In its Build 2016, Microsoft has announced the upcoming Windows 10 update and has also highlighted the importance of conversational artificial intelligence.
Microsoft’s developer conference, Build 2016, has been the source of several announcements related to the company’s most cutting-edge products. The software is intermingled with the services to the point of not distinguishing where one starts and the other ends. But what is true is that Redmond’s have chosen to give developers a huge range of possibilities. Among them are those that have to do with conversational artificial intelligence, which has been at the center of Microsoft’s offering.
For Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, the future of computing will move around three pillars. One of them are people, whose role is clear –they are the core around which everything revolves– and the other two are personal assistants and chatbots. Around them the Redmond company intends to evolve its products.
It is a comprehensive vision, which is present on all Microsoft platforms. Although at the 2016 Build opening conference there has been time to discuss each announcement individually.
The new Windows 10 update
Terry Myerson, vice president of the Windows and Devices group, gave figures: there are 270 million active devices running Windows 10, which makes the system the one that has been most quickly adopted. Although what Myerson came to talk about was the Anniversary Update, which will arrive in the summer for users.
Terry Myerson, on stage at Build 2016
Windows 10 update will bring Windows Ink, a functionality that optimizes note taking and drawing with a stylus, to resemble the experience as much as possible to delineating on paper. Corsican it also has news: the user will be able to talk to the assistant even if the device is locked. While the security tool Windows Hello, which allows you to unlock a computer with biometrics parameters will be available on more devices, as well as in the Microsoft Edge browser.
More intelligence inside Cortana
There was no lack of figures for Cortana, who currently has the role of Microsoft’s spoiled child. There are about 1,000 applications around the personal assistantwhich has been renamed Cortana Intelligence Suite. One of the novelties that this system has received, ready for developers to try, is a collection of APIs that allow the platform to see and hear, as well as interpret user needs no need to force communication.
The idea is that communication flows naturally and the assistant has enough intelligence to interpret the user’s needs. The second important novelty is the ‘Microsoft Bot Framework’, available to developers for build bots that allow users to speak with natural language on different platforms, from Skype to Slack, through Office 365.
The developers, at the center
Microsoft has confirmed that the developer version of HoloLens will start selling from now on. It has thus given the starting signal to its holographic ecosystem. But there was more. Bots also come to Skype. Developers will be able to create these automatic programs using different communication methods, such as voice, text or video.
Microsoft has also announced its Xbox Dev Mode, which allows your state-of-the-art consoles to become a development kit. To this is added, obviously, access to the functionalities of Cortana and the SDK of the Windows 10 update, which will allow you to integrate functionalities such as Windows Ink into applications.
Images: Microsoft
