New Windows 11 Insider Build Supports Third-Party Widgets, Slick New Teams Video Feature (theverge.com) 33
Microsoft is rolling out support for third-party widget development and new video calling functions for Chat from Microsoft Teams in its latest developer build of Windows 11. The new features in Preview Build 25217 are available for folks enrolled in the Windows Insider program. The Verge reports: Now, developers can create and test widgets that can be added to the Windows 11 widgets panel. New third-party widgets can only be tested locally on the latest Insider Preview build for now, but can later appear in the Microsoft Store for the shipping version of their apps once the build is formally released to the public. Microsoft says that Widgets can only be created for packaged Win32 apps at this time, but support for Progressive Web App (PWA) Widgets is planned as part of Microsoft Edge 108.
The Insider preview also includes a sneak peek (for a limited group of Insiders) at a new video calling experience for Chat from Microsoft Teams on Windows 11. When you open Chat from the taskbar, you'll soon be able to see a preview of your own video feed, allowing you to fix your appearance or spot any background issues before starting a call. Microsoft hopes to make this experience more broadly available in the coming months, but a 'small subset of users' will already have access to the feature as part of a sneak preview release. You can launch Chat from your Windows 11 taskbar yourself to check if you're one of the lucky few selected.
The Insider Preview Build 25217 also contains a few other feature updates, including improved cloud suggestions and integrated search suggestions for Simplified Chinese, and some design changes to the Microsoft Store. Now, the store makes it clearer if a game is included as part of Game Pass to spare you from accidentally purchasing a game you may have free access to. The Game Pass library is also getting a performance boost and some more simplified options.
The Insider preview also includes a sneak peek (for a limited group of Insiders) at a new video calling experience for Chat from Microsoft Teams on Windows 11. When you open Chat from the taskbar, you'll soon be able to see a preview of your own video feed, allowing you to fix your appearance or spot any background issues before starting a call. Microsoft hopes to make this experience more broadly available in the coming months, but a 'small subset of users' will already have access to the feature as part of a sneak preview release. You can launch Chat from your Windows 11 taskbar yourself to check if you're one of the lucky few selected.
The Insider Preview Build 25217 also contains a few other feature updates, including improved cloud suggestions and integrated search suggestions for Simplified Chinese, and some design changes to the Microsoft Store. Now, the store makes it clearer if a game is included as part of Game Pass to spare you from accidentally purchasing a game you may have free access to. The Game Pass library is also getting a performance boost and some more simplified options.
Slick? (Score:4)
Absolutely nothing about Microsoft Teams is "slick".
(and when are they going to remove the 's' from the end of the name)
Re: (Score:2)
I think I have been invited to a Teams meeting once, but if I remember the experience correctly, and having used Zoom and Skype in the past, I still find Google Meet to be the easiest and best for informal use.
Almost everyone has a Gmail account, or knows someone that does, so I'm surprised that Meet isn't used more frequently. Even free Gmail accounts can create a free meeting with up to 100 participants for up to 60 minutes. The ability for everyone to share their screen, share documents, and the audio/
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In my circle of acquaintances and relatives, there are almost no GMail accounts. Probably because most of them, myself included, are old enough to have their email address long before GMail existed, and for most of them, whatever they may think of Google, the appearance of a new email provider has never been reason enough to get a new email address.
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Almost everyone has a Gmail account, or knows someone that does, so I'm surprised that Meet isn't used more frequently.
Even if that were true it is irrelevant. Everyone with Windows 11 will have Teams already installed and already linked to their account (regardless of who hosts it). People overwhelmingly use what they have rather than seek out what is ideal or best suited for what they want to do.
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Almost everyone has a Gmail account, or knows someone that does
Yep I have my own domain. I handed out some business cards last week and about three people asked me if the email address was correct.
Quote: "But it doesn't end in gmail.com".
You can't make this up...
Re: (Score:3)
I really can't understand how Teams is so bad. Presumably they use it at Microsoft, so you'd have though some of the developers would have been motivated to improve it for their own benefit.
A lot of the improvements should be pretty simple. Basic stuff like scrolling down to show new messages when they come in.
Then again the Start Menu and Windows Search have been crap for decades so I guess it's something institutional at Microsoft.
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I really can't understand how Teams is so bad.
Want to suffer?
Wait 'til three or four companies have all added you to their "team".
Teams and Windows 11 are shit (Score:4)
Teams and Windows 11 are shit, and everyone knows it. Itâ(TM)s not âoeslickâ or even vaguely usable.
Stop promoting this trash, Slashdot.
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Teams and Windows 11 are shit, and everyone knows it. Itâ(TM)s not âoeslickâ or even vaguely usable.
Stop promoting this trash, Slashdot.
Thank you. No mod points, so I'll simply agree. We've been having ongoing issues with people on Teams calls sounding gibberish or even losing connections. Oddly it only happens for people who are in the buidling connecting to a Teams call. If they are on VPN there is no issue.
As for Windows 11, we are rolling it out now. I have a system set up for my team to acquaint themselves with it and all I can is say is whoever thought this abomination was remotely a good idea should be taken out behind the chemical
Shameless much? (Score:4)
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No one said Teams is slick. Maybe try reading the headline again. Having a slick feature does not mean the underlying software can't be an incredible piece of shit.
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Even the feature isn't that slick. They're not the first to have a prompt come up showing your video and giving you the opportunity to test your audio before you connect to the call.
Does it Have Slickest Feature of ALL? (Score:4, Funny)
What about fixing security and updates? (Score:2, Troll)
No? Well, I can understand that. These things are completely unimportant, after all. Got to have these bling-bling features, they are what _really_ counts!
In other news, MS has lost all vision and skills regarding Windows development and they do not care. They have given up and now only work on the looks. Unfortunately, putting lipstick on a pig does not do much.
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I get a huge kick out of this windows gadget shit when the last time they had windows gadgets (in windows 7) they eventually discontinued them because they couldn't make them secure. Now they're making them again, and I predict it's going to go just like it did last time.
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Yes, probably. MS is not in this for good engineering or for learning from mistakes. In fact, they avoid both like the plague.
They've reinvented Vista's gadgets (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, developers can create and test widgets that can be added to the Windows 11 widgets panel. New third-party widgets can only be tested locally on the latest Insider Preview build for now,
In other words these are 2007-era Windows Vista desktop gadgets with the first two letters of the name changed. OK, the tech will be slightly different because fifteen years have passed, but their great innovation for Windows 11 is to dig up the corpse of something they copied from Apple/Linux in 2007? They've really completely run out of ideas, haven't they?
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They've really completely run out of ideas, haven't they?
Isn't that a good thing? We all know Slashdot loves changes from new ideas in desktop OS design. /SARCASM (yes in all caps).
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FWIW they aren't the same technology as desktop gadgets, which were html/js like the Konqueror widgets they were ripping off. Those kept escaping their sandboxes so Microsoft shitcanned the whole thing because they were based on Aieee! and there was no way to secure that.
Microsoft originally didn't allow Windows 11 Widgets from any source but Microsoft when they introduced the feature, but announced eventual third party support in May [howtogeek.com]. Widgets are based on Adaptive Cards [adaptivecards.io], which on Windows is backed by UWP,
Now that windows 11 has become macos X (Score:2)
Re:Now that windows 11 has become macos X (Score:4, Interesting)
Microsoft isn't forcing you to use the Windows store yet. You can still get programs from wherever you want and they still have dramatically better backwards compatibility than OSX.
Apple also has an app store for OSX, and is probably more likely than Microsoft to actually force users to use it someday.
Jumping ship from Microsoft to Apple for freedom is like jumping off a log and onto a crocodile for long-term safety in Frogger. You're just going to have to jump again.
Re: Win32??? (Score:3)
Backwards compatibility. I don't imagine we will ever see 32 really die. By the time we have 128 bit ops, we will still have business users running legacy 32 bit apps.
Alienating those users is probably a valueless equation.
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The API is still called Win32 even when using a 64-bit instruction set. It's a fundamental change from the old Win16 API.
Microsoft and OEMs (Score:2)
There's nothing slick about Teams. OEMs probably love it.
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Enterprises love it because it comes with the O365 subscription they're already paying for, and the people making the decisions on that often aren't the ones actually using it. The enterprises don't want to pay for Slack subscriptions on top of O365, or for any of the other conference call services.
I'd prefer they focus on the bugs in 22H2 first (Score:1)
Video preview for chat is slick? (Score:2)
Might Pass On Windows 11, Entirely (Score:2)
How about moving taskbar to left/right instead? (Score:2)
What an absolute fucking abomination the taskbar is right now. Absolutely unusable on anything close to widescreen. It's just so stupid on 16:9 and 21:9 screens.
MammaMiaCovers (Score:1)