Topic: Microsoft PowerToys is a set of utilities for Windows 10 power users

[Software Santa]

Microsoft PowerToys is a set of utilities for Windows 10 power users:

https://github.com/microsoft/PowerToys

Microsoft PowerToys is a set of utilities for power users to tune and streamline their Windows experience for greater productivity. Inspired by the Windows 95 era PowerToys project, this reboot provides power users with ways to squeeze more efficiency out of the Windows 10 shell and customize it for individual workflows. A great overview of the Windows 95 PowerToys can be found here.


Current PowerToy Utilities

Color Picker
ColorPicker is a simple and quick system-wide color picker with Win+Shift+C. Color Picker allows to pick colors from any currently running application and automatically copies the HEX or RGB values to your clipboard. This code is based on Martin Chrzan's Color Picker.


FancyZones
FancyZones is a window manager that makes it easy to create complex window layouts and quickly position windows into those layouts.


File Explorer Add-ons

File Explorer add-ons will enable SVG icon rendering and Preview Pane additions for File Explorer.

Preview Pane is an existing feature in the File Explorer. To enable it, you just click the View tab in the ribbon and then click "Preview Pane". PowerToys will now enable two types of files to be previewed: Markdown (.md) & SVG (.svg)

Image Resizer

Image Resizer is a Windows Shell Extension for quickly resizing images. With a simple right click from File Explorer, resize one or many images instantly. This code is based on Brice Lambson's Image Resizer.



Keyboard Manager

Keyboard Manager allows you to customize the keyboard to be more productive by remapping keys and creating your own keyboard shortcuts. This PowerToy requires Windows 10 1903 (build 18362) or later.



PowerRename

PowerRename is a Windows Shell Extension for advanced bulk renaming using search and replace or regular expressions. PowerRename allows simple search and replace or more advanced regular expression matching. While you type in the search and replace input fields, the preview area will show what the items will be renamed to. PowerRename then calls into the Windows Explorer file operations engine to perform the rename. This has the benefit of allowing the rename operation to be undone after PowerRename exits. This code is based on Chris Davis's SmartRename.
PowerToys Run

PowerToys Run is a new toy in PowerToys that can help you search and launch your app instantly with a simple Alt+Space and start typing! It is open source and modular for additional plugins. Window Walker is now inside too! This PowerToy requires Windows 10 1903 (build 18362) or later.



Shortcut Guide

Windows key shortcut guide appears when a user holds the Windows key down for more than one second and shows the available shortcuts for the current state of the desktop.




Installing and running Microsoft PowerToys: Requirements

    Windows 10 1803 (build 17134) or later.
    Have .NET Core 3.1 Desktop Runtime. The installer should handle this but we want to directly make people aware.

https://github.com/microsoft/PowerToys/releases/latest

https://github.com/microsoft/PowerToys