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Releases: microsoft/PowerToys

Release v0.41.2

28 Jun 17:37
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Our goals for the v0.39 release cycle and v0.41 release cycle included stability updates and optimizations, general bug fixes, accessibility improvements, and supporting the integration of the new community led project, Awake, which allows Power-Users to now keep their computer awake on demand!

Installer hash

4BACDA8925D5267BE455348EEB0BACFE5CB3DB2E5189E9CA2FF85297C597E8D8

Change log

  • Shortcut guide removed support for long Win press to activate. Now supports Win + ? by default
  • Turned off FancyZones canvas editor magnetic snapping to allow keyboard support
  • Updated Color Picker GIF for OOBE. Thanks @niels9001!
  • Removed outdated MSIX code
  • Upgraded all projects to Modern WPF 0.94
  • Dropped support for the module interface API to save settings
  • Removed Winstore dependency

General

  • Improved auto-update experience in PowerToys Settings
  • Updated general bug report information to be more robust
  • Improved settings layout for radio button groups. Updated images and menu for OOBE. Thanks @niels9001!
  • Localization updates

Awake

  • New Awake utility added! Power-Users can now keep their computer awake on-demand without having to manage its power settings. Huge thank you to @dend

Color Picker

  • Improvements to Color Picker’s zoom functionality. Thanks @DoctorNefario
  • Prevent duplicate colors from appearing in selection history
  • Improved UX to better support keyboard navigation. Thanks @niels9001!
  • Fixed OOBE hotkey description. Thanks @coc0a

FancyZones

  • Full keyboard support for canvas editor's main window and context. Thanks @niels9001
  • New support for faster layout selection by double clicking a desired layout from the editor to automatically apply it and dismiss the editor.
  • New zone activation behavior allows users to snap a window to the zone who's center is closest to the cursor. Thanks @ulazy1!
  • Added process icon for FancyZones.
  • Fixed issue with zoning minimized windows.
  • Fixed a bunch of accessibility bugs
  • Now an independent exe, detached from the runner process.

File Explorer Add-Ons

  • Adjusted Markdown newline behavior to be less strict so the add-on behaves more like GitHub implementations
    Image Resizer
  • Fixed bug with custom size option where leaving a height/width value blank caused the output to be a 1 x 1 square pixel. Now the blank value automatically adjusts to the height/width that was set.

Image Resizer

  • Fixed bug where specifying a width but no height generated a 1x1 px image instead of auto-adjusting the height. Thanks @davidegiacometti!

PowerRename

  • Fixed File Explorer crash when running PowerRename

PowerToys Run

  • Multiple crashing bugs resolved.
  • New Unit Converter plugin! Activate in the query prompt with the default activation phrase %%. Ex: %% 10 ft in m. Thanks @jsoref and @ThiefZero!
  • New Windows Settings plugin! Search for specific Windows settings from PowerToys Run by utilizing the default activation phrase $ followed by the desired setting. Ex: $ Add/Remove Programs or $ Device:. Thanks @TobiasSekan and @htcfreek.
  • Updated the URL plugin to enable quickly launching the default browser with the action keyword, which defaults to //.
  • Added remainder/modulo support for Calculator plugin via % operator.
  • Faster launching from improved Win32 program indexing. Thanks @royvou!
  • Search text results now highlight matched characters from input. Thanks @niels9001!

Settings / Welcome to PowerToys

  • Fixed Color Picker’s key-binding information

Shortcut Guide

  • Customize key-binding from settings menu
  • Took Shortcut guide out of the runner process to remove unnecessary interdependencies

Installer

  • Updated .NET Core dependency to 3.1.15
  • Reduced the network traffic by making the updater not download files when they're already cached

Community contributions

We'd like to directly mention (in alphabetical order) for their continued community support this month and helping directly make PowerToys a better piece of software.

@Aaron-Junker, @coc0a, @davidegiacometti, @dend, @DoctorNefario, @dogancelik, @htcfreek, @itsme-alan, @Jay-o-Way, @djsoref, @niels9001, @nitroin, @ricardosantos9521, @ThiefZero, @TobiasSekan, and @ulazy1

Release v0.37.2

11 May 23:45
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This is patch release to fix two regression bugs in 0.37.0 we deemed important for stability based on user feedback. See v0.37.0 for full release notes.

  • #11068 - Power Rename freezes & resets explorer.exe after latest update
  • #11162 - Event handle leak in PowerToys.KeyboardManagerEngine.exe

Installer SHA256 Hash

BB045E34A8C6DDA640C1CB262E7A3C646C6F6BE8ADBCB7DC7B6E77F9217B71E6

Release v0.37.0

29 Apr 19:07
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Our goals for v0.37 release cycle Video Conference Mute work so we can bring it into the stable branch, general bug fixes, moving Keyboard manager out, and removing the legacy settings app.

Installer hash

262CD602206DF552323AF7FDCF1032FB0B0D0E8DAD82E1E3B11290CEFCF5757B

Change log

  • PowerToys now requires Windows 10, version 1903 or higher
  • FancyZones editor default launching key is Win+Shift+`
    • Windows Terminal's new Quake mode will use Win+`. We feel this is a far better use of the keystroke.
    • Current PowerToys users can update this in our settings in the FancyZone section.
  • Removed our v1 HTML based settings system

New Spec - Feedback please!

FancyZones

  • Editor UX bug fixes. Thanks @niels9001
  • Monitor resolution is added to the top to directly infer the boxes on top are your monitors
  • Fix for editor crash when editing a custom layout

PowerRename

  • Option added for capitalization.
  • Improved loading responsiveness with large sums of files.

PowerToys Run

  • Changed XAML to improve rendering. Thanks @niels9001
  • Disabled plugins are no longer loaded
  • VS Code plugin workspaces showing up now. Thanks @ricardosantos9521

Keyboard manager

  • Now an independent exe. This now runs high priority in its own process. When your CPU is under load, this should allow the process to continue to be prioritized

Color Picker

  • uses a centralized keyhook. This should improve activation
  • Esc for closing will no longer bubble through. Thanks @DoctorNefario

Settings / Welcome to PowerToys

  • Shortcuts will stand out more
  • Few accessability bugs fixed. Thanks @niels9001

Shortcut Guide

Installer

  • new arg for starting PT after silent install

Developer quality of life

  • Ability to directly debug against Settings

Community contributions

We'd like to directly mention (in alphabetical order) for their continued community support this month and helping directly make PowerToys a better piece of software.

@Aaron-Junker, @addrum, @davidegiacometti , @DoctorNefario, @htcfreek, @Jay-o-Way, @niels9001 and @ricardosantos9521

Experimental v0.36.0

15 Apr 16:50
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Experimental v0.36.0 Pre-release
Pre-release

This experimental release contains our Video conference mute feature plus everything in our v0.35.0 release. We know we have some issues and we have a main tracking issue - #6246.

This is our first release with the webcam driver actually being a DirectShow filter. This solves a multitude of quirks and simplifying the signing through our compile pipeline.

To find out more about the Video conference mute utility, head over to head to our Video Conference Mute overview.

Installer hash

6191C8B0781406622B24AD93EF58F7880EF67BAE6E165B6B7C693C8D8ECBB951

Current known issues and limitations:

  • with some webcams, there is an incompatibility with Teams and the overlay image is not rendered, instead a corrupted frame is shown. If your camera has this quirk, please let us know the model in the [main tracking issue - #6246]
  • the application preview (Teams, Meet, etc.) may show the overlay image flipped horizontally but that is expected, the image will show correctly to the other people on the call.
  • in order to enable/disable the VCM, PowerToys should run as administrator
  • changes to some of the VCM settings require the application to restart to pick up the new values such as a new overlay image.
  • in some cases, the overlay image can be shown flipped vertically (the workaround is to edit the image and flip it before selecting it).
    (#6246)
  • if the PowerToys Video Conference Mute webcam doesn't show up in the video conference app, try restarting the app and if still doesn't show up try restarting Windows.

Things to note

  • This release will not be on WinGet. We are evaluating if this is something people would be interested in.
  • This release is on the "Experimental" train, so only prerelease versions will be prompted for updates.

Release v0.35.0

01 Apr 16:50
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Our goals for v0.35 release cycle were to add in new functionality to support quick swapping layouts for FancyZones, wrap up work for the DirectShow migration for Video Conference Mute so we can migrate into the main dev branch as well as fixing bugs.

Where is the Video Conference utility?

Released 0.36 which is based on the 0.35 branch. You can find more on the experimental 0.36 release page

Installer hash

8A052767127A6E2058BAAE03B551A807777BB1B726650E2C7E92C3E92C8DF80D

Highlights from v0.35 Stable/0.36 Experimental

General

  • PowerToys will start requiring Windows 10 v1903 or greater after 0.35.x release. The v1 settings, which supports older Windows versions, will be removed in 0.37.
    • Note: We may be able to bring back support when we migrate to WinUI3 but as of now, we will be increasing the minimum version of Windows to 1903 or greater.
  • Localization corrections
  • Improved GitHub report bug template.
  • Increased .NET Core to 3.1.13
  • Fixed installer 'run as user' regression

Color Picker

FancyZones

  • Added hotkeys and quick swap functionality for custom layouts! Users can now assign a hotkey in the editor and use it to quickly set a desktop's zones with Ctrl + Win + Alt + NUMBER key binding, or by pressing the hotkey while dragging a window.
  • UX updates. Thanks @niels9001!
  • Fixed zone placement algorithm for when the Taskbar is vertical
  • Bug fixes

PowerToys Run

  • Users can specify where to show the launcher window. Thanks @addrum!
  • New plugin added to support opening previously used Visual Studio Code workspaces, remote machines (SSH or Codespaces), and containers! When enabled, use { to query for available workspaces. Thanks @ricardosantos9521! Please note, this plugin is off by default.
  • Shell history now saves the raw command instead of the resolved command. A command like %appdata% would now save in the Shell history as is instead of C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Roaming. Thanks @mayitbeegh!
  • Better logging to try to track down some bugs
  • Bug fixes

Video Conference Mute (Experimental)

  • Tracking work remaining at issue #7944
  • Goal is to have 0.36 experimental release week of April 5th (Yes, we've stated this before, we know)

Contributor workflow

  • Main project now has a vsconfig which will prompt you to install needed items versus having to use a script. This will aid in keeping you up-to-date when something changes.
  • Updated spell checker. Thanks @jsoref!

Community contributions

We'd like to directly mention (in alphabetical order) for their continued community support this month and helping directly make PowerToys a better piece of software.

@Aaron-Junker, @addrum, @BenConstable9, @htcfreek, @Jay-o-Way, @jsoref, @mayitbeegh, @niels9001, @pc-v2, and @ricardosantos9521

Release v0.33.1

04 Mar 17:30
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Our goals for v0.33 release cycle was to add in some critical new functionality into the new user experience as well as a plug-in manager for PowerToys Run.

Where is the Video Conference utility?

We'll be doing a 0.34 experimental release week of March 8th. We feel we are near ready to add in Video Conference mute into the stable release pending feedback from the pending 0.34 experimental release.

Installer hash

33D9A55E5D133EC521669FA05473A3B3F04F06B786016A36E92ADC83002502E1

Highlights from v0.33 Stable/0.34 Experimental

General

  • Updated overview links to be language agnostic to the docs site.
  • 'First time load' experience. The hope is a quick, light way to learn about basic functionality. We have some more work to do and want to also use the same framework for teaching about updates as well.
  • Localization corrections

FancyZones

  • Adjusted editor UX based on feedback. Thanks @niels9001!
  • New options to change zone activation algorithm.

File Explorer

  • Improved how SVG images are previewed in the preview pane, thanks@Drakula44!
  • @Aaron-Junker has created a proof of concept for using Monaco editor for previewing dev files. This will enable over 125+ file types.

PowerToys Run

  • Plugin Manager now is in settings. You can directly turn on / off, include items in general search, and change the action key! Thanks @htcfreek for the great feedback!
  • Improved support for additional window managers by abstracting out shell process calls. Thanks @davidegiacometti!
  • Fix for PT Run registering the hotkey on non-supported OS versions.
  • ~ will now act as the user home directory in Folder plugin. Thanks @davidegiacometti
  • Service plugin has adjusted status messages

Video Conference Mute (Experimental)

  • Adjust video muting to leverage DirectShow.
  • Goal is to have 0.34 experimental release week of March 8th.

Settings

ARM64 Progress

  • Investigation on how we'll accomplish Settings with the XAML Island and WPF app.

Community contributions

We'd like to directly mention (in alphabetical order) for their continued community support this month and helping directly make PowerToys a better piece of software.

@Aaron-Junker, @davidegiacometti, @Drakula44, @htcfreek, @Jay-o-Way, @niels9001, and @notDevagya

Release v0.31.2

05 Feb 17:26
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This is patch release to a regression bug in 0.31.1 we deemed important for stability based on user feedback. See v0.31.1 for full release notes.

  • #9453 - FanzyZones app history and zone settings granular saving

Installer hash

8B4A3D4C8D18DA10FD11558BD6C8CF195D931576D6E07369E7AC99BA9BE7C4C4

Release v0.31.1

02 Feb 17:34
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Our goals for 0.31 release cycle were to focus on adding improving the FancyZones editor, adding in some new toys into PowerToys Run, some ARM64 work, and stability. 0.31.0 was tested internally but not publicly released due to discovering #9396.

For the entire commit history, please look at the 0.16 release. Below are just a few of the bullet items from this release.

Where is the Video Conference utility?

We plan to roll out a DirectShow based version in February with the hope to merge the utility into the main PowerToys repository in February / March timeframe.

Installer hash

A1226B1788B2F254DA72383B879E3B1F38603DAAAF6D2674F0927730E0AD8AF4

Highlights from v0.31

General

  • Bug report tool and improved logging now added to our system tray.
  • Added in CodeQL and other CI improvements.
  • OOBE Spec should be finalized

ARM64 Progress

  • .NET Core upgrade for code bases the PowerToys team controls is complete. We still have two external dependencies that are .NET Framework that need to be updated.

Color Picker

  • Bug fixes in editor

FancyZones

  • Streamlined, simplified user interface (Massive thanks to @niels9001)
  • Dark mode for the editor
  • Certain settings (e.g. number of zones, spacing settings) can now be set on individual layouts.
  • Bug fixes

File explorer

  • Fixed OneDrive SVG Bug
  • SVG are scaled appropriately when viewbox is provided
  • SVG thumbnail quality improved

PowerToys Run

  • Service management plugin (restart, stop, ...)
  • Registry key plugin
  • System action plugin (Reboot, lock, ...)
  • Hyperbolic functions added to calculator
  • Icon fixes when running in certain themes
  • Unneeded dependencies removed
  • Bug fixes

Installer

  • Default to .NET Core 3.1.11

Community contributions

We'd like to directly mention (in alphabetical order) for their continued community support this month and helping directly make PowerToys a better piece of software.

@Aaron-Junker, @BenConstable9, @chrdavis, @davidegiacometti, @ExecThTs, @htcfreek, @itsme-alan, @jay-o-way, @martinchrzan, @niels9001, @pavelzw, and @TobiasSekan

Release v0.29.3

31 Dec 18:20
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This is patch release to fix two bugs 0.29.0 we deemed important for stability based on user feedback. 0.29.1 and 0.29.2 were internal tested but not publicly released.

  • #8808 - FancyZone zones would occasionally not appear. This was caused by two uninitialized variables. During testing, there was a race condition so we missed it. Our push on adding in additional code analysis tools will hopefully catch these types of bugs.
  • #8787 - PowerRename would throw regex errors when it shouldn't. We removed the error dialog for now and will add in a more targeted error catching block at a later time.

Release v0.29.0

29 Dec 20:53
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Our goals for 0.29 release cycle were to focus on adding on end-user experience, stability, accessibility, localization and quality of life improvements for both the development team and our end users. Due to the short dev cycle due to the holidays this month, larger work items will show up next release such as FZ editor improvements and threenew plug-ins for PowerToys Run.

For the entire commit history, please look at the 0.29 release. Below are just a few of the bullet items from this release.

Where is the Video Conference utility?

This is only included in the experimental release. Our hope is to release an updated experimental release early in 2021.

Release Notes

General

  • Bug report tool and improved logging.
  • Various localization improvements.
  • CodeQL added. Triggered via a cron timer twice a day.
  • "How to use" docs moved to https://docs.microsoft.com/windows/powertoys/
    • This will allow the community to do direct PRs against those documents

ARM64 Progress

  • .NET Core upgrade for code bases the PowerToys team controls is complete. We still have two external dependencies that are .NET Framework that need to be updated.

Color Picker

  • General bug fixes
  • Added ability to provide the name of the color at parity with Office and WinUI Color Picker.

FancyZones

  • Allows to use Windows Snap on desktops that don't have a layout applied and for apps that are in the excluded list.
  • Bug fixes

PowerToys Run

  • Improved performance
  • PT Run now supports accented characters.

Installer

  • Option to extract the MSI from the .exe for enterprise scenarios and more options to do unattended installations.
  • Removed toast notifications during installation.

We'd like to directly mention (in alphabetical order) for their continued community support this month and helping directly make PowerToys a better piece of software.

@Aaron-Junker, @benjamhooper, @davidegiacometti, @eriawan, @htcfreek, @jhutchings1, @jsoref, @jay-o-way, @martinchrzan, @niels9001, @riverar, @snickler, and @TobiasSekan