Microsoft releases epic PowerToys v0.65 update with .NET 7 support

PowerToys gets quite a lot of coverage here on BetaNews, and that's because it's one of the most useful and exciting pieces of software out there. We already know that there are plans for a great new quick launcher utility, and while we wait for development to finish, we have the newly released PowerToys v0.65 update to explore.

Although this update does not include any new utilities, it is still an important upgrade because of the number of tweaks and new features that have been added to individual modules. On top of this,  the entire codebase has been upgraded to work with .NET 7.

See also:

• Out-of-band KB5020683 update for Windows 10 makes it easier to upgrade to Windows 11 immediately
• Google Search on the desktop gains (almost) endless scrolling
• Microsoft is adding a quick launcher to PowerToys for easy access to the best Windows utilities

It is easy to feel disappointed about a PowerToys update that does not include new tools to play with, but there's still a lot to discover in PowerToys v0.65. Microsoft says that the v0.65 release cycle is focused on stability and improvements, and many of your favorite utilities have been updated with new features as well as fixes.

Among the modules that have been updated are Color Picker, which benefits from a new color format creation option, and Quick Accent which now shows character descriptions.

There are a handful of known issues to be aware of in this release:

• The Text Extractor utility fails to recognize text in some cases on ARM64 devices running Windows 10.
• After installing PowerToys, the new Windows 11 context menu entries for PowerRename and Image Resizer might not appear before a system restart.
• There are reports of users who are unable to open the Settings window. This is being caused by incompatibilities with some applications (RTSS RivaTuner Statistics Server is a known examples of this). If you're affected by this, please check the linked issue to verify if any of the presented solutions works for you.

The full changelog for PowerToys v0.65 is as follows:

General

• Downgraded the ModernWPF dependency to 0.9.4 to avoid issues on certain virtualization technologies. (This was a hotfix for 0.64)
• Upgraded and fixed the code to work with .NET 7. Thanks @snickler!

Always on Top

• Added telemetry for the pinning/unpinning events.

Awake

• Added telemetry.
• Removed exiting Awake from the tray icon when starting from the runner. Utilities started from the runner should be disabled in the Settings to avoid discrepancies.

Color Picker

• Fixed an infinite loop due to a looping UI refresh. (This was a hotfix for 0.64)
• Added a feature to allow users to create their own color formats.

FancyZones

• Fixed an issue that caused turning off spaces between zones to not apply correctly. (This was a hotfix for 0.64)
• Prevent the shift key press from trickling down to the focused window. Thanks @davidegiacometti!
• Fixed a bug causing FancyZones to try resizing hidden windows.
• Fixed the focus layout preview being empty on first run in the editor.
• Fixed UI margin in the "Create new layout" dialog.
• Fixed window positioning issues when switching between virtual desktops.
• Fixed snapping by hotkey in single zone layouts.

File explorer add-ons

• Added .log file support to the Monaco preview handler. Thanks @Eagle3386!

File Locksmith

• Query system and other users processes when elevated. (This was a hotfix for 0.64)
• Icon and UI fixes. Thanks @niels9001! (This was a hotfix for 0.64)

Group Policy Objects

• Removed a obsolete dependency from the admx file to fix importing on Intune. Thanks @htcfreek! (This was a hotfix for 0.64)

Hosts File Editor

• Added a scrollbar to the additional lines dialog. Thanks @davidegiacometti! (This was a hotfix for 0.64)
• Updated the plus icon. Thanks @niels9001! (This was a hotfix for 0.64)
• Prevent the new entry content dialog from overlapping the title bar.
• Updated the name for the additional lines feature. Thanks @htcfreek!
• Added a workaround for an issue causing the context menu not opening on right-click. Thanks @davidegiacometti!

Image Resizer

• Fixed a silent crash when trying to show the tier 1 context menu on Windows 11.

PowerToys Run

• Added pinyin support to the search. Thanks @frg2089!
• Fixed an error in the TimeZone plugin preventing searching for standard time zones. Thanks @Tantalus13A98B5F!
• Added the English abbreviations as fallbacks in the UnitConverter plugin. Thanks @Tantalus13A98B5F!

Quick Accent

• Added mappings for the mu, omicron, upsilon and thorn characters.
• Added a setting to exclude apps from activating Quick Accent.
• Fixed an issue causing the selector to trigger when leaving the lock screen. Thanks @damienleroy!
• Added the Croatian, Netherlands, Swedish and Welsh character sets. Thanks @damienleroy!
• Added support for more unicode characters. Thanks @char-46!
• Shift-space can now navigate backwards in the selector. Thanks @davidegiacometti!
• Added the Catalan accented characters. Thanks @ivocarbajo and @codingneko!
• Added the Kurdish accented characters.
• Added the Serbian accented characters. Thanks @damienleroy!
• Added the Irish and Scottish accented characters.
• Added the description for the currently selected character in the selector.
• Fixed a bug causing the selector window to appear blank.

Runner

• Fixed a crash on a racing condition accessing the IPC communication with Settings.

Settings

• Fixed settings name in the QuickAccent page. Thanks @htcfreek!
• Added a message indicating there's no network available when looking for updates.
• Fixed an error causing the backup/restore feature to not find the backup file. Thanks @jefflord!
• Fixed localization for the "All apps" expression in the keyboard manager page.
• UI refactoring, clean-up and bringing in modern controls. Thanks @niels9001!
• Improved settings/OOBE screens text. Thanks @Jay-o-Way!
• The backup/restore feature also backs up FancyZones layouts.

Shortcut Guide

• Added a setting to make the shortcuts and taskbar icons have different configurable response times. Thanks @OkamiWong!

Video Conference Mute

• Changed the warning about deprecating Video Conference Mute to saying it's going to go into legacy mode, thanks to community feedback. (This was a hotfix for 0.64)

Documentation

• Added the core team to COMMUNITY.md

Development

• Fixed some errors in the GitHub issue templates. Thanks @Aaron-Junker!
• Updated the Windows implementation library. Thanks @AtariDreams!
• Added Hosts File Editor to the issue templates. Thanks @davidegiacometti!
• Turned on C++ code analysis and incrementally fixing warnings.
• Cleaned up unused dependencies. Thanks @davidegiacometti!
• Fixed building on the latest MSVC.
• Fixed multi-processor build on the latest MSBuild.
• Added a message to suggest the feedback hub to the fabric bot triggers.
• Optimized every png file with the zopfli algorithm. Thanks @pea-sys!
• Updated the .vsconfig file for a quicker development setup. Thanks @ChaseKnowlden!
• Fixed a language typo in the code. Thanks @eltociear!
• Fixed wrong x86 target in the solution file.
• Added a script to fail building when the nuget packages aren't consolidated. Thanks @davidegiacometti!
• Upgraded the Vanara.Invoke dependencies.
• Upgraded and brought back the spell-checker. Thanks @jsoref!
• Added a new dependencies feed and fixed release CI. Thanks @Aaron-Junker!

More information about this release can be found on the download page here.