{"id":476035,"date":"2023-01-11T11:13:09","date_gmt":"2023-01-11T09:13:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=476035"},"modified":"2023-01-11T11:16:35","modified_gmt":"2023-01-11T09:16:35","slug":"microsoft-working-on-controversial-new-feature-for-windows-11","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/software\/476035-microsoft-working-on-controversial-new-feature-for-windows-11.html","title":{"rendered":"Microsoft working on controversial new feature for Windows 11"},"content":{"rendered":"

Microsoft is developing a feature in Windows 11 that could see ads rolling out to File Explorer.<\/p>\n

Twitter user @XenoPanther<\/strong><\/a> discovered that Microsoft added a new setting, “Show recommended content”, to the shell32.dll.mui file \u2014 the dynamic link library for instructions in File Explorer.<\/p>\n

Once enabled, the toggle to turn the feature on or off would appear in the Privacy section of the File Explorer Options window.<\/p>\n

A “Recommendations” string has also been added to the propsys.dll.mui, which governs instructions in Windows Search.<\/p>\n

While it’s unclear what exactly Microsoft regards as “Recommended content”, several users are concerned it could be ads, including for Microsoft’s own products.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

This screenshot of the File Explorer Options windows includes the “Show recommended content” toggle.<\/p><\/div>\n

XenoPanther opined<\/strong><\/a> that it likely wouldn’t be ad-related, as a string in the windows.storage.dll.mui suggested that Windows 11 would show the recommended content in File Explorer after the user had opened some files.<\/p>\n

What exactly the feature will do will only be known once it rolls out to Windows Insider testers.<\/p>\n

Whatever the function might be, the ability to turn it on or off will be useful for those who wish to keep their File Explorer as is.<\/p>\n

Microsoft previously came under fire after it presented certain Windows 11 users with a banner ad for its Microsoft Editor app in File Explorer in early 2022.<\/p>\n

The company later clarified the experimental banners were not meant to be published externally and were turned off.<\/p>\n

It previously added a large banner ad in the Windows 10 File Explorer in 2017 promoting its OneDrive cloud storage app.<\/p>\n

\n

Now read: Microsoft adding OpenAI’s ChatGPT to Bing<\/a><\/h2>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Windows enthusiasts are concerned that Microsoft again appears to be playing around with bringing ads to File Explorer. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":464145,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[15243,63172,123,70233],"class_list":["post-476035","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-software","tag-ads","tag-file-explorer","tag-microsoft","tag-windows-11"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476035"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=476035"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476035\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":476083,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476035\/revisions\/476083"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/464145"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=476035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=476035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=476035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}