In many cases, you simply can’t do the things with Cortana that you used to set up through the notebook - the various consumer tasks, notably. There’s no longer a notebook that lets you do things such view and edit your reminders. Those familiar with previous versions of Cortana will likely notice that it has been stripped down in another way as well. And it can’t do many smaller tasks either, such as creating location-based reminders - for example, having it tell you to buy Cherry Garcia ice cream when you’re at a Whole Foods store. It can no longer play music, control streaming video services like Netflix or Hulu, control smart home appliances, or do other consumer-oriented tasks.
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One final note before we begin: Cortana’s capabilities were significantly scaled back in the Windows Update. Right-click the taskbar, select Search, and click Hidden.) (You can even turn off the search box in this way. Right-click the taskbar and uncheck Show Cortana button from the menu that appears. You can also remove the Cortana button to the right of the search box. Then in the Allow apps to access your microphone section turn the slider to On. If you see the message, “Microphone access for this device is off,” click the Change button and move the slider to On. If you want Cortana to respond even when your PC is locked, move the slider to On for Use Cortana when my device is locked.Īfter you’ve done that, you’ll have to turn on permissions in Windows 10’s settings app. Then scroll down to “Choose which apps can use voice activation” and under Cortana, move the slider to On for Let Cortana respond to “Cortana” keyword. Go to Settings > Privacy > Voice activation and move the slider from Off to On under Allow apps to use voice activation. To do it, you first need turn on voice activation on your PC, and allow Cortana use be activated by voice. You may need to customize Cortana so you can activate it by voice or by pressing the Windows key + C. As with chat or texting, it displays your previous interactions, so you can scroll back and see your questions and Cortana’s answers. Cortana may ask questions to clarify what you want done, tell you it’s created the reminder, or say it can’t create the reminder. However, the Cortana app now offers a chat-like experience, so you instead speak or type using plain English words. In the previous version of Cortana, you often had to fill out on-screen forms to create reminders. IDGĬortana displays the results of your request and reads them to you. However, if you ask a more complicated question that requires a display of web links, Cortana will show the links in the Edge browser. When you ask Cortana a straightforward question or issue a straightforward command, Cortana displays the result onscreen and reads it to you. Once you start the app, to perform a Cortana search, you say “Hey Cortana” and speak your search, or click the Cortana icon to the right of the search box and speak, or press the Windows key + C and speak or type. You can start it by clicking the Cortana icon in the taskbar just to the right of the search box, pressing the Windows key + C, or saying “Cortana.” So the only way to use Cortana is to run the app. And then Microsoft went ever further and turned Cortana into its own app that works like any other Windows 10 app, including running in a resizable window that can be moved around the screen. First, Microsoft separated Cortana from the Windows search box. Cortana used to be integrated in the Windows search box: Whether you performed a search by speaking or typing, the results were delivered in the Cortana pane. If that’s the case for you, see the “Cortana and search” section of Computerworld’s “ Windows 10 cheat sheet” or the Cortana section of our Windows Update review.īefore we head into the tips, we should cover a bit of background. Note that this article covers tips for Cortana in the Windows Update (version 21H1), so if you have a different version, things may look different or may not work. To help you get the most out of Cortana, I’ve put together some of my favorite tips for using it - including using Cortana to manage your Google Calendar and to send you reminders. No matter which version you use, though, it’s a very useful tool and can do a lot for you, including alerting you to upcoming meetings searching your PC and the web telling you about the weather, news, and sports and a lot more. Depending on which version of Windows you’re using, it may be integrated directly into the Windows Search box, or run as an entirely separate app. Over the years, it’s had new features added, and then others taken away.
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But it was launched back in December 2015, and it’s changed quite a bit since then. Microsoft’s digital assistant Cortana was one of the major additions to Windows 10 when it first came out.