The PowerToys team is working on adding a new tool to the apps suite. It will allow to record the screen contents, and provide a few editing options. The tool is currently known as 'Video GIF Capture'.
The new tool will allow the user to record an app of a screen portion, and save the recording to a file . It will include an option to create a GIF animation from what the user captured. Some other features include the ability to trim the capture, and set video/GIF quality.
On GitHub, Microsoft has published a lengthy document regarding the new tool. It also includes some design mockups, which give the idea who the tool is supposed to work.
Video GIF Capture selection menu
Video GIF Capture expanded selection menu for exact coordinate selection
Video GIF Capture recording interface prior to recording
Video GIF Capture recording interface during recording
Video GIF Capture video editing
Video GIF Capture GIF editing
The user will be able to assign a hotkey to the screen recording action, and customize the color of the selection rectangle when setting up a capture.
The work is in progress, so it is not known when the new tool will become available to the public. Microsoft is taking a close look at existing apps, including Snip and Sketch, Xbox Game Bar, and third-party apps like Camtasia, Screen to Gif, to create a familiar and easy-to-use interface for the new tool.
PowerToys is a set of tiny handy utilities which were first introduced in Windows 95. Probably, most users will recollect TweakUI and QuickRes, which were really useful. The last version of the classic PowerToys suite was released for Windows XP. In 2019, Microsoft announced that they are reviving PowerToys for Windows and making them open source. Windows 10 PowerToys obviously are completely new and different, tailored for the new operating system.
Download PowerToys
You can download the app from its Releases page on GitHub:
PowerToys apps
As of now, Windows 10 PowerToys include the following apps.
- Video Conference Mute tool - an experimental tool that allows muting both audio and video on your computer with a single keystroke or click.
- ColorPicker - a simple and quick system-wide color picker that allows you to get the color value at any point of what you see on the screen.
- PowerRename - a tool that is intended to help you rename a large number of files using various naming conditions like search and replace a portion of the file name, define regular expressions, change letter case, and more. PowerRename is implemented as a shell extension for File Explorer (read plugin). It opens a dialog box with a bunch of options.
- FancyZones - FancyZones is a window manager that is designed to make it easy to arrange and snap windows into efficient layouts for your workflow, and also to restore these layouts quickly. FancyZones allows the user to define a set of window locations for a desktop that are drag targets for windows. When the user drags a window into a zone, the window is resized and repositioned to fill that zone.
- Windows key shortcut guide - The Windows key shortcut guide is a full screen overlay utility that provides a dynamic set of Windows key shortcuts that are applicable for the given desktop and currently active window. When the Windows key is held down for one second, (this time can be tuned in settings), an overlay appears on the desktop showing all available Windows key shortcuts and what action those shortcuts will take given the current state of the desktop and active window. If the Windows key continues to be held down after a shortcut is issued, the overlay will remain up and show the new state of the active window.
- Image Resizer, a Windows Shell Extension for quickly resizing images.
- File Explorer - a set of addons for File Explorer. Currently includes two Preview Pane additions to show contents of *.MD and *.SVG files.
- Window Walker is an app that lets you search and switch between windows that you have open, all from the comfort of your keyboard.
- PowerToys Run, provides a new Run command with extra options like quick search for apps, files, and docs. It supports extensions to get features like a calculator, dictionaries, nd online search engines.
- Keyboard Manager is a tool that allows remapping any key to a different function. It can be configured in the main PowerToys dialog.
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