WINDOWS 10
IN 2016
Cortanawillalsobringextrafunctionalityto Windows10.By
speakingcommands,youwillbeableto quicklycontrol thevolume,
forexample,or turn off notifications.It willtherefore becomea key
wayto interactwiththeoperatingsystem,andwhilethere have
beencomparisonsto themuch-ridiculedClippy, we’dbeshockedif
Microsoftwentdownthatsortof pathagain.
Instead,by unleashingCortanafromtheStartbox,it’s setto
belessintrusive,andit wouldappearto fit in withMicrosoft’s
philosophyas putforward by MicrosoftCEOSatyaNadella,who
sayssuchvirtualassistantswillalterthewaywebrowsetheweb.
It couldwellbecomethebiggestshake-upof howweuseour
computers,especiallyif it startsto learn outbehaviourandsuggest
waysof improvingourday-to-dayuse.
“Ouronlineconversationswillincreasinglybemediatedby
conversationassistantswhowillhelpus laughandbemore
productive.Thiswillleadus to questionandblurthewaywe
thinkaboutourcomputers,phonesandourmemoriesand
relationships,”saysLiliCheng,MicrosoftResearch NexT’s
DistinguishedEngineerandGeneralManager, in a pieceonthe
Microsoftwebsiteaskingfor 2016 predictions.
Verbalcommunicationwithcomputersis somethingwhich
intriguesMicrosoft,andthepredictionspointto 2016beinga big
yearforartificialintelligence.There’s a sensewithinthecompany
thatwe’llbeusingassistantslikeCortanato helpus understand
tasksandworkonthem.To thatend,more workwillbecarried
outonenhancingWindows10’s languagecapabilitiesusing
existingandnewtechnologies.
Skype,whichMicrosoftboughtin 2011for$8.5billion,is likely
to playa largerrole as a result.Microsoft’s peoplehavebeen
workingonSkypeTranslator, whichhelpsyouto communicate
acrosslanguagebarriersin real-timeso,forinstance,youcantalk
to a Frenchpersonin Englishandhavethemunderstandyou.It’s
notperfect,butit doeswork.Li Deng,PartnerResearch Manager
forMicrosoftResearch NexT, says,“There willbecontinued
rapidprogressin naturallanguageprocessing[in2016]basedon
deeplearningmethods,andstate-of-the-artmachinetranslation
performancemaybesetby attention-basedsequencelearning
techniquesbasedondeeplearning.”SeamlessComputing
Windows 10 willalsoimprovetheNotificationCentre withwidgets
setto beintroducedto allowforspeedy
snapshotsof data,andthere willbe
betterintegrationbetweentheservices
offeredby Office 365 andWindows10.
Indeed,Windows 10 seeksto bebetter
integratedwiththemostcommon
appsandutilitiesweuse,andit also
wantsto expandits reachso people
are ableto workacrossdevices.Our online conversations
will increasingly be mediated
by conversation assistants
hCortanawilldeliverhandyhints
buthopefullynotlikeClippyiCortanais goingtobesetfreeinWindows 10 during 2016