With a new week comes a new build of Windows 10 for Insiders in the Fast ring. Last week"s release was on Friday, so this week the build number is only increasing slightly with build 18965. Build 18963 introduced a few changes last week, including the ability to update the Notepad through the Microsoft Store.
As for this week"s build, there"s not a lot that"s new. The only notable change is a new option in settings to let apps be restarted when the user signs out and back in again:
Control over restarting apps at sign-in
As some of you already know, apps have the ability to register for restart, which helps in a few situations, including enabling you to get back to what you were doing if you need to restart your PC. Previously this option was tied to the “Use my sign-in info to automatically finish setting up my device” option under Sign-in options in accounts settings. We’ve heard feedback that some of you would prefer more explicit control over when Windows automatically restarts apps that were open when you restart your PC, and with 20H1 we’re bringing that option to you.
Windows now puts you in control with a new app restart setting. When turned on, Windows automatically saves your restartable apps when signing out, restarting, or shutting down Windows, and restarts them next time you sign in. This setting is off by default and you can change it any time in Settings > Accounts > Sign-in options, and can find it by searching for “restart apps” in Start or the search box.
In addition to that, Microsoft has officially announced some UI changes to the Feedback Hub, which were reported over the weekend. There"s a new UI for feedback search, new options for reporting similar feedback, and a new achievements page:
The Feedback Hub team has been hard at work lately to bring you some app updates based on your feature requests, and we have a few changes and improvements to share about the latest version that’s currently rolling out to Insiders in the Fast ring.
Feedback Search UI updates
On the Feedback section of the app, you will now be able to more clearly see the differentiation between Problems and Suggestions, with each showing an icon, color, and labels Problem or Suggestion displayed above each feedback entry. We also have updated iconography and displays for Adding similar feedback to problems, upvoting suggestions, and adding comments to feedback.
Adding similar feedback
In the past, Feedback Hub allowed two kinds of participation on feedback: upvoting and adding more details. The notion of voting on Suggestions makes a lot of sense – engineers at Microsoft want to know which features the community wants us to build next, and voting on feature suggestions is a great way to see where your interest lies.
However, voting on Problems was trickier – roblems are not a matter of popularity, and what helps engineers here resolve problems is having clear descriptions of how the issue arose. Feedback is especially helpful if it includes a reproduction of the problem, diagnostics that help our teams pinpoint what went wrong so they can fix issues faster. Voting on the search page often did not provide enough detail as to what was happening, and we saw that few people went into existing feedback to add their personal reproductions of the issues.
With the new Add similar feedback feature, selecting a problem with symptoms that match your own will take you to the feedback form, with the title pre-filled. You edit the title or add your own description to let us know exactly what was happening when you encountered the problem. We’ll already have your category selected to ensure the right feature team sees your feedback, and in our new Similar Feedback section, the feedback you selected will already be selected. As usual, the last step involves optionally adding your own reproduction of the issue or any attachments you like.
Windows Insiders Achievements
We are excited to announce a refresh of the Windows Insider Achievements page. We’ve made achievements more discoverable by moving them from your profile page to their own landing page, and we added additional features that allow you to categorize and track your progress. Be sure to check it out today and begin unlocking badges. We would love to hear your feedback on social media by using the hashtag #Builds4Badges.
The information previously found in your profile (Device ID and User ID) is now located in the settings section of Feedback Hub.
As always, we appreciate your feedback – if you have any suggestions or problems to report, you can share them in the Feedback Hub under Apps > Feedback Hub.
The relatively small changelog is to be expected, since last week"s release came on Friday and the build number is only slightly higher. It"s also worth noting that we"re still a ways off from the official release of Windows 10 20H1, so many features are likely to be added later on.
