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If you’re still using Internet Explorer, just please stop now, Microsoft says
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Microsoft has once again urged users to stop using its outdated Internet Explorer browser as the software limps closer to its retirement.

The company has again reminded users that Internet Explorer 11 is being retired from Windows 10 in June 2022, with Microsoft Edge taking its place.

It seems that some users may be a touch unwilling to make the jump, however, with Microsoft forced to emphasise that the days of Internet Explorer really are numbered.

The future is Edge

“As previously announced, the future of Internet Explorer on Windows is in Microsoft Edge,” Microsoft stated in a company announcement.

“The Internet Explorer 11 (IE11) desktop application will be retired on June 15, 2022, for certain versions of Windows 10. This means that the IE11 desktop application will no longer be supported and afterward will redirect to Microsoft Edge if a user tries to access it.”

The company did highlight that any particularly nostalgia-driven users can still use Internet Explorer mode (IE mode) within Microsoft Edge for the time being. IE mode aims to support legacy websites and applications within Microsoft Edge until they can be ported over to the new software.

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> Microsoft Edge is about to give you an excellent new way to procrastinate

> Internet Explorer might not be entirely dead just yet

> Microsoft 365 update will make sure no one is at a disadvantage

Microsoft first announced plans to retire support for Internet Explorer 11 across Windows 10 and Microsoft 365 back in August 2020, and since then has been gradually stripping back services for the software.

Its Microsoft 365 deadline passed in August 2021, although some apps may still function via the browser, albeit with users seeing a severely diminished experience.

External tools have also pulled back, with Google Search withdrawing support for Internet Explorer in October 2021, leaving the browser reliant on its own in-house Bing search, with support for Docs, Sheets, Slides and other Google Workspace apps removed in March 2021.

Microsoft Edge continues to perform strongly in the global browser market, with recent figures placing it on the verge of surpassing Apple's Safari offering. 

The latest StatCounter numbers show Microsoft Edge is now used on 9.54% of desktops worldwide, just behind Safari at 9.84% – although both are still far behind runaway market leader Google Chrome on 65.38%.

TechRadar – All the latest technology news

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Google Calendar update will stop people clogging your day with needless meetings
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Google is rolling out improvements for its calendar app that should help people better manage their busy schedules.

As described in a blog post, Google Calendar users will soon benefit from the ability to prevent unwanted invitations from being added to their calendar.

Under the updated system, users can choose for meetings and other events to be added to their calendar only after they have responded to the email invitation. The effect, says Google, is a less cluttered calendar interface and less time spent on administration.

The new Google Calendar feature should go live for all Workspace users (both business and personal) within the next two weeks.

Google Calendar invitations

Since the transition to remote and hybrid working, many more meetings have taken place over video conferencing and VoIP services. Managers have also been encouraged to check in more frequently with employees, in the absence of a quick chat or coffee break at the office.

All of this means a larger volume of meetings and more unwieldy calendars, which is somewhat of a nightmare for anyone who already spent more than their fair share of time in meetings before the pandemic.

With this latest update, however, Google Workspace users will be able to manage their calendars more effectively with less manual effort, as well as highlighting the events and meetings most important to them.

Of course, the ability to divert invitations doesn’t address endemic problems with meetings culture in this new world of hybrid working, but it will at least go some way to alleviating the symptoms.

To activate or deactivate the new feature, use the following pathway in the Google Calendar web app: Settings > Event settings > Add invitations to my calendar.

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Microsoft Teams update will stop you annoying your colleagues
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Microsoft is working on a simple update for Teams that should help address common issues with international collaboration.

According to a new entry in the company’s product roadmap, Microsoft Teams users will soon benefit from a facility that highlights each users’ current time-zone.

“You can easily find out the local time of the people you collaborate with by checking the profile card,” the listing explains.

The feature is still currently under development, but should roll out to all Microsoft Teams users by the end of January, 2022.

Microsoft Teams on tour

Although small businesses are less likely to make use of the new local time feature, it could prove extremely helpful for employees at larger enterprises with colleagues scattered across the globe, or for anyone who travels regularly for work.

For example, the ability to quickly check which colleagues are online and when should make it easier for managers to schedule a cross-team meeting or determine to whom to delegate a time-sensitive task.

If someone has their notifications turned on, meanwhile, the new feature will minimize the chances of a colleague disturbing them at an inopportune time with an unimportant task or query.

Since the transition to remote working, many people have also developed the habit of leaving messages for co-workers to discover when they first log on in the morning. Although the utility of this practice is obvious, it has the effect of making the person feel bombarded before they’ve had a chance to get their feet under the desk.

While the new time-zone feature does nothing to disincentivize this practice, the likelihood of accidentally falling foul of the collaboration faux pas is lessened.

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Microsoft to stop forcing Edge on Windows 11 users
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Microsoft has changed the way Windows 11 handles switching default web browsers, thankfully, reversing an unpopular decision it made when the OS was still in pre-release testing (back in August).

A fresh preview (testing) version of Windows 11 (build 22509) now lets you switch the operating system’s default browser with a simple single click; which is just as it should be (and the scheme of things in Windows 10).

So, what currently happens in Windows 11? Well, Microsoft concocted a rather convoluted method in the guise of offering users more fine-tuned control over what browser opens what files, which was, as we observed at the time of its inception, basically a nightmare (and it remains so).

You get one chance to change your default browser away from Edge when you first install and fire up an alternative browser, like say Chrome or Firefox – and when you pick that alternative, you must remember to tick the ‘Always use this app’ box. If you don’t check the box, you won’t see this prompt again, and instead you’ll have to go into Settings yourself and manually change the default browser.

The problem is that currently with Windows 11, this involves having to stipulate Chrome (or whatever alternative you wish to use instead of the built-in Edge browser) for multiple file types: HTML, HTM, PDF, SHTML, WEBP, HTTP, HTTPS, and more. As we already noted, the theory pushed by Microsoft is that this allows for more granular control.

But what it really represents for the overwhelming majority is a lot of clicking and changing, but fortunately, as Rafael Rivera tweeted (via The Verge) to point out, in a new test build, Windows 11 now has a simple ‘Set default’ button for browsers, bringing things back in line with how Windows 10 works.

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Microsoft’s Aaron Woodman, VP of Windows marketing, told The Verge: “In the Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22509 released to the Dev Channel on Wednesday, we streamlined the ability for a Windows Insider to set the ‘default browser’ to apps that register for HTTP:, HTTPS:, .HTM, and .HTML.”

Analysis: This should never have happened in the first place

Remember, this new scheme is only in testing now, but with any luck, the change should come to the full version of Windows 11 eventually. As we touched on above, Microsoft’s argument about giving more fine-tuned control for default settings based on user feedback doesn’t wash, at all. Clearly, this was – well, still is for the time being – a way of making sure Edge keeps getting pushed to the forefront.

Along with all the various ads for Edge, which as we saw earlier this week, have reached new lows in terms of anti-Chrome pop-ups (including ‘that browser is so 2008!’).

We’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again: Microsoft, you aren’t going to nag people into using your browser (or anything else), it’ll just annoy them and likely have the opposite effect, if anything. Nobody would be too bothered about the occasional pop-up, perhaps, but the amount of promotional activity, combined with software changes like this whole debacle around defaults, is dangerous territory to be treading.

At least this Windows 11 default browser decision has now been reversed, and we hope that the change comes through sooner rather than later.

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