Announcing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 25188

Announcing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 25188

Hello Windows Insiders, today we are releasing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 25188 to the Dev Channel.

TL;DR

• We are trying out a new touch keyboard setting in this build and Windows Terminal is now the default terminal.
• This build includes a good set of fixes to improve the overall experience for Windows Insiders.
• We’re also releasing another Microsoft Store update starting with Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel – details below.
• We have added a new known issue for this build where apps that rely on the .NET Framework 3.5 may be broken. If you have apps installed that use the .NET Framework 3.5 and need them to work, you may want to pause flighting and hold off updating to this build.

What’s new

Updated Touch Keyboard Settings

We are trying out a new touch keyboard setting that replaces the “Show the touch keyboard when there’s no keyboard attached” checkbox under Settings > Time & language > Typing > Touch keyboard with a new dropdown menu with 3 options to control whether tapping an edit control should launch the touch keyboard:

• “Never” suppresses the touch keyboard even when no hardware keyboard is attached.
• “When no keyboard attached” will show the touch keyboard only when the device is used as a tablet without the hardware keyboard.
• “Always” will show the touch keyboard even when the hardware keyboard is attached.

[We are beginning to roll this out, so the experience isn’t available to all Insiders just yet as we plan to monitor feedback and see how it lands before pushing it out to everyone.]

FEEDBACK: Please file feedback in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Input and Language > Touch keyboard.

Changes and Improvements

[Windows Terminal]

• Windows Terminal is now the default terminal in Windows 11. This means, all command line applications will open in Windows Terminal automatically (Command Prompt and PowerShell, for example). The setting for this change can be found via Settings > Privacy & security > For developers. Please note that Windows Terminal version 1.15 or greater is required for this feature.

[Settings]

• Updated the Wi-Fi and VPN properties pages in Settings to now include a link to advanced properties for that network.

Fixes

[Taskbar]

• Fixed an issue related to the taskbar overflow which was impacting explorer.exe reliability.

[Start]

• Fixed an issue that was causing Start’s recommended to only show one column instead of two.
• Made a fix for Narrator mistakenly reading out the search box in Start twice.
• Fixed an issue where the access keys (underlined letters) in WIN + X had duplicate definitions when an update was pending reboot.

[File Explorer]

• Fixed an issue causing a small percentage of Insiders to experience repeated explorer.exe crashes after attempting to access certain folders on their systems in the last couple Dev Channel builds.
• Fixed a recent issue where if File Explorer was open when you switched between light and dark mode, you could end up with some unreadable text / UI showing the wrong color.
• Fixed an issue that was causing explorer.exe to crash when opening folders with certain images.
• The up arrow should no longer be misaligned in File Explorer.
• Fixed an issue which could lead to not being able to unpin Desktop, Pictures, or Documents folders from Quick access.
• Fixed an underlying explorer.exe crash which could happen when File Explorer launch was aborted, for example if you were attempting to access a network share from the Run dialog, were prompted for credentials, and then clicked cancel instead of entering them.
• If the tab title is too long to display completely in the available space, hovering your mouse over it will now show a tooltip with the full name.
• Fixed an issue which could lead to explorer.exe crashing when File Explorer was closed.
• Fixed an issue causing the delete key to unexpectedly not work on files in File Explorer sometimes.
• Removed the toolbar some people were unexpectedly seeing (with View / Edit / etc) after the introduction of tabs in File Explorer. As part of this, the “always show menus” option in Folder Options was also removed which didn’t do anything.

[Search]

• Fixed an underlying crash which could lead to search not launching.
• Searching for “detect displays” will now return Display Settings.

[Input]

• Made a number of updates to emoji keywords based on feedback, including fixing that searching for apple didn’t return the red apple emoji in Korean or Polish (in the respective languages), searching for trash or garbage in English should now return the wastebasket emoji, searching for roger in English should now return the saluting face emoji, and searching for bug will now return the ladybug emoji. Please continue sharing feedback about emoji search results under Input & Language > Emoji Panel in the Feedback Hub!

[Settings]

• Fixed an issue where in certain cases removing a printer from Settings wouldn’t work.
• Fixed an issue where the DNS suffix search list entry wasn’t displaying correctly in Settings.
• Fixed an issue where the buttons for changing current view in Settings > Apps > Installed apps might unexpectedly show arrows overlaid on top.

[Task Manager]

• Updated the positioning of the View button tooltip position so it shouldn’t block the close button in the title bar anymore.
• The arrow shown when sorting processes by CPU should no longer be black on black in certain cases when using dark mode.
• Updated the selection highlight color when you select rows on the Details or Services page to be less bright and more aligned with the other colors used with the updated Task Manager design.

[Other]

• Fixed an issue leading to missing / broken characters on the Bitlocker screen when using the Japanese display language.
• Fixed an issue where the Advanced Settings of an application pool on a remote IIS server would display a blank screen.
• Fixed an issue where Steps Recorder wouldn’t close when you pressed ALT + F4.

NOTE: Some fixes noted here in Insider Preview builds from the Dev Channel may make their way into the servicing updates for the released version of Windows 11.

Known issues

[General]

• Some games that use Easy Anti-Cheat may crash or cause your PC to bugcheck.
• We’re looking into reports that audio stopped working for some Insiders after upgrading to the last flight.
• We’re investigating reports of a few different apps having started crashing in recent builds.
• [NEW] Enabling .NET Framework 3.5 from the Windows Features dialog will not work in this build. If you had it enabled prior to upgrading, it may become disabled. This will potentially lead to issues with apps that rely on these components. We’re working on a fix.

[File Explorer]

• We’re working on the fix for an issue where the search box background in File Explorer might be the opposite color of your current mode.
• We’re working on the fix for an issue where the taskbar isn’t able to display if File Explorer is maximized and you have the taskbar set to auto-hide.
• [NEW] A fix for File Explorer appearing to open and close before finally finishing drawing when launched from certain locations will be available in a future flight.

[Widgets]

• Notification badge number may appear misaligned on the taskbar.
• In some cases, the notification banner for some badging will not appear in the widgets board.

[Printing]

• We’re working on the fix for an issue in recent Dev Channel flights causing lines to not be included when printing tables from certain apps.

For developers

You can download the latest Windows Insider SDK at aka.ms/windowsinsidersdk.

SDK NuGet packages are now also flighting at NuGet Gallery | WindowsSDK which include:

• .NET TFM packages for use in .NET apps as described at ms/windowsinsidersdk
• C++ packages for Win32 headers and libs per architecture
• BuildTools package when you just need tools like MakeAppx.exe, MakePri.exe, and SignTool.exe

These NuGet packages provide more granular access to the SDK and better integrate in CI/CD pipelines.

Microsoft Store Update

We are beginning to test Microsoft Store Ads in search results. Developers interested in participating can sign up on the waitlist here.

About the Dev Channel

The Dev Channel receives builds that represent long lead work from our engineers with features and experiences that may never get released as we try out different concepts and get feedback. It is important to remember that the builds we release to the Dev Channel should not be seen as matched to any specific release of Windows and the features included may change over time, be removed, or replaced in Insider builds or may never be released beyond Windows Insiders to general customers. For more information, please read this blog post about how we plan to use the Dev Channel to incubate new ideas, work on long lead items, and control the states of individual features.

These aren’t always stable builds, and sometimes you will see issues that block key activities or require workarounds. It is important to make sure you read the known issues listed in our blog posts as we document many of these issues with each flight.

Build numbers are higher in the Dev Channel than the Windows 11 preview builds in the Beta and Release Preview Channels. You will not be able to switch from the Dev Channel to the Beta or Release Preview Channels without doing a clean install back to the released version of Windows 11 currently.

ALSO: Because the Dev and Beta Channels represent parallel development paths from our engineers, there may be cases where features and experiences show up in the Beta Channel first.

The desktop watermark you see at the lower right corner of your desktop is normal for these pre-release builds.

Important Insider Links

• Want to learn how we made Windows 11? Check out our Inside Windows 11 website to hear and meet our makers from Engineering, Design and Research to share their insights and unique perspectives throughout this journey.
• You can check out our Windows Insider Program documentation here.
• Check out Flight Hub for a complete look at what build is in which Insider channel.

Thanks,
Amanda & Brandon
Source: Announcing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 25188