Hiding Windows 11's Teams Icon Doesn't Just Save Taskbar Space -- It Also Saves RAM (arstechnica.com) 94
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Plenty of apps that you install on your computer have a setting that tells them to launch when you initially log in to save you the trouble of launching your most commonly used apps yourself. Leaving this setting on can also allow apps to check for updates or launch more quickly when you start them for the first time. The difference for some of the preinstalled Microsoft apps in Windows 10 and 11 is that they use some of these resources by default, whether you actually use the apps or not. Developer and IT admin Michael Niehaus drew attention to some of these apps in recent blog posts examining the resource usage of Windows 11's widgets, Microsoft Teams, and Microsoft Edge in a fresh install of Windows 11 (the Edge observations apply to Windows 10, too).
Both Widgets and Teams spawn a number of Microsoft Edge WebView2 processes in order to work—WebView2 is a way to use Edge and its rendering engine without launching Edge or using its user interface. Collectively, these processes use a few hundred megabytes of memory to work. The widget-related processes don't start unless you actually click the widgets button, though they remain in the background afterward, even if you're not actively viewing your widgets. But the Teams processes all launch automatically, whether you actually use Teams or not. Uninstalling Teams will prevent this from happening, but Niehaus points out that simply removing the Teams icon from Windows 11's Taskbar in the Taskbar settings is enough to keep these WebView2 processes from launching when you log in. Ars Technica's Andrew Cunningham also recommends disabling System Boost in the Edge settings if you don't use it as your default browser. Otherwise, it too will use a couple hundred megabytes of memory.
Both Widgets and Teams spawn a number of Microsoft Edge WebView2 processes in order to work—WebView2 is a way to use Edge and its rendering engine without launching Edge or using its user interface. Collectively, these processes use a few hundred megabytes of memory to work. The widget-related processes don't start unless you actually click the widgets button, though they remain in the background afterward, even if you're not actively viewing your widgets. But the Teams processes all launch automatically, whether you actually use Teams or not. Uninstalling Teams will prevent this from happening, but Niehaus points out that simply removing the Teams icon from Windows 11's Taskbar in the Taskbar settings is enough to keep these WebView2 processes from launching when you log in. Ars Technica's Andrew Cunningham also recommends disabling System Boost in the Edge settings if you don't use it as your default browser. Otherwise, it too will use a couple hundred megabytes of memory.
Not Using any Microsoft products (Score:5, Informative)
Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
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flash is rusting now (Score:2)
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I'm happy to use use Microsoft keyboards, or Skype (for linux).
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Not that I'm advocating for Windows 11, but it is actually available for free.
You can install Windows 11 without a key. The only downsides are that you can't change certain trivial settings like the wallpaper, and there is an overlay in the bottom right corner of the screen that says that Windows is not activated.
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Very retro choice, just the thing to go with my handlebar mustache and my penny-farthing. Microsoft is beating on, boat against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
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My favorite part of Windows 11, paid or not, is that the taskbar is fixed to the bottom of the screen.
Very retro choice, just the thing to go with my handlebar mustache and my penny-farthing. Microsoft is beating on, boat against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
Probably because it was right the first time. I suspect that's exactly where 99 percent of people wanted it.
I'm setting up a new W11 computer for a customer right now, and so far, it's mostly okay. I do like the facial recognition because I wear out keyboards (seriously) logging in and giving permission. I have to see if the plethora of stupid-ass popups and nags can be stopped from stealing focus. I'm doing a lot of command line stuff, and yeah, that's a nuisance.
Muscle memory keeps me moving the mouse
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It doesn't matter where most people want it. That's a terrible argument for fixing it in place. Some people will benefit greatly from being able to move it, most won't. But it's not a complicated feature, or at least it shouldn't be, so there's no good reason not to support moving it.
Apple is a much worse offender though, you have to tweak plists to get the dock to be back where NeXT used to put it, which was questionable on 4:3 monitors but is absolutely ideal for wide ones.
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It doesn't matter where most people want it. That's a terrible argument for fixing it in place. Some people will benefit greatly from being able to move it, most won't. But it's not a complicated feature, or at least it shouldn't be, so there's no good reason not to support moving it.
Apple is a much worse offender though, you have to tweak plists to get the dock to be back where NeXT used to put it, which was questionable on 4:3 monitors but is absolutely ideal for wide ones.
I'm not certain that I understand. My Mac allows me to place it on either the bottom, left, or right. magnify, make it cover the whole horizontal aspect of the screen, or make it so small that the icons are just a few pixels. Right in the System preferences Dock and menu bar. Third icon from the left in the second row. Unless NeXT had something other than the right hand dock, it's an easy thing to do.
And yet, I use only the bottom, have the Icons cover the bottom aspect, and that's what every other user I
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I've got an ultra-wide, it's nice to have it take up horizontal space rather than vertical.
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I've got an ultra-wide, it's nice to have it take up horizontal space rather than vertical.
Very true. I just tried my dock on the side, and the icons got so small I would have to get rid of a bunch of them to see them.
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Oof, no way to have two rows of icons?
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Oof, no way to have two rows of icons?
I'll have to find out.
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Unless NeXT had something other than the right hand dock, it's an easy thing to do.
NeXT had a dock that always grew down from the top-right, with the first three or so items always in the same place so that you could always find them there rapidly via muscle memory, instead of having to guide your way there visually because the icons wander all over the place. Apple thought it looked best at the bottom center, and the rest is history.
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Unless NeXT had something other than the right hand dock, it's an easy thing to do.
NeXT had a dock that always grew down from the top-right, with the first three or so items always in the same place so that you could always find them there rapidly via muscle memory, instead of having to guide your way there visually because the icons wander all over the place. Apple thought it looked best at the bottom center, and the rest is history.
I'm not certain I understand the wandering icon thing you speak of. I can put my icons where I want, and they don't go anywhere unless I turn on magnification and the Icon I'm hovering over gets larger.
Also, since you said that the idea of fixing the taskbar/menu bar in place was a bad idea, then note that the dock in NeXT computers was always coming down from the right hand top, it seems you like a fixed dock rather than one you can position.
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I'm not certain I understand the wandering icon thing you speak of. I can put my icons where I want, and they don't go anywhere unless I turn on magnification and the Icon I'm hovering over gets larger.
That is literally completely wrong. The default configuration for the OSX dock is to be located at the bottom center and to grow symmetrically from the center, which means that every time you launch an application not pinned to the dock, literally every icon on the dock moves. You literally could not be more wrong if you tried.
Also, since you said that the idea of fixing the taskbar/menu bar in place was a bad idea, then note that the dock in NeXT computers was always coming down from the right hand top, it seems you like a fixed dock rather than one you can position.
What I actually said, and I will thank you not to put stupid words in my mouth, is that NeXT at least put it in a place which makes sense. I never defended the fact that NeXT didn't l
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I'm not certain I understand the wandering icon thing you speak of. I can put my icons where I want, and they don't go anywhere unless I turn on magnification and the Icon I'm hovering over gets larger.
That is literally completely wrong. The default configuration for the OSX dock is to be located at the bottom center and to grow symmetrically from the center, which means that every time you launch an application not pinned to the dock, literally every icon on the dock moves. You literally could not be more wrong if you tried.
Right The MacOS dock acts exactly as I want it to act. I put the icons exactly where I want them to be. I make them the size that I want them, up to them taking no more than the aspect - which is exactly what I want. If I wanted them in some space other than the bottom, I could put them there. I enable magnification if I want it.
Also, since you said that the idea of fixing the taskbar/menu bar in place was a bad idea, then note that the dock in NeXT computers was always coming down from the right hand top, it seems you like a fixed dock rather than one you can position.
What I actually said, and I will thank you not to put stupid words in my mouth, is that NeXT at least put it in a place which makes sense. I never defended the fact that NeXT didn't let you reposition it, so I hope you have fun with your straw man.
Here's the problem. You are arguing your opinion on what is correct. Everyone has opinions.
The NeXT dock is exactly what I do not want. I don't want the dock on the right side. I don't want it pinned to the top. I like the dock at the bottom, and I like to arrange it as I like.
That's my opinion. However, I don't claim you as being "literally completely wrong", or your claim of strawman arguments. I consider it your opinion. Just for reference, I was giving some of the reasons why I don't like it
My
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I don't drive a Ford. I don't think it's relevant to the discussion but since we're being modded up and getting free karma for telling the world the things we don't do I want in!
I'm Not Surprised (Score:5, Informative)
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Unfortunately, I need Teams for my remote office stuff.
Re:I'm Not Surprised (Score:5, Funny)
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If you worked at a zoo then you wouldn't have to work with as many people, and there would be less poo flinging.
Dob't knock Teams until... (Score:2)
... you've used the abortion that is gmeet. Even Slack is better than the bug ridden garbage that google serves up.
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So I have an interview coming up over Teams and I'm supposed to decline because... Microsoft?
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Teams can be accessed in a web browser.
Re:I'm Not Surprised (Score:5, Informative)
PROTIP: Microsoft has made it easier to uninstall the crap by integrating WinGet into Windows 11. WinGet is their package manage, like apt. You can use it to remove most of the bundled apps.
You can script it too, so you can have a script that un-installs the apps that get re-installed when Windows 11 receives major feature updates.
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You can script it too, so you can have a script that un-installs the apps that get re-installed when Windows 11 receives major feature updates.
So windows has a feature that you can use to correct the misfeature of the OS vendor delivering stuff to you that you don't want and didn't ask for? And reverting settings while they're at it? That's better than nothing, but still shit.
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You can actually just make your own install disc without the features that you don't want. You still have to deal with the occasional update re-installing stuff though, and yes that is shit.
Since Vista the way Windows install CDs have worked is that you set up a Windows installation, get it how you like it and then use a tool to convert that into an OS image. The image has a few flags set that cause Windows to run the Out Of Box stuff it does post-install, and the tool also removes all the hardware informat
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Since Vista the way Windows install CDs have worked is that you set up a Windows installation, get it how you like it and then use a tool to convert that into an OS image.
I'm running Win7, have been for years and multiple installations, and I've never done that. Instead I've slipstreamed the latest service pack and the drivers I need into the install ISO.
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You can't slipsteam updates and service packs into the ISOs with Windows 7 and later. Or do you mean you just copied the installers onto the discs and then installed them from a working Windows system?
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HTH HAND [google.com]
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Huh, interesting. It looks like certain updates can be slipstreamed, but only certain ones. Thanks.
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So windows has a feature that you can use to correct the misfeature of the OS vendor delivering stuff to you that you don't want and didn't ask for?
No you asked for it. You wanted Windows, the bloatware is part of windows. If you want to pick and choose https://www.linuxfromscratch.o... [linuxfromscratch.org]
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PROTIP: Microsoft has made it easier to uninstall the crap by integrating WinGet into Windows 11.
But then I'd have two problems.
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Yes, because WinGet isn't all that good. It is missing a lot of popular applications and is slow to get updates in many others. It has limitations on the type of installers it can use as well.
I still use Chocolatey, a third party package manager. So if/when I upgrade to Windows 11 I'll need two package managers on my system, unless Microsoft improves WinGet.
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get-appxpackage | remove-appxpackage
not work anymore in 11?
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And then the next Windows update comes along and puts it all back just to remind me who really owns the machine.
I think you're doing something wrong. I've been using Windows 10 (Home edition for personal use, Professional edition at work) for years and I can't recall an update putting back apps that I had uninstalled.
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I just grab a copy of the LTSC build of Windows from bittorrent. No cortana bullshit and only required security updates supplied for 10 years.
Re: I'm Not Surprised (Score:2)
One of the first things I do when I have to use a Windows machine is uninstall all of the useless apps that get in the way.
Me too, I start by removing Windows.
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I hate to tell you this but you have to go back and make sure your preferences are enforced. Apps you uninstalled, may reinstall themselves with a "security" patch. For example, I uninstalled Edge but it is now mandatory whether I want it or not. Health Center installed itself in a patch without disclosing it was going to be installed. Also those apps that you cannot uninstall and turned off will turn themselves on for no reason. Just yesterday Clipboard User Service [random characters] was using a lot of p
How little memory do windows machines have? (Score:2)
The assumption of computing over the past 20 years is that we have hardware resources to waste and the most expensive input of any activity is the human capital.. which is why we preload at startup so users are not sitting there wasting time, which could be billable hours.
To be sure I optimize my websites to use minimal resources, optim
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Ever since at least Windows XP, which was released more than 20 years ago, there has been several services running that claim the purpose of "optimizing boot speed". Why don't these processes prevent these stupid programs from starting until we need them?
Because they were lying. Running more services isn't optimizing anything.
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Because preventing these programs from starting until we need them is already happening invisibly.
This is another one of those stories where you can just trust the OS to do things right and they generally do. If the app isn't useful and isn't accessing the memory actively and that RAM is needed for other tasks the OS will push its memory to the SSD.
Intelligent memory management is just the default now in every OS and how they can boot so fast. They dump things to the SSD and then hibernate and then just r
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The assumption of computing over the past 20 years is that we have hardware resources to waste and the most expensive input of any activity is the human capital.. which is why we preload at startup so users are not sitting there wasting time, which could be billable hours.
Can you imagine what would happen if every piece of software in the system did this? Thousands of programs loading themselves into memory so that they are available a few milliseconds faster should the user ever decide to call for them.
You might think that is ridiculous but over the years most luser systems I've seen were loaded to the hilt with this kind of crap wasting resources for no reason because every developer seems to think their bit of software is the most important in the entire universe. Who c
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If you don't want to waste time get an SSD. There is no reason whatsoever to condone this behavior.
Don't most computers use an SSD? Also, computers getting faster is what created this behavior.
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Ha ha ha -- Macbook Pro (touchbar) user
16GB RAM / 2TB SSD but Office still takes some time to load. Possibly I have gotten used to very fast load times, but I think there must be a natural law of consumer equipment that it finds more essential actions to take up time as it gets faster. Though "Verifying Microsoft Word" probably comes from MacOS.
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A bloated Windows install still feels sluggish even with an SSD now. Especially right after startup when your 45 taskbar icons are loading and it's scanning for viruses and checking for updates all simultaneously. Feeling nostalgic I can fire up an old PDP-11 and be booted to a multi user operating system in several seconds.
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Asking as I donâ(TM)t know.
Hint: Microsoft doesn't make the hardware, and it isn't a walled garden.
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If the target was to use more hardware resources to free up human resources then they failed effing spectacularly.
Never in the history of League of Legends has it felt more like the computer was doing its utmost to stop me from getting a job done.
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which is why we preload at startup so users are not sitting there wasting time, which could be billable hours
All hours are billable to someone, in the grand scheme.
But preloading in this case is more about pushing Teams, with the OS just being the conduit for the pitch. It used to be somewhat confined to browser choice but this is happening in a lot of places now. Microsoft did it with Cortana, OneDrive, Bing, whatever their email service is called these days. Apple with icloud and apple music and TV.
It isn't like Microsoft cares what percentage of your hours you bill.
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Well its a question of extemes isn't it. There may be some value in a background process that checks for updates, maybe fetches a little data to keep a cache warm etc so when you launch the app its ready to go - when we are talking about a few hundred kilobytes to perhaps a few tens of MegaBytes in the context of a machine with 8 Gigabytes or more memory.
I would argue burning 5% of the machines resources on something like that is probably past the inflection point. Oh and yes unsued ram is wasted ram...rig
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Preload at startup slows everything down at startup. I'm trying to join the mandatory Teams meeting and look good in front of the Director, but the Windows machine is bogged down trying to preload all Office applications, Adobe Acrobat AC/DC, Edge (now with 4 blades), TheOneDrive, and more. Also after a reboot due to an update it will recompile all of the .NET based windows crap to improve your user "experience". All of this is highly noticeable and annoying when using a Windows in a VM.
System Boost? (Score:3)
Memory (Score:5, Funny)
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640 TB ought to be enough for anyone.
Wiping Teams is a great idea (Score:2)
Corporate insists on using Teams, since Exchange is the only thing their dumb IT people know how to deal with, and it's a bloated, buggy piece of crap (especially compared to alternatives like Slack). Thankfully that's only on my useless work laptop - but it's so bad there I immediately wipe it off every personal machine. Who knows what the hell it's doing in the background? And I don't mean spying, I just mean randomly eating RAM, 100% CPU and causing bluescreens. There's certainly no downside to just
Hiding windows saves even more. (Score:4, Funny)
I've found that if I entirely hide windows, by uninstalling, it saves a great deal of my time.
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Yeah but launching Outlook is a bitch when you first have to wait for Windows and Office to finish installing every time.
Okay... (Score:3)
Maybe it's just the systems I work with but I've gotten numb to anything vacuuming up less than about 5-10GB of memory, 50GB of disk or 500MBps of network bandwidth. I mean, I'm about to stuff 512GB of DDR4 into each of 3 boxes. My laptop has 32 gigs of memory.
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The amount of used memory shown in Windows is misleading anyway. It counts stuff like memory mapped files and code that is in executables and DLL stored on disk but not currently in RAM. The amount of RAM and dedicated swap space used is always far lower than the total memory used show in Task Manager.
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Additionally it counts used RAM for cache which can be cleared when called upon. That RAM isn't just written to disk as traditionally is the case when you run out, but rather simply purged.
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I thought the same thing. Even most of the entry level computers at Walmart come with 8GB RAM. If Teams and Widgets using 5% of that is a problem for someone, they should probably add more RAM, or buy a computer with more RAM already installed. And few computers have mechanical hard drives anymore, so the worst case is that some of that gets offloaded into VM on flash storage (yes, I know what swapping to flash does to its lifespan) isn't going to make a huge speed impact anyway. This just isn't the issue i
What if every program did it? (Score:3)
This is the question all developers should hammer into the heads of product managers.
"What if every program did it?" ...
What if every program decided it needed to autostart?
What if every program needed to download a few GB of updates every day (looking at games)?
What if every program decided it needed to be the default handler for a file.
The last one I actually know: every 10s the desktop reloads all icons. 2 unrelated programs decided they wanted to be the default handlers for a specific file type, and had a watchdog to that effect. every 10s the default handler would change, prompting a complete refresh of all icons. This was win98 times...
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I'd like to think this would work - but I think it goes something like this:
PM: Can we make an auto-load, self-updater thingy so it starts up super quick and is always updated?
Dev: Sure, but regular windows update will keep it updated anyway
PM: Naar, we're game-changing, envelope pushing, value creating here - we're going to work on a different cadence to Windows Update so we can be agile and deliver our product to better serve our customers needs - if you're not moving fast in this game, you're already los
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Erm every product which uses the features you list already does.
If a program needs to be memory resident then it literally auto sets itself to autostart.
Programs literally download their entire package again every time an update comes out. Just not all programs are that big.
Every program with a custom file extension wants to be the default handler for that file.
You're literally describing exactly what every program already does, and no the world doesn't go under, because not every program is simultaneously
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> Erm every product which uses the features you list already does
Nice tautology.
Did I say anything about a "custom" file extension? The example I gave was with something generic like jpg with a timer!! checking it was still the default. Custom file extensions are of course fair game.
Autostart was meant specifically at the issue described: why the hell does Teams need to have a preloaded webView when inactive/off?
Once upon a time some web browsers were doing the same: preload into memory at startup so the
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The example I gave was with something generic like jpg with a timer!!
The example you gave is irrelevant whataboutism from 1998. If you want to make a relevant comment then you should ask: "What if every program checked if it is the default file handler and prompted the user to become it with the option of not checking again." Which is precisely how software works.
Autostart was meant specifically at the issue described: why the hell does Teams need to have a preloaded webView when inactive/off?
I'm sorry do you not know what webView is or how Teams is written or works? Teams isn't "off/inactive". It's backgrounded, running as part of a system service in Windows 11. It's not a program. It's a taskbar featur
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> The example you gave is irrelevant whataboutism from 1998.
You missed my point completely: at least two people somewhere thought that it would be a good idea to automatically change the default handler with no user input.
Both implemented that, hilarity ensued.
"What if every program checked if it is the default file handler and prompted the user to become it with the option of not checking again." is exactly what should have happened, but didn't...
> I'm sorry do you not know what webView is or
Always the same shit (Score:2)
New windows version. ....
Swear a lot.
Run decrapifier.
Remove the new shit.
Install the old shit.
Block all the new spying IPs in the router.
Disable all speaking, hearing and touching gimmicks.
I hate new versions of anything, especially this, since it's always more bloated with stuff that nobody needs or uses.
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Forgot
Get off my lawn.
Confirmed! This saved me 12MB of RAM (Score:2)
Hiding the Teams icon produced one less WebView2 process on my system, it was one that used 12MB of RAM. Collectively I'm down from 105MB to a tad above 90MB.
Phew, I was worried my 32GB was being wasted.
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Hiding the Teams icon produced one less WebView2 process on my system, it was one that used 12MB of RAM. Collectively I'm down from 105MB to a tad above 90MB.
Phew, I was worried my 32GB was being wasted.
People are complaining about this, but isn't this just good design?
If you will never print on a particular PC, you can shut down the spooler service and... free up RAM. If you will never use DHCP, you can shut down the DHCP client service and... free up RAM. If you want to use a command prompt only and not the Start Menu etc, you can change your shell to CMD.EXE and... free up ram.
Computers have a default configuration and if you close or disable parts of it you don't personally need, releasing resourc
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another reason (Score:2)
Not just a Windows problem (Score:2)
The "640k is enough for anybody" has devolved in to "let's waste a few hundred megs on startup. Most people won't care". It's the same mentality that gives us a few megs of JavaScript to display one line of text. It would be nice to see the industry turn towards efficiency. It would be good for our pocketbooks because most people are not crunching numbers and don't need modern hardware. A 20 year old computer would easily satisfy most users if we didn't bloat everything. This is not going to change th
Bad phrase "Hiding Windows 11 Teams" (Score:3)
I feel like that article was written by a 6th grader with no editorial oversight.
Isn't the problem that Teams IS HIDDEN? It's running in the background on start by default and it is hidden to the users. It's using up resources on the user's computer and the user doesn't even know it unless they go and look at, get this, "Show Hidden Icons" (yes HIDDEN) to see that Teams is actually running and hidden in the background.
The user does not want to hide this. It's already hidden!!! What they want to do is terminate the program and stop it from starting up on logon! The last thing they want to do is hide it.
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The user does not want to hide this. It's already hidden!!! What they want to do is terminate the program and stop it from starting up on logon! The last thing they want to do is hide it.
The users are being trained to ignore things they are not allowed to change. LOL. Reality is so disgusting.
Same old Microsoft shuffle .. (Score:1)