The Windows 10 April Update (1803): The Littlest Big Update
by Brett Howse on May 25, 2018 8:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Software
- Operating Systems
- Windows
- Microsoft
- Windows 10
Timeline
Arguably the biggest feature new feature for Windows 10 is one aimed squarely at productivity. Timeline is part of the Task view feature that was previously in Windows 10, and accessed in the same way, either by clicking the icon on the task bar, or pressing Win + Tab. The idea of Timeline is to make it very easy to get back into a task you were doing previously or find some information you know you had open in a browser.
Sorry for the poor screenshot but Timeline isn't working for me
By default, Timeline is only set to go back a single day, and apps will be sorted by hour. You can optionally enable it to go back 30 days as well, which seems like a more useful method to have as the default.
You can also adjust how Timeline works in the Privacy settings. When enabled, Timeline will sync activities from this PC, and also sync them to the cloud, so you can access documents and information across devices. But if you’d rather not have that data collected, you can disable the cloud sync, the local PC activity collection, or both.
Focus Assist
Another feature added with the April Update which focuses on keeping you focused is Focus Assist. After clamoring for notifications on the PC after seeing their benefit in mobile, it quickly became apparent that, while useful, notifications can also be a distraction.
In previous versions of Windows 10, Microsoft offers a Quiet Hours feature where you could set the PC to not provide notifications depending on the time, but with Focus Assist, that ability is expanded upon.
In addition to being able to schedule a time when notifications are muted, you can now change what level of notifications come through, with a custom priority list. You could in theory mute all notifications except those you want to see, which sounds fairly useful, or you could just set a time where you want to get some work done and only have alarms appear.
There’s also additional new automatic rules for notification action when duplicating a display, which will be very beneficial to avoid embarrassing notifications when using a projector, as well as when gaming.
Enabled by default is also a summary of notifications that were missed while focus assist was on, so if you were gaming, you’ll get a handy summary of everything that happened while you were having some fun, so you can get back to work.
This is of course still coupled with the notification settings where you can enable or disable notifications per-app.
Focus Assist is the kind of feature that Windows 10 needs. Notifications are great, but they can be distracting when you’re trying to get some work done. It would be great if Microsoft added some more settings here to allow you to create more automatic rules, such as when you have an app open, or additional time slots rather than just the single time you can enable it now.
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Chad - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
Been running it fine. Installed fine and everything works good. shrug1_rick - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
Control Panel's still there. As they add features to Settings, they tend to remove them from Control Panel. At the rate they're going it'll be years before CP goes away completely.ChristopherFortineux - Friday, June 8, 2018 - link
Control Panel is still there where it has always been. Somethings are being moved over. This update I personally have not noticed much gone. New menu has grown on me though. As for Command Prompt it is still there. I haven't noticed anything missing from it.Gunbuster - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
Wish Microsoft would stop calling it an update when they do a complete fresh install and migrate your apps (if they feel like it)Off to Linux Land - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
Perhaps using the word "refined" in association with consistently damaging Windows 10 updates is a stretch?This last update (1803) locked my pc up ...again. This time with some weird white screen with Cortana info and that annoying Cortana voice. That was probably fixable -- but, like an idiot, I put my money on Microsoft's "help" lines. After several so-called 'techs' (including one with such a heavy Indian accent that I had to politely ask for someone else), they caused me to 'inadvertently' wipe my hard drive clean. So, no more Windows anything for me. I donated my "new" pc to a local needy family. Going to Linux now, and forever.
Maybe Microsoft could use a little 'refinement' in their help department by contracting their online and phone techs in the USA and Canada... and not India?
damianrobertjones - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
Haa haa haa. You made me laugh. If you couldn't fix windows then have fun with Linux.P.s. Ensure you have a backup at all times.
Zingam - Sunday, May 27, 2018 - link
I installed Linux last week. I wasted several hours trying to set grub to hide the boot menu without any success the best I could do it to set the timeout to 1 sec. The second thing was I installed the proprietary driver and Good bye Linux - it wouldn't pass after the loading screen. It even locked up while navigating the grub boot menu to safe mode. Sorry but Linux as a desktop has always been a trash even compared to Win95.PeachNCream - Monday, May 28, 2018 - link
I've been straddling between Linux and Windows since 8 was released. Dual boot or, more recently, using Linux on my primary PC while an older box runs Win7 just in case I need a MS OS for something. It's been a long and slow transition, but at this point, I've found that I barely turn a PC on these days since my phone I good enough for most chores and I'm already carrying it. However, when 7 is no longer getting updates, I will just walk away from Windows altogether since Linux Mint is perfectly adequate for those few times that I still need a conventional PC for something.ChristopherFortineux - Friday, June 8, 2018 - link
If you rarely need to use your PC just keep Windows 7 on it. By the point you need a new PC chances are you will be an entire phone user.Mikey Wiz - Friday, May 25, 2018 - link
I updated and have had all kinds of problem. Lost connection to WHS, had to reinstall connector. Wifi keeps dropping. Several games deleted. Lost saved passwords. Very annoying to say the least.