It’s Saturday, which means that it’s time yet again to walk through all of the important things that happened in the Microsoft-verse in the past few days. This was one of the busiest weeks so far in terms of news and we had items related to Internet Explorer, Microsoft Edge, Windows 11, app previews, and leaks flowing in consistently. Without further ado, check out our weekly digest for July 30 – August 5!
The return of Internet Explorer
Internet Explorer (IE) is dead and isn’t even supposed to be bundled in Windows 11. However, some internet sleuths managed to find it within the depths of Microsoft’s latest operating system. It turns out that the GUI for IE still exists in Windows 11 and can be triggered pretty easily. Heck, you can even set a shortcut for it. Interestingly, Microsoft has remained silent on the matter even though there was a clear public perception prior to this week that Windows 11 is the first version of the OS that comes without IE bundled.
But coming over to Microsoft’s latest browser, Edge received a few noteworthy updates as well. Edge Dev 105.0.1336.2 introduced Narrator, a new management policy, and a bunch of performance improvements. The company also enabled Enhanced Security mode (previously Super Duper Secure Mode) by default in Edge 104.0.1293.44 Beta and then quickly rolled out the configuration with a new Basic option for everyone in Edge Stable via version 104.0.1293.47.
Talking about browsers in general, Edge is inching closer to 11% of the desktop market share. This is obviously still far behind Chrome’s current share of 66.19%, but it’s a start. Meanwhile, DuckDuckGo has now committed to blocking Microsoft scripts in its browser and extensions. Microsoft has also stated that it won’t profile users from DuckDuckGo on ad clicks, even though advertising on the site is done in partnership with Microsoft.
Windows 11 build 25174
Microsoft rolled out Windows 11 Dev Channel build 25174 this week. Most notably, this build introduces the Game Pass widget so that you can get a sneak peek at new arrivals, imminent departures, and more. There are a bunch of bug fixes for File Explorer, Settings, and Taskbar, as well as a lengthy list of known issues. A servicing build 25174.1010 (KB5017214) was also released yesterday.
There were a couple of interesting things about build 25174 too. While it could be due to a bug but there are hints that Microsoft is changing the icons in the Shut Down dialog box. In a similar vein, some Windows 11 users managed to trigger a floating rounded Taskbar. However, Microsoft later pointed out that this is a bug, much to the disappointment of many.
On the other hand, the Beta Channel received builds 22621.450 and 22622.450. As usual, the former has new features disabled by default while the latter has them on. Some improvements have been made to File Explorer but there are various known issues too. Since we are talking about issues, Microsoft has also resolved a display bug affecting the input indicator and language bar in Windows 10.
Coming over to the security side of Windows, Nvidia has released version 473.81 of its GeForce driver. This is also being made available to unsupported Windows 7 and Windows 8 systems since it patches some important security issues. Meanwhile, Smart App Control (SAC) in Windows 11 can now block LNK, ISO, RAR, IMG, VHD, and VHDX files, among others.
App previews, leaks, and updates
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