Articles about Microsoft

For as long as most users can remembers, Skype has come with a warning that it cannot be used to place 911 calls. Microsoft has just announced that this is now changing for users of the Windows 10, Windows 11, macOS, Linux, Android and iOS versions of the app.

The application is now labelled as offering "Limited emergency calling". What this means, for now, is that Skype users in the US are able to place 911 calls using the app, bringing it in line with a handful of other countries. More than this, Skype can help emergency operators to locate you if necessary -- but there are some limitations to the new functionality.

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Whether Linux distributions are more secure than Windows or macOS is the source of on-going debate, but Google's Project Zero has some interesting findings relating to the patching of security holes.

The security research program at Google has published information relating to security flaws found in software over the course of two years. Between January 2019 and December 2021 the Project Zero team found that Linux developers addresses problems far faster than Apple, Microsoft or Google itself.

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Microsoft has been pouring a lot of love into Windows 11 of late, and understandably so -- but this does not mean that people who have decided to stick with Windows 10 have been forgotten. And to prove this, the company has just released the significant KB5010415 update, introducing new features and options, as well as fixing various issues.

For now, KB5010415 is only a preview, meaning that it is an update that gives an early taste of the full launch next Patch Tuesday. The update is available to anyone who wants to install it, and it includes a number of compelling reasons to do so.

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If you're using Windows 11, there is a reasonable chance that you have a Microsoft account -- but it is not necessarily the case. While there are various advantages to signing into Windows using your Microsoft account, it is not something everyone feels entirely comfortable with.

So it will come as bad news to such hold-outs that Microsoft is going to force some users to create such an account. The change is coming to Window 11 Pro, meaning that home users who have opted for this version of Windows, in addition to the organizations, businesses and enterprises that use this edition of the operating system are affected. But there is some good news.

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Cast your mind back, and you will recall the Millennium Bug, or the Y2K problem. There were fears that planes would fall from the sky, bank machines would fail, and chaos would ensure as computer systems did not know how to properly interpret the two-digit date 00 (did it mean 1900 or 2000?). Now there is a comparable problem on the horizon for web browsers.

Version 100 of the major web browsers are not far from being released, and this presents something of a problem. When Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge and Mozilla Firefox hit three-digit version numbers, many websites will not know how to deal with user-agent strings that are made up of trio of numbers.

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When an app starts to consume too many system resources it can have a huge impact on your PC’s smooth running, even causing it to lock or crash in some extreme instances.

Last year Microsoft experimented with a Task Manager feature called Eco mode which gave users control over unruly apps. That never made it into the stable version of Windows 11, but now the feature is back with a brand new name.

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Windows 11 shipped with some pretty major features and functionality missing but Microsoft is finally righting these wrongs.

Earlier in the week the first Android apps preview arrived, and today in Insider Build 22557, the company introduced drag and drop support for the Windows 11 taskbar.

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Yesterday, Microsoft released the first major update for Windows 11 (KB5010414), with Android apps, taskbar improvements and more.

Today, Windows Insiders in the Dev channel get a brand new build that comes packed with even more new features, including folders in the pinned apps area of Start, live captions, a new Focus experience, Quick Access improvements in File Explorer, new touch gestures, and more!

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The latest update for Windows 11 is a big one -- and we're not just talking about the size of the download. The update in question is KB5010414, and it's something we have already touched on a couple of times.

Much of the focus has been, entirely understandably, on the new features the update brings; KB5010414 is about much more than this. Yes, the arrival of support for Android apps is nice, but it's certainly not something everyone is interested in. What is more impressive and interesting about the KB5010414 is the laundry list of changes, tweaks and fixes Microsoft has introduced. This is what makes this the most significant update to Windows 11 yet.

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Windows 11 is a really good operating system, but it is overkill for many home and education users these days. Not to mention, it can be risky to use since there is so much malware designed for it. Even for business, many companies are exclusively using web-based solutions in the browser, making Windows unnecessary for them. And so, Chromebooks are becoming more and more popular. They are affordable, easy to use, and extremely secure.

If a company wants to switch to Chromebooks from Windows laptops, however, there is a big dilemma -- what should be done with existing computers? After all, Chrome OS cannot be installed on computers that didn't ship with Chrome OS, right? Well, actually, this is changing...

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Although Windows 11 isn’t a bad operating system, it does lack polish and it’s missing general functionality we expect to see. People are still waiting for features that were touted when the OS was first announced -- native support for Android apps, for example.

Today, Microsoft is starting to make new experiences for Windows 11 available via a new update, and this includes an Amazon Appstore preview, Taskbar improvements and redesigned versions of Media Player and Notepad.

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The Windows Package Manager -- also known as Winget -- is an open source tool designed to make it easier to install software on Windows 10 and Windows 11, by automating and speeding up the process. If you’ve used a package manager in a Linux distro you’ll know what to expect.

Microsoft has now released a new preview build with a number of a fixes and improvements. It has also enabled a raft of experimental features in the build.

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Following the release of Windows 11 Build 22000.526, also known as the KB5010414 update, users are complaining of various problems with their computers.

The update was released to the Beta and Release Preview channels just a few days ago, and it introduced various changes and improvements to the Windows 11 taskbar. But it also seems that the update introduced problems with printing, and high CPU loads leading to overheating.

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There have been some great new utilities added to Microsoft's PowerToys collection recently, and now Microsoft has released another update to its much-loved software.

While PowerToys v0.55.2 is not quite an exciting as previous releases, it is no less important. Having identified a bug affecting the installer, Microsoft has fixed the issue and is rolling out this important patch.

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Microsoft has issued a warning -- or reminder, depending on your perspective -- about the impending end of support for Windows 10 20H2.

Also known as Windows 10 October 2020 update, this is not the first time Microsoft has urged people to upgrade their operating system to a version that will be supported for longer. The deadline is just three months away, so what are your options?

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