'Fast' Insiders get fix-up OS update, plus Skype decoupling and more: Redstone build 14327

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The last Fast ring Insiers update for Windows 10 Mobile was the buggiest yet, perhaps not surprising given the number of new UI features - but fear not, as there's a new build available now, 14327, and it includes a number of major bug fixes, plus some new features (Messaging) and rearrangements (Skype). See below for the official Microsoft quote.

From the Microsoft post:

You can now try out the preview of the “Messaging everywhere” feature in Windows 10 that allows you to send and receive text messages from your phone directly from your Windows 10 PC’s.

Messaging everywhere (Beta) settings on Mobile Messaging everywhere (Beta) settings on PC

To enable this:

  • Make sure you are signed in with your Microsoft Account (MSA).
  • On your phone – make sure “Send texts on all my Windows devices” is turned on.
  • On your PC – make sure you have chosen which phone to send messages through. You do this in the settings of the Messaging app on your PC (screenshot above).

Try it out and less us know what you think via the Feedback Hub.

Cortana in more languages

With this build, we are enabling Cortana for the Spanish (Mexico), Portuguese (Brazil) and French (Canada) languages for Mobile (available previously in PC builds). If you’re running the Windows 10 Mobile Insider Preview in these languages – give Cortana a try and let us know what you think. For each new market and language, the Cortana Team works to develop a custom experience that is relevant in each individual market and language. These are early versions that we will continue improve based on your feedback and we look forward to hearing more from you.

Voice input is also now available for these languages. Set focus to a text field and tap the microphone above the keyboard to give it a try.

Here’s what’s fixed for Mobile

  • We fixed the issue causing Language and Speech packs to fail to download.
  • We fixed the issue where in some cases your phone’s screen may not turn on and become unresponsive and Windows Hello stops working if you used the power button to lock/unlock your phone quickly.
  • We fixed the issue where in some cases, users might get in a state where neither space or enter are working on the keyboard.
  • We fixed the issue causing Facebook Messenger and other apps like WeChat, Transfer My Data, and UC Browser from failing to launch from Start or All apps.
  • We fixed an issue where diverse emoji couldn’t be deleted from the text box in an interactive notification.
  • We have updated the autocorrection logic, so you can now abort an autocorrection by tapping on the bolded word.
  • We have updated the Glance screen so it will now reflect Ease of Access text scaling.
  • We fixed an issue where tethering over Bluetooth wouldn’t work if Bluetooth had never been turned on before.
  • We fixed an issue where you couldn’t set a sample image as a lock screen background.

Known issues for Mobile

  • Feedback Hub is not localized and the UI will be in English (U.S.) only even with language packs installed.
  • We’re investigating a crash with the Camera app when going into your camera roll.
  • There is an issue in which you may see duplicate apps under All apps showing as pending despite being installed and usable on your phone. You may also see some apps stuck in the Store. To get out of this state, just start and pause a download in the Store and then choose to “resume all” downloads.
  • You may see square boxes in certain apps when using some of the new emoji – we’re still getting support for the new emoji added throughout the systems, this will be resolved in a future build.
  • There is a bug we’re investigating that prevents some apps such as Tweetium from launching.
  • We’re investigating issues which cause mobile data to stop working but show as connected.
  • Glance on/off setting is not respected after updating to a new build. After updating, you can reset this setting to what you had before.

You'll also notice that Skype integration in the Messaging app in this build of Windows 10 Mobile has been removed. This never really worked well, just slowing Messaging down and annoying everyone, so the two elements have now been decoupled. This paves the way for a Skype UWP app coming soon. In the meantime, we can use the existing Skype for Windows Phone app - hey, I was anyway!

Our phones are updating as I write this and I'll report back with any extra observations. The fact that Tweetium and some other apps still crash on launch is going to annoy. I'm sure the developers are leaning hard on Microsoft too, to sort this out. Yes, this is 'just' the Insiders programme, but application launching is something that really shouldn't break!

Most of the other applications which were crashing under 14322 now launch OK, so breathe a huge sigh of relief there. Media controls seem more reliable (so far), but I'm still noticing some oddities - with Tweetium not working, I switched to the official Twitter client and this can't insert photos into tweets, there's just an error message. The bleeding edge, eh?! Anyway, Aeries works fine, so... And there's always Fenice and others 8-)

As per all my recent charts and comments, note that Redstone builds are NOT available for the non-Win-10-approved phones (e.g. Lumia 920). no matter how many times you install the 'Windows Insider' utility and enthusiastically tap the 'Fast ring' entry.... The highest version of Windows 10, even unsupported, for older (mainly x20) handsets is 'Threshold' (the 10586.xxx branch).

Source / Credit: Microsoft