Controlled Folder Access - Windows 10 1809

I've been a big fan of Windows' Controlled Folder Access. Some of my coworkers have been "surprised" when it was enabled without their knowledge but I haven't experienced that. In fact I turn it on immediately when I build a new Windows system.

Over a recent long weekend I got on a tear upgrading 4 systems, desktops and laptops, to Windows 10 1809. I still haven't experienced any problems.

I've been posting about several new features in Windows 10 1809 that I think haven't gotten much press here, here, and here.

After my mass upgrade I've run into another unannounced feature that is valuable in relation to Controlled Folder Access.

In Windows 10 if a program violates the Controlled Folder Access you have established you get an ambiguous notification without enough information to act.

I Googled this and found that there is an event in the Event Viewer that has more information (archive.is). Here's how to get to it:

1. Right-click on the Start button and select Event Viewer.
2. Navigate to Applications and Services > Microsoft > Windows > Windows Defender > Operational
3. Filter for (or just look for): Event ID 1123

Or you could just upgrade to Windows 10 1809.

Here's what the Controlled Folder Access Settings screen shows after an exception in 1803:

Not much help.

In 1809 here's what you get:

When you click on "Recently blocked apps" you get:

Nice.

Viewing HEIC Pictures on Windows 10

Your new iPhones may be taking HEIC pictures. If you can't see them on Windows 10, install these 2 Microsoft Store apps.

HEIF Image Extensions

HEVC Video Extensions from Device Manufacturer

You will get prompted to login to Microsoft. I don't do that and choose to just install on this PC.

That was easy.

Nexus 7 and Nougat

I've been playing with my Nexus 7 2012 for a long time. For me it's the perfect size.

When I last posted about it 2 1/2 years ago, I had updated it to Android 5.1.1 Lollipop.

Rereading that post this is what jumped out at me:

[I]ts performance is consistently Ok.

That was generous. It was so slow that I eventually set it aside and bought a Nexus 7 2013.

Recently I decided I wanted a cheap tablet to keep in the car. I looked at Amazon Fire Tablets but then came across my old Nexus 7 2012 in my junk pile.

I spent some time Googling for ROMs for it and found a couple of Android 7.1 Nougat ROMs.

The people who had flashed Nougat had good things to say.

Still have plenty of memory space. It all runs nice & smooth. Very well done guys!Everything works great with the latest version of the rom. Thank you for your work !Thank you very much for this rom. It's very smooth and fast.

So I dug out my old ThinkPad with adb and the Nexus drivers and got to work. adb is always a little bit of magic and the busted screen on the ThinkPad didn't help any.

First I had to install twrp. As usual this was the hardest part.

Then I flashed the ROM and pico Gapps.

After a couple of hours the Nexus 7 2012 was booted on Nougat.

Now it's on Android 7.1.2 with the September 2018 security patches.

Yeah, It's slow but usable and not bad for a 6+ year old device.

Squoosh

I guess all the good domain names are gone. I've recently posted about Sweech and Zoolz.

Now there's Squoosh.

Squoosh is a web app from Google that will optimize image sizes to reduce page load time.

I would have thought that web image optimization has already jumped the shark what with 100+ Mbps home broadband but what do I know? I realize that not everyone has that bandwidth. My mother only has 10Mbps.

Squoosh runs all in the browser and after you load it the first time you can run it offline. Again, not sure WHY you'd need to do that but it does work.

Anyway, on to what it does.

I sent a 1.44MB jpeg to Squoosh and it optimized it to 521KB, a savings of 66%. There was no discernible difference in the image.

Original

Squoosh

That's nice.