New Insider Preview Build Adds Another Promised Windows 11 Feature

Microsoft has released Windows 11 build 22499 to Insiders in the Dev channel. It adds a promised Windows 11 feature that didn’t make the original release: the ability to share an app’s screen directly from the taskbar. But you won’t be shocked to discover that this feature, like Taskbar mute/unmute, is a lot more limited than originally described.

“We are beginning to roll out the ability to quickly share the content from open app windows directly from your taskbar to your meeting calls starting with Microsoft Teams,” Microsoft writes in the announcement post. “This experience eliminates the need to flip back and forth across applications just to share or reshare a window. There are no interruptions to your meeting attendees or what they see on screen – share any open window during your call.”

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What’s odd about this one is that it doesn’t appear to map to the feature Microsoft showed off back in June. As I wrote in Windows 11’s Broken Promises (Premium), Microsoft promised of Taskbar share that “you can confidently share any file directly from the taskbar with just one click,” and the demo showed a Share feature in the preview pane that appears when you mouse over an application icon in the taskbar.

But that’s not what this is. Instead, Taskbar share appears to be a way to quickly share any application’s display with others in a Teams meeting. As with Taskbar mute/unmute, it requires apps to access a Windows 11 API, and so it won’t work with non-Teams apps until developers use that API.

In other news, Microsoft also updated the Clock app in build 22499 so that it now supports signing in with Microsoft work and school accounts for focus sessions purposes. And there’s an ISO of this build available, which is rare. You can download that here.

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Conversation 9 comments

  • Daniel Blois

    10 November, 2021 - 4:57 pm

    <p>Microsoft should make all this integration work with any video conferencing app, just add apis for them. </p>

    • lvthunder

      Premium Member
      10 November, 2021 - 5:46 pm

      <p>These aren’t API’s just for them. Anyone can use the API’s if they want. It’s not Microsoft’s job to add features into Zoom. It’s Zoom’s job to utilize the API’s if they want that feature in their product.</p>

    • darkgrayknight

      Premium Member
      11 November, 2021 - 11:50 am

      <p>Microsoft has added the APIs for any app to be able to use this functionality, not just Teams. The only way to have this capability is for apps to utilize the APIs that allow it. So it is universal, but not like everyone assumed it would be, because it can’t be "universal" without the apps either having their own API to their controls, or the apps using the Windows API to access these features.</p>

  • JerryH

    Premium Member
    10 November, 2021 - 4:58 pm

    <p>Funny how they chose Clock as the important app to be able to login with a Work account. It isn’t like the store app is many times more important or anything, right? Sometimes they boggle the mind with the choices they make… Installing this new build now.</p>

    • Travelrobert

      Premium Member
      13 November, 2021 - 12:50 am

      <p>You have to compare apples with apples though Jerry. The login in for Focus Sessions is basically a login for Microsoft To Do (I’m guessing). This so that you can choose actual tasks, for you focus session, instead of "making new ones". </p><p><br></p><p>I wanted this feature, as Focus Sessions actually fits my work habits. </p>

  • sykeward

    10 November, 2021 - 5:13 pm

    <p>This is exactly why I was happy that Microsoft smelled like burned hair for a little bit after that whole open-source blowup last week. Yes the reaction from the OSS community was arguably out of proportion, but it was a little well-deserved come-uppance from a group that does not tolerate the type of terrible communication that the Windows community is evidently accustomed to.</p><p><br></p><p>With that, along with The Verge’s declaration today that they will no longer roll over for tech companies who insist on background communication to avoid accountability for being incomplete/misleading, I’m hoping that it’s the beginning of the tables turning on this stuff. It can’t happen soon enough.</p>

  • mattbg

    Premium Member
    10 November, 2021 - 5:49 pm

    <p>Any idea yet if we will all really have to wait until 2H 2022 to get updates like this, drag-to-taskbar , and the selectively-universal microphone muting in the Release channel?</p>

    • SvenJ

      12 November, 2021 - 4:46 pm

      <p>Don’t worry. It’ll all be in there by 2025.</p>

  • Piras

    14 November, 2021 - 9:51 am

    <p>Here is a feature I would like working. </p><p>How about favorites syncing timely and properly…</p>

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