team at Apple is not interested in implementing this feature as currently proposed / spec'ed.

Brave Software, maker of the Brave Browser, had this to say:

Brave inherits from Chrome implementation of Keyboard API which does not provide any functionality to the user (only Chrome and Opera support it and, to my knowledge, no site actually uses it). However, the API might be used for fingerprinting.

WICG Keyboard Map Draft mentions that the API can be used for fingerprinting of:

Users who use uncommon ASCII layouts (like Dvorak or Colemak)

Users who use an ASCII layout that doesn’t match the default for the region that they are in. For example, a user in the US with an active UK or French layout.

Mozilla finally added the Keyboard Map API to the list of harmful APIs that it won't implement in the Firefox web browser.

Google will implement the API in Chrome, but many other browsers, even those based on Chromium, won't implement it or will disable the API so that it can't be used by websites.

Interested users can check out the other features of Chrome 97 here.

Google Chrome 97 introduces controversial keyboard API

Microsoft decided to lock certain web links in its operating systems so that they always open in Microsoft Edge. This happens when you open web searches, support links in the Settings application, or links provided by the news widget. Edge is opened, even if another browser is the default. There is no technical reason for opening these in Edge either.

Tools like EdgeDeflector used to provide a workaround to get these links to open directly in another browser. Microsoft did lock the protocol in recent builds and this rendered these tools unusable as they could not provide the functionality anymore.

MSEdgeRedirect uses a different method, and it is one of the few working tools at the time of writing that can still redirect Edge specific links to another browser.

A new version of MSEdgeRedirect has been released. Interested users can download it from the official GitHub repository. It is available for 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows 8.1 and newer, including the latest Windows 11 builds.

Note: Google Safe Browsing and Microsoft SmartScreen may block the downloading or running of the tool. Since it is open source, you may check out the code to make sure it is legitimate. A scan on Virustotal returned three hits, but only from lesser known antivirus engines.

Setup displays a few options to the user. The default option is set to service mode, which has MSEdge Redirect run in the background and redirect Edge links automatically to the system's default browser. Options to start the service with Windows and to hide it in the system tray area are provided. The second main option is to run the program in active mode; this has it run only when Edge is launched.

The second page displays several additional options:

• De-embed Windows Store "Apps".
• Redirect PDFs to
• Replace Bing Search results with
• Replace Weather results with

These options remove some of the locked in options or default options of the Windows operating system. Web searches run with a different search engine once configured using the tool, and the other options use different services as well if you choose to configure those.

The new version improves several core features, including performance, installation and the detection of the default browser on the system.

The latest version of MSEdge Redirect, version 0.6.0.0, introduces the following changes:

• Added Install Success screen
• Added Install Settings screen
• Improved Installer screen layouts
• Added ability to update dev builds
• Improved Default Browser detection
• Improved Service Mode Performance
• Improved Installer Admin Rights handling
• Fixed 32-bit version failing Edge location checks
• Fixed Tray Icon not hiding when selected in installer
• Added additional Security Safeguards for URI handling
• Fixed Update Checker not running due to inverted logic
• Added ability for installer to detect and show existing settings values when updating
• Added ability to redirect weather results to one of two available alternative providers
• Added ability to semi-automatically repair IFEO Exclusion issues caused by Edge Updates

MSEdgeRedirect tool to redirect Microsoft Edge links has been updated

The C++ program aims to be the successor to TaskbarX (formerly FalconX), from the same developer, but TaskbarXI is still in an early development phase. It does not have an interface yet. The project's page mentions that a GUI is in the works, as are the options to change the taskbar background style and color.

That said, even at this stage, it does offer some nice features. TaskbarXI is portable, download it from the project's GitHub page,  run the executable, and it is ready to use. You may not notice a difference if you have a window that is maximized, i.e., the taskbar will look normal. But when you open a minimized window, or switch to the desktop, the tool will shrink the taskbar to a dock, with the wallpaper overflowing the edges. The system tray and clock are detached from the taskbar and appears like a secondary dock.

The edges of the dock are rounded, but has a jagged effect due to the lack of anti-aliasing in Windows 11. The tool displays the taskbar on multiple monitors, and supports the system tray and the clock as well. If you are not a fan of the centered icons, you can use it with a left-aligned taskbar by enabling the option in Windows 11's Personalization > Taskbar screen.

I think it looks better with the centered taskbar, because the left-aligned style creates a gap between the taskbar and the system tray, which looks odd. TaskbarXI supports separate DPI scaling.

The application works with Windows 11's light and dark themes. There is currently no option to make any changes whatsoever, so you can't change the size of the taskbar, or its transparency, enable auto-hide, etc. Since there is no GUI, the only way to close the program is to open the Task Manager and kill the Taskbar11.exe (the name includes the version number, e.g. Taskbar11_1.0.0.0.exe), and has the description "Windows 11 Taskbar Mod".

TaskbarXI crashed a few times for me, well I'm not sure if it did since it was still running in the Task Manager, but the taskbar disappeared randomly. It happened once when PotPlayer was running in windowed mode, but the other instances were random. It's understandable though, after all this is an alpha version, so instabilities are to be expected.

The tool seems to be a decent start for a first release, though in my opinion RoundedTB does a similar job, and has a user-friendly interface. There are other open source options that you may choose from for customizing the Windows 11 Taskbar, including TranslucentTB, Windows 11 Drag & Drop to the Taskbar (Fix), ElevenClock, to name a few.

Note: TaskbarXI developed by Chris Andriessen, should not be confused with Taskbar11, which is made by Dustin Hendriks.

If you want a nicer Start Menu, there is Open Shell, which is also free and open source. There are some paid alternatives that you could opt for such as Start11 or StartAllBack, I haven't used either, so I don't know if they're better than Open Shell.

TaskbarXI turns the Windows 11 Taskbar to a dock

The tool would be useful to restore your apps and data if you corrupt or need to re-install WSA, helping to maintain game progress for example.

The tool works by copying the data VHDX and restoring it to the right place on need, and will form part of WSATools 0.2 when that is released.

Keep an eye on the GitHub page for the next release here and consider donating to the developer here if you find his work helpful.

WSATools Backups will let you back up your Windows 11 WSA Android apps easily

The changelog reads:

• New Design  – The Weather app has been updated and now uses a graphic style more in line with the Windows 11 interface. Buttons now have rounded edges, fonts have been made larger and thicker, and controls on the settings page have been updated.
• Locations in the Start menu – When pinning additional locations to the Start menu, the corresponding city name will be displayed to make it easier for you to identify which link the Weather app is referring to.
• Miscellaneous bug fixes and improvements.

The improvements are currently only available to Windows 11 Insiders in the Dev channel.

via WBI

MSN Weather app for Windows 11 updated with improved UI, more

via WBI

Telegram Desktop app gets updated to version 3.4.2 with Reactions, more

Microsoft said that it was aware of the problem and was working on a fix.

We are aware of and working on an issue causing messages to be stuck in transport queues on Exchange Server 2016 and Exchange Server 2019.

[...] We are actively working on resolving this issue and expect to release details on how to resolve this issue later today.

The company has kept its promise and has released a resolution for the problem. It has provided both an automated scan engine reset script solution as well as a manual input solution.

First, we have the automated scan engine reset script (available at https://aka.ms/ResetScanEngineVersion). It can be run parallelly across multiple servers. The successful script completion should give the following output:

[PS] C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\Scripts>.\Reset-ScanEngineVersion.ps1
EXCH1 Stopping services...
EXCH1 Removing Microsoft engine folder...
EXCH1 Emptying metadata folder...
EXCH1 Starting services...
WARNING: Waiting for service 'Microsoft Filtering Management Service (FMS)' to start...
WARNING: Waiting for service 'Microsoft Filtering Management Service (FMS)' to start...
WARNING: Waiting for service 'Microsoft Filtering Management Service (FMS)' to start...
WARNING: Waiting for service 'Microsoft Filtering Management Service (FMS)' to start...
WARNING: Waiting for service 'Microsoft Exchange Transport (MSExchangeTransport)' to start...
EXCH1 Starting engine update...
Running as EXCH1-DOM\Administrator.
--------
Connecting to EXCH1.CONTOSO.com.
Dispatched remote command. Start-EngineUpdate -UpdatePath http://amupdatedl.microsoft.com/server/amupdate
--------
[PS] C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\Scripts>Get-EngineUpdateInformation
Engine                : Microsoft
LastChecked       : 01/01/2022 08:58:22 PM -08:00
LastUpdated        : 01/01/2022 08:58:31 PM -08:00
EngineVersion         : 1.1.18800.4
SignatureVersion      : 1.355.1227.0
SignatureDateTime     : 01/01/2022 03:29:06 AM -08:00
UpdateVersion         : 2112330001
UpdateStatus          : UpdateAttemptSuccessful

Next up, steps for the manual fix are provided for those who prefer to do a manual restore.

Remove existing engine and metadata

1. Stop the Microsoft Filtering Management service. When prompted to also stop the Microsoft Exchange Transport service, click Yes.

2. Use Task Manager to ensure that updateservice.exe is not running.

3. Delete the following folder: %ProgramFiles%\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\FIP-FS\Data\Engines\amd64\Microsoft.

4. Remove all files from the following folder: %ProgramFiles%\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\FIP-FS\Data\Engines\metadata.

Update to latest engine

1. Start the Microsoft Filtering Management service and the Microsoft Exchange Transport service.

2. Open the Exchange Management Shell, navigate to the Scripts folder (%ProgramFiles%\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\Scripts), and run Update-MalwareFilteringServer.ps1 .

Verify engine update info

1. In the Exchange Management Shell, run Add-PSSnapin Microsoft.Forefront.Filtering.Management.Powershell.

2. Run Get-EngineUpdateInformation and verify the UpdateVersion information is 2112330001.

You may find more details on the official Microsoft blog post linked here.

Microsoft releases official fix for Y2K22 Exchange Server bug that was causing mail jam

The effect appears to be a heavily blurred version of your wallpaper without the tint.

Microsoft appears to be working to bring Mica to more legacy apps, with the latest Insider builds also supporting “MicaBackdropInApplicationFrameHostTitlebar”.

Microsoft will reportedly bring the next big update to Windows 11 over Summer 2022, so it should not be long before we see these changes roll out to regular users.

via onMSFT, WindowsLatest

Microsoft is working on a new blur effect for Windows 11

The text editor is available for all supported operating systems. On Windows, it is available as a portable version and a setup version.

Installed copies of Notepad will receive update notifications in the coming weeks; users who want to update early need to do so manually.

The official release announcement has been posted to the official website.

The developer has added two features that users requested for some time. The first enables users to exclude folders from the program's find in files feature. Find in files searches for the text string that you enter in files, an in-content search feature that can be really helpful, e.g., to replace strings with others in all files that have that string. The exclude option can speed things up considerable for users, as it skips excluded folders, which speeds up the processing and may also reduce the number of returned items.

Select Search > Find in Files to use the functionality in Notepad++.

Use the filters field to exclude folders: *.* !/source !/bin searches all folders with the exception of the source and bin folders.

The second feature introduces auto saving for the loaded session on exit; this works while the "open session in a new instance" is set. Select Settings > Preferences >Multi-Instance Settings & Date to check the state of the setting. The default needs to be switched for the feature to work.

Notepad++ 8.2 includes a number of fixes besides that. One addresses a memory leak issue when toggling lite and dark modes of the application.

Here is the list of features and bug fixes of the new version:

1. Add exclude folder(s) capacity in Find in Files (mouse hover on "Filters" label for getting the example on tool-tip).
2. Fix UTF-8 detected wrongly as TIS-620 encoding issue.
3. Add auto save loaded session on exit feature (while "Open session in a new instance" is set in Multi-instance settings).
4. A comprehensive fix for dockable panels losing background color when switching back Notepad++.
5. Fix memory leak while toggling between Dark/Lite Mode.
6. Fix caret left-right inverse moving in RTL mode issue.
7. Fix Document List icons unchanged issue after switching to dark mode or changing to alternative icons.
8. Fix incorrect folding behaviour in C, C++, Java, JavaScript, TypeScript and Objective-C.
9. Update boost regexp from v1.76 to v1.78
10. "Rename tab" name field enlargement (from 20 to 63 char!).
11. Apply "crontab" file to the syntax highlighting of bash.

Now You: which text editor do you use? (via Deskmodder)

Notepad++ 8.2: improved features and a memory leak fix

Frontpaged: Notepad++ 8.2

The first social report for this rolled in at 1am EST from Reddit user /u/FST-LANE who suggested that Microsoft released a bad update, aptly named “220101001”. This was presumably a scheduled patch to allow for processing the new date, but it didn’t go as planned. “ I see a bunch of errors from FIPFS service which say: Cannot convert “220101001” to long,” wrote /u/FST-LANE.

This aligns with reports from Marius Sandbu, manager for the Norwegian firm Sopra Steria, who released a detailed synopsis of the cause. He reports Microsoft Exchange servers have stopped processing mail all together because it isn't prepared to handle today’s date. He states, “The reason for this is because Microsoft is using a signed int32 for the date and with the new value of 2.201.010.001 is over the max value of the “long” int being 2.147.483.647.”

The most troubling part of this is the stop-gap solution. In order to resume processing of mail, sysadmins are disabling malware scanning on their exchange servers, leaving their users, and possibly the servers themselves, vulnerable to attack.

The bug affects Exchange Server 2013. 2016, and 2019.

Y2K22 bug: Microsoft rings in the new year by breaking Exchange servers all around the world

One of those is translucent menus, which lets some of the background just peek through in the menu.

If you are desperate for a bit of that look on Windows 10, and do not want to upgrade to Windows 11, there is now a small open source app which will let you do just that.

AcrylicMenus is a tiny proof-of-concept application that applies acrylic effect to almost all existing Win32 context menus on Windows 10 via native Win32 hooking API.

Because the app is experimental and still buggy, the developer has not designed the app to be permanently installed, and users report it remains somewhat buggy and inconsistent.

If you are however dying to try out the look, check out AcrylicMenus at Github here.#

via FireCube

This experimental app can give you acrylic menus on Windows 10

The developer calls it the Swiss Army knife for developers. The application includes multiple tools that developers, but also non-developers, may find useful.

Tools are divided into the groups Converters, Encoders/Decoders, Formatters, Generators, Text and Graphic. Each section lists one or multiple tools that users can execute directly from within the application.

Each of the tools has a description attached to it when a group is opened, which explains the functionality. Converters, for example, support conversions between JSON and YAML data, and number base conversions.

One example: the number base converter displays decimal, hexadecimal, octal and binary values based on the input.

Most tools are useful to developers only, but some may also be of use to non-developers. The Text group of tools features a text diff tool that compares two texts and highlights the differences between the versions.

Inspector & Case Converter checks a text and converts the case of the text, and the Regex Tester may be useful for users who are learning regular expressions or want to test regular expressions.

Here is the full list of tools that are included currently:

• Converters
  • Json <> Yaml
  • Number Base
• Encoders / Decoders
  • HTML
  • URL
  • Base64
  • JWT Decoder
  • Formatters
  • Json
• Generators
  • Hash (MD5, SHA1, SHA256, SHA512)
  • UUID 1 and 4
• Text
  • Inspector & Case Converter
  • Regex Tester
  • Text Comparer
  • Markdown Preview
• Graphic
  • PNG / JPEG Compressor

DevToys has a couple of other interesting options. Smart Detection, enabled by default, detects the best tool automatically based on the content that is copied to the clipboard. Users may switch between light and dark themes, change the system language, and change fonts and other visual settings of the application.

The developers of the application are adding more tools regularly to the tools collection. One of the main reasons for designing the application is they wanted to create a solution that may be run locally, so that developers don't have to use websites for their activities.

Closing Words

Developers who use Windows 10 or 11 may find the tools collection a useful application. Non-developers may find it useful as well in some cases.

DevToys: a tools collection for Windows developers

Previously, the company released two feature updates per year for Windows 10, even though the last three updates for Windows 10 were minor feature updates only.

Both Windows 11 and Windows 10 will receive a single feature update per year in 2022 and onward. Microsoft confirmed that the 2022 feature update for Windows 11 would be released in the second half of the year, but did not narrow it down further.

Windows Central suggests that the first Windows 11 feature update could be released earlier than many users and administrators would expect. According to the blog, Windows 11 version 22H2 will be completed in May 2022 and a final build will be released in Summer 2022.

I'm told the current engineering schedule has mainline development on version 22H2 scheduled for completion in May 2022, with a final build expected sometime in the summer.

Summer 2022 in the Northern Hemisphere starts on June 21 and ends on September 23 in the year. A release closer to the end of the period, in September in particular, seems feasible, considering that the release date would be just 11 months after the official release of the Windows 11 operating system.

Windows Central does not mention its source for the information, and the news should be filed under rumor for the time being.

The next feature update has the codename Sun Valley 2. It will introduce new functionality to the operating system, notably support for Android applications by integrating the Windows Subsystem for Android in the operating system. Other improvements include updated applications and overall polishing of the system, which some users felt rushed by Microsoft.

Windows 11 is still being rolled out to all compatible devices at the time of writing. The next feature update version will be offered to devices that Telemetry considers to offer the best upgrading experience. Rollouts happen over periods of weeks or months, and Microsoft expects to offer the free upgrade to Windows 11 to all eligible devices by mid-2022. The period of the 2022 feature update release rollout will likely be shorter.

The option to set the default browser again may also be introduced with the feature update.

Closing Words

Windows 11 has a few confirmed issues currently,  but Microsoft has been criticized mainly for removing functionality that existed in previous versions of Windows, including Windows 10. Most top requested Windows 11 features ask Microsoft to bring back functionality that it removed.

To name a few issues: changing default programs is less straightforward, annoying AMD performance issues, a taskbar with reduced functionality, and a redesigned File Explorer with usability issues.

Now You: what do you expect from the first feature update for Windows 11?

The first major Windows 11 Update may be released in Summer 2022

Some criticized Microsoft for strengthening Chromium, fearing that the move would give Google even more power over the future of the Internet. Others liked the leaner version of Edge that offered better web compatibility and performance than the old version.

Companies and organizations that relied on Internet Explorer technology can use the Internet Explorer Mode of Edge to continue using these applications and services.

First versions of Microsoft Edge were released in 2019, and Microsoft surprised many by releasing Edge for other platforms. The classic version of Edge was a Windows 10 exclusive feature, and one of the main reasons why the browser never managed to gain a sizeable share of the market. The new Edge is available for all supported Windows platforms, Linux, Mac and Android.

Microsoft's change in strategy, from a Windows 10 exclusive browser to a browser available on all platforms, seemed to pay off. Users could finally sync data between all versions of Edge, and use it on other platforms.

Recently, criticism of Microsoft Edge and Microsoft's overall strategy concerning the browser has increased. Many users on Windows 11, Microsoft's newest operating system, are getting frustrated with the company's efforts to keep the Edge browser the system default browser. Some links, for instance web search results and widget links, use a special link scheme that forces these links to open in Edge exclusively. There is no technical reason for that, only to enforce the use of Edge on the system.

Programs that allowed users to bypass the restriction have been rendered unusable mostly by recent changes to the operating system. Microsoft has made it harder to change the default browser when compared to previous Windows versions, and the company has been criticized for it by competitors such as Vivaldi CEO Jon von Tetzchner.

Feature overload

Microsoft has also been criticized for a number of features that it added to Edge recently. Some of which are only available in certain regions, others have been introduced in development editions of Edge.

In the past two months alone, Microsoft added a controversial buy now - pay later feature to Edge, which critics say may incentivize Internet users to make purchases that they may not need or can afford otherwise.

Another new feature that has been added recently is a new Games button, which Ashwin reviewed here. Users may click on it to get a list of games and related information, powered by Microsoft's MSN service.

Most of these features can be turned off, but they are usually enabled by default.

Closing Words

Is Microsoft adding too much bloat to Microsoft Edge, and if so, why? Some commenters believe that Microsoft could use a trial and error approach to development of features, to keep those that offer a positive return and drop others that don't. Since Edge is Chromium-based, adding features that Chrome, Edge's main competitor, does not have, may also play a role here.

Others believe that Edge has too many cooks that make decisions, and that this leads to a perceived feature bloat because of a missing overall strategy in regards to the browser.

Now You: Is Microsoft heading in the right direction with Edge? (via Dr. Windows, Born City)

Is Microsoft adding too many controversial features to its Edge browser?

Microsoft removed this feature from Windows 11, along with quite a few options, not to mention the entire right-click menu's usability. Martin has a nice write-up that talks more about the taskbar's state in the latest operating system.

If you were using the Drag and Drop feature in prior versions of Windows, and want it back, in Windows 11, there is something that you can do. Like some other fixes that we have seen, this too requires a third-party solution.

How to restore drag and drop to the Taskbar in Windows 11

The utility you will need for restoring the feature, is called Windows 11 Drag & Drop to the Taskbar (Fix). The name is kind of on the nose, but the program works quite well. Download the executable from GitHub. It is a portable software which creates a config file in the same folder. Run the program and an icon will appear on the system tray. This indicates that the application is active, it needs to be running in for the functionality that it restores.

To test if it works as intended, open any application that you'd like to open files in. E.g. Notepad. Minimize the window, and switch to Explorer. Drag a text document over Notepad's icon and mouse over the preview pane that appears, and click it. The file will be opened in the text editor.

Note: You need to have the Microsoft Visual C++ 2015-2022 Redistributable x64 installed on your computer, else the tool won't work.

How does it work?

When you drag something to the taskbar, the tool waits for a few milliseconds to see if the action is valid, and simulates the Win + T hotkey. This shortcut is normally used to switch between a program's windows in the taskbar, but the application uses it to open files.

The only downside to the program is that it cannot create be used to pin shortcuts to the taskbar, and according to the project's site, this function is not being worked on.

Windows 11 Drag & Drop to the Taskbar (Fix) is an open-source application, you can find the source code on the project's GitHub repository. Right-click on its taskbar icon and select the Configure option, to modify its settings, you'll see the config file open in a Notepad window. The program's documentation lists several options that you can add per your requirements, so give it a read. The tool works out of the box, but it never hurts to have more options. Users who are using a custom theme may want to look into the setting that checks the colors of the pixels, to prevent the tool from accidentally detecting a mouse action as a drag.

As for an official fix, Windows Latest reports that Drag and Drop for the Taskbar will be added in Windows 11 22H2, which could arrive in a few months.

Restore drag and drop to the Taskbar in Windows 11 with this open-source program

The feature hasn't made it to the stable channel yet, but according to reddit user, Leopeva64-2, who spotted the option, is available in the Edge Canary Channel.

The person also shared some screenshots on the social website to highlight the feature. The toggle for the Games button is located in the Edge > Settings > Appearance page. It is not enabled by default, which is a good thing. Switching it on adds the button to the browser's toolbar. Clicking the said button, displays a modal that pulls content from MSN Games.

That's what it is, the panel is a glorified web wrapper for Microsoft's online gaming portal. Great, that's just what we want, more bloat!

I mean, take a look at this list, some of these are useful options. Do we really need a button that takes you to the MSN Games page to clutter the toolbar? That's what makes it bloat, right?

I have all three channels of Edge installed on my computer (for testing purposes), but the Games button isn't available for me in the latest version of Edge Canary, 99.0.1117.0. So, the option is probably only available for users in specific regions for soft-testing purposes, or maybe it has been pulled already like the "follow the website" feature that is sort of like an RSS feed.

If it provided something useful, like quick access to Steam, Epic Games, GOG, or  the Xbox GamePass store, I can kind of understand how that can be useful, a faster way to search game fronts might be handy. But, the screenshots tell a different story, and since I can't test the feature myself, I can't comment on how the Games button and the panel will work. I wouldn't be surprised if it displays notifications or ads for games, invites from other players, but this is pure speculation of course.

Where is Microsoft Edge heading?

When Microsoft introduced features like Vertical Tabs, Sleeping Tabs, etc., I thought that Edge browser was very impressive and modern. But the browser has been on a downward spiral for a while.

The Redmond company has been criticized for making it difficult for users to switch default apps in Windows 11. Even if you set a different browser as your default handler, web searches are forced to open in Edge. And then there is all the negative marketing that Microsoft has been involved with, it ridiculed Chrome as a dated browser, promoting itself when the user searches for rival browsers. Maybe they are doing all this deliberately, to take the heat away from Windows 11's performance issues? How's that for 4D chess?

Jokes aside, I can barely find a reason to recommend Edge these days. Sure, it is well optimized and hence is faster than other browsers on Windows, but that's about the only positive thing I have to say about it.

Do you remember when useful features like EPUB support were removed from the browser, despite having many votes on the Feedback Hub? We have seen various odd features arrive in Edge, like shopping coupons, a buy now pay and later option which is quite controversial, and now we have a nearly useless games button.

Microsoft is adding more bloat to Edge with a Games button

7-Zip 21.07

The new version of 7-Zip is already available. Users can download it from the project's website for all supported operating systems (Windows 32-bit and 64-bit, Windows 64-bit ARM) to install it or upgrade existing versions of the archiver on a system.

7-Zip 21.07 introduces support for VHDX disk images that it can now extract. These are Microsoft Hyper-V Virtual Hard Disk v2 format files, and files with the VHDX extension may be extracted just like any other archive using the archiver. Just right-click on a VHDX file in Explorer or another file manager and select the extract option of 7-Zip to extract the contents of the disk image to the system. The file type can also be opened in 7-Zip to browse the contents without extraction.

Virtual hard disk files may be created for virtual environments, and it may sometimes be useful to access files that they contain directly. 7-Zip supports the extraction of several virtual disk image formats, including VHD, VDI and VMDK.

The update introduces the following additional changes to the archiver:

• New switches: -spm and -im!{file_path} to exclude directories from processing for specified paths that don't contain path separator character at the end of path.
• In the "Add to Archive" window, now it is allowed to use -m prefix for "Parameters" field as in command line: -mparam.
• The sorting order of files in archives was slightly changed to be more consistent for cases where the name of some directory is the same as the prefix part of the name of another directory or file.
• TAR archives created by 7-Zip now are more consistent with archives created by GNU TAR program.

7-Zip does not support the new right-click menu of Microsoft's Windows 11 operating system yet, but the developer of the program, Igor Pavlov, is working on adding support in a later version.

7-Zip 21.07 Final released with VHDX disk image extracting support

Microsoft has recently enabled the ability to follow websites by default in Microsoft Edge, meaning it won’t require you to go through the pain of enabling a flag. Microsoft is currently testing the feature with Chrome Canary users, so you’re out of luck if you’re using Dev or Stable version of the browser.

For those unaware, the new Followable web feature is designed to help people get the latest content from the website they follow. It aggregates all the latest content from the sites that you follow, making it easier for you to find them all in one place.

As for how to use the feature, a Follow button can be located on the address bar of the Microsoft Edge browser. The sites that you follow will appear on a side panel. In order to see which sites you’re following, you’ll have to go to the Collections, and then click on the ellipsis menu of the Collections box.

As Leopeva64-2 noted, the Followable web feature is part of controlled feature rollout. In other words, not every Microsoft Edge Canary user will get the feature in one go. But if you’re one of the lucky users to get the feature, do let us know your experience down in the comments section.

You can download Microsoft Edge Canary browser from here.

Useful Followable web feature marks a return in Microsoft Edge

Here's how Microsoft describes the issue:

After installing Windows 11, some image editing programs might not render colors correctly on certain HDR displays.

[..] This issue occurs when certain color-rendering Win32 APIs return unexpected information or errors under specific conditions.

However, not every color profile management program is affected by the bug, confirms Microsoft. The firm's own various color settings in Windows 11 are also unaffected:

Not all color profile management programs are affected, and color profile options available in the Windows 11 Settings page, including Microsoft Color Control Panel, are expected to function correctly.

The company, however, isn't exactly sure where exactly the problem had its start as it has left the "Originating update" column as N/A. Perhaps the bug was present from the beginning and is only now starting to be reported on.

If you are a Windows 11 user affected by this issue, then you'll have to wait a while for a fix. Microsoft says that a resolution is coming in late January as it is currently investigating the issue.

Source: Microsoft

Attention photo and video editors, new Windows 11 bug can break color rendering