Download PowerToys 0.68.0

Microsoft has released version 0.68.0 of PowerToys. The PowerToys are a collection of small programs for power users. There were PowerToys for Windows 95 and Windows XP and since mid-2019, Microsoft has also been developing a version for Windows 10 and higher. The PowerToys currently exist Awake, Color Picker, Fancy Zones, File Explorer Addons, Image Resizer, Keyboard Manager, PowerRename, Power Toys Run, Shortcut Guide and the Video Conference Mute. The changelog for this release shows the following changes and improvements.

Highlights

• New utility: Paste as Plain Text allows pasting the text contents of your clipboard without formatting. Note: the formatted text in the clipboard is replaced with the unformatted text.
• New utility: Mouse Jump allows to quickly move the mouse pointer long distances on a single screen or across multiple screens.
• Add new GPO policies for automatic update downloads and update toast notifications.
• Support MSC and CPL files in “Run command” results of PowerToys Run Program plugin.
• Add support for log2 and log10 in PowerToys Run Calculator plugin.
• Added experimentation to PowerToys first run experience. There are current page which says “welcome” and a variant with direct instructions on how to use some of the utilities. We want to see if directly showing how to use PowerToys leads to more people using the features 🙂

General

• Improve metered network detection in runner.
• Update PowerToys logo used by installer.
• Add new GPO policies for automatic update downloads and update toast notifications.
• Update copyright year to 2023.

Fancy Zones

• Refactored and improved code quality.
• Fix crashing on moving window between monitors with Win + arrows. (This was a hotfix for 0.67)
• Fix issue causing window attributes to not be reset properly. (This was a hotfix for 0.67)
• Fix issue causing window to not be adjusted when layout is changed. (This was a hotfix for 0.67)
• Fix issue causing window not to be unsnapped on drag started. (This was a hotfix for 0.67)
• Fix issue causing layouts not to be applied to new virtual desktops. (This was a hotfix for 0.67)
• Fix issues causing windows not to be restored correctly to their last known zone.

File explorer add-ons

• Add Developer files previewer option to set max file size and fix styling issue.
• Improve Developer files previewer exception handling and printing of error messages.
• Fix crash when generating PDF and Gcode file thumbnails. (This was a hotfix for 0.67)

Hosts file editor

• Improve hosts file loading.
• Improved duplicate hosts finding.

Keyboard Manager

• Fix typo in Keyboard Manager Editor.

Mouse Utils

• Resolve grammatical error in Mouse Highlighter description.
• New utility: Mouse Jump allows to quickly move the mouse pointer long distances on single or across screens.

Paste as Plain Text

• New utility: Paste as Plain Text allows pasting the text contents of your clipboard without formatting. Note: the formatted text in the clipboard is replaced with the unformatted text.

Power Toys Run

• Show Steam (steam://open/) shortcuts in the Program plugin.
• Localize paths of Program plugin results.
• Improved stability of the code used to get the localized names and paths.
• Support MSC and CPL files in “Run command” results of Program plugin.
• Added missing MSC and CPL settings to the results of Windows Settings plugin.
• System plugin: Setting for separate “Open/Empty Recycle bin” results or single result with context menu. (This was implemented based on user feedback for a change in the last build.)
• Add support for log2 and log10 in Calculator plugin.
• Removed the TimeZone plugin.
• Fix the crash when loading thumbnail for PDF files. (This was a hotfix for 0.67)

Shortcut Guide

• Added: Dismiss Shortcut Guide with mouse click.

Quick Accent

• Added Lithuanian characters.
• Added additional (Chinese) characters.

Settings

• Add missing flyout borders on Windows 10.
• Add experimentation for oobe landing page.
• Show icons of user-installed PowerToys Run plugins.
• Fixed crash when clicking Browse for backup and restore location while running elevated.
• Respect taskbar position when showing system tray flyout. (This was a hotfix for 0.67)
• Show correctly Hosts module image. (This was a hotfix for 0.67)

Development

• Turned on C++ code analysis and incrementally fixing warnings.
• Centralize .NET NuGet packages versions.
• Separate PowerToys installer logs and MSI logs to different files.
• Added new GPO rules to the reporting tool.
• Move PowerToys registry entries back to HKLM to fix context menu entries not working on some configurations. (This was a hotfix for 0.67)