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Windows 11’s next major feature drop is available now – for those brave enough to grab a preview update
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Windows 11’s next feature update known as ‘Moment 5’ is now rolling out, albeit it’s still an optional update at this point.

The preview update KB5035942 became available yesterday, so pretty much everyone on Windows 11 (23H2 and 22H2) should see it now – if they check for it.

As mentioned, this is an optional installation, so it will only show up if you manually fire up a check in the Windows Update panel, whereupon you can then choose to download KB5035942.

Bear in mind that as it’s still in testing, there could be wrinkles in the preview update. But if you want those new Moment 5 features and can’t wait, well, they’re up for grabs now.

Currently, there are no known issues with KB5035942, but that’s not a guarantee you won’t encounter technical hitches, of course – it’s just that they might not have been flagged up yet.

At the time of writing, there are no reported issues on the Reddit thread announcing the update at any rate, which is a good early sign – there’s just a warning that this one is a hefty download. Given that it’s a major feature update, that’s to be expected, of course.

Analysis: Lock and load – or wait for next month?

What new features are provided by Moment 5? There’s an extensive list of the fresh additions in Microsoft’s support document for the March 2024 preview update, but let’s touch on some of the highlights here.

They include new functionality for the lock screen in Windows 11 in the form of cards that pipe through info on weather, stocks, traffic and more – a somewhat controversial addition as some regard it as bloat. Mind you, if you don’t like the idea, you don’t have to enable the lock screen cards, and we should note that this is rolling out gradually within those adopting Moment 5 right now – so you may not see it yet anyway.

The Voice Access feature has also received a good deal of attention here, including nifty new shortcuts for custom commands (like pasting a boilerplate piece of text), and the ability to use voice controls over multiple monitors for the first time. Narrator has a raft of new features too, and that includes being able to use voice commands with the screen reading tool, so you can verbally ask it to “speak faster” for example.

For those not signed into a Microsoft account, it’s also worth noting that Copilot now lets you run 10 queries, so you can give the AI assistant a quick trial without being logged in. (Copilot is now rolling out to more users, incidentally, so if you haven’t seen it yet, you might do very soon).

So, should you bag all these features now? Well, you need to balance your desire for new toys to play with against the possibility of faulty bits in testing. Generally speaking, the safest course of action is to wait for this to become a finished cumulative update in April, and install Moment 5 then. Still, if you can’t wait for any particular piece of functionality – or important bug fix, as there are some glitches resolved here, too – then you might want to go early on this one.

Via Neowin

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iOS 17.4 might give you more options for turning off those FaceTime reactions
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The FaceTime video reactions Apple introduced in iOS 17 are kind of cool – fireworks when you show two thumbs up, and so on – but you don't necessarily want them going off on every call. Now it looks as though Apple is about to make the feature less prominent.

As per MacRumors, with the introduction of iOS 17.4 and iPadOS 17.4, third-party video calling apps will be able to turn the reactions off by default. In other words, you won't suddenly find balloons filling the screen on a serious call with your boss.

That “by default” is the crucial bit – at the moment, whenever you fire up FaceTime or another video app for the first time, these reactions will be enabled. You can turn them off (and they will then stay off for that app), but you need to remember to do it.

The move also means third-party developers get more control over the effects that are applied at a system level. As The Verge reports, one telehealth provider has already taken the step of informing users that it has no control over these reactions.

Coming soon

FaceTime reactions

A thumbs down is another reaction you can use (Image credit: Apple)

This extra flexibility is made possible through what's called an API or Application Programming Interface – a way for apps to interact with operating systems. It would mean the iOS or iPadOS setting no longer dictates the setting for every other video app.

The changes have been spotted in the latest beta versions of iOS 17.4 and iPadOS 17.4, though there's no guarantee that they'll stay there when the final version of the software rolls out. As yet it's not clear if the same update will be applied to macOS.

iOS 17.3 was pushed out on January 22, so we shouldn't have too much longer to wait to see its successor. Among the iOS 17.4 features in the pipeline, based on the beta version, we've got game streaming apps and automatic transcripts for your podcasts.

Apple will be hoping that a new version helps to encourage more people to actually install iOS 17 too. Uptake has been slower than it was with iOS 16, with users citing bugs and a lack of new features as reasons not to apply the update.

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Google’s new generative AI aims to help you get those creative juices following
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It’s a big day for Google AI as the tech giant has launched a new image-generation engine aimed at fostering people’s creativity.

The tool is called ImageFX and it runs on Imagen 2,  Google's “latest text-to-image model” that Google claims can deliver the company's “highest-quality images yet.” Like so many other generative AIs before, it generates content by having users enter a command into the text box. What’s unique about the engine is it comes with “Expressive Chips” which are dropdown menus over keywords allowing you to quickly alter content with adjacent ideas. For example, ImageFX gave us a sample prompt of a dress carved out of deadwood complete with foliage. After it made a series of pictures, the AI offered the opportunity to change certain aspects; turning a beautiful forest-inspired dress into an ugly shirt made out of plastic and flowers. 

Image 1 of 2

ImageFX - generated dress

(Image credit: Future)
Image 2 of 2

ImageFX - generated shirt

(Image credit: Future)

Options in the Expressive Chips don’t change. They remain fixed to the initial prompt although you can add more to the list by selecting the tags down at the bottom. There doesn’t appear to be a way to remove tags. Users will have to click the Start Over button to begin anew. If the AI manages to create something you enjoy, it can be downloaded or shared on social media.

Be creative

This obviously isn’t the first time Google has released a text-to-image generative AI. In fact, Bard just received the same ability. The main difference with ImageFX is, again, its encouragement of creativity. The clips can help spark inspiration by giving you ideas of how to direct the engine; ideas that you may never have thought of. Bard’s feature, on the other hand, offers little to no guidance. Because it's less user-friendly, directing Bard's image generation will be trickier.

ImageFX is free to use on Google’s AI Test Kitchen. Do keep in mind it’s still a work in progress. Upon visiting the page for the first time, you’ll be met with a warning message telling you the AI “may display inaccurate info”, and in some cases, offensive content. If this happens to you, the company asks that you report it to them by clicking the flag icon. 

Also, Google wants people to keep things clean. They link to their Generative AI Prohibited Use Policy in the warning listing out what you can’t do with ImageFX.

AI updates

In addition to ImageFX, Google made several updates to past experimental AIs. 

MusicFX, the brand’s text-to-music engine, now allows users to generate songs up to 70 seconds in length as well as alter their speed. The tool even received Expressive Chips, helping people get those creative juices flowing. MusicFX even got a performance boost enabling it to pump content faster than before. TextFX, on the other hand, didn’t see a major upgrade or new features. Google mainly updated the website so it’s more navigable.

MusicFX's new layout

(Image credit: Future)

Everything you see here is available to users in the US, New Zealand, Kenya, and Australia. No word on if the AI will roll out elsewhere, although we did ask. This story will be updated at a later time.

Until then, check out TechRadar's roundup of the best AI art generators for 2024 where we compare them to each other. There's no clear winner, but they do have their specialties. 

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Windows 11’s new features won’t be for everyone – but they’re seriously cool for those who’ll use them
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Windows 11 is close to getting some smart additions for those who use a stylus, and other improvements besides, as seen in a new preview build.

This is preview build 22635.2776 (also known as KB5032292) which has been pushed out to the Beta channel, the last avenue of testing before Release Preview (the final step before new features come to the finished version of Windows 11).

The big step forward here is for Windows Ink, with the ability to write directly in some text boxes in Windows 11 coming to a lot more people. In other words, rather than typing in text for a search, for example, you can directly scribble your search terms into the box.

This ability was available for the US, but is now coming with support for a bunch of new regions – that includes English (Australia), English and French (Canada), English (India), and English (United Kingdom), plus many more (check out the blog post for the full list).

Windows 11 stylus writing in menus

(Image credit: Microsoft)

Windows Ink is being further bolstered by a greater level of accuracy for its recognition technology, as well as some new gesture controls. There are now gestures to select, join, or split words, to delete a word, and to insert a new line.

The Task Manager has also been tinkered with in this beta release, with Microsoft noting that it has improved process grouping in the panel that lists your running processes.

Also rolling out in this preview are notifications for Microsoft accounts on the home page of the Settings app. We’ve seen these in the past, and they’re prompts to remind you about the status of your account, and tasks you might want to finish off (though we should note we’ve not been keen on the way this has been handled in the Start menu).

Analysis: Supercharging that stylus

This is an important update for those who use a stylus, then, outside of the US, as a lot more territories across the globe are now being covered with support for writing directly in menus. This is an excellent time-saving feature for those using their convertible laptop as a tablet, for example, and it’s something Microsoft is set to develop more going forward.

Indeed, we’ve been told in the past that the eventual aim is that you’ll be able to use your stylus to write anywhere in Windows 11, which is a very cool concept.

Improved process grouping in Task Manager should be a useful little change, too, if you’re one of the Windows users who takes an interest in diving into this area of the interface. Task Manager can be a useful tool for troubleshooting what’s slowing down your PC, for example, if it seems to have hit a sticky patch.

We don’t know how the change will work yet, but more intelligent grouping of related processes should enable better visibility into what’s happening under the hood at any given time with your Windows 11 system.

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Windows 11’s new passkey feature lets you talk to the hand (or face) and kiss those annoying passwords goodbye
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Windows 11 is now introducing a new feature to the OS, which allows users to replace passwords with passkeys instead.

A recent Windows 11 Insider Preview Build (23486) lets you “use Windows Hello natively to create and sign in to supported applications and websites using passkeys, where you’ll be asked to prove your identity using a PIN, fingerprint, or face scan,” according to The Verge. 

Basically, this means that if you choose to log in using any of those three methods instead of using a password, two cryptographic keys are created instead. One is stored in your device and the other is stored in your choice of cloud storage service, which combine and grant you access to your device. These keys aren’t known to anyone, including yourself. You would simply use the login method of your choice and it does the rest.

Passkeys could truly be the future 

Though making a sound password with a combination of letters, numbers, and symbols is usually an excellent way to safeguard accounts, in recent years identity thieves have gotten much better at cracking passwords. Not to mention that many people don’t apply best practices when it comes to creating passwords.

The concept of passkeys is a great one. Using either a PIN or biometric login method, you have two passkeys created, letting you access your device safely and without having to memorize a complicated string of characters or risk having them discovered by a bad actor. 

What’s also great about them is that you have a nice variety of choices involved in your login method. Some people feel more comfortable using biometric authentication, while others like myself prefer the classic method of using a PIN instead. Regardless, the passkey functions the same way, circumventing a password in the process.

Microsoft Edge, Apple, and Google Chrome have either already supported passkeys or will later in 2023, but this Windows Hello rollout means that people can manage logins on the OS level. However, according to Bleeping Computing, there are still plenty of kinks to work out with this system right now. But hopefully, as tech giants become more accustomed to working with Windows Hello, it will eventually become a seamless feature.

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Windows XP activation has been cracked – for those desperate enough to still use it
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The activation algorithm for Windows XP has been cracked, so those stuck not being able to get the ancient operating system working can now do so – and yes, there are folks who still use this OS.

Granted, it’s a seriously slim – vanishingly so – niche of Windows users, and we’ll come back to that. For most of us, though, this is just a curiosity.

As The Register reports, the encryption algorithm for Windows XP product activation has been cracked and reimplemented, with the details provided via a tinyapps blog post.

This means anyone can now generate a valid product key to install and activate Windows XP offline.

Microsoft turned off the servers required to activate Windows XP long ago, so you can’t use a genuine old product key to activate the OS. Well, not online anyway, though from what we can see on Reddit, Microsoft still facilitated a product activation on the phone back in 2020 – and The Register reckons this way still works.

Analysis: Desperate times, desperate measures…

So, if you don’t want to get on the phone and try to persuade Microsoft to activate your Windows XP when you have a genuine product key that can’t be validated online anymore, you can simply do-it-yourself at home (or in the office) with no fuss.

Why would you ever want to use Windows XP, though? Yes, it was a much-loved operating system without a doubt, for many reasons – mainly that it was such a big step forward for performance, and the quality of the interface, over its predecessor – but it’s obviously ridiculously outdated at this point in time.

However, some people must remain on Windows XP due to legacy software or hardware that won’t work with any more modern Microsoft operating system. These are most likely businesses, who might, say, have eye-wateringly expensive machines that only work with software that runs on XP and hasn’t been updated in forever.

In those cases, this crack could prove very useful, but clearly, anyone running Windows XP is exposing themselves to a whole lot of potential pain in terms of the vulnerabilities present in the OS. Which is why if you are in this boat, whatever you do, keep that Windows XP installation offline for obvious reasons.

Are you now wondering how many Windows XP users are still out there? According to the latest from analytics firm Statcounter, XP amounts to a 0.35% userbase out of all Windows versions (not all that far behind Windows 8, Microsoft’s most recently defunct OS which is on 1.28% as of April 2023).

Cracking rusty old Microsoft operating systems appears to be quite the trend at the moment. You may recall that Windows 95’s (relatively flimsy) activation was recently hacked, with a twist – ChatGPT was fooled into generating keys that worked with the OS (in a small number of cases).

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Outlook update will give you more control over those nagging notifications
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Maintaining a healthy work-life balance can be difficult especially as notifications begin to pile up on your smartphone which is why Microsoft is rolling out a new update to its email service.

According to a new post on the Microsoft 365 roadmap, the software giant has updated its email client with new settings that make it easier to manage email notifications on mobile.

These new settings are now rolling out to smartphones running both Android and iOS so that Outlook users can stay on top of the things that matter to them and ignore the ones that don’t.

Upgrading Outlook for hybrid work

In a separate post on the Microsoft 365 roadmap, Microsoft has revealed that it will add working hours and location settings to Outlook later this summer.

Whether you’re still working from home or back at the office as part of your organization’s hybrid work model, you’ll soon be able to add your working hours and location in Outlook. This will allow your co-workers and others to know exactly when they can reach you so that they won’t need to worry about bothering you during your off hours.

Read more

> Microsoft Outlook is getting a handy new feature for mobile users in a hurry

> Microsoft Outlook will alert you if your emails aren't up to standard

> Your Microsoft Outlook calendar is going global

While this feature was initially added to the Microsoft 365 roadmap back in December of last year, it will finally become generally available beginning in June of this year.

By allowing users to more easily manage their notifications and let others know where and for how long they plan to work each day, Microsoft is giving workers the tools they need to succeed in a hybrid working world.

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Outlook update will give you more control over those nagging notifications
  • No Comments

Maintaining a healthy work-life balance can be difficult especially as notifications begin to pile up on your smartphone which is why Microsoft is rolling out a new update to its email service.

According to a new post on the Microsoft 365 roadmap, the software giant has updated its email client with new settings that make it easier to manage email notifications on mobile.

These new settings are now rolling out to smartphones running both Android and iOS so that Outlook users can stay on top of the things that matter to them and ignore the ones that don’t.

Upgrading Outlook for hybrid work

In a separate post on the Microsoft 365 roadmap, Microsoft has revealed that it will add working hours and location settings to Outlook later this summer.

Whether you’re still working from home or back at the office as part of your organization’s hybrid work model, you’ll soon be able to add your working hours and location in Outlook. This will allow your co-workers and others to know exactly when they can reach you so that they won’t need to worry about bothering you during your off hours.

Read more

> Microsoft Outlook is getting a handy new feature for mobile users in a hurry

> Microsoft Outlook will alert you if your emails aren't up to standard

> Your Microsoft Outlook calendar is going global

While this feature was initially added to the Microsoft 365 roadmap back in December of last year, it will finally become generally available beginning in June of this year.

By allowing users to more easily manage their notifications and let others know where and for how long they plan to work each day, Microsoft is giving workers the tools they need to succeed in a hybrid working world.

TechRadar – All the latest technology news

Read More

Save 25% on Cyberlink Photo Director and Director Suite to help those video projects
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Cyberlink is one of the leaders in video editing apps – from movies to wedding projects, they're a go-to in making sure that there's an easy process in getting the right edits.

PhotoDirector 365 and DirectorSuite 365 are the latest versions in its editing suites for Windows and macOS, where you can pay for a monthly or annual subscription, rivaling it against similar apps such as Adobe Creative Cloud.

With vacations and events opening up in 2022, there's going to be more opportunity to capture some moments on video, which is where Cyberlink's Suites will come in.

This is why the company is offering a discount on both of these apps until the end of April.

Cyberlink Director Suite: $ 129.99/yr $ 96.99/yr direct
Save 25% – This suite combines PowerDirector, PhotoDirector, AudioDirector, and ColorDirector into one, at 25% off the annual price. For example, you can use video editing features of Chroma Key, Keyframing Multicam in PowerDirector, and then use AudioDirector to use the Vocal Balance feature to level out the audio. If you have a project to create, edit and share from start to finish, this suite will do the job in an interface that’s easy to use, for a cheaper annual price.

Cyberlink Photo Director: $ 54.99/yr $ 40.99/yr direct
Save 25% – This is Cyberlink’s photo editing suite for beginners, but with features to make it easy for anyone to edit photos. From deblurring to layer tools, there’s plenty to use. But not only do you get a great editing suite for your photos, but you also gain access to 4,000,000 images from Shutterstock and Getty images to use for those projects.

While many go for Adobe or built-in apps such as iMovie on Apple's macOS operating system, Cyberlink is one of the few in the category where you can create a project from start to finish, and cover every area that you may have not previously considered.

Every project has to have its time to shine, regardless of whether it's a college assignment or your friend's big day for the summer, which is where a suite of apps from Cyberlink should be able to do the job on your Windows 11 laptop.

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