Microsoft’s Chromium-based Edge for Linux is getting sign-in and sync support for saving favourites, passwords, browser data and extensions across devices.
The sync feature is shipping in Edge 91.0.831.1 to the Dev channel, so it should ship in the Stable channel in a few weeks.
Microsoft notes that the feature is only supported for personal Microsoft Accounts at the moment, meaning Azure Active Directory (AAD) accounts are not supported yet.
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Additionally, users may need to enable a flag in order to see this setting. This can be done by typing ‘edge://flags’ in the address bar, and looking for and enabling the ‘MSA sign in’ experiment.
After signing into the profile dialog, users can select Sync to sync favouites, passwords, and other browsing data across devices used with that account. The profile dialog displays the sync status.
Microsoft warns that as a Dev channel construct, the sync feature might approach with a few glitches. But it has also listed a range of mitigation options for troubleshooting any problems, such as browser crashes.
Microsoft launched Edge for Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora and openSUSE Linux distributions in October, but it’s nonetheless in a developer preview, which doesn’t support AAD yet.
Another update for Edge on Linux is the ability to use the system theme.
Microsoft notes that it’s investigating an issue where some extensions, such as the Microsoft Editor extension, don’t work on Linux. As soon as they’re installed, they crash and are disabled, according to Microsoft.
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Microsoft has also launched 14 new theme colours in Settings for users to personalise the interface. These can be found in the Theme section, alongside with the recently launched set of Microsoft-developed themes, which include a few from Xbox such as Halo, Sea of Thieves and Microsoft Flight Simulator. Themes are unique to each profile to make it simpler to distinguish between personal and work profiles.
Other updates in this construct of Edge include an option in the right-click menu to open the current page in the Immersive Reader. There’s also a new management policy to ensure that PDFs are opened in Secure Mode.
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