Windows 10: Apps disappeared, unable to maximize open applications.

Newly assembled gaming pc. All part work as intended or so it seems. Downloaded discord, steam, and apex legends. Periodically all applications on desktop disappear. All apps that are “open” or “running” are minimized at the bottom of the screen. I am unable to maximize them. This is my first PC build, I am confused. Anything helps.

:)

 

Why has the maximize button disappeared in one of my apps?

I'm using an application called Postman. My practice, whenever I want to make an app maximized, is to drag the window to the top of the screen/monitor. That maximizes it, then I go about my business. But importantly, the minimize, maximize, and close buttons always remain available.

Well, for some reason today when I did that to Postman, the maximize button disappeared. The minimize and close buttons are both still there, it's just the maximize button which has disappeared. Furthermore, all other apps still have the minimize, maximize, and close buttons. So, why is it that Postman has lost the maximize button?

 

The Photos app and its window-maximization weirdness

When opening most applications in Windows, Windows is supposed to figure out whether the application's window is to start maximized, or not maximized (I don't know if there is a proper word for "not-maximized". Floating, maybe?). Usually, if an application gets closed while it's window is maximized, then that same application's window will be maximized the next time it gets started up. This is also the case when opening more than one instance of an application: if an app's window is maximized, and you open another instance of that same app (so that they are both running at the same time), then the new instance's window will also be maximized. Microsoft recently pushed the latest version (2023.11090.12017.0) of the Photos app upon my machine, and this new version apparently deviates from the normal maximized-or-not-maximized paradigm. If I open an image in Photos, maximize the window (if it is not alreadly), close Photos, and then open it again, the window will be maximized, as it should be. However, if at this point I open another image (so that there are now two images opened), the second image will not be maximized. It will be floating. Any subsequent images that I open will also be floating. This is very frustrating for me because I open lots of images simultaneously, and I now have to click maximize on each one. Does anyone else experience this? Is this a bug, or a feature?

 

Mail app will not open on 10041.

Hello Adam,

This is the suggested solution below if you haven't already tried it.

In this Windows 10 build 10041, the Mail, Calendar, and People apps may be broken due to a licensing issue with the Store Beta. To get these apps working again, you need to follow these steps:

• Open powershell as administrator
• Run the command Get-appxprovisionedpackage –online | where-object {$_.packagename –like “*windowscommunicationsapps*”} | remove-appxprovisionedpackage –online
• Re-install Mail, People and Calendar from the Store (green tile)