I’m glad to say my arm’s better now. But I’ve got a question for you: How would you celebrate an anniversary?
Flowers? A meal out? Maybe a nice bottle of wine (we had a lovely bottle of Chianti the other day – probably the nicest Chianti I’ve ever had). All sound good to me.
But not Microsoft – they do things differently.
It’s a year now since WIndows 10 was launched and Microsoft have decided to celebrate by bringing out an update to it.
They really know how to celebrate there!
Anyway, if you have Windows 10, you’ll be getting the update shortly – it’s becoming available on the 2nd August (that’s tomorrow if you’re reading this the day I sent it).
This isn’t just one little update like you get all the time through Windows Update (though it will happen automatically through Windows Update) – it’s a package of lots of changes and tweaks put together and Microsoft have made quite a splash about it.
I’ve had a look through what they’ve included. It’s mostly really sensible little tweaks that lots of people have been asking for. A lot of them you’d probably never even notice.
For example they’ve improved the way Cortana (that’s the bit that you can talk to, to tell it to set reminders and so on) works, especially if you also use a Smartphone. You can have an app for it on your phone and it’ll give you the same reminders on your phone and your PC. Useful if you need it – but most people will probably never notice that this has changed.
There’s also a “Dark mode” that is designed for using in dim light, so the screen isn’t as bright because there aren’t big chunks of white or pale grey. Easier on the eyes if you’re using a device in dim light and it can also save power.
They’ve also improved the way tiles in the start menu work. They’re called “live” tiles and (for example) the news one will show you headlines before you even click on it. In the past if one was interesting and you clicked on it, it would open the news app but wouldn’t take you to the article about that headline that you’d seen and clicked on, so you had to hunt for it. Now it’s possible for apps to be written so that it will take you straight to the specific thing the tile was showing when you clicked on it. Much better.
There’s one big tweak in the start menu, if you can have a big tweak. You don’t have to click on “All Apps” to get the list of all the apps – it’s there as soon as you open the start menu. And some of the options that used to be taking up lots of space in writing now have little symbols on the left instead. For example, to get to settings, you click on a little cogwheel symbol.
This makes it a bit quicker to get to your apps – instead of having to click on All apps each time, you’re straight into it.
And there are lots of other smaller tweaks.
The update might take a while to download and I would think not everyone will get it at exactly the same time, so don’t panic if you don’t get it straight away. But also don’t worry if you see your PC saying something about an “Anniversary Update” – I’d just let it go ahead.
Overall, I think it’s a fairly good update. It’s not ground-breaking – but it rounds off a few of the jagged edges of Windows 10.
On the other hand, Julie, if you’re reading this, when it’s our anniversary, I still think I’d prefer a nice bottle of wine…
A quick tip for iPads, other tablets and smartphones
Most people who have a tablet (or smartphone) know that if you’re reading something on the web and you want to make it bigger, you can touch the screen with two fingers and pull them apart, as if you’re stretching whatever’s on the screen.
(And if you didn’t know, you do now!)
But there’s also another way that can be convenient – if you’re reading something and the text doesn’t fill the screen, maybe because there’s a big margin or there’s a column of pictures next to the text.
Just double tap (that’s tap once and then straight away tap again) on the text. Make sure you’re not tapping on a link, just a bit of text.
It should zoom in so that text fills the width of the screen, so it’s just the right width to make it easy to read.
I look forward to receiving the update in due course. Meantime, when Windows Live Mail was discontinued, we were told to use Mail. This is rubbish and not nearly as versatile or easy to use as Live Mail. Is there any chance that Microsoft will sort things out? I know other people are fed up with it.
I agree with you – I’m not impressed with Mail either. Microsoft seem to be quite pleased with it, though, so I’m not sure they’ll do anything about it.
You might want to consider using Mozilla Thunderbird – it’s a bit more like Live Mail and it can be downloaded free from https://www.mozilla.org/en-GB/thunderbird/.
Tim
I loaded windows 10 on my computer on 28/07 it took almost 3 hours to download because Microsoft said all my files and everything else would be the same as windows 7. Wow I was in for a shock after the download, the picture on my screen was massive, I altered the resolutions which only had 3 settings against 8 on windows 7 none of the setting would would shrink the picture to fit my screen. I could not get into my emails all I got on the screen was you email address as become inactive, none of my games would play or my music I had stored on my files, the printer would not operate after fiddling about with the settings the printer started to work but would not stop I had to switch it of on the machine itself. the last resort I asked my son to have a look at the computer he works in computers everyday he could not sort it so he pressed a button and within 10 minutes I had windows 7 back working perfect. No more windows 10 for me.
No , I have a very nice bottle of wine every day NOT just anniversaries.
We have not had password for august club yet
Hello
it was definitely sent out to you (I’ve just checked that it was sent to your email address) – it might be worth checking in your junk or spam folder in case it’s been put in their by your email program. If you don’t have it your best bet is to email us on [email protected] and we can send it out again (I don’t want to put it here as other people could see it who aren’t members!)
Tim
Great tip to increase the text size for iPad