Latest Windows 10 Insider Preview Boosts Windows Ink, Photos

Microsoft has revealed the latest Windows 10 Insider Preview which introduces various updates and fixes as well as a new stencils feature for Windows Ink.

The 14951 build of Windows 10 brings with it optimisations to touchpad precision when using laptops with the operating system and a simplified camera interface for the PC and mobile versions of the Camera app, including the ability to capture photos with snippets of video to create ‘living images’ on Microsoft’s Surface range of tablet-laptop hybrids.

The Photos app can also make use of the drawing features offered by Windows Ink by adding the tool bar form the latter into the former’s interface.

Windows Ink now comes with a Stencils feature, which brings a protractor tool into the drawing app, for paper-hating people who enjoy drawing accurate angles with a stylus on a Windows 10 compatible tablet.

Nips and tucks for developers

Scratch the digital surface of the new build and you will find it has a suite of tweaks designed to make life easier for developers working on Windows 10.

“We’ve done some underlying work, and now you’ll no longer have to reboot your PC after turning on Developer Mode! This means that you can start using Device Portal and Device Discovery as soon as the Windows Developer Mode package has finished installing, rather than having to reboot first,” said Dona Sarkar, a software engineer and Microsoft’s Windows and Devices group.

For people who like their PCs and laptops to talk to them, Microsoft has tweaked the Narrator feature in Windows 10 so that the tool is more accurate and less prone to interruptions than it once was.

The new build also introduces a Windows subsystem for Linux, providing support for Ubuntu 16.04 running on Windows instances, and WSL interoperability with Win32 applications.  This follows on from the support Microsoft added to Windows 10 for Bash n Ubuntu.

The new Windows 10 Insider Preview build is available for today to members of the Windows Insider programme.