Microsoft

When extolling the virtues of Windows 10, Microsoft is keen to stress how much safer the new OS is.

The problem, of course, is that the weakest link in any security chain is pretty much always the user. Microsoft is introducing a new feature to Windows 10 that will make the OS more secure, and help users make better decisions.

Over time your hard drive can get clogged up with leftover junk, including temporary files, cookies, cached internet data and file fragments. You can remove this clutter manually, use a tool like CCleaner, or make use of the built-in Windows Disk Clean-up tool.

In the Windows 10 Creators Update, Microsoft is introducing a new feature called Storage Sense which can automatically free up disk space. You don’t need to wait for the Creators Update to try it though.

Microsoft is aiming for April for the Windows 10 Creators Update, so is rushing out new builds for Insiders to try. Last week we got not one but two new releases on the Fast ring -- Build 15002, which introduced a wealth of changes and new features, and Build 15007, which also introduced a fair amount of new functionality.

The latest release, Build 15014 fixes a ton of issues from the previous two builds, but also introduces some exciting new features.

At the end of last week, Microsoft Germany published a post waving an early goodbye to Windows 7, and stating that the aging OS can "no longer keep up with the increased security requirements", and sticking with it could prove costly for users and businesses.

The software giant’s solution for Windows 7 users worried about security was, naturally, to switch to Windows 10. But, having faced an inevitable backlash from Windows 7 users and security experts, the company has pulled the post.

If you’re a Windows 10 user, you’ll be no stranger to Microsoft’s adverts which appear all throughout the operating system, including on the Start menu, and the Lock screen. As I wrote a week ago, Microsoft is planning on introducing even more adverts in the Creators Update.

The latest ad to appear is for one of Microsoft’s Chrome extensions, and it arrives -- appropriately enough -- above the Chrome icon on the taskbar. The browser doesn’t need to be open at the time.

As part of its new "3D for Everyone" strategy, Microsoft has announced that it will acquire the 3D optimization vendor Simplygon.

The company's corporate vice president of Next Gen Experiences Kudo Tsunoda revealed the acquisition intended to help boost its own 3D efforts. The Swedish company Simplygon will play a large role in allowing Microsoft to simplify the process of allowing its users to capture, create and share in 3D.

Microsoft and Linux used to be like oil and water. In more recent years, however, the Windows-maker has embraced that kernel and other open source technologies too.

Today, Microsoft announces the addition of Intel's Clear Linux OS to Azure Marketplace. In other words, users of the company's cloud platform can set up a virtual machine using this distribution in addition to existing Linux-based operating systems.

Google has one, Apple has one, Amazon has one, so Microsoft seems to feel that it should have one too. We're talking ebook stores, and a leaked version of Windows Mobile reveals that this is something that is due to be added to the Windows Store.

While Microsoft has been slowly but surely building up its store ecosystem, the focus has been mainly on apps so far, with music and video thrown in for good measure. With the company having fairly recently added EPUB support to Microsoft Edge, the arrival of ebooks is perhaps not entirely surprising, but Microsoft is very late to the party.

Linux and Windows living happily side-by-side is not something many people would have predicted, but Windows 10 Anniversary Update saw the arrival of Bash on Ubuntu thanks to the Windows Subsystem for Linux. Not everyone was happy with Microsoft's choice of Ubuntu, with many preferring a different flavour of Linux.

Senior Product Manager for SUSE Linux Enterprise, Hannes Kühnemund, is -- unsurprisingly -- one of those whose taste buds were not tantalized by Ubuntu. He would rather you ran SUSE on Windows 10. In fact he doesn't just want this to happen, he tells you how to do it -- specifically with openSUSE Leap 42.2 and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12 SP2 -- so you too can run Linux binaries natively on Windows.

Last week was a bumper week for Windows 10 Insiders on the Fast ring. First Microsoft rolled out Build 15002, which introduced a wealth of changes and new features, and then a few days later it followed it up with Build 15007.

While 15007, for PC and Mobile, didn’t leave us quite as shaken and stirred as the previous build, it still had some interesting new additions -- and more than we originally knew. It also included some rather major problems which are only just now being acknowledged.

Now that Windows 10 build 15007 is available for Windows Insiders on the Fast Ring, we're really starting to get a proper look at where Microsoft is going with the impending Creators Update release. We've already seen how the company is pushing 3D and augmented reality, but it has not forgotten about gamers.

Proclaiming that "2017 is going to be a monumental year for gaming at Microsoft", the Windows maker has taken the wraps off Game Mode. The promise that this special mode will increase the performance of PC games is something that will be welcomed by gamers the world over. But there's more to look forward to as well.

Although Microsoft claims that Windows 10 is now more popular than Windows 7, analyst firm NetMarkShare’s monthly usage figures paint a very different picture. In December, for example, Windows 10 hit 24.36 percent globally, but it's dwarfed by Windows 7's 48.34 percent share.

It’s clear that Windows 7 is going to remain the number one desktop operating system for some time to come -- globally at least -- but Microsoft is desperate for those users to switch to Windows 10 and warns that Windows 7 support is coming to an end, and that the OS has outdated security and can’t keep up with today’s security needs.

If you’re thinking of joining the Windows 10 Insider program, or you just want to do a clean install with an up to date version of Windows 10, the good news is Microsoft has released a new ISO image.

The image, for Build 15002, is available to all, and you can download it now. Build 15002 comes packed full of great new additions, including the ability to pause updates, new features for Edge, Cortana, Windows Ink and Windows Defender, smoother windows resizing, and more. If things go wrong you might even get to experience the new Green Screen of Death! (Hopefully not, but if you do then at least it will be a different color to curse at).

A few days ago, Microsoft rolled out Build 15002 (for PC) to Insiders on the Fast ring. It introduced a wealth of new features for Edge, Windows Ink, and Cortana, as well as the ability to pause updates, a new Share experience, and much more.

You might expect Build 15007 to just be a bunch of fixes to shore things up and improve stability, but actually it also adds a selection of new features and improvements. Here's what's new.

The forthcoming Creators Update for Windows 10 introduces a lot of new features, including something called Dynamic Lock.

This allows Windows 10 to detect when you’re away from your computer and automatically lock the device to prevent anyone accessing it in your absence. You don’t need to have Windows Hello configured to use it.