Wikipedia for Windows Phone 8.1 updated with Cortana support

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Windows Phone 8.1 has been out as a developer preview for just a little more than a week, but we are already seeing developers updating their apps to support the OS’ new features. Among the many apps being updated is Wikipedia, developed by Rudy Huyn. This app is the closest to an official app from one of the world’s largest resources for information, as it is made by a popular third party developer with Wikipedia themselves approving and endorsing it for the platform. The app now has been updated to include support for Cortana, the new personal voice assistant and one of the major new features of the OS. Once updated, the v2.3 will let you directly search for topics using your voice by giving simple commands to Cortana.

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This is Cortana, Microsoft’s take on Siri and Google Now

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Cortana, once popular for being Master Chief’s personal assistant, is now truly digital, as it takes the form of Windows Phone’s own virtual assistant. Cortana is Microsoft’s take on Siri and Google Now, currently the two popular voice assistants for iOS and Android respectively. While Siri took a more personal approach to an assistant, Google took it another way with contextual search and ambient presence, while Cortana is trying to marry the both. Powered by Bing’s neural networks, Cortana literally takes advantage of all the data mined over the search engine’s life time. And not only that, it will learn you like Google Now on actions and like Siri on personal detail, which makes it a decent competitor to Google.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nX9P6skzZNU

Read more about Windows Phone 8.1 here

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Cortana shows up on Bing’s personalization settings ahead of reveal

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Cortana, Microsoft’s own take on a virtual personal assistant, is all set to be revealed at the //build/ developer event today in San Francisco. While we still haven’t heard anything straight from Microsoft regarding Cortana yet, it’s own property, Bing, which will power Cortana, now has references to the long awaited assistant. Cortana has been rumoured to be like Apple’s Siri and Google Now combined, with it offering personalized results, recommendations and more, apart from setting your alarms, reminders etc like Siri.

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Meet Cortana, Microsoft’s Voice based Personal Assistant

Apple has Siri and Google has Google Now, what does Microsoft have? It had Bing search on its phones till now, but things are expected to change soon as the next version of Windows Phone – Windows Phone 8.1 which is expected during Spring will come with Microsoft’s very own voice based personal assistant and it will be called – Cortana.

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Tell me voice assistant aka Cortana rumoured to launch on Windows Phone this April

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Long rumoured voice assistant, codenamed “Cortana”, is all set to make its beta appearance on Windows Phone, starting April 2014, according to a very credible source – @msftnerd. The Siri-like feature is reportedly voiced by Jen Taylor, who actually did the voice acting for Cortana, an AI character in the hit game-series “Halo”. The voice assistant, which might carry the name “Bing Tell me”, will launch for developers, in beta, in April, which coincides with the Build 2014 Developer event by Microsoft. “Build” is where Microsoft plans to unveil information about the next release of Windows, codenamed Threshold.

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Windows Phone 8.1 leak suggests incoming on-screen controls

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Rumors have been going around for a while that Microsoft might drop the hardware buttons requirement for their mobile operating system. This first leak by the infamous Evleaks seems to reaffirm this. Continue reading “Windows Phone 8.1 leak suggests incoming on-screen controls”