Windows 10 only tasks

As Windows 10 evolves, tasks are being added that have no counterpart in Windows 7, and so cannot be repaired after reversion. These tasks are reported as not installed by a Scan, and attempts to Repair them fail. They are already effectively in an unplugged state, and will not interfere with the operation of the Task Scheduler. They can be safely left alone, or, if you want to tidy up, deleted from System32\Tasks.

The current list of such tasks is:

Microsoft\Windows\AppID\EDP Policy Manager Microsoft\Windows\AppID\SmartScreenSpecific Microsoft\Windows\CertificateServicesClient\AikCertEnrollTask Microsoft\Windows\CertificateServicesClient\CryptoPolicyTask Microsoft\Windows\CertificateServicesClient\KeyPreGenTask Microsoft\Windows\Location\WindowsActionDialog Microsoft\Windows\MemoryDiagnostic\RunFullMemoryDiagnostic Microsoft\Windows\Shell\FamilySafetyMonitor Microsoft\Windows\Shell\FamilySafetyRefresh Microsoft\Windows\Shell\IndexerAutomaticMaintenance Microsoft\Windows\Time Synchronization\ForceSynchronizeTime

Thanks to jthomas11, who reported this list. Below, for each task, I give the description shown in Task Scheduler in Windows 10, and the executable that implements their action. For most of them, Task Scheduler merely shows ‘Custom Handler’, and won’t give you any more detail than that. But if you look in the XML file, it gives a GUID that leads via the registry to a DLL implementing the action, which is what I list.

Almost none of the executables implementing the actions appear on a Windows 7 system, which is pretty good evidence that the tasks did not exist. The only exception is System32\srchadmin.dll, which is used by Microsoft\Windows\Shell\IndexerAutomaticMaintenance. However, it does not register the COM object invoked in Windows 10. The earliest references that I can find to this task are from Windows 8; I think that the Windows 7 indexing service did not implement it.

Microsoft\Windows\AppID\EDP Policy Manager This task performs steps necessary to configure Enterprise Data Protection System32\AppLockerCsp.dll I think that this feature was added in Windows 10

Microsoft\Windows\AppID\SmartScreenSpecific Task that collects data for SmartScreen in Windows. system32\apprepsync.dll Windows 8 introduced SmartScreen filtering at the desktop level, performing reputation checks by default on any file or application downloaded from the Internet

Microsoft\Windows\CertificateServicesClient\AikCertEnrollTask This task enrolls a certificate for Attestation Identity Key. system32\ngctasks.dll See https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn410314.aspx

Microsoft\Windows\CertificateServicesClient\CryptoPolicyTask This task synchronizes cryptographic policy. system32\ngctasks.dll

Microsoft\Windows\CertificateServicesClient\KeyPreGenTask This task pre-generates TPM based Attestation Identity Key (AIK) and Storage Key (SK). system32\ngctasks.dll

Microsoft\Windows\Location\WindowsActionDialog Location Notification System32\WindowsActionDialog.exe

Microsoft\Windows\MemoryDiagnostic\RunFullMemoryDiagnostic Detects and mitigates problems in physical memory (RAM). System32\MemoryDiagnostic.dll

Microsoft\Windows\Shell\FamilySafetyMonitor Initialises Family Safety monitoring and enforcement. System32\wpcmon.exe

Microsoft\Windows\Shell\FamilySafetyRefresh Synchronises the latest settings with the Family Safety website. System32\WpcWebSync.dll

Microsoft\Windows\Shell\IndexerAutomaticMaintenance Keeps the search index up to date System32\srchadmin.dll

Microsoft\Windows\Time Synchronization\ForceSynchronizeTime This task performs time synchronization. system32\TimeSyncTask.dll