What's next for Windows?

[Casey Pelous]

In my opinion it doesn't really matter one way or another. 10 and 11 are both stable. I like 10 a little better but got a new laptop so 11 it is. Why Microsoft decided they need a new version number is a mystery to me.

I got a new laptop a while ago that has 11 on it -- seems fine. Took a little getting used to, especially the task bar. I don't find it particularly thrilling or horrifying.

I'd update to 11 on my desktop but don't have the option. I ran their little "check if you can update" program and I seem to need a NUMPTY drive instead of a SUMDAMTHING drive. Or something.

I had the sense the program was mocking me for my hard drive choices.

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

I had the sense the program was mocking me for my hard drive choices.

Ha ha, poser!

 

[WolfEyes]

I still miss 3.11 since for me it was quite useful not only at the office but for home life as well. It had an excellent system for storing recipes on notecards!

If you go into Settings in the widget panel you can reduce a lot of the clutter. Here's mine: Microsoft Start (msn.com) Of course that might not let you see anything or it might show you your own settings.

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

It sticks a little blurb in the very left corner of your taskbar that is usually your local weather conditions

Oh yeh, I turned the weather off without even looking at it.

I had the sense the program was mocking me for my hard drive choices.

You have a hard drive? Ha ha ha.

 

[Clara D.]

Probably to force people to buy new hardware.

The majority of Monehs from selling Windows is from OEM's. If you don't buy a new computer, M$ doesn't get Monehs.

 

[Essence Lumin]

Windows 10 seems to be free now. Twice I downloaded an ISO from microsoft's site and installed it with no requests for money or product keys before or after installation.

 

[Noodles]

Windows 10 seems to be free now. Twice I downloaded an ISO from microsoft's site and installed it with no requests for money or product keys before or after installation.

I have a PC that has an activated Windows 10 off of a pirayed Windows 7.

I don't think they can say it, for a variety of reasons, but they don't care, they just want people on Windows because the real money is in things like Gamepass and Office 365 and selling things in the store.

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

Windows 10 seems to be free now. Twice I downloaded an ISO from microsoft's site and installed it with no requests for money or product keys before or after installation.

They have an online record of that particular computer being entitled to run Windows, and it checks with that before telling you you can't have any soup.

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

AI is what's next for Windows.

Yesterday Microsoft held a big media event where it covered two topics - its latest Surface device lineup (these machines are usually super high quality but several tiers beyond my means, so meh), and the formal announcement of Copilot, its AI powered digital assistant.

Like the late Cortana (yeah I know, you all just turned off Cortana immediately and that's fine, but I really liked it as it was originally released, before it started bleeding features until finally it was just deprecated completely), Copilot will be integrated in many ways - in Microsoft 365 nee Office, in Edge of course obviously, in Outlook, and as a standalone desktop app in Windows 11. Some capabilities will also be extended to MS Paint and the Photos app. It will be able to search for files and things, open apps and do other OS tasks, do everything Bing Chat can do, and even probably won't somehow kill you.

Like Cortana, you'll be able to turn it off, and/or turn off certain features and integrations.

Copilot will come to Windows 11 as a preview version in an update that will release on the next Patch Tuesday (September 26).

Also just kind of on the side in the update are a couple of other non-AI related things - for example, MS Paint is getting a layers feature. Also, apparently there's going to be a new File Explorer redesign? I'm really interested to see that. Notepad now has autosave, and the new Outlook app is launching to replace the Mail and Calendar apps. If you use them, for a little while you've been able to preview the new Outlook with a toggle switch at the top of those apps.

Earlier this year Microsoft promised a new upcoming feature allowing you to customize the Widgets bar, including the ability to remove the news feed from it completely. There's no mention of whether that feature made it into this update. I'm waiting really really hard for it.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Copilot sounds like a good excuse for scanning much, much more user data than ever before.

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

Copilot, its AI† powered digital assistant.

† Not actually AI.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

Copilot sounds like a good excuse for scanning much, much more user data than ever before.

Part of why my University has resisted Windows 11. Trying to square data slurping and student privacy laws is a difficult problem.

 

[Noodles]

Also, apparently there's going to be a new File Explorer redesign?

The redesign I want, is two explorers, in the same window, like you could do in like, Windows 3.1, maybe the 95/98 era. I think it was called Windows Explorer. Two windows next to each other is not quite the same and tabs is definitely not. I want that easy drag and drop.

Also if they could fix the weird refresh bug that would be great. Easy example, but it pops up elsewhere, Right click, new file/folder, nothing happens. But it did happen, you press F5 or just right click refresh, and its there, waiting for you to name it. You name it, and.... it just still says New Folder/New Whatever Document.ext. once again, until you refresh agaain.

This happens, ALL the time, and it happens, on MULTIPLE machines, from my own laptop, desktop, and work laptop.

 

[Essence Lumin]

My pet peave is the volume control. This should be really simple right? It used to be. Now I click the icon in the taskbar and it takes a second or two to go from greyed out to where I can use it.

 

[Essence Lumin]

These Windows improvements over the years don't mean much to me. I wish MS would just pick a version and stop trying to change things around. The last really significant helpful change I can think of was in 2016 when they added Windows subsystem for linux. That is handy.

AI is what's next for Windows.

Ugh. As someone on another board pointed out, it could be an opportunity for major data mining.

Also just kind of on the side in the update are a couple of other non-AI related things - for example, MS Paint is getting a layers feature.

MS Paint has historically been pretty much of a useless joke. Layers are really essential. It's nice to see they are trying to make a beginners program that is actually a little useful, but paint.net is free, easy to use, and does much more.

Also, apparently there's going to be a new File Explorer redesign? I'm really interested to see that.

That is good. It works but never seemed very polished.

Notepad now has autosave, and the new Outlook app is launching to replace the Mail and Calendar apps.

Again, a free download is necessary but notepad++ is way better than notepad will ever be. It autosaves too. As for Outlook, I am not so familiar. Afaik, not many people use a local mail client anymore. When I have done so it has been thunderbird. Perhaps people who are used to Outlook in a work environment will like it.

Earlier this year Microsoft promised a new upcoming feature allowing you to customize the Widgets bar, including the ability to remove the news feed from it completely. There's no mention of whether that feature made it into this update. I'm waiting really really hard for it.

Maybe I'm missing something here, but when I got this laptop 6 months ago I removed all the crap from the taskbar. I don't see news anymore. Is it lurking somewhere?

 

[Katheryne Helendale]

MS Paint has historically been pretty much of a useless joke. Layers are really essential. It's nice to see they are trying to make a beginners program that is actually a little useful, but paint.net is free, easy to use, and does much more.

I like MS Paint. I always have. It's been a really handy, easy tool for when I needed to throw together a quick graphic, such as adding arrows to a screenshot. Simple stuff like that for which a photo editor like GIMP is akin to fishing a small pond with dynamite.

 

[Essence Lumin]

I like MS Paint. I always have. It's been a really handy, easy tool for when I needed to throw together a quick graphic, such as adding arrows to a screenshot. Simple stuff like that for which a photo editor like GIMP is akin to fishing a small pond with dynamite.

That is sort of why I like paint.net. It doesn't have the complexity of the gimp or photoshop. Sometimes all I want to do is crop the picture which I'm sure one could do in MS Paint. Many times I need layers or something though and I know paint.net so well. I've been using it for a decade.

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

Copilot sounds like a good excuse for scanning much, much more user data than ever before.

You only think it's much much more user data than ever before.

Heh. Heheh.

Heheheheheh.

 

[Noodles]

Layers alone would do wonders for Paint I think.

Occasionally, I would think "I could just do something quick with paint" but the problem becomes, "Once I unselect this selection, thats it, it becomes part of the image.". From text or stuff clipped from another image or eveen just trying to slap two images together side by side.

Not being able to select and move ot again sucks.

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

I guess the thing is....like, with WordPad. WordPad is a very simple bare-bones word processor app that's always been bundled with Windows so that someone who never plans or needs to have an actual fully-featured pro-level word processor for serious work still has something available that can do the job once or twice a year when they unexpectedly have to type up a letter or something.

MS Paint has always been just a basic utility like that. I think it was kind of expected that if you ever decided to do some serious art or image work you'd probably get something more robust.

I get the feeling that more recently Microsoft is trying to make Paint "more" than that. But even if they're not, I really like that "layers" is now considered a basic bare-bones feature.