A collection of upcoming CFPs (call for papers) from across the internet and around the world.

The post Call For Papers Listings for 5/1 appeared first on Leon Adato.

Job postings that came across my desk, slack, email, discord, etc this week.

The post Job listings for week ending 5/1 appeared first on Leon Adato.

Hello Windows Insiders I’ve now spent the past two months in this expanded role leading the Windows Insider Program. Two themes have stood out in my conversations with you. First, you want more transparency. You want to see what we’re doing, understand our decisions, and see progress through shipping. Second, a shared sense of pride. We want to be proud of what we build, and as Insiders, you’re proud to be the first to guide us with your feedback. When we get it right, we celebrate together. When we don’t, you push us to improve. We want Insiders to feel that same connection to what we’re building. Over the next few months, you’ll see us laser focused on the improvements we’re shipping. My ask of you: try the experiences, pressure test them, and let’s keep building a product we are proud of. Below are a few of the top improvements we’ve started rolling out to Windows Insiders over the past month, including some experiences rolling out in today’s flights.

Making the Windows Insider Program easier to navigate, with more control of the features you want

[caption id="attachment_178861" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] Newly updated Windows Insider Settings screen showing the new Experimental and Beta channels[/caption] Everything starts with Windows Insiders. Before a feature or improvement reaches general availability, we deliver it to you first. Last week, we began rolling changes to make the Windows Insider Program easier to navigate, simpler to understand, and with more control to try the features you want. With these changes, we're moving to two primary channels, Experimental and Beta, with clearer expectations for what each offer. In Beta, we're ending controlled feature rollouts (CFR), so when we announce a feature and you take the update, you'll have it. In Experimental, we're also adding new feature flags, so you can choose which features to try. We’re also making it easier to move between channels or leave the program without a clean install. Alongside these changes, we've continued improving Feedback Hub to reduce friction when sharing feedback, with recent updates focused on more consistent window behavior, easier navigation, and accessibility improvements. See our Windows Insider experience blog post for the full breakdown of channel changes, feature flags, and how to switch channels. For more information on the transition over the next month and how to access the new changes, read last week’s Windows Insider blog.

Less disruption from Windows Update

[caption id="attachment_178902" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] Showing ability in Windows Update to extend update pause[/caption] The theme is simple: fewer disruptions, more clarity, more control. This update moves Windows toward a single monthly restart by consolidating OS, .NET, and driver updates, and gives you more flexibility to time updates around your schedule. We've also made changes to the Power menu so you'll always see the standard Restart and Shut down options without having to install a pending update first. You decide when updates happen, not the other way around. These improvements are available in the Experimental channel. See our Windows Update blog post for more on how unified updates, improved pause controls, and the new Power menu work together to keep you in control.

Simplifying AI experiences across inbox apps

Last month we said we would reduce where Copilot shows up across Windows, focusing on bringing AI where it’s most valuable. You’re seeing those changes roll out. In Snipping Tool and Photos, we've removed the “Ask Copilot” button entirely. And in Notepad, we've replaced the generic Copilot icon with a clearer "Writing Tools" label that better describes what it does. This is part of a broader shift to make AI in Windows more intentional and realign the experiences to those that provide the most value to users, and you’ll see us continue to be deliberate about where Copilot shows up, with fewer more curated experiences. These changes have been gradually rolling out through Microsoft Store updates over the past month.

Delivering improvements to make File Explorer faster and more dependable

File Explorer is a go-to tool for hundreds of millions of people across diverse workflows. It is an experience customers depend on to be functional, and we want to make it loved. We’re making foundational architectural improvements and rolling them out incrementally to reduce hangs, improve responsiveness, polish, and drive consistent gains in performance. In parallel, we’re addressing long-standing user feedback with targeted improvements that make day-to-day experiences more stable and reliable. This has included fixes to deliver smoother, more responsive launch and navigation, making the Home experience more stable with fewer jarring transitions and improved visual polish, including sharper thumbnails. These improvements have already begun to roll out in the Experimental channel, with several rolling out in today’s flights.

More control over widgets and feed experiences

One of the areas we’re looking at closely across the operating system is the idea of “calm”. When you’re designing an experience for over a billion users, what are the right defaults that are easy, simple, and limit distractions? One of the most significant areas we’re addressing this is in Widgets and the Discover feed to make them quieter by default. We're changing default settings for launching and badging so you have more control over when these experiences show up and when they're allowed to seek your attention. When notifications do surface, we're setting a higher bar to make sure they're meaningful. We're also continuing to separate Widgets and the Discover feed into more distinct destinations, with calmer defaults that give you more control of what you choose to see. These improvements are rolling out today in the Experimental channel. We’ll soon also be reducing the default set of Widgets on lock to just Weather, putting customers in more control of curating the Widgets they want to see on lock. [caption id="attachment_178928" align="aligncenter" width="2061"] Comparing the in-market widget experience (left) with the new experience (right)[/caption]

Improving system performance

As part of our commitment to making Windows more responsive and consistent, we have also been making progress on system performance across several areas of the operating system. We have been actively investigating and pursuing memory savings across the system. Widgets is one of the areas we’re focused on, leveraging device characteristics and user behavior patterns to optimize memory for our users. This includes things like a smaller default memory footprint, giving back memory faster when not in use, putting the user in more control of pre-launch, and limiting pre-launch on devices with lower memory capacity. Several of these changes are beginning to roll out to Windows Insiders today and we will be sharing more of our improvements in Widgets and in other areas over the coming months. We have been improving responsiveness across key OS and app launch experiences. In mid-March, we began rolling out targeted performance/power tuning improvements for the most frequently used OS and app scenarios. While we continue to tune these policies for improvements, these optimizations accelerate app launch and core shell scenarios like the Start menu, Search, Action Center, and more. One other cool update was work the team recently did to update the Windows scheduler. By better handling processor power states (C-states), we improve user-perceived responsiveness in everyday use. This optimization is beginning to become available in retail for customers.

What’s ahead

We know there’s a lot of excitement for Taskbar customization – and that’s coming soon. We’re actively refining the experience to ensure it meets our quality bar before broader preview. I’m excited to share more on that work later this month, including how we’re improving Taskbar and Start, as well the work underway to enhance Search. Since March, we’ve also been traveling to various cities to meet with Windows Insiders, listen to feedback, and share how we’re thinking about the future of the program– first in Seattle and last week in New York. The team and I are excited to continue connecting with you at our upcoming meetups taking place in Hyderabad, Taipei, San Francisco and London in the months ahead. If you’re interested in attending, register here! The commitments we made in March reflect our focus on delivering real performance, reliability and craft improvements to Windows 11 throughout this year. With Microsoft Build next month, we’ll have more to share on how we’re making Windows even better for developers. Looking forward to seeing you there! For a complete view of what’s shipped in each build, check the latest release notes on the new Windows Insider Program Documentation Hub. Please keep the feedback coming. Marcus

Hello Windows Insiders, Today we are expanding the rollout of the new Windows Insider experience improvements to Canary Channel 28000 series devices, which will begin to move to Experimental (26H1). As a reminder, this does not change your current version of Windows, just bringing you the latest improvements to the Windows Insider experience.

Extending ISO download support

One of the areas of feedback we received was that many of you like to use ISOs to install your builds. We’ve heard you, and are committing to releasing ISOs available to download alongside regularly scheduled builds across all versions of the Beta and Experimental channels. To find ISOs for Windows Insider Preview Builds, see the Windows Insider Preview Downloads page.

New builds this week

Today we are releasing new Windows 11 Insider Preview Builds. As a reminder, all Insiders can find the release notes for your device based on the new channel system, even if you haven’t moved yet. This is to make finding build information as easy as possible during the transition. See your channel release notes here:

• Beta (Including Beta Channel): Build 26220.8340
• Experimental (Including Dev Channel): Build 26300.8346

For those on other specific build versions, here are today’s new builds and release notes:

• Experimental (26H1) – Including Canary 28000 series: Build 28020.1921
• Experimental (Future Platforms) – Including Canary 29500 series: Build 29580.1000

As a reminder, you can always find your build number in the watermark on bottom right-hand corner of your desktop.

Notable new features:

[Run dialog update]

Release channel: Experimental We’re rolling out a refreshed Run dialog experience designed to bring a more modern look and improved usability. This update introduces updated visuals and a cleaner interface, along with new controls that make it easier to manage the experience from within Settings. The refreshed Run dialog is currently available as an opt-in experience for Windows Insiders on the Experimental channel, where you can enable it by going to Settings > System > Advanced and turning on the new Run dialog option. See the Dev blog announcement for more information.

New run dialog

[Feedback Hub app update]

Release channel: Experimental, Experimental (26H1), Experimental (Future Platforms) Thanks Windows Insiders that have been sharing feedback about the Feedback Hub – we’re now rolling out version 2.2604.301.0. This update contains a number of improvements based on what you’ve been telling us, including:

• Generally improved reliability.
• More tweaks to improve general design fit and finish, accessibility, and localization.
• The Community feedback section for non-English now allows you to switch view to English if you’d prefer.
• Collection titles and Official responses now will be automatically translated in top languages.
• The file upload limit when submitting feedback is back up to 500mb.
• Improved upvote and comment count accuracy for feedback.

Please keep the feedback coming! If you want to share any thoughts, you can file them in the Feedback Hub under Apps > Feedback Hub.

[Widgets is quiet by default]

Release channel: Experimental We’re working to make Widgets feel less distracting and overwhelming by making the experience quiet by default. To do this, we’re testing a new set of default settings designed to reduce unexpected alerts and visual interruptions. These changes include:

• Disabling Open on hover by default
• Turning off taskbar badging  by default

• Opening to widgets experience on first launch

• Limiting taskbar alerts until you choose to open and engage with the Widgets experience

If you prefer more proactive updates, you can easily turn features like taskbar badging back on through Widgets settings. Thanks, Stephen and the Windows Insider Program team

A major barrier to AI adoption isn’t willingness but governance, as leaders seek secure, observable, and controllable systems to confidently deploy AI across enterprise environments.

The post AI Agent & Copilot Podcast: Inside Microsoft’s Vision for AI Agents and the Future of Work appeared first on Cloud Wars.

Microsoft is launching a new AI agent inside Word that's specifically designed for legal teams. Legal Agent handles document edits, negotiation history, and complex documents to help legal teams handle tasks like reviewing contracts.

"Instead of relying on general AI models to interpret commands, the agent follows structured workflows shaped by real legal practice, managing clearly defined, repeatable tasks like reviewing contracts clause by clause against a playbook," explains Sumit Chauhan, corporate vice president of Microsoft's Office Product Group.

The Legal Agent can work with existing documents that have tracked changes, and analyz …

Read the full story at The Verge.