The World According to Mitch

Last night I was pleased to hear that, as predicted, Windows 10 version 1809 dropped at the Microsoft Surface event in New York City.  While it may or may not be available for you via Windows Update this morning, I downloaded the ISO yesterday and went right to work.  Well, to be more specific, I skipped my lunch break and went right to it.

As I wrote earlier in the week, my first use case for the new version of Windows 10 (1809, the October 2018 Update, or Redstone 5) will be for my Windows to Go key, which stopped working with my primary device when I updated the firmware recently.  I was concerned because, in the past, you were not always able to create a Windows to Go key from an operating system running an earlier build.  Fortunately that does not seem to be the case from 1803, and I was able to get it going.

The feature that most people seem to be talking about is the dark theme for File Explorer, which is enabled using the Colors page under the Personalization section of Settings.  Okay, it is nice that we have the choice… but this is something I experimented with many years ago using third-party tools, and I decided that the default scheme is just fine by me.  I will not be making this jump.

Something that will be big for developers, especially cross-platform types, is the new option to Open Linux shell here, in the File Explorer expanded context (Shift + Right-Click).

Something I hope I remember to use, because I have often thought how useful it would be, is the Clipboard History feature.  Press Windows Key + V, and you will see what you have copied to the clipboard before.  For the security conscious among us, there is an option to Clear All in that menu, which will be useful when sharing machines.  Additionally, there is a Clipboard page in Windows Settings, where you can modify the settings for the Clipboard, including synchronizing across devices.  Cool.

There is a new Game Bar and Game Mode feature that I have heard discussed.  As someone who never plays games on his PC, I cannot address this… but I have heard that in this new mode you will not be interrupted for system maintenance such as Windows Updates.  Feel free to try it on your own 😉

I like that the Bluetooth and other devices page under Settings now displays the battery level of connected devices.  I hate when I am watching a movie on a flight (using my Bluetooth beadset) and the batteries die… this will give me warning to charge them when needed.

Also under Settings, the different networks will show Data Usage, allowing you to monitor in case you are tethered to a network such as a cellular phone.  You can also see usage per app, in case some of your background applications are using more data than you expected.

HD Color has been introduced to the Windows Settings page. For those who are video fans, this should be a nice addition.

There are a lot of new features being added to Narrator, for people who use it.  As well, Speech, Inking, and Typing is being split into two pages under Settings, with Speech getting its own context page.

I will not pretend to be a big fan of the extended emojis available with Unicode 11 (there are apparently 157 new emojis, including superheroes and redheads).  As a forty-six year old man I occasionally use the 🙂 and 😦 emoticons… and I don’t concern myself with the Unicode graphics of them.

For those of us who use tablets and hybrid devices, the on-screen keyboard now includes SwiftKey intelligence, so you can swipe from letter to letter, rather than lifting your finger and tapping every key.  It learns your writing style, and will give you more accurate auto-corrections and predictions over time.

There is more to Windows 10 1809, and over the next few weeks I am sure I will address more of them in this space.  In the meantime, I invite you all to try it for yourself, whether in a virtual machine (download the ISO and create a VM), or on your production machine (either from Windows Update, or downloading the ISO and reinstalling your OS.  It will be interesting to see