Dev channel update to 87.0.658.0 is live

[josh_bodner]

Hello Insiders!  Today we’re releasing build 87.0.658.0 to the Dev channel, and we’ve got a lot to talk about: 

• In light of their recent introduction in Dev, we’ve got a small overview of our work on PDF table of contents and scrolling improvements:  https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/articles/improvements-in-pdf-reader-table-of-contents-and-smo.... 
• In anticipation of its broader rollout, we’ve got an in-depth introduction of our new web screenshot capture tool:  https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/articles/introducing-web-capture-for-microsoft-edge/m-p/17213.... 
• For web developers, we’ve got an article announcing the general availability of the Edge Dev Tools extension for VS Code:  https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2020/10/01/microsoft-edge-tools-vscode/. 
• For those curious about how the browser works, we’ve got an in-depth look at our multi-process architecture:  https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2020/09/30/microsoft-edge-multi-process-architecture/.  Specifically, this can help answer why there are more Edge processes in Task Manager than there are tabs in the browser!
• Finally, from our performance team, we’ve got an explainer for how we think of “performance”:  https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2020/09/23/faster-leaner-more-efficient-microsoft-edge/. 

As for all of the new features and fixes this week: 

Added features: 

• Added the ability to translate selected text on a page. 
• Added the ability to never translate a particular site. 
• Added a management policy to Configure Speech Recognition.  Note that updates to documentation and administrative templates are still needed. 
• Obsoleted the management policy to Enable Deprecated Web Platform Features. 

Improved reliability: 

• Fixed an issue where opening Edge sometimes causes the device to bluescreen. 
• Fixed an issue where opening the Downloads management page sometimes crashes the browser. 
• Fixed a crash when opening a website installed as an app. 
• Fixed a crash when Password Monitor shows an alert. 
• Fixed an issue where using certain accessibility features like Narrator sometimes causes tabs to crash on certain versions of Windows 10. 
• Fixed an issue where dragging items into a Collection sometimes crashes the Collections pane. 
• Fixed an issue where Edge sometimes opens many command prompt windows with ERROR: file_io_win.cc(180). 

Changed behaviors: 

• Temporarily disabled the cards that appear when hovering the mouse over tabs. 
• Fixed an issue where there is sometimes blank space between tabs or between the new tab button and the last tab. 
• Fixed an issue where Read Aloud sometimes doesn’t start reading from the current location in PDFs. 
• Fixed an issue where the profile image on the Taskbar shortcut doesn’t match the image in the browser. 
• Fixed an issue where searching on the History management page sometimes doesn’t work. 
• Fixed an issue where using Guided Switch opens an additional new tab. 
• Fixed an issue where Guided Switch sometimes is triggered for popup windows. 
• Fixed an issue where text selected in PDFs sometimes doesn’t unselect when it should. 
• Fixed an issue where keyboard shortcuts registered by extensions sometimes don’t work. 

Known issues:  

• Users of certain ad blocking extensions may experience playback errors on Youtube.  As a workaround, temporarily disabling the extension should allow playback to proceed.  See https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/articles/known-issue-adblock-causing-errors-on-youtube/m-p/14... for more details. 
• Some users are still running into an issue where all tabs and extensions immediately crash with a STATUS_INVALID_IMAGE_HASH error.  The most common cause of this error is outdated security or antivirus software from vendors like Symantec, and in those cases, updating that software will fix it. 
• Users of the Kaspersky Internet Suite who have the associated extension installed may sometimes see webpages like Gmail fail to load.  This failure is due to the main Kaspersky software being out of date, and is thus fixed by making sure the latest version is installed. 
• Some users are seeing favorites get duplicated after we made some previous fixes in that area. The most common way this is triggered is by installing the Stable channel of Edge and then signing into it with an account that has already signed into Edge before.  Fixing this should be easier now that the deduplicator tool is available.  However, we’ve also seen duplication happen when running the deduplicator on multiple machines before either machine has a chance to fully sync its changes, so while we wait for some of the fixes we’ve made to come to Stable, make sure to leave plenty of time in between runs of the deduplicator. 
• After an initial fix for it recently, some users are still experiencing Edge windows becoming all black.  Opening the Browser Task Manager (keyboard shortcut is shift + esc) and killing the GPU process usually fixes it.  Note that this only appears to affect users with certain hardware and is most easily triggered by resizing an Edge window.  For users with discrete GPUs, updating graphics drivers may help. 
• Some users are seeing “wobbling” behavior when scrolling using trackpad gestures or touchscreens, where scrolling in one dimension also causes the page to subtly scroll back and forth in the other.  Note that this only affects certain websites and seems to be worse on certain devices.  This is most likely related to our ongoing work to bring scrolling back to parity with Edge Legacy’s behavior, so if this behavior is undesirable, you can temporarily turn it off by disabling the edge://flags/#edge-experimental-scrolling flag. 
• There are some issues where users with multiple audio output devices sometimes don’t get any sound from Edge. In one case, Edge becomes muted in the Windows Volume Mixer and unmuting it fixes it.  In another, restarting the browser fixes it. 

As always, everything we do is for you.  You’re a vital part of our operation! 

[#2]

@josh_bodner 

I presume that when you say "Temporarily disabled the cards that appear when hovering the mouse over tab" you actually mean "Temporarily changed default to disabled" as my hover cards (with preview images) are still appearing just fine, but then I set both cards and images on cards flags to enabled when those flags first appeared. If you really mean disabled rather than changed the default, then someone has messed up because mine are still there.

[#3]

When are you going to do something about the known issues? Reach out to the software that isn't working or force it upon people. For instance, tell users to update Kasperkey if they want it to work with edge.

[#4]

I like the improvements made to vertical tabs in this update. from the new button placement to the overall stability of the vertical tabs. great work

[#5]

Wanted to add that in the previous update when restarting the browser it had not resorted the previous session but in this one, it did so the is issue solved.

The card that appears when hovering the mouse over a tab was not able to contain the whole tab description (when the description was very long) which the previous implementation can show.
Not being able to see the whole tab description when hovering on the tab defeats the whole purpose of having the feature.

[#6]

@josh_bodner 

I really like the update to the look of the vertical tabs. Makes it more likely that I'll use it. Could use a little more tweaking like getting rid of this waste of space. I have send feedback on the issue.

[#7]

Whoa, this is a mouth-full: "Obsoleted the management policy to Enable Deprecated Web Platform Features"

[#8]

Thanks for giving us the option to select specific parts of the website to translate. It was a feature from the translator extension from Legacy Edge and I used it a lot.

[#9]

@DavidGB nope, you're right.  If you've manually changed the flag to enabled or disabled, that will override whatever our feature rollout system does.  

[#10]

@ethanmenzel that's more or less what the known issues are doing (we hope!)  We have no way of knowing which users are running outdated software or reaching out to them, so we just have to make sure that info is posted in areas we think people will see it, and these release notes meet that criteria.  

[#11]

@positron7120 just a heads up, but the issue with losing tabs will be back next week.  The bug only happens when you update Edge from a build before the bug exists to a build where the bug exists, which is why you didn't see it again this week.  Unfortunately, the fix will cause the same thing to happen again (but only once, when upgrading from a build where to bug exists to a build where it's fixed), and we anticipate that to be in next week's Dev.  

The good news is that the session information should still exist in your History, so if you go to ... > History, you should be able to re-open your previous windows from the Recently Closed section.  

[#12]

It is not related to a recent update, but I've finally been using the ability to switch between my personal live profile and my work's live profile. The feature works really well and saves me a ton of headache. Thanks!

[#13]

@josh_bodner 

Since this week's update, the taskbar icon for Edge Dev is a bit blurry around the edges. A minor annoyance but I thought should post here.

[#14]

@SumitDhiman 

You're right - I thought a little about it, but didn't think more about it. Here is how it looks for me (light theme, task bar in the top):

The icon at the far right looks better - it's the same browser (Edge Dev) just a different profile.

[#15]

I've observed (and reported) the same issue in the beta channel as of a few weeks ago.

[#16]

@adrianghc We've got a fix coming soon for the current Beta, and we're making sure we get this fixed in Dev before it becomes the next Beta.  

[#17]

This version crashes when I try to open "Voice options"

[#18]

@mkoninin 

Just tried the same. The whole browser didn't crash, but when I adjusted the reading speed the tab froze with the options open. Have submitted feedback with recording of the issue.

[#19]

That's great, thank you. 🙂

[#20]

@ahl2ndc Looks like it's still happening in Canary too, so I'll make sure the team knows!