Microsoft’s digital assistant Cortana, introduced last year on Windows Phone 8.1 and available now on desktops and tablets running Windows 10, isn’t officially due to arrive on the Xbox One until 2016. But some resourceful tech wizards have found a way to access it early.
Cortana, the Redmond, Washington-based company’s answer to Siri, made her debut in the Halo series of Xbox games before becoming real-life virtual assistant, so it’s only fitting for it to come back to the console that first made it famous. However, its release was delayed earlier this month for unspecified reasons (possibly to give the company time to make it work with headsets).
However, as Engadget, The Verge, and WinBeta all reported last week, a handful of users have taken to Reddit to report that Cortana is currently accessible for anyone who is currently testing the preview version of the upcoming Windows 10 for Xbox One interface.
They claim that by going to the Setting tab, moving up once and pushing the A button multiple times, Cortana will be activated and will immediately be snapped to the side of an app or game. It looks identical to the Windows 10 version, according to reports, and while it is not yet able to perform all Xbox functions, it can access information accessible to it on other platforms, such as calendar appointments, news headlines, and stock information.
What else to expect with the New Xbox One Experience
While Cortana’s official release isn’t expected to come until after January, Microsoft will be rolling out the Windows 10 update for Xbox One in November. This new dashboard will come with several new features, including an upgraded store, quicker access to games, and OneGuide for media content.
Initially, when the Xbox version of Cortana was first announced, Microsoft said that Kinect would be required in order for the digital assistant’s speech recognition feature to be utilized, which is what has fueled speculation that its release was delayed so that it could be tweaked to work with headsets. At this point, however, that has not been confirmed.
The upgraded interface, officially known as the New Xbox One Experience (NXOE), started rolling out to testers late last week, and according to Mark Hachman of PC World, “it seems to work pretty well – it’s a little slower than usual, and my login information to Netflix vanished in the update. Otherwise, however, I haven’t noticed any major bugs.”
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Feature Image: Windows
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