Windows 10: Microsoft starts improving web apps experience on Windows 10

WinLatest · Mar 22, 2021

Microsoft has now started installing WebView2 runtime on some Windows 10 PCs to improve the web apps experience when using certain services, such as Office apps, Outlook, and Microsoft Teams.

The big idea here is to improve the quality of web apps. But web applications aren’t exactly new on Windows, so what does “WebView2 runtime” give us that is new?

According to Microsoft, WebView2 is a web control built on top of Chromium Edge and it’s the successor to the EdgeHTML-based WebView. It allows apps to access the latest web tech, which means a better web experience and performance for you.

Microsoft Edge WebView2 is used as a rendering engine to display web-related contents in your Windows apps and next-gen Microsoft 365 services will also rely on it. For example, WebView2 is required for Meeting Insights features in Outlook and it will also power Microsoft Teams “Alpha”, a new desktop client reportedly arriving later this year.

According to Microsoft’s official roadmap, the tool is installed on PCs using Microsoft 365 services only.

However, in our tests, we observed that Microsoft installed “Microsoft Edge WebView2 Runtime” on our machines where we have Office 2016 Student Edition installed, which is not a part of Microsoft 365.

Why do you need WebView2 runtime on Windows 10?

By installing WebView2 runtime on Windows 10, Microsoft will be able to provide users with Office features that look and feel the same across all form factors. According to Microsoft, Edge WebView2 runtime will also ensure a “consistent experience” for web-based contents/features in Windows 10 apps.

It’s worth noting that WebView2 is necessary for some Microsoft 365 apps and features, but it doesn’t require Microsoft Edge to be installed and it won’t change your apps, browser or search engine settings.

If it’s not active on your PC, you won’t be able to take advantage of all Microsoft products.

This is why Microsoft is forcefully installing the runtime and there’s no way to pause the rollout unless you’ve access to the advanced Group Policy editor. Remember that only PCs that are using Microsoft Office products will be impacted, at least for now.

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btarunr · Mar 22, 2021

Microsoft Announces Windows 10 Operating System

Microsoft Corp. on Tuesday unveiled its next Windows operating system, Windows 10, and gave a first look at an early technical preview for the PC available Oct. 1. The announcement highlighted advancements designed for business, including an updated user experience and enhanced security and management capabilities. The company also introduced the Windows Insider Program, kicking off its largest-ever open collaborative development effort to change the way Windows is built and delivered to best meet the needs of customers. Program participants will receive the technical preview of Windows 10 and a steady stream of builds through the development cycle to use and give feedback on.

"Windows 10 represents the first step of a whole new generation of Windows, unlocking new experiences to give customers new ways to work, play and connect," said Terry Myerson, executive vice president of the Operating Systems group at Microsoft. "This will be our most comprehensive operating system and the best release Microsoft has ever done for our business customers, and we look forward to working together with our broader Windows community to bring Windows 10 to life in the months ahead."

Windows 10: familiarity and consistency across devices
Windows 10 adapts to the devices customers are using - from Xbox to PCs and phones to tablets and tiny gadgets - and what they're doing with a consistent, familiar and compatible experience, enabling even greater productivity. Windows 10 will run across the broadest range of devices ever from the Internet of Things to enterprise datacenters worldwide. Microsoft is also delivering a converged application platform for developers on all devices with a unified app store. Developers will be able to write an application once and deploy it easily across multiple device types, making discovery, purchase and updating easier than ever for customers.

Windows 10: designed for the challenges of modern business
Windows 10 builds nearly everything that businesses need right into the core of the product - including enterprise-grade security, identity and information protection features - in ways that can reduce complexities and provide better experiences than other solutions. One area of advancement is in the work Microsoft has done with user identities to improve resistance to breach, theft or phishing. Windows 10 will also help advance data loss prevention by using containers and data separation at the application and file level, enabling protection that follows the data as it goes from a tablet or PC to a USB drive, email or the cloud.

Management and deployment have been simplified to help lower costs, including in-place upgrades from Windows 7 or Windows 8 that are focused on making device wipe-and-reload scenarios obsolete. Businesses will also have the flexibility to choose how quickly they adopt the latest innovations and influence continued improvements. In addition, organizations will be able to customize an app store specific to their needs and environment. The intent is an app store that will allow for volume app licensing, flexible distribution, and the ability for organizations to reclaim or reuse licenses when necessary.

Technical preview PC productivity
The early technical preview of Windows 10 demonstrates new levels of flexibility, navigation and familiarity through the Windows experience. Features include these:

Expanded Start menu. The familiar Start menu is back, providing quick one-click access to the functions and files that people use most, and it includes a new space to personalize with favorite apps, programs, people and websites.

Apps that run in a window. Apps from the Windows Store now open in the same format that desktop programs do. They can be resized and moved around, and have title bars at the top allowing users to maximize, minimize and close with a click.

Snap enhancements. Working in multiple apps at once is easier and more intuitive with snap improvements. A new quadrant layout allows up to four apps to be snapped on the same screen. Windows will also show other apps and programs running for additional snapping, and it will even make smart suggestions on filling available screen space with other open apps.

New Task view button. The new Task view button on the task bar enables one view for all open apps and files, allowing for quick switching and one-touch access to any desktop created.

Multiple desktops. Instead of too many apps and files overlapping on a single desktop, it's easy to create and switch between distinct desktops for different purposes and projects - whether for work or personal use.

Open and collaborative development
The introduction of the Windows Insider Program demonstrates Microsoft's continued commitment to working closely with customers to help shape the future of Windows. Windows Insiders will be able to give feedback on early builds of the product throughout the development cycle. The program will include various ways for Windows Insiders to engage in a two-way dialogue with Microsoft, including a Windows Feedback app for sharing suggestions and issues and a Windows Technical Preview Forum for interacting with Microsoft engineers and fellow Insiders. More information on the Windows Insider Program and the technical preview can be found here.

Brink · Mar 22, 2021

Improvements for Enterprises in Microsoft Edge on the Windows 10 CU

Last month, we began rolling out the Windows 10 Creators Update (Windows 10 version 1703) to over 400 million customers around the world. The Creators Update upgrades Microsoft Edge to EdgeHTML 15, including a number of performance, security, and compatibility improvements.

In this post, we’ll share a bit more detail on how the Windows 10 Creators Update makes Microsoft Edge better than ever for Enterprise customers and IT Professionals.

Management Improvements

In Windows 10 version 1703, we’ve added new policies that support key management scenarios, enabled by Mobile Device Management (MDM), Microsoft Intune, and Group Policy. In particular, we’ve focused on missing policies that were requested in your feedback.

You can find the full list of new policies for Microsoft Edge in the Available Policies topic on TechNet. Some of the highlights include:

Compatibility

We’ve often discussed compatibility for legacy sites, and how Microsoft Edge and Internet Explorer 11 can work better together to provide a modern experience, while still providing a compatible fallback for legacy experiences. Microsoft Edge and Internet Explorer provide the ability to seamlessly switch from one to the other, based on the site you’re loading, making sure your users have the best experience possible. To reinforce this approach, we’ve added these policies for better app compatibility:

Keep favorites in sync between Internet Explorer and Microsoft Edge

One of our most common requests is for a policy to Keep favorites in sync between Internet Explorer and Microsoft Edge. New in the Windows 10 version 1703, this policy setting synchronizes user favorites between the two browsers in real-time. That means that any changes you make in the Internet Explorer Favorites folder structure is also made in the Microsoft Edge Favorites database, and vice versa. Combined with the Enterprise Mode Site List, your users should never need to remember which browser to use to open a site – it should all be done automatically.

Allow Adobe Flash

Some customers have shared concerns about how to manage Adobe Flash content. Windows 10 version 1703 adds the Allow Adobe Flash policy setting to completely turn off, or disable, Adobe Flash content from running in your organization.

Adobe Flash Click-to-Run

We’re encouraging the transition to HTML5 alternatives by providing additional user control over when Flash content loads. We’ve made Microsoft Edge default to only allow Adobe Flash content to run when someone explicitly clicks on it. With this policy, you can choose to override this experience and allow Adobe Flash content to simply run,.

Customizing the experience

We’ve also added a number of policy settings that help you customize user experiences and functionality as per your enterprise policy:

Prevent the First Run webpage from opening on Microsoft Edge

This setting disables the “First Run” experience in Microsoft Edge. Your users will instead navigate straight to their default start page.

Disable lockdown of Start pages

We’ve previously provided the ability to lock down your Start pages by using the policy setting, Configure Start pages. Since then, we’ve heard feedback from a number of customers who simply wanted a configuration option, with no lock down. In Windows 10 version 1703, we’ve added an additional policy setting that you can set on top of the existing one to configure Start pages without locking them down. You can then decide whether to modify, add, or delete these Start pages.

Search

We have introduced three new policies to help you configure search providers:

Configure additional search engines: Lets you add additional search engine providers for your employees to choose from.

Set default search engine: Lets you decide the default search engine for your employees.

Allow search engine customization: Lets you decide whether to lock down your search engine configuration so your employees can’t change it.

Allow Address bar drop-down list suggestions

This policy setting lets you decide whether the Address bar drop-down functionality is available in Microsoft Edge. If you disable this setting, your employees won’t get suggested search results when typing in the Microsoft Edge suggestions list.

Allow clearing browsing data on exit

If you don’t want an employee’s browsing data to persist on the machine at the end of a browsing session, you can use this policy setting to automatically clear all browsing data when Microsoft Edge closes.

Productivity

With the Windows 10 Creators Update, we’ve introduced a number of new features and ongoing improvements to browser fundamentals, to improve the overall experience of the browser for all of your users.

Tab management

Microsoft Edge now lets your users set tabs aside for later, sweeping them aside and organizing them neatly in a special section for easy access at a later time. We’ve also made it easier to glance at the content of all open tabs by simply clicking the “show tab previews” icon, which will expand the tab bar to show a preview of each open tab.

Fundamentals

Made for the modern web, with available support for the legacy web

Microsoft Edge stays up-to-date. with support for the latest web standards that are driving today’s websites and web apps, giving you a browser that “just works” with modern sites. The Edge Developer Center also provides guidance and tools to help developers update their sites to use modern standards.

We understand that migrating your sites to modern web standards can be a long-term process. Using Enterprise Mode with Internet Explorer for backward compatibility can help you upgrade more easily. We’re also making it easier for you to manage your Enterprise Mode site lists. If your site list is of a relatively small size, using the Enterprise Mode Site List Manager is the easiest way to manage your Enterprise Mode Site List. If your if your site list is relatively large and requires multiple users to work on it, we recommend using the Enterprise Mode Site List Portal.

More efficient, more responsive and more secure

In a recent blog post, we talked in detail about the work done to make Microsoft Edge more efficient, responsive, and secure in the Windows 10 Creators Update. Some of the highlights are:

We’ve improved battery efficiency, so when your users are mobile with their laptops or Surface devices, they will get more out of their battery, improving productivity on the go.

Microsoft Edge is now faster and more responsive, even when the page may be busy or hung, by prioritizing the user’s input.

We’ve introduced Arbitrary Code Guard and Code Integrity Guard to help protect users from exploits that aim to load malicious code into memory, and dramatically improved the Microsoft Edge sandbox, cutting the attack surface available by up to 90% in some areas.

Conclusion

The Windows 10 Creators Update (version 1703) makes life easier for you as an Enterprise administrator or IT professional, introducing a number of new policies and improvements to reduce the overhead of supporting both Microsoft Edge and Internet Explorer 11. It also improves the end-user experience considerably, with new features and improved fundamentals for a more productive and enjoyable experience on the web.

If you’re on a Windows 10 device, you can simply check for updates to try the Windows 10 Creators Update today – see the instructions here for more details.

Puneet Arora, Principal Program Manager, Microsoft Edge
Click to expand...

Source: Improvements for Enterprises in Microsoft Edge on the Windows 10 Creators Update - Microsoft Edge Dev Blog

Ahhzz · Mar 22, 2021

Windows 10 Tweaks

As you may already know, Windows 10 (as well as Windows 8) allow you to log in with a valid Microsoft account, instead of creating a local account that only works on your machine. However, you may prefer to keep a local account for privacy reasons. If you do, though, some Windows 10 features—like Cortana—may not work. Despite the default behavior, the Windows 10 Store is not one of them. You can still log in to your Microsoft account for just the Store without switching to a full Microsoft account. The process, however, is not terribly obvious. To do so, follow these steps:

Launch the Store from your Start menu.

Click the user icon next to the search box.

Click “Sign-in” from the menu that appears.

Choose “Microsoft account” and log in like normal.

When the “Make it yours” box appears do not enter your password. Instead, click “Sign in to just this app instead.”

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Windows 10: Microsoft starts improving web apps experience on Windows 10

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