Microsoft may finally be fixing some of the most annoying parts of File Explorer

The Windows Forecast is a look at the future of Windows that comments on the latest news for Windows Insiders, as well as other major announcements in the Windows space each and every week. My name is João Carrasqueira, and I’ve been covering the world of Windows professionally since 2018. If there’s something you’d like to see covered, you can reach me at joao@xda-developers.com.

After the bombastic news of last week with Recall and Click To Do finally becoming available, this week has been very slow for Windows news. In fact, pretty much nothing official has happened. However, some interesting discoveries have been made by internet sleuths, so let’s talk about it.

Microsoft is finally fixing annoying parts of File Explorer

Tabs will finally be worth something

Last year, I wrote about how Microsoft’s implementation of tabs in File Explorer just wasn’t living up to its potential, and how they should behave more like browser tabs. By that, I meant that when you open a foilder from an external app or form the desktop, that folder should open in a new tab in an existing window, rather than a new window entirely.

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Wouldn’t you know it, a year later, that seems to be exactly what’s happening. Thanks to the discoveries made by Bluesky user phantomofearth, we know that Microsoft is working on an option to enable this exact behavior, and it’s about time. It looks like you’ll be able to turn this behavior on or off in the File Explorer options, though I can’t imagine anyone wanting the current behavior to stay the same. It essentially makes tabs useless since you always have to go out of your way to use them, rather than it feeling natural. Hopefully this new implementation becomes available sooner rather than later.

Image credit: phantomofearth (Bluesky)

That’s not all this user discovered, though. Another annoying bit in the latest versions of File Explorer has been the constant reminder to back up your folders to OneDrive if you haven’t already. The option to start a backup is always there in the address bar, and there’s no reason for it. As it turns out, you may soon be able to turn off those reminders, too.

As much as we can criticize Microsoft for its ads and attempts to push services onto its users, it’s nice to know the company is listening and willing to back off given enough pressure. Hopefully this won’t be limited to a test that never rolls out officially, though I could see it going either way.

Recall is getting more features, too

See files related to what you’re looking at

Another interesting tidbit spotted by the same Bluesky user has to do with Recall and Click To Do. Apparently, Microsoft is working on a new feature that lets you find files related to something on your screen. For example, in the example shown below, selecting the text “Cool art” will show other files with the word “cool” in it.

This is not the most interesting use case, but I can easily see how this would be an interesting feature. If you get an email or Teams message referring to a report or some kind of document you’ve worked on in the past, it makes sense for Copilot+ to be able to surface that document for you. I’m still waiting to have a Copilot+ PC, but it’s definitely exciting to see Microsoft invest in this idea.

I think the idea of Recall and Click To Do has basically unlimited potential, so it’s really up to Microsoft to come up with ideas to make this a worthwhile feature. This is a good step in that direction, but I want to see a lot more, especially as more powerful NPUs become available.

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Could Windows 365 Link bring more changes to Windows 11?

Windows “CPC” is interesting

Image credit: phamtomofearth (Bluesky)

Last week, Microsoft announced Windows 365 Link, a mini PC that’s designed to only run Windows 365, meaning it basically boots from the cloud. However, this mini PC does still come with an OS of its own based on the Windows we know, and some users have managed to get their hands on a build of this operating system, which is being called Windows CPC.

There isn’t a whole lot to it aside from some images of the out-of-box experience (OOBE), but I do wonder if some of these elements will be borrowed for Windows 11 in the future. For example, one screen shared by the same Bluesky user was of a Bluetooth keyboard pairing screen, which, to my knowledge, doesn’t exist on Windows 11. In fact, I’m not entirely sure you can connect a Bluetooth keyboard at all during the WIndows 11 setup. From my searches online, unless the PC’s manufacturer builds a solution for that, you don’t have that ability, which is kind of ridiculous when you think about it. Apple does this right on macOS, so if Microsoft has figured it out for this Windows CPC, I’d hope Windows 11 gets it too.

Otherwise, more screenshots show some interesting UI elements here and there. There’s a floating area with icons for Wi-Fi, sound, and accessibility, and more parts of the UI seem to let the background shine through (as seen above), so it’s a interesting-looking OOBE approach. Obviously a lot of this is designed with the idea that this is a very lightweight OS, so I don’t expect a lot of these elements to come to Windows 11 itself, but it will be interesting to see if Microsoft designing this lighter version of Windows could influence proper Windows PCs in the future, too.

Wrapping up

Indeed, it has been an incredibly slow week in terms of official news for Windows fans, but there have been some interesting developments thanks to the community of Windows sleuths. I’m very curious to see some of these changes become officially available, but who knows when that will happen? Either way, let’s hope next week brings us a bit more to digest. Until then, enjoy your weekend!