Remember when Notepad was just… Notepad? A simple text editor nobody asked to be modernized?
Yeah, Microsoft didn’t care either. They bolted on Markdown support and AI features anyway. And now we’ve got CVE-2026-20841. Remote code execution. Via a text file. This is the kind of thing that makes you go “oh come on, really?”
Mac guy who uses Windows at work. It can be disabled.
On my Windows 11 workstation, the AI stuff and Markdown stuff is gone from Notepad. It’s very easy to do in the settings, and there’s even a gear icon right on the main window. As a Mac user I know ⌘+, (Command + Comma) opens Settings, but with Windows, it’s typically File --> Settings or Tools --> Settings or something like that. Notepad makes it even easier. The AI stuff can be disabled with a click. The Markdown stuff will warn you that any Markdown will be converted to plain text, which is fine, because I don’t even know Markdown. (I assume it’s similar to the formatting used on Lemmy, Reddit, et al.)
If there’s a way to deny Notepad access to the network, I don’t know it, and probably can’t do it on a locked-down workstation anyway. They lock down a lot of dumb shit, like the wallpaper. We can’t change the wallpaper. I can’t change my phone number in my Outlook profile, either — it just goes to the switchboard. I can put my direct line in my email signature and they actually encourage that. Dumb shit like that.
Anyway, TextEdit (the Mac equivalent) has none of that dumb shit AFAIK. It always opens in small windows and the text is super tiny. Oddly enough, after a restart, Notepad wants the text two sizes too big, but I do CTRL± (Control plus Minus/Dash) I think, twice, and it’s just right. Honestly I like Notepad a little more. The real GOAT (on both Mac and Windows!) is Sticky Notes, though. It’s not the same application but it has the same functions.
the dumb shit that locks down the wallpaper is usually a group policy and those are basically on/off type options with very little configuration options
the Outlook profile thing with the phone number is usually because IT doesn’t get to control that and its in the HR section of your profile on the 365 portals, so the path of least resistance is just put it in your email signature and stop bothering us with your requests that take lots of manpower because microsoft has made this all so overtly complicated so that they can sell more stuff to your buisness that requires more input that nobody knows how to do because microsoft write shitty info documents that read like a jigsaw puzzle