Photo favourites return for Windows 10 Mobile

Published by at

You know the drill by now. An application gets totally rewritten for a new release of a mobile OS, yet all the features of the old application aren't there in the rewrite. Cue cries of anguish from users (ok, perhaps I'm being a little melodramatic) but slowly the features all come back under the new app and architecture. And then everyone's happy again? In this case, it's the return of being able to 'favourite' items in the new version of the Photos application for Windows 10 Mobile (all under the Insiders Programme at the moment, of course).

As someone who likes to keep favourite photos on hand at all times, for admiring and showing off to others, this is all very welcome. Here's a walkthrough of how it works:

Screenshot, Photos on Windows 10 MobileScreenshot, Photos on Windows 10 Mobile

There's a new control on the toolbar, tapping it adds the image as a favourite though, typically for Windows 10 Mobile, there seems to be a cloud sync action going on before the icon changes to 'solid' - I'd have liked to have seen the icon change first and then do the sync in the background! Come on, Microsoft, think about it!

Screenshot, Photos on Windows 10 MobileScreenshot, Photos on Windows 10 Mobile

A 'Favourites' album is now present, with contents as you'd expect - perfect.

Screenshot, Photos on Windows 10 MobileScreenshot, Photos on Windows 10 Mobile

Again mirroring what happened under Windows Phone 8.1, you can choose what to show on the Photos live tile - pick 'Favourites' and the tile cycles through these very prettily.

Make sure you keep up to date on the Insiders Programme with a daily visit to the Store and 'check for updates' (just in case). And watch out for that new Insiders firmware coming very soon, which will tie up a lot of performance loose ends.