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Microsoft's Windows 10 Fall Update: Don't expect Edge extensions

Microsoft's coming 'Threshold 2' update to Windows 10, likely to be known as the Windows 10 Fall Update, is on track for a November release. Here's the likely feature list.
Written by Mary Jo Foley, Senior Contributing Editor

We've heard rumors for a while now that the next major update to Windows 10, codenamed "Threshold 2," would be available this Fall -- and more specifically, this November.

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It looks like the tipsters were correct, based on a new report from my Windows Weekly cohost Paul Thurrott. Thurrott's sources say Threshold 2, which Microsoft will christen officially "Windows 10 Fall Update," is definitely coming in November. (Though Microsoft will encourage partners and others not to call it that and just refer to it as plain-old Windows 10, given the push to get users to think of Windows 10 as a "service.")

The coming Fall Update will be delivered to users as a regular Windows 10 Cumulative Update that will feature mostly new features that Windows Insider testers have been evaluating over the past few months. No reactivation will be required after applying the update, Thurrott notes.The update will be made available to any device running Windows 10 RTM (Build 10240) or higher.

Among the new features expected in the Fall Update are improvements to Cortana and search; Favorites, Reading List and password syncing in the Edge browser (along with the ability to launch a second instance of Edge); and support for the recent Activation changes Microsoft made to allow Windows 7 and Windows 8.x product keys to work.

I haven't heard any updates recently as to whether some of the expected missing business features for Windows 10, such as Enterprise Data Protection and support for a Store for business apps/users, will still be part of Threshold 2, but I am thinking this is still on. The new, bundled Universal Skype messaging, phone and video apps are also still likely to be part of the Threshold 2 update, I believe.

What's not going to be part of Threshold 2 is support for extensions in Microsoft's Edge browser, as Winbeta reported recently. That feature has slipped and is now slated to be part of "Redstone 1," the next major update to Windows 10, which will be out by June 2016, my sources confirm. My sources are also saying that Windows Insiders will likely get to test Edge extensions as part of a Windows 10 Insider build before this calendar year is over.

Update: Microsoft officials confirmed to ArsTechnica that Edge isn't getting extensions until some time in 2016.

The lack of extension support in Edge is preventing some (including me) from making it their daily driver in Windows 10.

I also do not believe Microsoft's alternative to Apple Pay will be in Threshold 2, as it has not yet gone to testers. That feature is codenamed "OnePay," my sources have said. Microsoft talked up this feature in March at its WinHEC China conference but hasn't mentioned it lately.

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