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Windows 10

I of the changes Microsoft introduced when it launched Windows 10 was the ability to show suggested applications, aka advertisements, within the Start Menu and on the lock screen. The "suggested application" function can be disabled relatively hands, only Microsoft is making changes in Windows 10 to increase application visibility and hopefully entice more users to head for the Windows Store.

Once the Anniversary Update drops, the number of promoted apps in the First Menu volition double, from five to 10. To accommodate this change, the number of static Microsoft applications will subtract, from 17 to 12.

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Many of these promoted applications (aka Programmable Tiles) aren't actually installed on the system by default. Instead, they have the user to the Windows Store where the app tin can be installed.

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Neowin isn't sure if this will apply to existing Windows ten PCs, or if this change will merely become live on new installations. Either way, it'southward a smart move for Microsoft.

Shifting paradigms

I of the most meaning barriers to Windows Store adoption is the entrenched behavior of Windows' users. For decades, Windows users have been used to downloading software from various sites on the Internet. If you lot demand a media player, you apply VLC or MPC-HC. If you need messaging software, y'all can download diverse apps from individual vendors or catch an all-in-one product like Trillian or Pidgin. Your showtime browser might come from Microsoft, but if you desire something else you'll head for Firefox or Google Chrome.

Microsoft wants users to see the Windows Store every bit a one-stop store for its applications, only it's difficult to shift how people utilize a system they've spent decades with. We don't arraign the company for using promoted apps what the Windows Store tin can offering. The problem is, the majority of the programs we've seen on the Windows Store don't compare well against the applications y'all can download on the Internet. Nosotros've chronicled the problems with diverse UWP games already, only applications you download from the Windows Store are ofttimes tablet-centric and explicitly designed around certain limitations Microsoft enforces.

The real trouble for the Windows Store isn't getting people to expect at it — it's edifice upwards an application library of stuff people desire to actually use. This has been a problem for Microsoft since information technology launched Windows 8, and while the store's layout and UI have improved significantly, breakout application successes are few and far between. The app model simply hasn't caught on for desktop software, perchance because almost people expect PC software to be more than complicated and accept a greater range of capability than the application-equivalent. On a smartphone or tablet, apps can exist good stand-ins for browsing or using websites. On desktops, the existing paradigm is dissimilar. Unless Microsoft tin offer users some stellar software, it may non come across the uptake it's looking for, no matter how many PC users upgrade to Windows 10.