It solely took three years, however Microsoft is lastly fixing one among its annoyances in Windows 11’s File Explorer.

The “show more options” double menu? No, sadly not. But Microsoft is no less than including explanatory labels to the icons inside File Explorer, now describing what they do moderately than forcing you to parse them like some unknown hieroglyphs.

Microsoft launched Build 26058 within the Windows 11 Canary and Dev Channels on Wednesday, that means that, technically, it’s possible you’ll by no means see this alteration launched to your PC. Fingers crossed! Other options being added embrace a change to the Widgets menu, a change to the lock display screen, and a few accessibility enhancements.

A protracted-overdue change in File Explorer

Hearken again to my 2021 review of Windows 11, and I had this to say:

“Windows 11 also adds a row of shortcut icons to File Explorer that, even after using the OS for weeks, simply don’t effectively communicate their purpose. I can certainly figure out that the ‘scissors’ icon means ‘cut’ and that the ‘garbage can’ icon means ‘delete,’ but I still have trouble recognizing which icon represents ‘rename,’ ‘paste,’ and ‘share,’ without specifically thinking about which icon represents which function.”

Since then, in fact, I’ve figured it out. But if somebody migrates from Windows 10 to Windows 11, it’s not precisely intuitive to determine what the Rename icon, for instance, truly does. Adding one-word descriptions (why weren’t these there earlier than?) simply solves the issue.

Mark Hachman / IDG

Microsoft can be testing tweaks to the Widgets board. If you miss a notification inside Widgets (do individuals actually search for notifications inside Widgets?) you’ll see a small badge on the Taskbar. It’s not clear how that’s new, on condition that my Taskbar has a small badge on it proper now.

What is completely different, nonetheless, is that Microsoft seems to be dividing the Widgets menu in two, by way of a brand new navigation pane on the left. There, you’ll have a selection to select between “My Widgets” — the widgets you need to see — and “Discover,” aka the widgets Microsoft desires you to see. Microsoft can be including extra, detailed info to the Windows lock display screen.

Mark Hachman / IDG

Naturally, Microsoft is asking you for suggestions on these, to see how they may very well be additional improved.

Finally, Microsoft is making some tweaks to its accessibility options. The most attention-grabbing change is a “crosshairs” of types that can higher present the place the mouse is in Windows 11.

Mark Hachman / IDG