Feb 19

Announcing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22557

Hello All, last Wednesday, after waiting for 2 weeks on a sable build, Microsoft released Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22557 to the Dev Channel.

and what a build it is, tons of new stuff to check out & test, the new task manager, editable folders/groups in start, OneDrive’s integration into explorer, folder preview is back & more

A new Quest in Feedback Hub, testing adding languages with the new PowerShell commands:

New Quest in Feedback Hub

Using the Store App Configuration Designer open an unexpected Terminal Window when WT is you default console (Feedback Hub: https://aka.ms/AAfsbhs)

With A screen layout like the screenshot below, since this build crossing the top edge of screen 1, ends up on screen 2 while it’s only supposed to do that on the part where both screens touch each other

What’s new in Build 22557

Create and curate folders in the pinned apps area of Start

We’ve heard from many of you that you’d like to customize your pins in Start by organizing them into folders, so we’re introducing the first version of folders in this build. Simply drag an app on top of another to create a folder. You can add more apps to a folder, rearrange apps within a folder, and remove apps from a folder. Keep an eye out for further improvements like the ability to name and rename folders in one of our upcoming builds.

Start showing pinned apps organized into folders.
Start showing pinned apps organized into folders.

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Desktop Environment > Start menu.

Introducing Do Not Disturb and Focus

We’ve reimagined focus experiences on Windows. Do not disturb makes it easy to silence notifications. Focus is a new experience that enables everyone to stay in the moment and minimize distractions on their PC. To help you stay on track, focus integrates with the Clock app for other focus tools, such as a focus timer and calming music.

Do not disturb:

It’s now easier than ever to silence notification banners with do not disturb. When you are ready to see the notifications that you may have missed, you can find them in Notification Center.

How do not disturb appears when turned on in Notification Center.
How do not disturb appears when turned on in Notification Center.

You are always in control of your notifications. Under Settings > System > Notifications, you can set up rules to automatically turn on do not disturb. For example, you could set do not disturb to automatically turn on outside of your work hours. Additionally, you can set priority notifications to control whether calls, reminders, and specific apps break through when do not disturb is on.

You can personalize do not disturb in Settings > System > Notifications.
You can personalize do not disturb in Settings.

Focus:

It is easy to start focus right from Notification Center (click on the time and date in the taskbar):

  1. Open Notification Center.
  2. Select the amount of time for your focus session.
  3. Press Start Focus.
Focus session in progress with taskbar badging off, the focus timer on screen, and do not disturb will turn on.
Focus session in progress with taskbar badging off, the focus timer on screen, and do not disturb will turn on.

When you start a focus session, taskbar badging will turn off, flashing of applications in the taskbar will turn off, a focus timer will appear on screen, and do not disturb will turn on. Focus in Windows integrates with focus sessions in the Clock app, so you can play calming music and see a task list from Microsoft To-Do. When your focus session ends, you will receive a notification letting you know your focus time has completed. You can personalize your focus experience (Settings > System > Focus).

You can personalize your focus experience under Settings > System > Focus.
You can personalize your focus experience under Settings > System > Focus.

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Desktop Environment > Focus.

Live Captions

Live captions will help everyone, including people who are deaf or hard of hearing, better understand audio by viewing captions of spoken content. Captions are automatically generated on-device from any content with audio. Captions can be displayed at the top or bottom of the screen, or in a floating window. The caption window can be resized, and caption appearance can be personalized by applying or customizing a caption style. Microphone audio can be included, which can be helpful during in-person conversations. Live captions support English (U.S.) content.

Live captions (launched from Quick Settings Accessibility flyout) generating captions for a video playing in the web browser.
Live captions (launched from Quick Settings Accessibility flyout) generating captions for a video playing in the web browser.

To get started, live captions can be turned on with the WIN + Ctrl + L keyboard shortcut, or from the Accessibility flyout under Quick Settings. When turned on the first time, live captions will prompt for download of the required speech model to enable on-device captioning.

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Accessibility > Live captions.

Improving Quick Access in File Explorer

We are rolling out an update to File Explorer’s Quick Access view. First, “Pin to Quick Access” support has been extended from only supporting Folders to now also supporting Files. Pinned files are shown in a new section above Recent files in Quick Access.

Quick Access in File Explorer now supports pinning files and will show files hosted in OneDrive, SharePoint, and Teams.
Quick Access in File Explorer now supports pinning files and will show files hosted in OneDrive, SharePoint, and Teams.

Next, for users who log into Windows with (or attach as a secondary account) a Microsoft Account or Work/Education account, Pinned and Recent files from Office.com will also be shown in Quick Access. Changes that pin or unpin files hosted in OneDrive, SharePoint, and Teams will sync and be reflected in Office.com and Office apps. File activity updates from collaborators such as edits, and comments are shown in Tiles view and can also be shown in Details view.

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

See your OneDrive storage in File Explorer

Backing up your files and managing your cloud storage is important for the safety of your stuff. To help you have control over storage consumption and ensure your files are syncing, we’ve added OneDrive integration into File Explorer. When browsing your OneDrive folders, you can now see your sync status and quota usage without having to leave File Explorer.

OneDrive storage as shown in File Explorer when navigating to OneDrive folders.
OneDrive storage as shown in File Explorer when navigating to OneDrive folders.

ALT-TEXT: OneDrive storage as shown in File Explorer when navigating to OneDrive folders.

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

New Touch Gestures

This build includes 5 new touch gestures to make it easier and quicker to navigate Windows 11 on a PC with touch:

Swipe to invoke and dismiss Start: Swipe with your finger from the middle of the taskbar to invoke the Start menu and swipe back down to dismiss it.

Swipe with your finger from the middle of the taskbar to invoke the Start menu and swipe back down to dismiss it.
Swipe with your finger from the middle of the taskbar to invoke the Start menu and swipe back down to dismiss it.

Swipe between Pinned/All apps and Recommended/More on Start: Within Start, swipe right to left from Pinned to get to All apps and left to right to get back to Pinned. The same gesture works for Recommended/More.

Within Start, swipe right to left from Pinned to get to All apps and left to right to get back to Pinned. The same gesture works for Recommended/More.
Within Start, swipe right to left from Pinned to get to All apps and left to right to get back to Pinned. The same gesture works for Recommended/More.

Swipe to invoke and dismiss Quick Settings: Swipe with your finger from the bottom right of the taskbar to invoke Quick Settings and swipe back down to dismiss it.

Swipe with your finger from the bottom right of the taskbar to invoke Quick Settings and swipe back down to dismiss it.
Swipe with your finger from the bottom right of the taskbar to invoke Quick Settings and swipe back down to dismiss it.

Swipe to invoke and dismiss Notification Center: We’ve updated the animation when swiping to invoke and dismiss Notification Center from the right edge of your screen so that it’s more responsive and follows your finger.

We’ve updated the animation when swiping to invoke and dismiss Notification Center from the right edge of your screen so that it’s more responsive and follows your finger.
We’ve updated the animation when swiping to invoke and dismiss Notification Center from the right edge of your screen so that it’s more responsive and follows your finger.

Full screen gripper: In full screen touch-oriented apps and games (e.g., Solitaire), notice a gripper that appears if you swipe from the edges of the screen. This feature is designed to keep you in your app if you accidentally swipe near the edges. If you need to access edge content, simply swipe again on the gripper.

In full screen touch-oriented apps and games (e.g., Solitaire), notice a gripper that appears if you swipe from the edges of the screen.
In full screen touch-oriented apps and games (e.g., Solitaire), notice a gripper that appears if you swipe from the edges of the screen.

Note that these gestures are reversed in Right to Left languages. Any swipe from the right becomes a swipe from the left and vice versa.

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Input and Language > Touch Input and Gestures.

Improving Snap Layouts

We’ve added a new way to snap windows into snap layouts that works wonderfully with both touch and mouse! To try it out, just drag a window to the top of the screen to reveal the snap layouts, drop the window on top of a zone to snap it, and use snap assist to finish building your layout.

ust drag a window to the top of the screen to reveal the snap layouts, drop the window on top of a zone to snap it, and use snap assist to finish building your layout.
Just drag a window to the top of the screen to reveal the snap layouts, drop the window on top of a zone to snap it, and use snap assist to finish building your layout.

On top of all that, we’ve also improved snap assist to seamlessly animate between zones in a layout for a delightful end-to-end snapping experience.

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Desktop Environment > Snap.

More sustainable power settings and recommendations

The default values for Sleep and Screen off have been updated to reduce energy consumption, and carbon emissions, when PCs are idle. We will also provide power saving recommendations to help reduce carbon emissions to those with Sleep and Screen off set to Never.

Power saving recommendations shown in Settings to help reduce carbon emissions to those with Sleep and Screen off set to Never.
Power saving recommendations shown in Settings to help reduce carbon emissions to those with Sleep and Screen off set to Never.

The changes to default Sleep and Screen off settings will only be seen by those clean-installing Windows 11 with this build or higher. If you intentionally set Sleep or Screen off to Never, please let us know why, especially if sleep is not working as expected. We’re still working on the content that the “Power consumption and carbon emissions” options links to – stay tuned for future updates.

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Power and Sleep > Sleep (or use the link above).

More improvements to browsing the web in Microsoft Edge with Narrator

Building off the collection of improvements for Narrator and Microsoft Edge from Build 22509, we have been working on more improvements to web browsing with Microsoft Edge and Narrator. Specifically, when navigating the web more useful information is provided, navigating dialogs is more natural, and editing text should now be more reliable.

When navigating the web, you can have Narrator read the current item (e.g., current page, current time etc.) and when you need to sort a table on the web, Narrator will announce the sort order you’ve selected (e.g., ascending, descending).

We also made it simpler to know when an item is selected in a tree view control and to know the state of a checkbox when these are part of a list. We also improved link navigation, and you will find that tabbing through links on a webpage and pressing Enter will always take you to the link destination.

When you encounter a dialog box on the web, Narrator will help you stay focused within the dialog box and prevent navigation to the content that’s behind it. This improvement is currently available in Microsoft Edge Canary builds.

Lastly Narrator has a few improvements for when you are editing text on the web. First, if you are deleting text on a form field, Narrator will read the character that was deleted and if you need to cut a large set of text with Control + X, Narrator will confirm that the text has been cut.

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Accessibility > Narrator.

Task Manager Redesign & Efficiency Mode

We have updated the design of Task Manager to match the new Windows 11 design principles. This includes a new hamburger style navigation bar and a new settings page. A new command bar on each page gives access to common actions. We are also excited to bring dark theme to Task manager and will automatically match the system-wide theme configured in the Settings app.

The updated design of Task Manager in dark theme.
The updated design of Task Manager in dark theme.

Last April, we experimented with a new feature called “Eco mode” in Task Manager and we’re bringing this back with a new brand name: Efficiency mode. This feature is helpful when you notice an app consuming high resources and would like to limit its consumption so that the system gives priority to other apps which will lead to faster foreground responsiveness and better energy efficiency.

The new Suspended and Efficiency mode icons as they appear in Task Manager.
The new Suspended and Efficiency mode icons as they appear in Task Manager.

You can apply Efficiency mode either by clicking on the command bar in the Processes page or right click on the process. You can only apply Efficiency mode to single process and not to the entire group process.  If the option is grey out, it generally means that it’s a core Windows process and throttling it might affect the performance of the system. The Efficiency mode process will be marked with a new leaf icon, and we are also introducing new pause icon for Suspended process to indicate the process is in suspended mode

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

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Desktop Environment > Task Manager.

This new PowerShell Module allows users to easily add languages and related language features and manage settings like System Preferred UI Language, System Locale, Input method (Keyboard), Locale, Speech Recognizer, User Preferred Language List using the PowerShell prompt. These commands work in conjunction with the existing International PowerShell Module to provide the user control over various elements of the UI language on a PC.

 Note: To run the Install and Set commands you must run PowerShell as an administrator.

To do thisCommand
Install a language on the PC.Install-Language Note: Please restart or log out and log back in for changes to take effect. Once you log back in, please change your Windows display language (WDL) via Settings > Time & language > Language & region to change the UI language on the PC. You can also change your WDL by using the international module commands (Set-WinUILanguageOverride ). Params: Language: The bcp47 tag of the language being installed. CopyToSettings (optional): If included, set the system and default device settings (WDL, regional, locale format) to the provided language following the installation.
Get a list of the installed languages on the device, which type of Language Pack is installed, and what Language Features are installed.Get-InstalledLanguage Alias: Get-Language Params: Language (optional): filters the list to only show the given language.
Set a language as the System Preferred UI LanguageSet-SystemPreferredUILanguage Alias: Set-PreferredLanguage, Set-SystemLanguage Params: Language: The bcp47 tag of the language being installed
Get the value of the current System Preferred Language.Get-SystemPreferredUILanguage Note: Please restart or log out and log back to see the changes reflected in the new language. Additional user accounts created on the same system will reflect the new system language. Alias: Get-PreferredLanguage , Get-SystemLanguage
Uninstall a language on the PC.Uninstall-Language Params: Language: The bcp47 tag of the language being installed.

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Apps > PowerShell.

Changes and Improvements

[Taskbar]

  • Drag and drop is now supported on the Windows 11 taskbar. Quickly drag and drop files between app windows, by hovering over apps in the taskbar to bring their windows to the foreground. Try attaching a file to an Outlook e-mail by dragging it and hovering over the Outlook icon in the taskbar to bring the window to the foreground. Once in the foreground, drop your file into the e-mail to attach it. You can also customize your taskbar with your favorite apps from Start’s All apps list by dragging and dropping over the taskbar to pin them. You can also drag and drop to the desktop via “Show desktop” at the very right corner of the taskbar.
  • For Insiders using Microsoft Teams for work and school that are using share any window from the taskbar, we have added a new visual indication to the taskbar that indicates which window is being shared. This is especially important when you have multiple applications running or where your attention is split across multiple monitors. When you choose to share a window in your Microsoft Teams call, the shared window will also now be surrounded by a colored border.
When using Share any window, we have added a new visual indication to the taskbar that indicates which window is being shared.
When using Share any window, we have added a new visual indication to the taskbar that indicates which window is being shared.
  • On PC’s with more than one color profile, you will be able to add a quick setting to switch more easily between these modes. On clean install, the Color profile button should not be pinned by default, but it might appear on upgrades.
The new color profile quick setting.
The new color profile quick setting.
  • When casting (WIN + K) from your PC, a Cast icon will appear at the lower-left corner of your taskbar to show you are casting. Clicking the icon will open the Cast Quick Settings where you can quickly stop casting if needed. And expect more improvements coming for this experience.
The new Cast icon as it appears on the taskbar when casting to a display.
The new Cast icon as it appears on the taskbar when casting to a display.
  • As discovered by Insiders with Build 22543, we have updated the battery charging indicator to use a lightning bolt instead of a power cable. This addresses feedback that it was not possible to see lower charging levels at-a-glance because they were obscured by the cable. It’s also consistent with other consumer electronics devices and reflects the evolving landscape of charging to include USB charging devices.
The updated battery charging indicator as shown on the taskbar.
The updated battery charging indicator as shown on the taskbar.

[File Explorer]

  • File Explorer will now show previews of items within folders.
Folders now show previews of the contents within them in File Explorer.
Folders now show previews of the contents within them in File Explorer.
  • When sharing a local file in File Explorer to Outlook – you can now compose an email message directly within the share window without having to go into Outlook directly. You will need Outlook Desktop Integration installed via the Store and this capability is not available for files stored in OneDrive folders as OneDrive has its own share experience. Also, the share window will now suggest contacts from Microsoft 365 to share the file to via Outlook.
Share a local file via Outlook in File Explorer a compose an email without leaving the share window.
Share a local file via Outlook in File Explorer a compose an email without leaving the share window.

[Search]

  • Searching for apps and settings in the Windows search box on the taskbar is now even faster and more accurate than before. Try searching for your favorite app or a setting you use frequently to see faster results. We’ve also fixed an issue that prevented Windows users from being able to search for an app in the first few seconds after it had been installed.

[Windowing]

  • We have updated the snap group visuals to include the desktop wallpaper to make it easier to differentiate your groups from normal windows. This will appear when using ALT + TAB, Task View, and in the taskbar previews. Additionally, ALT + TAB will now show as windowed for all Insiders running Build 22554 and up.
ALT + TAB showing the updated visuals for snap groups.
ALT + TAB showing the updated visuals for snap groups.
  • We are updating the transition animation that shows going from one snapped window state to another. Snap some windows using the snap assist, move windows from one configuration to another and observe the fluidity of the transition with our new animations.
The updated transition animation that shows going from one snapped window state to another.
The updated transition animation that shows going from one snapped window state to another.
  • Rotating your device between portrait and landscape orientation is snappier, more responsive.
We have made rotating your device between portrait and landscape more responsive.
We have made rotating your device between portrait and landscape more responsive.
  • We have reduced the number of notification sounds that play when you connect and disconnect docks and monitors.
  • It is now easier to move your cursor and windows between monitors, by letting your cursor jump over areas where it would previously get stuck. This behavior is controlled in settings with System > Display > Multiple displays > Ease cursor movement between displays.
  • We’ve made some small changes to the snapping options under System > Multitasking to help simplify them and make them easier to understand.

[Narrator]

  • Narrator now provides a new male natural voice called Guy. We introduced new natural voices for Narrator in Build 22543.
Narrator now provides a new male natural voice called Guy to download.
Narrator now provides a new male natural voice called Guy to download.

[Voice typing]

  • We are adding the ability for you to choose which microphone to use in voice typing if you have multiple microphones connected to your PC. [We are beginning to roll this change out, so it isn’t available to all Insiders just yet as we plan to monitor feedback before pushing it out to everyone.]
  • We are beginning to roll out the ability for you to use the following new commands in voice typing. [We are beginning to roll this change out, so it isn’t available to all Insiders just yet as we plan to monitor feedback before pushing it out to everyone.]
To insert thisSay this
Enter“Press Enter”
Backspace“Pres Backspace”, “Backspace”
Space“Press space”, “Insert Space”
Tab“Press Tab”, “Tab”

[Voice access]

  • A new setting to add punctuation automatically when dictating text has been added. You can turn it on by clicking on the settings icon on voice access UI and selecting automatic punctuation from “manage options”.
  • We added a new setting to filter profanity. This is on by default and any profane or sensitive words will be masked with asterisk (*) when dictating text or commanding. You can turn it off by clicking on the settings icon on voice access UI and selecting filter profanity from “manage options”.
  • It is now easier to use “show numbers” command as we have reduced the occurrence of number labels hiding the controls on windows UI and making it hard to understand the control under a number.
  • We improved feedback messages for unsupported languages.
  • We also improved feedback messages for using voice access when you have multiple displays setup.
  • We improved discoverability of using touch keyboard with voice to enter passwords or PINs, correcting mistakes, and spelling out words using “correct that” and “spell that” commands.
To do thisSay this
Correct the last dictated text“Correct that”, “Spell that”
Correct specific text“Correct [text]”, “Spell [text]”

[Graphics]

  • We’re expanding Dynamic Refresh Rate (DRR) experiences on laptops with 120Hz displays beyond smooth scrolling in Office and low latency inking. When you move the cursor, the system will now boost to 120Hz, making your PC feel more responsive. Touch and pen interactions blend into smooth animations in Windows UI and apps UI. Smooth scrolling is now supported not only in Office, but also in Microsoft Edge Canary and Windows UI such as the Settings app. To enable smooth scrolling on Edge Canary you need to enter the following in the address bar of a new tab: “edge://flags/#edge-refresh-rate-boost-on-scroll”, set the highlighted flag to ‘Enabled’ and then restart Edge.
  • The Windows HDR Calibration app is coming to Windows PCs soon – you’ll be able to improve color accuracy and consistency on your HDR display. For easier access, you’ll be able to access this app via the Windows settings under System > Display > HDR You may see an early access point in HDR settings in this build, but as the app is not live yet, it will simply lead you here.
  • This build introduces a feature called Optimizations for windowed games and is designed to significantly improve latency and unlock other exciting gaming features including Auto HDR and Variable Refresh Rate (VRR). Latency improvements can benefit all gamers – from improving your input lag to creating a competitive edge in your gaming experience. Go to System > Display > Graphics > Change default graphics settings to enable the feature. Note that this feature may be already on by default and is also required to use other graphics features such as Auto HDR. To learn more, check out https://aka.ms/WindowedGameOptimizations.

[Input]

  • We’re working on adding an IME On/Off key to the touch keyboard small layout for the Japanese, Korean, and Chinese Traditional IMEs. For Insiders with only one keyboard this will be a standalone key on the left of the space key. If you have multiple keyboards the On/Off key is combined with voice typing – to access voice typing, simply press and hold the key. In addition, we’re adding small layout support for the Chinese Simplified Microsoft Pinyin and Microsoft Wubi IMEs. These changes are currently rolling out to a subset of Windows Insiders at first and we’ll expand over time based on feedback.
The small layout in the touch keyboard for the Japanese IME.
The small layout in the touch keyboard for the Japanese IME.
  • Updated some of the emoji based on feedback, including the smile with tear emoji, sakura emoji, and colored heart emojis.
Updated emoji in Build 22554.
Updated emoji in Build 22554.
  • Added a few new items to the kaomoji section in WIN + Period(.) based on feedback, including UwU.
  • Windows 11 now supports Hungarian for handwriting input as of this build. Pick up your pen and write using Hungarian in the handwriting input panel or handwriting keyboard, and have your handwriting be converted to text.

[Settings]

  • We’ve done some work to generally improve results when searching in Settings, including more relevant results and now have some flexibility for returning results in the case when the search terms have common typos.
  • We’ve increased the size of the icons in the Settings navigation pane to make them a bit easier to see.
  • To help customers give their PC a second life, or recycle it, we are including links in Settings to help customers find available programs. Some articles may not be localized.
  • Storage Sense will now be enabled by default for PCs going through OOBE. Your current settings will be persisted on upgrade. You can configure your Storage Sense settings under System > Storage.
  • Updated Settings Time & Language category and Date & time page to now include a live digital clock and information about currently selected option.
  • Updated the design of Network & Internet > Dial-up when you have a connection set up to align with the overall design of Settings in Windows 11.
  • We’ve made some adjustments to Personalization > Fonts to improve the design of the page, including that the drag and drop area for installing fonts is larger now.

[Windows Sandbox]

  • Aligning with Hyper-V behavior, even if you’re not in full screen mode, modifier keys and shortcuts (for example Windows key shortcut) will now be intercepted by Windows Sandbox if the window has focus.
  • Windows Sandbox now supports basic environment variable usage (like %USERPROFILE%) inside in mapped folder paths.

[Other changes]

  • We have updated the accessibility flyout on the login screen to align with Windows 11 design principles.
The accessibility flyout on the login screen now matches the Windows 11 design principles.
The accessibility flyout on the login screen now matches the Windows 11 design principles.
  • Insiders will notice the Mica material in more title bar surfaces. For example, the Run dialog now utilizes Mica.
The Run dialog with Mica in the title bar.
The Run dialog with Mica in the title bar.
  • TKIP and WEP are deprecated security standards and Windows 11 will no longer allow connections to those types starting with this build. Contact your network administrator or update your router to one that supports at least WPA2 (WPA3 is the current standard).
  • Similar to Windows 11 Home edition, Windows 11 Pro edition now requires internet connectivity during the initial device setup (OOBE) only. If you choose to setup device for personal use, MSA will be required for setup as well. You can expect Microsoft Account to be required in subsequent WIP flights.

Fixes

[General]

  • Fixed a recurring backgroundTaskHost.exe some Insiders were experiencing.
  • Fixed an issue leading to auto HDR not activating as expected in certain games.
  • Mitigated an lsass.exe crash that was resulting in some Insiders seeing crashes on the login screen in recent flights.
  • Addressed an issue that was leading to noticeably distorted audio for audio devices connected using the Xbox Wireless Adapter in recent flights.

[Taskbar]

  • Task View should no longer crash if you hold CTRL while hovering over it.
  • Dragging a file across the taskbar on secondary monitors should no longer cause an explorer.exe crash.

[File Explorer]

  • Updated the Storage Usage button in the Properties dialog for a disk to now be called Details and a little wider, to accommodate for languages where the button text was getting truncated.
  • Improved the performance of deleting files in Recycle Bin.
  • Fixed the Blu-ray icon so it aligns with the other drive and volume icons.

[Input]

  • Addressed an issue where the IME candidate window was unexpectedly not following your preference of light or dark mode.
  • Fixed an issue leading to some elements of the voice typing settings flyout to be invisible in dark mode.
  • The IME candidate window should appear as expected now in the username field of a UAC prompt.
  • Updated the term “Halfwidth alphanumeric / Direct Input” to just say “Halfwidth Alphanumeric” in the Japanese IME context menu.
  • Fixed an issue where after typing hiragana in Kana-input mode if there was a half-width alphabet character before the hiragana in composition it would unexpectedly become full-width.
  • Addressed a rare issue where the input switcher might unexpectedly list the same entry twice.
  • Mitigated an issue leading to an unexpected black box that was appearing in the input switcher sometimes.
  • Updated the input switcher so it can get a bit taller now for people with more than 4 keyboards.
  • Fixed a memory leak in the input switcher leading to explorer.exe crashing after repeated rapid use.
  • Fixed an explorer.exe crash when clicking on More Keyboard Settings in the input switcher.
  • Fixed an issue where the emoji panel might show “you’re offline” even though you had network connectivity.
  • Fixed an issue where the multiply emoji and counterclockwise arrows button emoji were displaying the design for the wrong emoji.
  • Updated the preview in the Personalization > Text input Settings page to reflect your desktop wallpaper rather than the default.
  • Did some work to improve reliability of the Stop media key when media is playing.

[Voice access]

  • We fixed a Visual C++ Runtime mismatch causing voice access to not run on some PCs.

[Search]

  • Fixed a high hitting search crash.
  • Clicking the search box in Start will now immediately switch over to Search without showing the Search window animate in upwards, just like when you press the Windows key and start to type.

[Settings]

  • Addressed an issue where Narrator wasn’t reading the elements of System > Storage correctly.
  • Fixed the broken “size and theme” link under Time & Language > Typing > Touch keyboard.
  • Did some work to help improve performance when updating accent color or mode.
  • We made a change to help reduce clipping in combo boxes in Settings for certain languages and text sizes.
  • Fixed an issue that was causing the icons on the IME settings pages to sometimes be white on white.
  • Mitigated an issue leading to the install button having truncated text in some languages when previewing fonts.
  • Fixed an underlying crash that was causing the preview video on System > Display > HDR to be distorted sometimes.
  • Addressed an underlying issue that could make Settings crash when you scrolled the window.
  • Adjusted the Wi-Fi icon in the Wi-Fi section of Quick Settings so that the lock shown for a secured network now has a small separation from the Wi-Fi strength, making it a bit easier to distinguish.

[Windows Spotlight]

  • Updated the name of Spotlight collection to be Windows Spotlight, so it’s consistent with the Lock screen.
  • Made a change to help make Windows Spotlight update images more reliably.
  • Rather than showing a solid color background, if for some reason new Windows Spotlight images aren’t available for the desktop, it will now fall back to showing the default Windows Spotlight background image (Whitehaven Beach).
  • Right-clicking on “Learn more about this picture” for Windows Spotlight on the desktop will now always show all options, just greyed out if they’re not currently available.
  • When hovering over “Learn more about this picture”, the tooltip should now more consistently align with the current image.

[Windowing]

  • Addressed an issue that was causing the minimize, maximize, and close buttons in File Explorer and some other apps to be invisible in certain cases.
  • Mitigated an issue leading to performance impact when dragging windows with acrylic and other scenarios with acrylic.
  • You should no longer see a briefly visible yellow border when taking screenshots.
  • We’ve made some improvements to address feedback that windows were repositioning unexpectedly.

[Network]

  • Did some work to address an issue that might cause certain VPN connections to fail. If you continue experiencing issues, please file feedback with a capture of the issue under Network and Internet > Connecting with a VPN client.
  • Fixed an issue that was leading to decreased Wi-Fi speeds after waking your PC from sleep in the previous flight.

[Narrator]

  • When backspacing, Narrator will now more consistently announce when you’re deleting characters with backspace.
  • Fixed an issue causing Narrator not to read selected text in the Feedback Hub.

NOTE: Some fixes noted here in Insider Preview builds from the active development branch may make their way into the servicing updates for the released version of Windows 11 that became generally available on October 5th, 2021.

Known issues

[General]

  • When going through the device setup experience (OOBE) on the Enterprise edition, the network add screen will be skipped on the first attempt. As a workaround, when users see the “name your computer” option, please reboot and re-start OOBE. The network add screen will now appear as expected.

[Start]

  • Names of apps in folders may appear blurred briefly when opening folders in Start.

[Taskbar]

  • The taskbar will sometimes flicker when switching input methods.

[File Explorer]

  • Searches from Quick Access may not work.
  • We’re working fixing issues regarding icon sizing, visual bugs, and text clipping in the flyout showing OneDrive storage.

[Focus]

  • The taskbar icon and tooltip may not match the focus state.
  • Clock app integration requires an app update that is starting to become available today. Most users should get this update automatically, but you can check for app updates manually by navigating to Microsoft Store > Library and clicking Get updates.
  • The Clock app does not yet update Windows Focus state when configuring focus sessions within the app. This will be addressed in a future app update.

[Search]

  • After clicking the Search icon on the Taskbar, the Search panel may not open. If this occurs, restart the “Windows Explorer” process, and open the search panel again.

[Widgets]

  • With the taskbar left-aligned, information such as temperature is not shown. This will be fixed in a future update.

[Live captions]

  • Certain apps in full screen (e.g., video players) prevent live captions from being visible.
  • Certain apps positioned near the top of the screen and closed before live captions is run will re-launch behind the live captions window positioned at top. Use the system menu (ALT + Spacebar) while the app has focus to move the app’s window further down.
  • The very top of maximized apps (e.g., title bar window management buttons) can’t be reached with touch while live captions is positioned at the top.

[Task Manager]

  • We are aware that the Efficiency mode icon is missing on some child processes.
  • Some settings options are not preserved.
  • We are working on fixing issues regarding icon size, visual bugs and in most cases the workaround is to either resize Task Manager or lower the resolution settings from Settings > Display > Display resolution.
  • Task Manager has limited keyboard support in navigation and command bar. Users may unable to navigate the UI using the keyboard due to limited support.

For developers

You can download the latest Windows Insider SDK at aka.ms/windowsinsidersdk.

SDK NuGet packages are now also flighting at NuGet Gallery | WindowsSDK which include:

These NuGet packages provide more granular access to the SDK and better integrate in CI/CD pipelines.

Your Phone app: Get to your recent Android apps faster

We are excited to announce another feature for the Your Phone app. For those of you with Samsung devices, now you can enjoy more continuity as you move from your phone to your PC. With this latest addition, you can easily access recently used apps from your Android device on your Windows PC.

Your recently used Android apps shown on the taskbar.
Your recently used Android apps shown on the taskbar.

You can access the three most recently used apps from your Android by selecting the Your Phone icon in the Windows taskbar. You can also find a new recent apps section within the apps page in Your Phone app. The feature is now available for all Windows Insiders in all Insider channels with select Samsung devices (details below). Give it a try and let us know what you think!

Recent Apps requirements:

To use recent apps, you will need:

  • Your Phone app version 1.21092.145.0 or higher. Older versions will not show recent apps even if you have a supported device.
  • A supported Android device. Recent Apps requires a deeper level of integration with the Android device and the team worked directly with Samsung to light this up. It is available on select Samsung devices that have Link to Windows, with OneUI 3.1.1 or higher and Link to Windows Service 2.3 or higher, such as:
    • Samsung Galaxy Z Fold
    • Samsung Galaxy Z Flip
    • Samsung Galaxy S series
    • Samsung Galaxy Note series
  • Your Android device and PC need to be connected to the same Wi-Fi network for apps to launch on your PC.

source: Windows Blogs

Feb 16

Windows Insiders Webcast February 2022

>download reminder here<

Jan 29

Announcing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22543

Hi all, last Thursday Microsoft released Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22543 to the Dev Channel.

A smooth upgrade here on all devices,

The crashing backgroundtaskhost.exe’s not reloved yet (FBH: https://aka.ms/AAfh06f)

Taskmanager no longer crashes when switching to the performance tab

Last 2 builds, presenting full screen in a Teams session, the taskbar acts strange when moving the mouse pointer to the bottom of the screen (FBH: https://aka.ms/AAfkhbf)

Snapped Outlook window show up partially off screen after standby (FBH: https://aka.ms/AAfkoup)

Context menu in explorer jumps when loading 3rd party items (FBH: https://aka.ms/AAfle5l)

Happy Upgrading!

What’s new in Build 22543

More Natural Narrator Voices

We’re introducing more natural voices for Narrator. More natural voices enable Narrator users to enjoy scenarios like browsing the web, reading, and authoring mail, and more. Natural Narrator voices use modern, on-device text to speech and once downloaded are supported without an internet connection. Natural Narrator voices are available in English-U.S.

Get Started

Narrator will announce that more natural voices, “Jenny” and “Aria”, are available when it first launches.

Narrator will let you know new natural voices are available to install when launched.
Narrator will let you know new natural voices are available to install when launched.

Select “Install now” on the announcement window to go to Narrator Settings to add the new voices. From there you can select “Add” button under the “Add natural voices” section. The dialog allows you to select either the “Jenny” or “Aria” voice. Both voices can be installed but must be installed separately. You can click “Preview” to hear a preview of the voice and you can select “Install” to start the download of the selected voice.

The "Select a natural voice to install" dialog displays a list of natural voices preview, install, and cancel buttons.
The “Select a natural voice to install” dialog displays a list of natural voices preview, install, and cancel buttons.

“Select a natural voice to install” dialog displays a list of natural voices preview, install, and cancel buttons.

New Narrator Keyboard Commands

In addition, we have made it easier for Narrator users to switch between voices to better support common tasks like reading and navigating.

Newly added Narrator keyboard commands include:

  • Narrator + Alt + the Minus key – Move to the previous voice in Narrator’s voice settings combo box.
  • Narrator + Alt + the Plus key – Move to the next voice in Narrator’s voice settings combo box.

Updated keyboard commands include:

  • Narrator + Alt + the Left Bracket key – Move to the previous punctuation reading mode.
  • Narrator + Alt + the Right Bracket key – Move to the next punctuation reading mode.

We look forward to you trying out our new natural voices and would love to hear your feedback and suggestions in Feedback Hub (Win + F) under Accessibility > Narrator.

Changes and Improvements

  • Building on the recent changes to the flyout design for the hardware indicators, we have updated the media controls which appear on the Lock screen when playing music in a supported app. It more closely matches the design shown for the media controls in Quick Settings when signed-in to your PC. The media controls will always use dark theme to complement the rest of the Lock Screen visual style. [We are beginning to roll this change out, so it isn’t available to all Insiders just yet as we plan to monitor feedback and see how it lands before pushing it out to everyone.]
The updated media controls on the Lock screen reflect the Windows 11 design principles.
The updated media controls on the Lock screen reflect the Windows 11 design principles.
  • We have updated the experience of resizing app windows in snap layouts by overlaying the relevant app icon on top of the acrylic background. Snap some windows using the snap assist, resize the snapped window layout using the buffer and watch the other snapped windows go out-of-focus overlaid with their app icon.
Resize the snapped window layout using the buffer and watch the other snapped windows go out-of-focus overlaid with their app icon.
Resize the snapped window layout using the buffer and watch the other snapped windows go out-of-focus overlaid with their app icon.
  • Using the WIN + ALT + K keyboard shortcut to mute your call will now show a confirmation flyout.
Confirmation flyout of muting your call.
Confirmation flyout of muting your call.
  • The input switcher improvements announced with Build 22518, including updated design with an acrylic background, is now available to all Insiders in the Dev Channel.
  • When doing a full build upgrade, the progress ring animation has been updated, aligning with the updated boot screen animation.
  • Updated the design of System > Storage > Disks & Volume and Storage Spaces in Settings to align with the overall design of Settings in Windows 11. Certain options for the drive, volume, and space, like properties, are also now directly available inline on these pages as buttons without having to click that entry first.

Fixes

[General]

  • Task Manager shouldn’t crash when switching to the Performance tab.
  • The updated flyout for the hardware indicators for volume will now show the level.
  • Fixed an issue where certain characters (like characters with umlauts) weren’t allowed when naming your PC in OOBE, even though it was allowed in Settings after finishing OOBE.
  • Addressed an issue which was leading to OneNote crashing in recent builds when trying to open pages with inserted PDFs.
  • Mitigated an issue that was leading to unresponsive UI after enabling HDR.

[File Explorer]

  • Fixed an issue that could lead to explorer.exe crashing when dragging and dropping a file out of a zipped folder in File Explorer.
  • The context menu in File Explorer now shows a CTRL + Shift + C keyboard shortcut next to Copy as Path.

[Input]

  • Fixed an issue which was leading to the cursor unexpectedly disappearing in certain apps.
  • Fixed a crash in Quick Settings when opening the input switcher from there.
  • Addressed an issue which was leading to the candidate window customization being unexpectedly missing from Personalization > Text Input for Chinese Simplified IME users sometimes.

[Taskbar]

  • We fixed the issue causing two arrows to appear for the hidden icon flyout and the Quick Settings icons, and the date and time were misaligned.

[Settings]

  • Mitigated an issue leading to Settings getting stuck in a suspended state and couldn’t be launched.
  • If you’ve opted to turn off the startup sound, that setting should persist upgrades going forward.
  • Fixed the icon in the notification that shows if you have chosen to postpone finishing setting up your device.
  • Tabbing through Quick Settings should no longer set focus to an invisible element.
  • Fixed an issue that was sometimes causing the media controls above Quick Settings to be off-screen.

[Windowing]

  • The underline indicating the active desktop in Task View will now follow your chosen accent color instead of being blue.
  • Mitigated a WER issue which was leading to DWM crashes in recent flights.

NOTE: Some fixes noted here in Insider Preview builds from the active development branch may make their way into the servicing updates for the released version of Windows 11 that became generally available on October 5th, 2021.

Known issues

[Taskbar]

  • The taskbar will sometimes flicker when switching input methods.

[Search]

  • After clicking the Search icon on the Taskbar, the Search panel may not open. If this occurs, restart the “Windows Explorer” process, and open the search panel again.

[Input]

  • On a UAC prompt, the IME candidate window doesn’t show up.

[Widgets]

  • With the taskbar left-aligned, information such as temperature is not shown. This will be fixed in a future update.

[Narrator]

  • Restart Narrator if the voice is not automatically switched after downloading Microsoft Aria (Natural) from voice selection combo box.

source: Windows Blogs

Jan 22

Announcing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22538

Hi all, Last Wednesday Microsoft released Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22538 to the Dev Channel.

A welcome update as it fixed Camera not working issues in Teams,

Crashing of the backgroundtaskhost.exe is still in this build, (Feedback Hub: https://aka.ms/AAfh06f)

No issues with the TPM on my devices upgrading to this build, looks like this might also be fixed (Feedback Hub: https://aka.ms/AAfh079)

Task Manager crashes on some devices when switching to the performance tab (Feedback Hub: https://aka.ms/AAfin6x)

What’s new in Build 22538

Updates for voice access

We first introduced voice access in Build 22518. Voice access is a new experience to control your PC with just voice. With today’s build, we have some updates for voice access for Windows Insiders to try out.

Using touch keyboard with voice access

Numbered tear drops appearing over all keys of touch keyboard.
Numbered tear drops appearing over all keys of touch keyboard.

You can use the touch keyboard with voice access to:

  • Spell words e.g., names and email addresses.
  • Enter numbers e.g., phone numbers and addresses.
  • Enter punctuation marks and symbols.
  • Enter emojis.
To do thisSay this
Open touch keyboard“Show keyboard”
Hide touch keyboard“Hide keyboard”
Click a key on touch keyboard“Click [number]”, “[number]” e.g., “Click 2, “2”

You can only use the following voice access commands while using the touch keyboard:

  • Voice access on/ off commands e.g., “voice access wake up”, “voice access sleep”, “turn off microphone”, “turn off voice access”.
  • Commands to use touch keyboard e.g., “hide keyboard,” “click 2”.

Changes and Improvements

  • The updated entry point for Widgets with weather on the taskbar first introduced with Build 22518 should now be available to all Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel.
  • In ALT + TAB, Task view, and Snap assist, the focus rectangle that shows what is selected will now use your chosen accent color on your PC.
ALT + TAB showing focus rectangle with accent color.
ALT + TAB showing focus rectangle with accent color.
  • Our updated IMEs and touch keyboard designs will now show on the Lock screen and where you enter your account information such as username and password. This change is currently rolling out to a subset of Windows Insiders at first and we’ll expand over time based on feedback.
The updated touch keyboard design as seen from the Lock screen.
The updated touch keyboard design as seen from the Lock screen.
The updated IME design as it appears on the Lock screen.
The updated IME design as it appears on the Lock screen.
  • We are beginning to roll out the ability for voice typing to download Speech Packs from the Microsoft Store for device-based speech recognition that provides a better performance of transcription.
  • We’re experimenting with improving the discoverability of certain input features in various areas across the OS.
  • For those who need it, you can access ncpa.cpl directly again.
  • We have added HTTPS boot for Hyper-V Generation 2 VMs. The feature is enabled by default.
  • For PCs that support it, display calibration is now directly available under Settings > Display > HDR instead of having to open a separate Settings page.

Fixes

[General]

  • Pressing the hardware buttons for volume up/down should no longer cause explorer.exe to crash for some Insiders.
  • We believe that the issue causing some Insiders to see text in Settings and other places mixed up in the previous flight should no longer repro in this build.
  • Fixed an issue that was causing Narrator to crash in text boxes when using scan mode.
  • Mitigated an issue where for some PCs, after resuming from sleep or hibernate, video playback would resume instantly but the audio could take 10 seconds to start playing.

[File Explorer]

  • Folders named Advanced should no longer unexpectedly open the Advanced Sharing Settings page in Settings.

[Search]

  • We’ve done some work to address an issue wherein typing when using Search from Start or after clicking the Search icon Taskbar would not actually start a Search, as no text was input. If you continue to experience this issue after upgrading, please file a new piece of feedback under Desktop Environment > Search in Feedback Hub.

[Taskbar]

  • Taskbar’s date and time in the long format should no longer cut off on secondary monitors.

[Settings]

  • There should no longer be a random blank entry under Bluetooth & Devices.
  • Fixed an issue where Narrator was reading the Resume updates button as “Check for updates” in the Windows Update page.
  • Settings should no longer crash when going to System > Display > HDR.
  • Fixed an issue believed to be the root cause of Settings crashing sometimes when using the clear location history option.
  • Mitigated an issue that was causing Settings to crash for some Insiders when viewing the properties of a Wi-Fi network.
  • The “private” and “public” controls in network properties should no longer flicker for people with dual network cards.
  • If you search for “network reset” the Settings page for doing that will now appear in the search results.
  • When viewing the list of available Wi-Fi networks in Quick Settings, the signal strength indicators should now reflect the correct signal strength instead of all showing full strength.

[Input]

  • Removed the “try out your setup” box from Personalization > Text Input > Custom Theme, since it didn’t work.
  • The customized text color from Settings > Personalization > Text input > Custom theme” should actually apply to the text in the candidate window / clipboard history/ emoji panel now.
  • Mitigated an issue which was impacting the performance for Insiders with the new input switcher when rapidly switching input back and forth.
  • Tapping the search box in the expressive input area of the touch keyboard should no longer cause the touch keyboard to immediately dismiss the first time you do it after switching input language.
  • Fixed an unexpected 1-pixel gap between the side of the touch keyboard and edge of the screen when docked.
  • Adding missing inverted interrobang (⸘) to the general punctuation section of WIN + Period.

[Windowing]

  • For those using the custom mode in Settings > Personalization > Colors, the background of ALT + Tab, Task View, and Snap Assist should now follow the default Windows mode for light or dark and not the default app mode.
  • Dragging and dropping windows in Task View while using an Arabic or Hebrew display language should drag in the correct direction again now.
  • Explorer.exe shouldn’t crash now when closing snap groups which include 3 or 4 apps.

[Widgets]

  • We fixed the issue where if you changed the taskbar alignment, it would cause the Widgets button to disappear from taskbar.
  • Widgets content on taskbar should not get out of sync between monitors when multiple monitors are connecting to your PC.

[Voice access]

  • Fixed an issue where recently removed microphone shows up as the selected microphone.
  • An issue was addressed to ensure the microphone state changes are announced for screen reader users.
  • Fixed an issue to ensure microphone names are read out for screen reader users on the microphone selection page while setting up voice access for the first time.
  • Fixed an issue to ensure microphone labels communicate the current microphone state for screen reader users.
  • Fixed an issue where duplicate number labels were showing up on Microsoft Edge home page with the command “show numbers”.
  • Fixed an issue where the command “lowercase previous character” was not working as expected.
  • Fixed an issue where voice access would give an incorrect message to say “voice access wake up” even when no microphone is connected.
  • Fixed an issue where the command “switch to Edge” was not prompting for input when two Microsoft Edge windows are open with one of them maximized.
  • Fixed an issue where the command “go to font” didn’t give expected results in Microsoft Word.
  • Addressed an issue where the command “voice access wake up” was not activating voice access microphone when you speak continuously without any pauses.
  • Addressed an issue where dictation was not working as expected on the desktop and File Explorer.
  • Addressed an issue where the command “show numbers” was not showing number labels on the window in focus.

[Task Manager]

  • Fixed an issue that was impacting Task Manager reliability.
  • Update App History tab column name in Task Manager from “Tile updates” to “Notifications”.

NOTE: Some fixes noted here in Insider Preview builds from the active development branch may make their way into the servicing updates for the released version of Windows 11 that became generally available on October 5th, 2021.

Known issues

[Taskbar]

  • [ADDED] We’re investigating reports of two arrows appearing for the hidden icon flyout and the Quick Settings icons and date and time are misaligned. Rebooting may resolve the issue.
  • The taskbar will sometimes flicker when switching input methods.

[Search]

  • After clicking the Search icon on the Taskbar, the Search panel may not open. If this occurs, restart the “Windows Explorer” process, and open the search panel again.

[Input]

  • On a UAC prompt, the IME candidate window doesn’t show up.

[Widgets]

  • With the taskbar left-aligned, information such as temperature is not shown. This will be fixed in a future update.

source: Windows Blogs

Jan 20

Windows Insiders Webcast January 2022

>download reminder here<

Jan 15

Announcing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22533

Hi all, Last Wednesday Microsoft released Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22533 to the Dev Channel.

Some interesting challenges here, 2 of my hybrid-joined, Intune managed devices lost access to their TPM causing a lot of issues… Outlook unable to launch, OneDrive failing to sign in, credential manager not working, causing all authentication to be re-done after reboot…

Fixed it by clearing the TPM & re-enrolling the devices in MDM

Backgroundtaskhost.exe crashes multiple times a day: Feedback Hub: https://aka.ms/AAfh06f

Reliability Monitor’s logging information & warnings again on this build

Happy Upgrading!

Changes and Improvements

  • We have updated the flyout design for the hardware indicators for brightness, volume, camera privacy, camera on/off and airplane mode, to align with Windows 11 design principles. These new flyouts will appear when you press the volume or brightness keys on your laptop and will honor light/dark mode to give you a more coherent Windows experience. Brightness and volume indicators continue to be interactive with the update.
The redesigned hardware indicator for volume.
The redesigned hardware indicator for volume.
  • You can now search for voice access from the taskbar and pin voice access to your taskbar or Start like other apps as well as turn it on/ off.
  • We’re expanding the rollout of extending the 13 touch keyboard themes to IMEs, the emoji panel, and voice typing (first introduced with Build 22504) to all Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel.
  • When you press WIN + X or right click the Start icon it will now say “Installed apps” in the menu instead of “Apps & Features”.
  • It is now possible to uninstall the Clock app if you want.

Fixes

[General]

  • Fixed an issue where Insiders may have seen error 0x8007012a during a driver or firmware update.
  • Addressed an issue causing Insiders to be unable to sign-in to certain apps sometimes, such as Feedback Hub.
  • Fixed the text in the exploit protection description in the Windows Security app so it just refers to Windows and not Windows 10.
  • Fixed an issue resulting in not being able to import photos from certain cameras and mobile phones into the Photos app (it would just loop forever saying 0 items found so far).
  • Launching Windows Sandbox, closing it, and then launch it again, should no longer lead to having two Windows Sandbox icons in the Taskbar (one of which is non-functional).

[Taskbar]

  • The Wi-Fi icon should appear more reliably in the Taskbar now.
  • If you have multiple monitors connected to your PC and right-click on the date and time on the taskbar on your primary monitor, explorer.exe will no longer crash.
  • Holding CTRL and hovering your mouse over the Task View icon in the taskbar should no longer make explorer.exe crash.

[Settings]

  • Mitigated an underlying issue related to the use of mica in Settings which was impacting overall reliability of the Settings app in recent flights.
  • Fixed an issue impacting some Insiders which was resulting in Settings crashing when trying to access the Installed Apps, Startup Apps, and Default Apps pages.
  • Mitigated an issue that was making the Wheel page in Settings crash when adding an action for an app.
  • You should no longer hear a crackle if playing audio and repeatedly clicking the volume slider in Quick Settings to change the volume.

[Windowing]

  • If you hover your mouse over a truncated window title in ALT + Tab or Task View a tooltip showing the full window name will now appear.

[Input]

  • Improved how the text color and buttons look with theming applied on candidate window, emoji panel and clipboard (before this, some buttons/text was hard to see with certain custom background colors).
  • The voice typing launcher should no longer unexpectedly reappear after clicking the microphone icon to invoke voice typing.
  • For Insiders with the updated input switcher experience, accessibility tools like Magnifier and Narrator should work better with it now.

NOTE: Some fixes noted here in Insider Preview builds from the active development branch may make their way into the servicing updates for the released version of Windows 11 that became generally available on October 5th, 2021.

Known issues

[General]

  • [ADDED 1/14] We’re investigating reports that some Insiders are experiencing explorer.exe crashes when using hardware keys to adjust the volume and/or brightness. If you are impacted, please use Quick Settings (WIN + A) to do this for the time being.

[Start]

  • In some cases, you might be unable to enter text when using Search from Start or the taskbar. If you experience the issue, press WIN + R on the keyboard to launch the Run dialog box, then close it.

[Taskbar]

  • The taskbar will sometimes flicker when switching input methods.

[Search]

  • After clicking the Search icon on the Taskbar, the Search panel may not open. If this occurs, restart the “Windows Explorer” process, and open the search panel again.

[Settings]

  • When viewing the list of available Wi-Fi networks, the signal strength indicators do not reflect the correct signal strength.
  • Settings may crash when going to System > Display > HDR. If you need to enable or disable HDR on an HDR-capable PC, you can do so using the WIN + ALT + B keyboard shortcut.
  • There is a blank entry under Bluetooth & Devices.

[Widgets]

  • Changing the taskbar alignment can cause the Widgets button to disappear from taskbar.
  • When having multiple monitors, Widgets content on taskbar may get out of sync between monitors.
  • With the taskbar left-aligned, information such as temperature is not shown. This will be fixed in a future update.

New Calls experience for the Your Phone app

This week we are beginning to roll out a new Calls experience for the Your Phone app on Windows 11. This update will be available to all Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel. This update includes a new in-progress call window with updated icons, fonts, and other UI changes that align with the improved design of Windows 11. Placing calls with the Your Phone app should still work as before with this new UI! Please try it out and share any comments with us via Feedback Hub under Apps > Your Phone.

New in-progress call window with updated visuals in the Your Phone app.
New in-progress call window with updated visuals in the Your Phone app.

source: Windows Blogs

Jan 11

Fix – Windows 11 upgrade fails with ‘We couldn’t update system reserved partition’

Some Windows 10 preloads have a small EFI System Partition of 100MB which is enough for 10 but might cause the upgrade to Windows 11 to fail with the message ‘We couldn’t update system reserved partition’ error code 0xc1900104, or error code 0x800f0922.

Without the need for partition resizing tools you should be able to work around this issue by following these steps:

  1. Search for cmd. Press-and-hold or right-click on Command Prompt in the results, and select Run as administrator.
  2. At the command prompt, type mountvol y: /s and then hit Enter. This will add the Y: drive letter to access the System Partition.
  3. Switch to the Y drive by typing Y: and press Enter. Then, navigate to the Fonts folder by typing cd EFI\Microsoft\Boot\Fonts. Once there, type del *.ttf to delete font files. The system may ask you if you are sure to continue, press Y and then Enter to continue.

now retry the upgrade

Jan 08

Announcing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22526

Hi all, last Thursday Microsoft released the 1st Dev Channel release of 2022 for Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22526.

Fast & smooth upgrades here, happy upgrading!

Changes and Improvements

  • We’re experimenting with showing ALT + TAB as windowed instead of full screen for some Insiders.
  • We have added support for wideband speech when using Apple AirPods products (AirPods, AirPods Pro, or AirPods Max), improving audio quality for voice calls.
  • Starting with Build 22518, Credential Guard is now enabled by default on Windows 11 Enterprise (E3 and E5) licensed PCs that are enterprise-joined.
  • We are experimenting with indexing more file locations so that using search to find important files in Files Explorer is quicker.

Fixes

[File Explorer]

  • Did some work to help address an issue where if you’d used search in File Explorer, and then explorer.exe crashed, the next time you tried to search in File Explorer it wouldn’t work.

[Search]

  • We’ve made another fix to help address the recent searches flyout getting stuck on the screen (appearing transparent except the border).
  • Improved the resolution of app icons displayed in search results when the display scaling was set to greater than 100%.

[Spotlight collection]

  • If you’re using spotlight collection, the current image should migrate on upgrade now (if the build you’re upgrading from is Build 22523 or higher).

[Widgets]

  • Fixed an issue result in the Widgets board potentially not having the correct resolution when hovering over the entry point on a secondary monitor.
  • Addressed an issue where the Widgets board would temporarily be blank, showing only an Add Widgets button (which also opened to a blank dialog).

[Other]

  • Fixed a bugcheck with KMODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED remote desktop users were encountering when attempting to shutdown or restart.
  • Microsoft Store should no longer show a message that trying to install the latest Web Media Extension update is returning error code 0x80073CFB.
  • Addressed a DWM crash impacting some Insiders on the previous flight.

NOTE: Some fixes noted here in Insider Preview builds from the active development branch may make their way into the servicing updates for the released version of Windows 11 that became generally available on October 5th, 2021.

Known issues

[General]

  • You may be unable to sign-in to certain apps such as Feedback Hub. Restarting your PC should correct the issue.
  • We’re investigating reports that some Insiders are seeing driver and firmware update failures in recent builds with the error 0x8007012a.

[Start]

  • In some cases, you might be unable to enter text when using Search from Start or the taskbar. If you experience the issue, press WIN + R on the keyboard to launch the Run dialog box, then close it.

[Taskbar]

  • The taskbar will sometimes flicker when switching input methods.
  • The network icon sometimes goes missing in the taskbar when it’s supposed to be there. If you encounter this, please try using Task Manager to restart explorer.exe.
  • If you have multiple monitors connected to your PC and right-click on the date and time on the taskbar on your primary monitor, it will crash explorer.exe

[Search]

  • After clicking the Search icon on the Taskbar, the Search panel may not open. If this occurs, restart the “Windows Explorer” process, and open the search panel again.

[Settings]

  • When viewing the list of available Wi-Fi networks, the signal strength indicators do not reflect the correct signal strength.
  • Settings may crash when going to System > Display > HDR.
  • There is a blank entry under Bluetooth & Devices.
  • We’re working on a fix for an issue impacting some Insiders, resulting in Settings crashing when trying to access the Installed Apps, Startup Apps, and Default Apps pages. If you are one of those impacted and need to uninstall an app, using winget should work.

[Widgets]

  • Changing the taskbar alignment can cause the Widgets button to disappear from taskbar.
  • When having multiple monitors, Widgets content on taskbar may get out of sync between monitors.
  • With the taskbar left-aligned, information such as temperature is not shown. This will be fixed in a future update.

[Voice access]

  • Some text authoring commands, e.g., “select that” or “delete that”, may not work as expected across Windows applications.
  • Recognition of some punctuation marks and symbols such as @ sign is not accurate

source: Windows Blogs

Dec 19

Announcing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22523

Hi all, Last Wednesday Microsoft released Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22523 to the Dev Channel.

This is the last build for this year, the team surely earned some R&R after a great year of new stuff!

ISO’s are also available for this build: https://aka.ms/wipiso

Fast and smooth upgrades on all devices here, reliability monitor still only shows critical events (FBH: https://aka.ms/AAewixr)

Make sure you do the new Quest in Feedback hub on ‘Snap Groups in Alt + Tab and Task View‘

Happy Upgrading!

Changes and Improvements

  • We have rolled out snap groups in ALT + TAB and Task View just like when you hover open apps on the taskbar, and you see them there, to all Insiders in the Dev Channel.
  • When File Explorer is open to This PC, the add media server and (if appropriate) remove media server option is now available when you click the “…” in the command bar.
  • As part of our ongoing effort to bring over settings from Control Panel into the Settings app:
    • Links to Programs & Features in Control Panel will now open to Settings > Apps > Installed Apps. EDIT: In other words, links to the page to uninstall or change programs on your PC.
    • We’re moving Uninstall Updates (for cumulative updates, etc.) from Control Panel to a new page in Settings under Settings > Windows Update > Update History.

Fixes

[Taskbar]

  • Fixed an issue related to text input initialization that could lead to the shell (for example, Start menu and search) becoming non-responsive on ARM64 PCs.
  • The battery icon tooltip should no longer unexpectedly show a percent above 100.
  • App icons should no longer overlap the date & time on secondary monitors when there are a lot of open apps.

[File Explorer]

  • Did some work to address an issue that was leading to losing keyboard focus sometimes after pressing Enter when using F2 to rename OneDrive files.

[Spotlight collection]

  • After enabling spotlight collection, your first image (after Whitehaven Beach) should arrive a little faster now.
  • Added icons to the spotlight collection context menu entries.

[Input]

  • Improved reliability of invoking voice typing.
  • Fixed an issue where the border of our text input experiences (voice typing, emoji panel, etc) wasn’t drawing correctly when a contrast theme was enabled.
  • Mitigated an intermittent crash with the pen menu process if it was launched and then immediately closed before the launch happened.

[Widgets]

  • We fixed the issue causing links to not open properly when opening the widgets board using hover.

[Settings]

  • Settings content should no longer get truncated off the side of the window when making the Settings window small.
  • Settings should no longer sporadically crash when opening comboboxes, which was impacting certain settings such as the ability to set custom click actions for the pen.
  • Addressed an issue where the “Add a device” option in Bluetooth & Devices was silently crashing when trying to connect new Bluetooth devices.
  • Added a number of keywords to make the Voice Access feature appear in settings search results.

[Other]

  • Fixed an issue that was causing ARM64 PCs to experience bug checks citing a memory management error in the previous flight.
  • Fixed an issue that was causing DWM to crash (causing the screen to flash repeatedly) when trying to use certain apps.
  • Mitigated an issue leading to certain apps hanging when Narrator was running.
  • Added some missing information when examining the details in the properties of narratorquickstart.exe.
  • Addressed an issue where Narrator would not respond to UIA events such as notifications, live regions or text events.

NOTE: Some fixes noted here in Insider Preview builds from the active development branch may make their way into the servicing updates for the released version of Windows 11 that became generally available on October 5th.

Known issues

[General]

  • You may be unable to sign-in to certain apps such as Feedback Hub. Restarting your PC should correct the issue.
  • We’re investigating reports that some Insiders are seeing driver and firmware update failures in recent builds with the error 0x8007012a.

[Start]

  • In some cases, you might be unable to enter text when using Search from Start or the taskbar. If you experience the issue, press WIN + R on the keyboard to launch the Run dialog box, then close it.

[Taskbar]

  • The taskbar will sometimes flicker when switching input methods.
  • The network icon sometimes goes missing in the taskbar when it’s supposed to be there. If you encounter this, please try using Task Manager to restart explorer.exe.
  • If you have multiple monitors connected to your PC and right-click on the date and time on the taskbar on your primary monitor, it will crash explorer.exe

[Search]

  • After clicking the Search icon on the Taskbar, the Search panel may not open. If this occurs, restart the “Windows Explorer” process, and open the search panel again.

[Settings]

  • When viewing the list of available Wi-Fi networks, the signal strength indicators do not reflect the correct signal strength.
  • Settings may crash when going to System > Display > HDR.
  • There is a blank entry under Bluetooth & Devices.

[Spotlight collection]

  • If you’re using spotlight collection, the current image does not currently migrate on upgrade, which may leave you with a black desktop background after upgrading to this build. This should be addressed in the next flight.

[Widgets]

  • Changing the taskbar alignment can cause the Widgets button to disappear from taskbar.
  • Widgets board may not have the correct resolution when hovering the entry point on a secondary monitor.
  • The Widgets board may be temporarily blank.
  • When having multiple monitors, Widgets content on taskbar may get out of sync between monitors.
  • With the taskbar left-aligned, information such as temperature is not shown. This will be fixed in a future update.

[Voice access]

  • Some text authoring commands, e.g., “select that” or “delete that”, may not work as expected across Windows applications.
  • Recognition of some punctuation marks and symbols such as @ sign is not accurate.

source: Windows Blogs

Dec 11

Announcing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22518

Hi all, last Wednesday Microsoft released Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22518 to the Dev Channel.

Smooth upgrades here, nice to have the current weather back in the taskbar

The transparent bars when maximizing a WSA app are fixed (FBH: https://aka.ms/AAf4y6n)

What’s new in Build 22518

View the world on your desktop with Spotlight collection

Keep your desktop fresh and inspiring with Spotlight collection. You will get beautiful new desktop pictures from around the world every day and fun facts about each picture. Here is how you can try out Spotlight collection:

  1. Right-click on your desktop and choose “Personalize”.
  2. On the Personalization settings page, choose “Background”.
  3. Under the “Personalize your background” dropdown, select “Spotlight collection”.

Upon enabling Spotlight collection, you will see an inspiring picture from Whitehaven Beach in Australia on your desktop as well as the Spotlight icon.

Right-click on the Spotlight icon on your desktop to switch to between Spotlight pictures or tell us whether you like or dislike a picture.
Right-click on the Spotlight icon on your desktop to switch to between Spotlight pictures or tell us whether you like or dislike a picture.

Later in the day, we will replace Whitehaven Beach with a collection of up to five background pictures from around the world. This could take up to 24 hours. If you hover over the Spotlight icon, you can learn more about each picture. Right-clicking on the Spotlight icon on the desktop opens a context menu where you can switch to a different background picture as well as tell us whether you like or don’t like one of the pictures. Double-clicking on the Spotlight icon launches the landing page where you can learn even more about any of the Spotlight collection pictures you saw throughout the day.

Please note the Spotlight collection experience is not yet localized and will show text in English only. Full localization will come in a future update. Spotlight collection is available to Windows Insiders in the following countries: Australia, Canada, China, Finland, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Korea, Norway, Spain, Sweden, U.K., U.S. More countries will be added over time.

Updated entry point for Widgets on your taskbar

We are trying out showing the Widgets entry point on the left side of your taskbar with live weather content. You can also open the Widgets board by simply hovering over the entry point.

We’re trying out showing the Widgets entry point, with weather, on the left side of the taskbar.
We’re trying out showing the Widgets entry point, with weather, on the left side of the taskbar.

For users who choose to align their taskbar, the Widgets entry point will be to the right of the Task view icon.

How the Widgets icon looks on a left-aligned taskbar with weather.
How the Widgets icon looks on a left-aligned taskbar with weather.

Group policies and the ability to show/hide the Widgets button from the taskbar remains unchanged.

We’re trying this out so let us know what you think and check out the known issues below for some issues we’re aware of for this experience.

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

Introducing Voice Access

Voice access is a new experience that enables everyone, including people with mobility disabilities, to control their PC and author text using their voice. For example, voice access supports scenarios like opening and switching between apps, browsing the web, and reading and authoring mail. Voice access leverages modern, on-device speech recognition to accurately recognize speech and is supported without an internet connection. Voice access supports English-U.S. language only, so the Windows display language should be set to English-U.S., otherwise voice access may not work as expected.

Get started

You can enable voice access under Settings > Accessibility > Speech.
You can enable voice access under Settings > Accessibility > Speech.

You can find voice access in Settings > Accessibility > Speech. When you turn on voice access for the first time, it will prompt you to download a speech model for the on-device speech recognition. Once it is downloaded, you can choose a microphone you want to use with voice access and start using your voice to control your PC.

You can choose to auto start voice access the next time you sign-in to your PC in settings. You can also use voice commands or keyboard shortcuts (Alt + Shift + C and Alt + Shift + B) to control whether voice access is listening or not listening.

To do thisSay this
Get voice access to start listening to you“Voice access wake up”, “Unmute”
Put voice access to sleep
(It’ll only respond to “voice access wake up” command)		“Voice access sleep”, “Mute”
Completely stop voice access from listening to you 
(You can use mouse or keyboard to click on the microphone button to change its state)		“Turn off microphone”
Interactive guide showing the page titled "working with controls and options with instructions on the left and practice area on the right.
Interactive guide showing the page titled “working with controls and options with instructions on the left and practice area on the right.

Voice access includes an interactive guide that explains how to complete common tasks using your voice.

In addition to the interactive guide, you can access a complete list of commands by asking “what can I say?” when voice access is listening. You can also access the complete set of voice access commands here.

Desktop showing voice access UI at the top of the screen with voice access in listening state.
Desktop showing voice access UI at the top of the screen with voice access in listening state.

Voice access gives real-time feedback of what voice access heard so that you know which word was not recognized correctly.

Navigate Windows with your voice

You can navigate and interact with Windows, including opening and switching applications using your voice. You can also emulate your standard inputs like keyboard and mouse via voice.

For example, the following table includes how to complete common tasks:

To do thisSay this
Open a new application“Open [application name],” e.g., “Open Edge,” “Open Word”
Switch to an active application“Switch to [application name] ,” e.g., “Switch to Edge”
Manage your Windows “Minimize window,” “Maximize window,” “Close window”
Click an item, like a button or a link“Click [item name],” e.g., “Click Start,” “Click Cancel”
Right click an item“Right-click [item name],” e.g. “Right click Start”
Double clicks an item “Double click [item name],” e.g., “Double click Recycle Bin”
Scroll in a specific direction “Scroll down” or “Start scrolling down”
Press a key or key combination “Press Escape,” “Press and Hold Shift,” “Press tab 3 times”
Numbered tear drops appearing over all interactive items on Mail app, voice access UI and taskbar.
Numbered tear drops appearing over all interactive items on Mail app, voice access UI and taskbar.

Voice access number overlays make it possible to interact with items which don’t have a name and they also put you in control when there are more than one matching items to a command.

To do thisSay this
Show number overlays“Show numbers” or “Show numbers here”
Click a numbered item“Click [number]”, e.g., “Click 1”, “Double click 1”, “Right click 1”
Hide number overlays“Hide Numbers,” “Cancel”
3x3 grid with numbers drawn over the Mail app.
3×3 grid with numbers drawn over the Mail app.

In addition, to interact with inaccessible UI and achieve precise mouse movement with grid overlay:

To do thisSay this
Show the grid “Show grid” or “Show grid here”
Drill down into the grid“[Grid number],” e.g., “1”
Click an item at the centre of a grid“Click [grid number],” e.g., “Click 1”
Mark an object to drag “Mark [grid number],” e.g., “Mark 1”
Drop the marked object into a location “Drag”

Author text with your voice

In addition to navigating Windows, you can dictate and edit text with voice access:

To do thisSay this
Insert text in a text box“[Text]”, e.g., “hello world”
Select the last text you dictated“Select that”
Select specific text in a text box“Select [text]”, e.g., “select hello world”
Select previous or next character(s) or word(s) or line(s) or paragraph(s)“Select next word”, “select previous two lines”
Delete the selected text or last dictated text“Delete that”
Delete specific text in a text box“Delete [text]”, e.g., “delete hello world”
Capitalize the first letter of a word“Capitalize [word]”, e.g., “capitalize hello”
Capitalize all the letters of a word“Uppercase [word]”, e.g., “uppercase hello”
Change all the letters in a word to lowercase“Lowercase [word]”, e.g., lowercase hello”
Place cursor before/after specific text“Move before [text]”, e.g., “Move before hello world”
Move cursor to beginning/end of a word or a line or a paragraph“Go to beginning of line”, “go to end of paragraph”

Tips for best recognition quality:

  • Try to speak as clearly as you can
  • Work in an environment with minimal ambient background noise if possible
  • To prevent system audio (e.g., media playback or people speaking on a call) from being picked up by voice access, it is recommended to use headphones/earbuds or mute your system audio when voice access is actively listening

Be sure to check the known issues section below for known issues with voice access. We look forward to you trying out voice access and would love to hear your feedback and suggestions in Feedback Hub (Win + F) under Accessibility > Voice access. You can find the link to the Feedback Hub on the voice access help menu as well – use the voice command “Open Voice access help” > “Click Give feedback” to get there.

Install the Windows Subsystem from Linux (WSL) from the Microsoft Store

WSL is now available in the Microsoft Store. This is the same WSL you know and love but just a different delivery mechanism. Installing WSL from the Store will make it easier to get the latest WSL updates in the future. You can learn more about the Store preview at this blog post or by watching this video.

Starting in this preview build, we’ve made it easier for new users to get started with the WSL in the Microsoft Store by changing the `wsl.exe –install` command to install WSL from the Microsoft Store by default. Additionally, we’ve added some additional arguments to `wsl.exe –install` to make it easier to configure your install, such as `wsl –install –no-launch` which will install a new WSL distro without immediately launching it. To see a full list of available commands please run `wsl –help`. If you want to get started with the Store version right away and already have WSL installed just run `wsl –update` to update immediately to the Store version!

Changes and Improvements

  • Starting with today’s build we’re rolling out an underlying platform change to improve the overall performance and reliability of the input switcher for Insiders using multiple keyboard languages and layouts. In addition to this, we’re updating the input switcher to now have an acrylic background. If you have any feedback for the input switcher, please file it in the Feedback Hub under Input and Language > Keyboard and language switching. [We are beginning to roll this change out, so it isn’t available to all Insiders just yet as we plan to monitor feedback and see how it lands before pushing it out to everyone.]
Input switcher UI with acrylic background.
Input switcher UI with acrylic background.
  • Updated the context menu in File Explorer to make these options top level based on feedback:
    • “Install” when right clicking on font files and .inf files.
    • “Install certificate” when right clicking on .cer files.
    • “Map network drive” and “Disconnect network drive” when right clicking on This PC.
    • “Disconnect” when right clicking on network drives.
  • The ability for personalized combinations of emoji based on face and skin tones of family members, couples with heart, kissing, and people holding hands which we began rolling out with Build 22504 is now available to all Insiders in the Dev Channel.
  • Starting with Build 22509, we began rolling out a change to display your clock and date will now also be displayed on the taskbars of the secondary monitor or monitors. This is now available to all Insiders in the Dev Channel.
  • We’ve added a new extra-large candidate height option for Simplified Chinese IME users under Personalization > Text Input in Settings.

Fixes

[Taskbar]

  • Fixed an explorer.exe crash related to having websites pinned to the Taskbar.

[Search]

  • Did some work to help address an issue where an invisible window frame for the recent searches flyout could end up stuck on the screen, consuming input in that area.
  • When you’re hovering over items in the recent searches flyout, truncated text in the flyout (for example, when using the accessibility setting to make text larger) will now have a tooltip so you can see the full text.
  • Improved visibility of the text in the recent searches flyout if a contrast mode was enabled.
  • The recent searches flyout now has an accessible name when a screen reader sets focus to it, instead of just saying button.
  • Fixed an issue which was causing the search icon in the recent searches icon to become a garbage character for people using the Chinese display language.
  • Fixed a high hitting Search crash.
  • Did some work to help reduce the likelihood of keystrokes getting dropped if you start your search by pressing the Windows key and start typing.
  • If you use Search to run commands, the “Run as administrator” and “Open file location” options should be visible again for you to select on the side of the search window. In addition, CTRL + Shift + Enter should work again now for commands.

[File Explorer]

  • Mitigated an issue that could lead to not being able to add network drives as a source in Media Player.
  • Fixed an issue that could lead to seeing an unexpected blank icon after compressing a file, instead of the one corresponding to your default app for handling that file type.
  • Right clicking on a folder and then quickly closing and reopening the File Explorer window should no longer lead to an explorer.exe crash when the “run as a separate process” option is enabled.
  • Removed some unexpected characters in the dialog when moving user account folders to another location.
  • If you right click on files like .htm in File Explorer, the icon next to Microsoft Edge Canary, Beta or Dev should now display correctly (if installed) under Open With, instead of showing a generic icon.
  • Addressed an issue that could lead to icons for app entries (like Windows Terminal) in the context menu going missing / being invisible sometimes.
  • Improved the consistency of the background color of the command bar and menu dropdowns when a contrast mode was enabled.
  • Made some more little improvements to help with File Explorer folder navigation performance.

[Input]

  • If you’ve pressed WIN + Period and have navigated to the emoji or gifs section with a search term, when you go back to the main page, we will now clear out the search query so you can start fresh.
  • The IME candidate window should now appear more reliably when typing into Search immediately after booting your PC.
  • Fixed an issue where u-mode/v-mode/name-mode wasn’t not showing candidates when typing with the Simplified Chinese IME.
  • Fixed an issue where the Japanese IME was unexpectedly displaying candidates in horizontal mode instead of vertical mode.
  • Fixed an issue where the IME toolbar might randomly show on the lock screen.
  • Addressed an issue where the keyboard focus wouldn’t always be in the right place after pressing WIN + Period, depending on where you’d left focus the last time the window was used.
  • When personalizing your family emoji in the emoji panel, the UI should no longer unexpectedly dismiss when you click the white space.
  • Clicking on your personalized family emoji in the most recently used list in the emoji panel should no longer unexpectedly invoke the customization UI.
  • If you try to start voice typing (WIN + H) without setting focus to a text box first, the popup suggesting you move focus should work again now.

[Windowing]

  • Fixed issue where snap group thumbnails weren’t updating in real time in Task View after you moved a group window to a different Desktop.

[Settings]

  • Fixed an issue that was causing Settings to crash when going to open options for added languages for some Insiders.
  • Fixed a few issues on the Text Input page under Personalization, including:
    • The preview image for your current set up should be showing now.
    • Added a few keywords to help search for this page.
    • Improved read out of the page for screen reader users.
  • Searching for the word widgets should return to the corresponding Settings page with that toggle now.

[Other]

  • Mitigated an issue believed to be causing Insiders with certain devices to be experiencing bug checks with the error SYSTEM_SERVICE_EXCEPTION in recent flights.
  • Fixed an issue where users updating from Builds 22000.xxx, or earlier, to newer Dev Channel builds using the latest Dev Channel ISO would receive the following warning message: The build you are trying to install is Flight Signed. To continue installing, enable flight signing.
  • Removed some excess padding on the left of the boot logo, which was causing it to look off-center compared to the progress wheel.
  • Addressed an issue where UAC was unexpectedly showing “Unknown program” when trying to elevate certain programs, despite them having proper names.
  • Fixed an issue leading to Narrator unexpectedly saying “No item in view” sometimes when tabbing to win32 text boxes.
  • Fixed a crash that was leading to login issues in OOBE (if you were to reset your PC), and well as issues resetting your PIN from the lock screen in the last 2 flights.
  • Fixed an issue leading to acrylic unexpectedly not working in certain places in the preview flight.
  • Mitigated an issue leading to some people unexpectedly seeing “Something went wrong” when trying to click the “stop recording” button when recording a message in Voice Recorder.

NOTE: Some fixes noted here in Insider Preview builds from the active development branch may make their way into the servicing updates for the released version of Windows 11 that became generally available on October 5th.

Known issues

[General]

  • We’re investigating reports from Insiders that DWM is crashing (causing the screen to flash repeatedly) when trying to use certain apps.
  • [ADDED 12/9] You may be unable to sign-in to certain apps such as Feedback Hub. Restarting your PC should correct the issue.

[Start]

  • In some cases, you might be unable to enter text when using Search from Start or the taskbar. If you experience the issue, press WIN + R on the keyboard to launch the Run dialog box, then close it.

[Taskbar]

  • The taskbar will sometimes flicker when switching input methods.
  • The network icon sometimes goes missing in the taskbar when it’s supposed to be there. If you encounter this, please try using Task Manager to restart explorer.exe.
  • If you have multiple monitors connected to your PC and right-click on the date and time on the taskbar on your primary monitor, it will crash explorer.exe

[Search]

  • After clicking the Search icon on the Taskbar, the Search panel may not open. If this occurs, restart the “Windows Explorer” process, and open the search panel again.

[Settings]

  • When viewing the list of available Wi-Fi networks, the signal strength indicators do not reflect the correct signal strength.

[Widgets]

  • Changing the taskbar alignment can cause the Widgets button to disappear from taskbar.
  • Widgets board may not have the correct resolution when hovering the entry point on a secondary monitor.
  • The Widgets board may be temporarily blank.
  • Links may not open properly when opening the widgets board using hover.
  • When having multiple monitors, Widgets content on taskbar may get out of sync between monitors.

[Voice access]

  • Voice access is not yet fully compatible with screen readers like Narrator, and you may experience gaps or unexpected behavior running these together.
  • Some text authoring commands, e.g., “select that” or “delete that”, may not work as expected across Windows applications.
  • You cannot use the command “press Windows L” to lock your PC via voice.
  • Recognition of some punctuation marks and symbols such as @ sign is not accurate.

source: Windows Blogs