FragglePete Posted June 17 Posted June 17 Well, <sarcasm> this was a nice surpise from Microsoft </saracsm>. The latest security update (2026-06) has been applying to PCs around our school and it completely changes the way the Start Menu works! All the Apps now appear within 'Category' blocks at the bottom of the Start Menu, which you can change to Grid or List. Start policy settings | Microsoft Learn In a way, I think overall it does work better - but why as a security update has this happened? I downloaded the latest ISO from Micrsoft (May 2026) and installed this thinking it was part of that release, but no, it's only when it applied the 2026-06 update did the start menu change. FFS! Playing with this, it would appear the .json method of pinning items now does appear to work correctly (and doesn't break the start menu like it did before), but the GPO to 'Hide Category view in the Start Menu' which should default to Grid View which shows installed apps as a proper list does not appear to work. Well, I can't get it to work. Is it just me? Anybody else slightly miffed at this? Just trying to sort our install for Summer and where I normally just give MDT the latest .ISO to work with (I know, I know, but it works for us for now) and let it install the updates as it goes, this 'security' update seems to take an absolute age to apply during the task sequence. So, seeing if a Sysprep and Capture will work now to get things working quicker. Pete 1
jthompson Posted June 17 Posted June 17 It's funny that one of the defining features of Windows '95, the Start menu, feels so far from maturity after more than 30 years. They'll never leave that ******** thing alone. It's almost as if the usage telemetry of the previous design has told them what we all knew from the outset: the people just it to be a flat, alphabetical list of installed apps, with no lifestyle or shopping mechanics intruding. 3
MYK-IT Posted June 17 Posted June 17 Yes, spotted and reported by users this week, and recently enabled the 'Hide Category view in the Start Menu" policy too. Need to see if it works! Interestingly, it appears you cannot force to 'All Apps'
itskdog Posted June 17 Posted June 17 Since at least Windows 10 if not longer, they've simplified the patches into a single Cumulative update each month, with all the features, bug fixes, and security fixes since the last Feature Update in one, so the number of updates you have to install after building a machine are reduced. Last year they changed the name that appears in the Settings app to be easier for the layman to read - previously it would look this like "2024-02 Cumulative Update for Windows 11 for x64-based Systems (KB5034766)" (and it still shows like that on the Update Catalog), but now they just put "YEAR-MONTH Security Update (VERSION.BUILD)" for cumulative updates (as all CUs will include security fixes, so it gets the most critical description that fits it). Driver updates are also in plain English now, it's "MANUFACTURER DRIVERCLASS Driver Update (VERSION)" when it used to just be "Manufacturer - Driver Class - Version"
JazzFlute Posted June 17 Posted June 17 5 hours ago, FragglePete said: Well, <sarcasm> this was a nice surpise from Microsoft </saracsm>. The latest security update (2026-06) has been applying to PCs around our school and it completely changes the way the Start Menu works! All the Apps now appear within 'Category' blocks at the bottom of the Start Menu, which you can change to Grid or List. Start policy settings | Microsoft Learn In a way, I think overall it does work better - but why as a security update has this happened? I downloaded the latest ISO from Micrsoft (May 2026) and installed this thinking it was part of that release, but no, it's only when it applied the 2026-06 update did the start menu change. FFS! Playing with this, it would appear the .json method of pinning items now does appear to work correctly (and doesn't break the start menu like it did before), but the GPO to 'Hide Category view in the Start Menu' which should default to Grid View which shows installed apps as a proper list does not appear to work. Well, I can't get it to work. Is it just me? Anybody else slightly miffed at this? Just trying to sort our install for Summer and where I normally just give MDT the latest .ISO to work with (I know, I know, but it works for us for now) and let it install the updates as it goes, this 'security' update seems to take an absolute age to apply during the task sequence. So, seeing if a Sysprep and Capture will work now to get things working quicker. Pete Yes i noticed this recently and thought that someone had changed some view/start settings then realised its on everyone i update, I just sigh and go with it but like you it does seem better but not sure why they include it in a security update.
J-14P Posted June 18 Posted June 18 (edited) 23 hours ago, MYK-IT said: Yes, spotted and reported by users this week, and recently enabled the 'Hide Category view in the Start Menu" policy too. Need to see if it works! Interestingly, it appears you cannot force to 'All Apps' I couldn't get the gpo to force list to work, so it seems setting reg key "AllAppsViewMode" to 2 in "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Start" seems to set start menu to "list" mode, the user can set it back themselves. I'm just applying on logon through gp. Edited June 18 by J-14P 1
FragglePete Posted June 18 Author Posted June 18 3 hours ago, J-14P said: I couldn't get the gpo to force list to work, so it seems setting reg key "AllAppsViewMode" to 2 in "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Start" seems to set start menu to "list" mode, the user can set it back themselves. I'm just applying on logon through gp. yep, thanks - that worked. Did see that elsewhere but it just seems a messy solution to muck about with registry tweaks with GPOs. Still, it's in and it works - thanks. Pete
J-14P Posted June 18 Posted June 18 (edited) 6 minutes ago, FragglePete said: yep, thanks - that worked. Did see that elsewhere but it just seems a messy solution to muck about with registry tweaks with GPOs. Still, it's in and it works - thanks. Pete I agree, not ideal I don't like doing reg tweaks but as usual will probably take a while for it to be included as a policy.. if it ever is... (Looking at you start menu alignment) Edited June 18 by J-14P
psydii Posted June 18 Posted June 18 (edited) The category layout they've gone with really reminds me of Program Manager / PC Tools Desktop from the 3.0/3.1 days. Edited June 18 by psydii 1
ZeroHour Posted June 19 Posted June 19 On 17/06/2026 at 08:32, FragglePete said: but the GPO to 'Hide Category view in the Start Menu' which should default to Grid View which shows installed apps as a proper list does not appear to work. Just to say that policy appears to work for me when deployed via InTune.
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