Microsoft"s Cortana Will Be Available For Android and iOS Soon

Cortana, which is basically a Microsoft’s very own voice assistant, is soon to be available for Android and iOS, announces Microsoft. This news is true as Redmond’s Joe Belfiore disclosed it in his recent video promo. Cortana is essentially a “phone companion app” and will be assisting both Google’s Google Now and Apple’s personnel assistant Siri which are the main features of Android and iOS respectively.

It looks like Cortana will be offering mostly the same features to iOS and Android which it is already offering to Windows phone consumers. But it will act as a standalone app partly due to its limitations and also because it is not integrated into the corresponding operating system.

It will work as you expected – you can make whatever queries you want. Other features include location based reminder for iOS and Android system. Cortana will also make interaction with the OneNote, OneDrive and other Microsoft’s own applications.

Comparison of Cortana with Siri and Google Now showed that it is the perfect combination of real usefulness and personality. Not only in Android and iOS, Cortana will also be debuted in Windows 10 PCs this year. This means that Cortana is truly a digital voice assistant of different platforms.

The company has not provided any particular date for the launch of the Cortana on the Play Store and App Store. However, it is assumed that company will present this voice assistance with the launch of Windows 10 for phones, which is expected later this year.

Microsoft"s Cortana Will Be Available For Android and iOS Soon

Reuters: Microsoft Cortana to arrive as a standalone app on iOS and Android

Based on the recent reports published by Reuters, Microsoft seems to be planning to bring its digital private virtual assistance Cortana on iOS and Android platforms. For the moment, this is available only as a beta version of Windows Phone 8.1 devices in few selected regions and a global roll-out can be expected later in 2015. The reason behind this rumor that Cortana could feature on Apple and Google platforms is basically due to the fact that Microsoft seems to be planning to expand the user base for its software products.

In this field of digital personal assistance, three big tech giant namely Apple, Google and Microsoft have tried their hands with their own Siri, Google Now and Cortana. However, Cortana seems to be having an edge over its other two rivals and is surely ahead of the pack. Once Cortana would find its way to Apple and Google platforms the competition is going to get even more stronger and Apple and Google will really have to work-out to put in line its Siri and Google Now respectively to be equally competent enough with Cortana.

source: Reuters

Reuters: Microsoft Cortana to arrive as a standalone app on iOS and Android

Siri beats Google Now and Cortana in multiple language test

Apple’s Siri started the trend for voice-activated personal assistant and now has two major competitors – Microsoft’s Cortana for Windows Phone and Google Now for Android. There are many reviews comparing the three services trying to judge which among them is the best.

Venturebeat tested Siri, Cortana and Google Now for 5 languages to check which multilingual voice-activated personal assistant is the best. Their team asked 18 questions to each of the three assistants in 5 languages – English, Italian, Mandarin, French and German. A quick and correct response was awarded the score of 1.0, answers that were not straightforward but the correct answer appeared somewhere in the clutter of a list of search results got a score of 0.5. Responses that didn’t understand the question or gave irrelevant answers or admitted that they couldn’t complete the job were given 0.0.

In case of English, all the three voice-enabled assistants were highly accurate with only a little difference in their scores. Siri topped with 15.5 out of 18, Cortana got 12.5 while Google Now scored 11.5. For Italian, Siri was undoubtedly the leader scoring the same as in English – 14.5 out of 18. Results for others were quite unimpressive with 8.5/18 for Google Now and 6/18 for Cortana.

The results for French and German were quite similar to those of Italian, although Siri dropped marginally while Cortana and Google Now fared slightly better. The last language tested was Mandarin. In this Siri again topped with 13.5/18, Cortana scored only 5/18 while Google Now got a meager 1.5/18.

Google Now offers more than 50 languages and dialects, a lot many compared to Siri and Cortana but most languages seem to be set up only for voice search and not as a full fledged voice assistant. Cortana was found to respond to a query most likely with a web search.

All in all, Siri won the contest hands down, scoring 76% for accuracy in all languages followed by Google Now with 46% and Cortana with 42%.

Check out the infographic below:

 

Source VentureBeat

Via PhoneArena

Siri beats Google Now and Cortana in multiple language test

Work Assistant app from Microsoft to integrate Cortana in upcoming Office Apps

The Windows Phone Store might be showing the Work Assistant app as of now but still the app remains closed and cannot be installed. Now reports from the industry show that Microsoft is currently testing this app that would help Windows Phone users for office related tasks. The reports show that Microsoft is developing a 2MB app Digital Life + Work group that is said to be a part of Application and Services Group and company chief Bill Gates is said to be personally involved in this.

Moreover, the good news is that this Work Assistant app would also integrate personal digital assistant Cortana also to it. Last month, the company showed that how could Cortana work with the OneDrive storage system. However, it is being said that this new Work Assistant app is designed so that the voice search abilities of Cortana could also be used with the touch version of Office apps that would come with Windows 10 for Phones.

There have been complaints from the Windows Phone users that the Android and iOS version of Office is better than that on the Windows Phone platform. Well, there is no doubt to it that Microsoft being the parent company of Windows Phone platform, they must receive the best version for Office.

source: ZDNet

Work Assistant app from Microsoft to integrate Cortana in upcoming Office Apps

Microsoft announces Cortana as a part of Windows 10 for PC. Start Menu now comes with Live Tiles

Well, who doesn’t know Cortana! At least one who is closely associated with the smartphone world must surely know it. Cortana is a personal digital assistant on the Windows Phone platform just like “Ok Google” feature of Google Now for the Android users. Well, day before yesterday at a press conference, Microsoft has announced that this cloud-based assistant will not be available with Windows 10 for PC. This means that the intelligent Cortana will now make a home on your Desktop getting to your assistance soon while working on your PC. Cortana is said to have undergone major improvement offering more enriched PC experience. Cortana occupies it place in the new search bar that exists in the new modeled task bar. In addition to acting as a instant voice search, it even offers a quick and faster access to web, settings, files and many other core functions of Windows 10.

Microsoft has now given Cortana a more personalized touch wherein a soft female voice cracks few jokes, does impersonations and understands 7 new languages. Well, with voice commands, you can ask Cortane to be quiet, play music and perform other functions in addition. Turning even smarter, Cortana is now clever enough to know the user it is aiding to. This was demoed at the press conference by Microsoft asking for some personal suggestions and advices for which Cortana responded happily. Moreover, just like Google Now, Cortana also provides the right notifications and suggestions when the user needs them.

Cortana has also been integrated with the newly introduced Spartan web browser for more content enriched experience suggesting info boxes, links and many other things.

Start Menu

One of the major complains about the Windows 8 users were regarding the absence of the Start Menu button at the task bar. Microsoft has ensured that it is now brought back to the Windows 10 OS but now features the Live Tiles display intead of the classic look. The full-screen mode is still there and is also default for the tablet mode. This means that Windows 10 will works on all devices right from PCs to tablets and smartphones.

Other major change includes the removal of search from Start Menu and making it more visible by bringing it to dock. Additionally, the new Continuum feature facilitates easy switching between modes for different devices. In case of laptop mode, the mouse and keyboard would work with compact Start Menu while for tablets and smartphones you would be switched to a Windows 8 Style Start screen.

One of the other major announcements done at the event was the new VR headset Microsoft HoloLens.

Microsoft announces Cortana as a part of Windows 10 for PC. Start Menu now comes with Live Tiles

Google’s short film explains about Talking with Computers

Computers have come a long way since the first basic computer was developed in the 19th century. Now computers play and win games such as Chess or Jeopardy against humans. Intelligent personal assistants like Google Now, Apple Siri and Microsoft Cortana have been developed that are capable of voice recognition and can answer questions which would have seemed quite impossible a few decades ago.

The day is not far when we can talk to computers like we do with other human beings. Google’s short film ‘Behind the Mic: The Science of Talking with Computers’ explores man’s dream of talking with machines and the challenges involved in developing algorithms for this. It traces the history of development of speech recognition systems. We have made a lot of progress till date and speech recognition can now transcribe what we have said, but we need to improve it still further if we want it to understand  a spoken sentence.

We are still a long way off from making computers understand language as we speak it. We need to exactly replicate the language algorithms of the human brain and to make computers understand language and speech. Researchers are trying to develop a neuron net that is very similar to the neurons in the human brain and hope that it will help the computers to recognize speech and understand the language.

You can have a look at the said Google’s short film about Talking with Computers:

 

Google’s short film explains about Talking with Computers

Windows Phone 8.1 GDR2 rumoured to be released on October 8th

Windows Phone 8.1 GDR2 (General Distribution Releases) is rumoured to be released next month, on October 8^th to be precised. The platform is expected to support 2K and the Snapdragon 805 CPU.  It will also be running a Preview for Windows Developer Users which include the changes and improvements in first two weeks of October.

Some of the improvements in GDR2 version includes, sorting of settings in Windows Phone in the alphabetical order by default with an option for the Windows user to change it as per order that they wish to, like an app list; the availability of mobile data toggle in Action center as an option, as well as the Cortana will be available in more regions.

Cortana is a personal assistant in Windows Phone which will help make things easier for the user and keep the user up to date on things that is important to them. Cortana will likely to release in more European markets while another version, Alpha Cortana will be released in India, Australia and Canada.

Sylwester salek has revealed that Cortana will be available in Polish version in this GDR2 version.

Windows Phone 8.1 GDR2 rumoured to be released on October 8th

Cortana by Microsoft- A new age application for controlling home lighting

Cortana can be used to control home lighting.

The software like apple ‘Siri’ and ‘Google now’ has already made a good image in the eyes of its customers. The outstanding voice command features provided by these applications intrigued many people. Now, Microsoft has entered the league with its revolutionary new product called Cortana. Albeit, new in the league, some out of the box features like notebook are a treat for the customers. The service can keep a track of your preferences and your habits too.

However, it does not end here; the hackers at Onion.io are trying best to add some extraordinary features to the app. If successful, Cortana will be able to control the lights in your home. 

Now turning on and off your lights will be just at a distance of your voice command; scientists made a successful attempt to use the Onion.io’s backend for devices connected to the internet to turn on and off the lamps.

You can imagine myriads of other amazing uses of this application, such as adjusting the lightings at your house according to parties or movie nights. Adjusting the room temperature is one of the ways to use this application too. 

A lot of companies will be waiting to use this amazing app and come out with some great ideas; but if you are impatient and have an itch to try this now, you can chose to buy a Bluetooth module and a netduino.

Cortana by Microsoft- A new age application for controlling home lighting

Turn on your PC remotely with cortana using VoiceWake for windows phone

If you have cortana available in your windows 8.1 phone, then you are all set to try the new application named Voice Walk lite. Many of you will be thinking of how to use it when cortana is not available outside U.S.  For that matter, you can try the region hack to enable Microsoft’s new voice assistant. This app is been designed for waking up your PC using ‘wake-on-LAN’. Now you can turn on your PC from miles away and we know that you have your own ideas too.

To gather more information about Wake On LAN, you can take help of Google or Wiki. 

The very simple design of the app makes it easy to use and it is going to get better, as the ‘lite’ version will be out soon.

Wake On LAN should have been enabled on your PC before you start using this app. For all those who have not used it in past; it can be found under the BIOS settings when the computer boots first. Now that you have Wake On LAN on your PC, just download the app and configure it with your PC’s Mac address, IP info, etc. 

The app is ready to use once everything is configured correctly. Now you can just give a voice command: “Cortana wake (your computer name)”.  See how it works by playing the embedded video.

It also offers some amazing features like ‘location based wake feature and wake schedule feature’. It means that you can wake your PC when you reach somewhere or at a certain time. To enjoy this outstanding feature, you may upgrade to the paid version, which will be out soon.

It is available here, in the store, and we will keep you informed about the paid version.

Turn on your PC remotely with cortana using VoiceWake for windows phone