Overlooked features inside of Windows 10 Fall Creators Update

Microsoft recently released the Fall Creators Update for Windows 10. As usual, Microsoft has added some pretty cool features in this version of Windows 10. Let's take a look at some of the new overlooked features included in the Window 10 Fall Creators Update.

There are a couple of new features that have gotten all sorts of publicity, the support of virtual reality headsets and mixed reality. But there are a few new features that have gotten passed over.

Make a movie using the Photos app

Creating a video using the Windows 10 Photo app

This feature is reminiscent of the old Windows Movie Maker program. You select some pictures and videos, set up the different parameters, and then export your video out.

One of the coolest features in that you can add either predefined generic music or use your own. Another is the preset themes that you can apply to your video. Here is a list of some of the other options.

• Changing the order of the photos
• Changing the duration a photo is displayed
• Various predefined photo filters
• Adding text to a photo
• Predefined motion styles

Easily insert an emoji

The emoji panel inside of Windows 10 Fall Creators Update

Do you like to use emojis? Well, inserting them just got a whole lot easier. With the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, you can now add an emoji with just a couple of keystrokes.

All you have to do is open a program that supports using emojis, like webmail in a browser or e-mail client (Outlook, Windows 10 Mail) You can even insert an emoji into a Microsoft Word document.

To bring up the emoji panel, press the Windows logo key + Period (.) or Semicolon (;) and left-click on the emoji you want to insert. If you're going to add multiple emojis, you will have to repeat the keystroke combination for each emoji.

There appears to be over 1200 emojis to choose from. If you left-click on the search magnifying glass and type the first few characters of the emoji name your looking for, the panel will display all the emojis that match.

And some of them you can even change the skin tone. To see this in action, search for Santa and use the skin tone box in the upper right-hand corner to change his skin tone.

Quick and easy dictation

Now let's look at one of the cooler features inside the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, the on-the-fly dictation. If you have a microphone, it's a pretty cool little program.

OK, I'm a little skeptical when it comes to doing voice recognition to text. I have had programs that said that they would translate from voice to text, but none of them worked well, but this one works pretty well.

I found the dictation program inside of the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update will work with any program that types text, like Notepad or WordPad. Sure, it has its little quirks; it doesn't capture all of the words correctly.

But about 95% of which you speak does get translated to decent human legible text. And if you hate to type, the dictation app could help.

You can bring up the dictation app two (2) different ways:

• Press the Windows logo key + H on a physical keyboard
or
• Select the microphone icon on the touch keyboard

Controlled folder access inside of Windows Defender

The controlled folder option inside of Windows Defender

One of the most anticipated new features of the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update is the controlled folder access inside of Windows Defender. With all of the file-encrypting malware outbreaks, this is a great new feature. But it does have its pros and cons.

In essence, Windows Defender blocks access to your folders (desktop, documents, favorites, pictures, music, and videos) from programs that it does not recognize (non-Microsoft). You can also add any other folder you would like to protect too. But you will have to turn this option on, as by default it is disabled.

Now, this can also be an issue with non-Microsoft programs accessing files in the protected folders. Case in point, I recently updated a client's computer to the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, and QuickBooks couldn't get to the documents folder. But it was easily fixed by adding QuickBooks to the allowed programs list inside of Windows Defender.

Even though you can have Windows Defender working side-by-side with your existing anti-virus software doing periodic scans, the controlled folders option only works when Windows Defender is the only anti-virus program installed.