While there are a large number of changes in Windows 11, it is the visual side of the operating system that is generating the most discussions in the community.
And for good reason, too — these are the changes that people notice first.
But by now we know that Microsoft is not just redesigning the OS in terms of how it looks, but the company is packing in a whole bunch of enhancements to how people will use it. This is the reason why many an element in the platform warranted a whole new approach.
One such element that has undergone a complete rethink is the good old context menu.
Redmond recently detailed how it is going about this in a post on the Windows Developer Blog, explaining that the thought process behind the restyling is centered on key concepts of aesthetics, user friendliness, and modernization.
The software titan talks about how, over the years, the Windows context menu has been left to its own devices. As a result, this vital feature of the operating system has grown and expanded out of control, as you can see from the image above.
This is why the company decided to do something about it.
Gone is the unwieldy arrangement of icons and options in the current context menu, and in its place is something that can be called a massive improvement that not only addresses these problems of the past, but also looks towards the future.
The restyling places common commands up top, right next to where the menu is invoked. Most used choices like “Open” and “Open with” are grouped together. Same goes for app extensions, which are now group together below Shell verbs.
Apps with more than 1 verb are grouped into a flyout with app attribution. And the Shift + F10 key combination loads the current Windows 10 context menu if your wanted option is unavailable in the current implementation.
Pretty good job, overall.
Give the post a read to see how it is all coming together. There is a lot of good information there on the redesigned context menu in Windows 11.
