Windows is testing a new, wider Run dialog box. Here’s how to try it

The Windows 11 Run dialog box is one of the oldest pieces of user interface still in use. It works just fine, but it has an aesthetic that harkens back to earlier versions of Microsoft’s operating system. Now, that’s set to change. Redmond is testing a new version of the Run dialog box, if you have one of the latest Beta or …

[DarkwavePunk]

Blimey

Seems a bit of a faff for not much return. If I do use Windows, the run dialogue is very useful but I'm not sure a slightly wider bar makes much difference. It's usually cut'n'paste into it or total muscle memory without looking. How odd.

[AndrueC]

Re: Blimey

It'd be more useful if they changed it to a full feature but single line command shell. Ie; give us parameter completion, file name completion.

[DarkwavePunk]

Re: Blimey

Too bloody right. I used to have a mutant tiny terminal in the top left as a sticky window in FVWM. That, focus follows mouse and sloppy focus made for a useful but minimalist launcher.

[Ken Hagan]

Re: Blimey

They could just have made the existing box resizable, no?

Baffling that anyone considers this a new feature that requires testing and opt-in from Insiders.

[DarkwavePunk]

Re: Blimey

How sensible. How long did it take to get cut and paste error messages from a dialogue box? Is that even universal yet? The ability to resize input fields is some crazy future technology.

[FirstTangoInParis]

Re: Blimey

> They could just have made the existing box resizable, no?

This. So many of the dialogue boxes in W11vare like this, so you can’t tell if you’re about to send a link to MyVeryLongNameFile-v22 or MyVeryLongNameFile-v22-with-extraCleverBits.

[LybsterRoy]

Re: Blimey

I dispute your use of the term "not much return". It should be "bugger all return"

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Blimey

You missed its primary function: obscure control elements while in use and thus reduce the usability of Microsoft products once more. As a well known chain in the UK keeps repeating: "every little bit helps" (in this case to prove to shareholders that their customers are locked in so tightly they'd even accept it to work only 25% of the time, probably the aim for 2026).

[herman]

Re: Blimey

Wow - absolutely astonishing Microsoft innovation. Bill Gates will be so proud of his legacy...

[dsch]

How do you browse with the new one?

[Paul Herber]

If the button is not provided then you do not need it.

[Anonymous Custard]

Just take heart that there's no coprolite AI crammed in there trying to tell you what you want to run...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's only because it's a preview feature at this stage

[Excused Boots]

"Just take heart that there's no coprolite AI crammed in there trying to tell you what you want to run...”

Give it time!

[David Austin]

...Yet.

[Pascal Monett]

I wonder

I wonder when Windows Insider is going to give us an OS. You know, that thing that used to be used only to allow the user to run what HE wanted to run ?

[gv]

Re: I wonder

Bring back the vertical taskbar.

[Fruit and Nutcase]

Re: I wonder

I wonder when Windows Insider is going to give us the old Notepad

[Mage]

Re: I wonder

when they will ditch Insider program and have a proper test & QA dept instead?

[Bloodbeastterror]

Re: I wonder

It already exists - it's called Linux.

I finally got fed up with the constant data sucking and control freakery, and on my 50th attempt over the years I've managed to get a Linux that actually works (pretty much, with a few quirks) - Zorin OS 18.

[herman]

Re: I wonder

I ditched Windows completely in 2009 and haven't looked back.

[Anonymous Coward]

Honest question, does anyone even use this thing besides scammers? If I want to run something I either search for the program itself or I open Terminal. I think I've only exclusively seen this used by scammers to trick people into opening Internet Explorer or to paste in some nasty PowerShell script that got auto-inserted into the clipboard from a malicious website. Literally, never once I have ever seen it used outside of that context. Not with friends, not in videos, never.

[MiguelC]

I use it, usually to run regedit or some other seldomly used programmes - way faster than scouring the menus for the correct entry

[david 12]

way faster than scouring the menus for the correct entry

Which brings up another point: the menus in Win95-WinXP, while arguably less attractive, were faster and easier to use.

[Mage]

WFW311 was easier to use than Win10. OK, no start menu or pinned icons and no right click context menu. Win32s even runs some 32 bit Windows programs. They deliberately added some APIs on Win95 for Office 95 to stop people running Office 95 on WFW/Win 3.1x. It made it fail on NT 3.5, so we got a free upgrade to NT 3.51. Not sure if everyone did. There was an Explorer Shell preview for NT 3.51 and you could run NT 32 bit FileManager on NT4.0 instead of using Explorer Shell File Explorer, which still is maddening.

[LybsterRoy]

Cmd and Regedit that's about it

[Anonymous Coward]

It's useful to type in %localappdata% to get into the user's profile instead of navigating the file system complete with hidden folders.

[I am David Jones]

Among other things it’s the quickest way I have found to shutdown / hibernate / restart a computer.

[LybsterRoy]

I added a couple of icons onto the taskbar

C:\Windows\System32\shutdown.exe -r -t 00

C:\Windows\System32\shutdown.exe -s -t 00

easy and quick (as long as I can spot the cursor and find the mouse)

[s151669]

That's just fine as long it is your personal laptop. But useless when navigating corporate network with standard installs.

[X5-332960073452]

Click accidentally, with the -t 00 option, instant shutdown / restart with no option to cancel (or is a UAC (user account control)) dialogue invoked?

EDIT - just tried, no UAC and no option to cancel ----------> doubly

[David 132]

To scratch this particular itch, I wrote a trivial C# WPF applet that sits pinned on the taskbar, and when clicked, pops up a dialog in the centre of the screen with a timer progress bar - and a large, prominent, "cancel" button that aborts the shutdown timer if clicked. That way I can shut down/hibernate my PC with one click but cancel it if I change my mind.

Happy to share the code with anyone who wants it, but it really wasn't more than 5 minutes' work.

[that one in the corner]

The IT chap at my last job used it a lot: some tweak was needed on your PC for whatever arcane reason. A nice lad, overall, but:

He tended to scowl when at my desk, because of the lack of a "Windows" key on my beloved keyboard.

And looked blankly when I just alt-tabbed to the inevitably already open cmd.exe window; maybe ther *is* some oddity in the execution environment between the "Run" dialogue and a generic cmd.exe session, but I never found out what it is...

[iron]

So no Browse button or drop down list? What is it with the current crop of big tech devs that they always replace a working feature with a new, less capable and not fit for purpose version?

I'd have given this such a scathing code review that the incompetant snowflake responsible would need therapy!

[JoeCool]

Confused ...

Adding pixels to a drop down box is a insider release highlight feature?

Is there more going on .. inside the "OS" ?

[brainwrong]

News?

Why is this news?

"vivetool /enable /id:57156807,57259990,58527096,58381341"

Did someone start at 1 and try over 58 million options to find this?

Are they still going? You must update us with whatever else they find that's of no interest.

[DJV]

C**** on a bike!!!

Of all the things that need fixing on Windows 11, THIS is what they prioritise?

[Michael Hoffmann]

How to enable?

Isn't this missing a step?

"First, install Windows 11"

Which would already make a lot of people angry and is widely regarded as a bad move.

[Bebu sa Ware]

You can Run…

and you can hide, but you can never escape…

But Hell ! It's worth trying…

[that one in the corner]

How to enable the new Run dialog box

> Launch the command line

And just use that.

Minimise it and keep it around, it'll be useful again soon, and with a useful history...

[Blogitus Maximus]

Stay on the left..

"Note that this covers over the Start button and taskbar icons if you have your Start menu aligned to the left."

Which of course, in my view, irritates many users as its entirely sane to return the start menu back to the left after Win11 tries to go all 'Mac' on you.

What a pointless change.

[Pussifer]

Woop! Woop!

A real reason to return to Windows after a couple of decades with the penguin!

/s

[Gerhard den Hollander]

Autohotkey

I've setup ahk so that alt-F12 drops down a command window from the top, just like yakuake does on Linux ( or like ~ does in gzdoom or quake, whence the name )

I honestly don't remember why I ended up choosing alt-F12 rather than ~ maybe because alt-F12 works when focus is on a terminal and ~ doesn't?

It's honestly been so long that I think on windows this is done by spawning Konsole.

[Anonymous Coward]

Just wow.

I'm over the moon

[Grunchy]

“You’ll need to be using Windows”

Yep I’m excluded already.

[Evaluator]

I just got new windows. Double pane glass all around. They fill the space between the panes with nitrogen.

[David 132]

So much better than the old melted-cheese filled ones.

[xyz]

Lipstick on a pig

Windows is gone from my life and somehow I feel clean again.

[Steve Davies 3]

Typical Lipstick on a pig

can't hide that there is pig behind it.

[druck]

Re: Typical Lipstick on a pig

Glitter on a turd would be far more appropriate.

[Anonymous Coward]

Not to worry about this being just an aesthetic change, this is just a preview after all. By the time it appears in a production version, the Run dialog will have sufficient AI assistance - no more direct execution of a specific program, it will be "agentic" Run instead that will deduce what you really want to do and run that instead.

The branding of the feature will also change somewhat. The current leading candidate is "The Runs".

[frankyunderwood123]

will it have copilot ?

… asking for a friend

[CFtheNonPartisan]

Obviously the product of countless hours at Microsoft Research. How could the user base ever get along with that old functional run window? I have heard anguished cried for years demanding a wider one. Thank you for responding Microsoft.