It"s the second day of Microsoft"s Build 2017 conference, and during the keynote, the company announced a number of new features that are coming in the next Windows 10 update, which will be called the Fall Creators Update. OneDrive placeholders are coming back, although they"ll be called Files On-Demand, and there are some features that are meant to bring continuity between devices.
The flagship app for the update will be Story Remix, and that"s availalable today with Windows 10 for PCs build 16193. The build was released to the Fast ring following the day two keynote. Here"s what"s new:
Tell your story your way: Today at Build we unveiled a big update coming to the Windows 10 Creators Update and the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update. Story Remix is an evolution of the Photos app that makes it easier than ever to relive your memories and introduces video story creation from your photos and videos. Windows Insiders will be the first to try out many of the new features demonstrated today – with more to come!
Videos made easy: Story Remix uses its understanding of your content to find collections of content most relevant to you and automatically brings it together into video stories – each with a soundtrack, theme, and transitions. You can keep these suggested video stories to enjoy and share, remix them with just a click of a button, or edit them yourself in story editor to get it just right. Anyone can get started creating great videos with the help of Story Remix.
Search: Story Remix uses deep learning and AI to automatically tag your content. Now you can search by people, places or things to easily find specific photos in your ever-growing collection so that you can view, edit or create a story.
Updated UX: The Story Remix app now includes elements of Fluent Design like connected animations, conscious scrollbars, and acrylic. The Explore page is the hub for your entire collection of photos and videos, where you can view your content in three different sizes – small, medium, and large. The Create page is the jumping off point for creating new stories.
Discovery bar: The new discovery bar gives you quick access to delight and common tasks, making it easy to create a new story, see stories we’ve created for you, and discover your past memories of people, places, and things.
Share your stories: Upload your video stories quickly to YouTube and Facebook, or share them easily via email or via OneDrive.
Power Throttling Update: Starting with Build 16193, the Task Manager column name has changed from “Background Moderated” to “Power Throttling”. For more information on Power Throttling, read this blog post here.
Individually controlling the volume of your UWP apps: We’ve updated the Volume Mixer to now include UWP apps (like Microsoft Edge, or Groove Music), so you can set their volume without impacting the overall system volume. Appreciate everyone who’s shared feedback requesting this, let us know what you’d like to see next! Note: UWP apps will only appear in the Volume Mixer once they start playing sound. To open the Volume Mixer, right-click on the speaker icon in the taskbar.
Other than the ability to individually control the volume of UWP apps and some minor changes to Power Throttling, the big news here is the Story Remix app. Microsoft says that with each major feature update, it wants to have a flagship first-party app; for example, with the Anniversary Update, it was Ink Workspace, and with the Creators Update, it was Paint 3D.
Microsoft also announced the first Fall Creators Update Bug Bash, which kicks off Sunday night at midnight Pacific Time. Obviously, this will be the build that it focuses on, so make sure to check back into the Feedback Hub next week for Quests.