Software & Apps - Page 45

Windows 11 has a bug that's reportedly causing some VPNs (using one specific protocol) to run very sluggishly, and Microsoft has said it's now looking into the matter.

The issue has been reported on Reddit (and other forums online), having started in the cumulative update for May that rolled out last week. (Technically, it began in the preview of that update which was deployed late in April for Windows 11 22H2).

This problem seemingly affects L2TP/IPsec connections, not the most used VPN protocol (that would be the likes of OpenVPN and WireGuard).

Microsoft has finally got round to fixing a bug that broke Spotify integration with its Focus Sessions feature on Windows 11.

That feature is something Panos Panay, Chief Product Officer, and VP Microsoft Devices, tweeted very enthusiastically about back in 2021.

Indeed, Panay called Focus Sessions (fired up via the Windows Clock app) a "game-changer," with Spotify integration being part of what made it so great.

Mac users who also have WhatsApp at the center of their messaging world can now take advantage of a new addition to the app - so long as they're using the latest beta version.

WhatsApp has been making some changes to the way its Mac app works in recent weeks and now a new report suggests that it is working on bringing group calling to the Mac app as well.

The WhatsApp beta watchers at WABetaInfo report that the previous version of the WhatsApp app on the Mac didn't allow group calls to be initiated with the button simply not working. Now however, a new beta appears to have improved matters with the button fully functional for some beta testers.

With Valve making big changes to the Steam client and more coming, the company is looking to make it easier for users to opt in and check out upcoming updates via the Steam Client Beta. The new one-click opt-in will make it easier for anyone to jump in and check out what's on the Steam horizon, in a move that is essentially Valve asking the community for additional help as it preps the next major update.

And the latest update is pretty big, with several under-the-hood changes to the app's code covering the Steam Desktop Client, Big Picture mode, and Steam Deck.

The in-game overlay is getting a massive overhaul, too, with Valve noting that "originally created to be a quick way to chat with friends or check on game-related questions or content, we've built a brand-new user interface, adding new utility and allowing for more customizability."

Windows 11 is going rusty, and we don't mean that someone left the operating system out in the rain for too long - rather that Rust is now part of the OS in a fresh plan being enacted by Microsoft to bolster security levels.

As tweeted by Mark Russinovich, CTO of Microsoft Azure, Windows 11 testers are now using builds of the operating system which have Rust in the Windows kernel (as denoted by the 'rs' in the above screenshot).

What is Rust? It's code that offers a greater level of security than C++, and Microsoft is introducing it to the kernel to beef up memory safety in particular. Tackling that aspect is a big thing, as a good deal of zero-day exploits come about due to bugs in memory handling.

WhatsApp users who also happen to own a wearable powered by Wear OS now have a new option with the instant messaging outfit sharing a beta for its upcoming app.

WhatsApp is already one of the most popular instant messaging platforms on the planet thanks to its secure and cross-platform capabilities. But now it's testing a Wear OS app that can be used on the Pixel Watch, Galaxy Watch 5, and other Wear OS-powered wearables.

The app is only available in beta right now which means that you should probably expect there to be the odd problem here and there, but getting it installed is pretty simple - just head to the WhatsApp Google Play entry. From there it's just a case of signing up for the beta and installing it.

RAM disks were a thing back when high-speed drives didn't exist, offering people improved speeds for specific tasks and operations. They're not intended to run fully-fledged operating systems like Windows 11, but this example is impressive.

Tiny11 is a lightweight version of Windows 11 that removes the bloat and strips the OS back to a size that can run on modest hardware. Recently we reported on a version called Live11 that managed to squeeze Windows 11 on a 4GB USB drive that could run on RAM without installation.

And with the ability to turn the VRAM of any GPU into a RAM drive, Tiny11 developers NTDEV have done just that and were able to get its cut-down version of Windows 11 running on a GeForce RTX 3050 Laptop GPU with only 4GB of VRAM.

Gmail users will soon see a blue checkmark beside senders that have been verified by Google, hopefully reducing the chances of someone falling foul of scams like phishing.

The new move is part of an expansion of the existing Brand indicators for Message Identification system that is behind something you might already have noticed - some email senders have their company's logo instead of the usual first character of their name. That's all part of making it easier to tell who is real and who isn't, and a new checkmark is part of that program.

It's all made possible by strong authentication based on DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance), Google says, and the blue checkmark will be immediately recognizable to anyone who ever used Twitter or another social network.

WhatsApp has long allowed people to move their chats from one device to another, but it required that they use iCloud as the middleman for that data. And that was fine for people who had the iCloud storage to spare or didn't have a ton of chats with a lot of media. But for everyone else, it was a problem.

Now, it seems that WhatsApp is working on fixing that by giving people another option entirely.

According to the WhatsApp watchers at WABetaInfo, the latest beta version of the iPhone WhatsApp app allows people to transfer their chats directly, without the need for any intermediaries. Instead, they simply scan a QR code on the donor iPhone and the chats automatically begin to sync to the new device.

Creatives like to be able to use creative apps, and Final Cut Pro is one of those that video editors rely on every day. The lack of a Final Cut Pro iPad app has long meant that some people haven't been able to use the tablet as their work machine. While there are other video editing apps available for iPadOS, Final Cut Pro is a biggie. Now, a new rumor claims that it's coming to Apple's tablets.

If the rumor turns out to be true Apple will ship a desktop-class version of its Final Cut Pro video editing app in 2024, with Logic Pro following. Logic Pro is Apple's audio creation tool and that too would be a huge addition to the App Store on the iPad.

However, it's important to remember that this is an early leak and it's one that we're not 100% sold on. Not only does the leaker say that Final Cut Pro is coming, but they went on to clarify that the version that ships on the iPad will be a 1:1 copy of the Mac version which, frankly, seems unlikely.

If you're a fan of GIFs - and really, who isn't? - you're probably already acutely aware that WhatsApp hates them. Well, that might be about to change with the news that a big change is coming to the way the popular instant messaging app will handle those little animated pictures.

Like, it's actually going to animate them.

See, WhatsApp has long supported GIFs but the problem was that you had to tap them to see them animated the way that they were always intended to. However, WhatsApp is working to change all of that with the company now rolling out a beta version that automatically plays animated GIFs for you.

Windows 11 might just be picking up some pace when it comes to attracting new users, at least according to the latest set of figures from one analytics firm.

Statcounter has furnished us with the statistics for April 2023 showing the relative market share of the various versions of Windows. Microsoft will doubtless be pleased to see Windows 11 hitting a market share of 23.11%, representing an increase of 2.16% on the previous month.

That's a heftier uptick than we've seen for some time, and it builds upon the momentum of last month, too. In March 2023, Windows 11 also drove forward to the tune of 1.81%, giving the OS a cumulative gain of nearly 4% in two months.

A new Windows client roadmap update has confirmed that the latest Windows 10 version currently available, 22H2, "will be the final version of Windows 10." Microsoft also confirms that the operating system will reach its end of life in support on October 25, 2025.

What does this mean for millions of Windows 10 users? Monthly security updates will arrive from now until this date, meaning you'll need to make an OS switch at some point between now and then. We won't be surprised if Microsoft extends security updates beyond the late 2025 date. By that same token, Windows 12 is coming sooner than expected, with reports pointing to a 2024 release.

22H2 being the "final" version of Windows 10 is surprising, though, as this significant update dates back to October 2022. We would have expected this announcement to arrive after another major release for the OS.

Instant messaging app WhatsApp is going to make it easier for people to post content to their Facebook Stories according to a new report.

The Meta-owned company is getting ready to help people post on another Meta-owned company's Stories feature, with the feature already in testing and available to some people who are using the latest beta version of the app.

That app is now available for Android users so long as they have the new feature enabled on their accounts. Once it is they'll be able to quickly and easily turn their WhatsApp Status into a Facebook Stories posting with the whole thing happening automatically. All they have to do is sign into their Facebook account from within the WhatsApp app and away they go.

WhatsApp users could soon have a new way to listen to voice messages. In fact, they might not need to listen to them at all.

That's because WhatsApp is now testing a feature that lets people have their voice messages transcribed for them on-the-fly, so they can still learn what was being said without having to listen to the message itself. That could be a huge deal for people who work somewhere they can't easily listen or simply wouldn't be able to hear for whatever reason.

The new feature isn't yet available to the public but the beta watchers at WABetaInfo say that it is now in the hands of beta testers who have the latest WhatsApp TestFlight version installed. However, it isn't yet available to everyone and it appears to be limited to specific accounts.

Proton has just added another app to its growing library of products focusing on tight privacy and security, and the latest offering is a password manager.

It'll come as no surprise that the name is Proton Pass, fitting in with the likes of Proton Mail (security-focused encrypted email), Proton Drive (secure cloud storage locker) and Proton VPN (no prizes for guessing what that is).

Note that Proton Pass is still a limited beta right now on iOS and Android (plus there are browser extensions for Chrome and Brave), and it argues a strong case for upping its levels of protection in comparison to your average password manager.

Windows 11 just had a new preview build drop that comes with some beneficial changes on the power front for laptops.

Preview build 25346 landed in the Canary channel and came with fresh work on an existing feature, Content Adaptive Brightness Control (CABC).

This intelligently adjusts the brightness of your display according to the content being shown, allowing for dimming some areas and therefore saving a bit of power (it all adds up over time).

MSI Afterburner is one of the most popular tools for tweaking and overclocking GPU hardware and monitoring performance, power, temperatures, and overall stability. Earlier this year, we reported on the news that the future of the app was uncertain due to a tech ban on Russia, which is where MSI Afterburner developer Alexey Nicolaychuk, aka "Unwinder," is based.

At the time, MSI advised that it was looking to resolve the issue of being unable to pay Alexey for this work. With today's release of MSI Afterburner 4.6.5, the popular tuning app sees its first major official update in a long time. In addition to adding official support for NVIDIA GeForce RTX 40 Series and AMD Radeon RX 7900 Series graphics cards, it also adds power monitoring support for future AMD and NVIDIA GPUs. Plus, hardware monitoring for Intel Arc GPUs.

It's great to see MSI Afterburner back with a stable and official update, alongside MSI and Alexey figuring out a way to continue development on the app. MSI Afterburner 4.6.5 brings a lot of changes, updates, new support, and improvements. There are even new Windows 11-themed skins.

Microsoft has released DirectStorage 1.2 as part of the DirectStorage SDK, bringing several new features to the technology designed to improve game load times. Namely, support for older hard drives in the form of a new ability to open files in buffered mode that will benefit from "OS file buffering features."

What's DirectStorage? Well, it's a Microsoft technology designed to help games load faster with the aid of NVMe storage and PCIe Gen 4 speeds. With the visual fidelity of games increasing and things like textures, character models, and other files getting larger, handling all of that data can be a challenge.

DirectStorage bypasses the need for game files and decompression to go from an SDD to RAM to the CPU and GPU. It shifts the load to the GPU so files and data can be quickly decompressed and accessed. It's similar to Microsoft's Xbox Velocity Architecture that debuted with the Xbox Series X|S, which led to games loading in seconds versus upwards of a minute or longer.

Instagram has long been a very good way for people to share their photos and short videos but there's one thing that it has been particularly bad at - letting people share links to their websites and other profiles. Now, not so much.

In a change that means people won't need alternative arrangements like LinkTree, Instagram now allows people to put up to five different links in their profile for the first time. Previously, that number of links was very limited but this change isn't perfect.

As some people are already starting to notice, Instagram might now let you put up to five links into your profile but people will only actually see one of them. The profile shows the first link and then says that there are x other links available to be viewed. The result is that people have to tap that to open the list of links which, frankly, isn't ideal.