The Windows 10 April Update (1803): The Littlest Big Update
by Brett Howse on May 25, 2018 8:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Software
- Operating Systems
- Windows
- Microsoft
- Windows 10
Nearby Share
One feature that should be very useful to certain people is Nearby Share. This lets you quickly and easily share files between people from PC to PC, without having to send an email or use a messaging app as the transfer tool. Nearby Share works over Bluetooth or Wi-Fi, and will use Wi-Fi as the preference. In an office, this was something done via a USB drive most recently, but with wireless and Bluetooth in all modern laptops, it makes sense to leverage that to avoid a step.
It should be very useful in certain situations, and isn’t tied to an account so you can send to any nearby device. The receiver will have the option of accepting the file. It’s not on by default, but can be toggled on when needed. It’s definitely something you’d not want to leave on.
Easy Bluetooth
Windows 10 now supports a simpler Bluetooth pairing process for some devices which lets you pair devices with a single click. You’ll get a pop-up notification asking if you want to pair a device, and if you say yes, it’s all setup. Devices have to support this though, and ones that require PINs are not going to work with a single click setup.
Windows 10 S Mode
Windows 10 S launched with the Surface Laptop as its first device to offer the constrained version of Windows 10 that restricts users to only running apps from the Store. The idea was to keep people from harming themselves, and to keep performance levels where they should be, by not allowing people to just install whatever they want, and to keep apps in packages that allow for easy removal and less items running at startup. This is pretty much how any modern smartphone works of course, but the downside to it on Windows 10 was that the Microsoft Store is not known as one of the key selling features, so uptake and usuage of Windows 10 S had to be pretty small. With the April Update, this is replaced by Windows 10 in S Mode, which is just a setting that can be enabled on any PC to make it like Window 10 S was. It'll still likely never get used, but it's a much better solution than another version of the OS just for this purpose. There's reasons you'd want this of course - education being a great example - but the average consumer is choosing Windows for the legacy application support, so this new model is definitely the better way to handle it.
The drawback is that S Mode is a one-way setting at the moment. A machine can be set in S mode when imaged using an unattended.xml file and dism, but if it's set back to regular Windows 10, there's not a way to switch back and forth.
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stuffwhy - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
I'm happy to have a small, feature light update. Even if it isn't the case, it serves to make me feel that the focus is more toward the core of the software, and not bolting things on additionally. Personally, I rarely engage in any new features, especially anything in Edge, so less time interrupted by installing smaller updates is ok to me.Duncan Macdonald - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
Even better - 10 yearly intervals. Please Microsoft - leave it alone - no more interface tweaks and compatibility problems. There is no benefit to the users from the changes and there is a cost to M$ to produce them so why keep doing it.All that is wanted is bugfixes and driver updates - leave everything else alone.
(In case anyone thinks that I am saying Windows 10 is perfect - I am not - however I do not believe that it is within the capability of Microsoft to make it better - just different and worse.)
Holliday75 - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
I guess we'll see how much they value your opinion the next couple of years.ಬುಲ್ವಿಂಕಲ್ ಜೆ ಮೂಸ್ - Saturday, May 26, 2018 - link
We have been waiting 37 years to see how much they value our opinion....Are you sure its only a couple more?
BurntMyBacon - Tuesday, May 29, 2018 - link
Oh, they've shown us plenty of times in the last 37 year how much (or little) they value our opinion. Of course, we'll get to see how much they (still don't?) value our opinion in just 6 months with the next update. Though, I doubt it will be any different than the current update, or the six months prior to that, ...JCB994 - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
Is this the update from a few weeks ago? Never could get it to complete the install. Would get almost done and then suddenly uninstall. Finally downloaded an MS program to bypass updates. I have the HP Envy x360 with Ryzen 2500u. No problem downloading and installing on my other PCs (Dell Alienware Aurora R1 and Dell Precision 7510).Duncan Macdonald - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
With GDPR Microsoft will need to drastically revise their data collection. As it stands their telemetry is incompatible with GDPR as it collects data without informed consent and without the ability to say NO. A fine of 4% of their global turnover might get the Microsoft board to actually care about protecting privacy.haplo602 - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
As long as MS is collecting only non-identifiable data, they don't need any consent ....ಬುಲ್ವಿಂಕಲ್ ಜೆ ಮೂಸ್ - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
Fake News!stephenbrooks - Saturday, May 26, 2018 - link
I don't see how "all my browsing history and every task I have ever done on any of my devices including what I looked at, in chronological order" is non-personally-identifiable data.