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Posts tagged "Microsoft"

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Forget Microsoft Copilot – an unofficial Clippy AI is available for Windows 11
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Clippy is back – sort of – and ready to help you out on the Windows 11 desktop, if you dare to install a new app (still in beta).

Okay, so yes, this is an odd one, but you may recall Clippy (real name Clippit, but everybody uses the nickname now) from the heady days of Office 97, where the paperclip performed as a virtual assistant. In theory, it helped you to do stuff, but in practice, Clippy was generally an annoying presence. (“It looks like you’re writing a letter…” – well, we aren’t, Clippy, so go away).

The awfulness of Clippy has been mostly forgotten in the mists of time now, replaced by a nostalgic fondness for the assistant, and one enterprising developer has been inspired to resurrect Microsoft’s creation from the 90s.

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FireCube has made the Clippy app which is available from the Microsoft Store (and elsewhere, for free), software that puts a Clippy icon on your Windows 11 (or Windows 10) desktop, one powered by OpenAI’s GPT 3.5 model (as in ChatGPT).

You can pin this Clippy to the desktop and chat away to what is essentially ChatGPT in paperclip form. Note that this is still very early days for the application, so if you take the plunge, expect issues. Likely lots of them.

Analysis: A paperclip that needs some polish

To give you some perspective on where we’re at with this app, Clippy for the desktop was put on Github only a couple of days ago, with the developer FireCube observing that there are still issues with random crashes. So, stability is likely to be somewhat wonky for the time being, we’d imagine.

A further sticking point is that an OpenAI key is required to use this preview version of the Clippy app. If you haven’t paid for one of those, you won’t be able to fire up Clippy. As noted by the dev, this is one of the most pressing known issues for the application, and FireCube is working on a way around this that’ll hopefully be implemented soon enough.

Further work promised in the near future is the ability to drag and resize Clippy, and FireCube aims to bring more classic characters into the mix alongside the paperclip – like Microsoft Bob.

You may recall that Bob was an attempt to make the interface of Windows 95 (and Windows 3.1 before that) more user-friendly by turning it into a cutesy representation of a house. Like Clippy, Bob turned into something of a joke in the computing community, and was a concept swiftly abandoned by Microsoft.

This new take on Clippy for Windows 11 is clearly a tongue-in-cheek move ahead of the inbound Copilot AI which should go into testing in the relatively near future. (Microsoft promised this would happen in June, but that looks like a bust at this point). To say all eyes are on Copilot, and how it’ll be implemented, is an understatement (check out this recent leak for the latest gossip).

AI is very much the future of Windows 11, or rather, next-gen Windows – that and shifting to the cloud (and maybe a subscription model) – so we don’t expect Copilot will be consigned to the bin in short order, as was the fate of Clippy (and indeed Bob). That said, you never know…

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Microsoft Launcher’s latest update is causing issues, especially for these users
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Microsoft Launcher’s latest June update has been giving users plenty of trouble, especially if they happen to be using a Surface Duo.

The update, released on June 27, 2023, has already amassed plenty of posts from Reddit and Twitter users about their devices not working properly with Microsoft Launcher. Though it’s a wide range of devices having issues, the Surface Duo seems to be the most common which, according to Windows Central, seems to be tied to a recent system update.

screenshot of microsoft launcher error

(Image credit: Reddit user /yugabe)

Right now, the only real solution has been to reset the launcher when prompted by the error message, though some users are apparently reporting that doesn’t work either. This could especially be a problem for Surface Duo as it’s that device’s only launcher, because if resetting doesn’t work then you might have to resort to customizing settings again. Other phone users can simply switch launchers when the error pops up, however, saving a bit of a headache.

TechRadar has reached out to Microsoft concerning this issue, and will update this story if and when we hear back from the company.

Surface Duo users getting the short stick

Microsoft Launcher was first released in 2015 as a beta under the name Arrow Launcher, and officially released in 2017 for both iOS and Android. It was an initiative made to make its devices as accessible as possible across platforms.

It’s generally a solid feature that allows users the option to integrate between Windows PCs and smartphones, especially for larger devices like the Surface Duo with more screen real estate that can better take advantage of the feature. 

However, for the Duo, this recent error proves that it should be able to switch launchers like other phones can, as Duo users who are experiencing this problem are stuck troubleshooting until Microsoft pushes out a fix. And it certainly can’t be fun having an otherwise functional device that you’re forced to constantly either reset or customize options on repeatedly. 

Hopefully, the tech giant will have answers for this soon, and even better, will ensure that Duo users will have other options going forward.

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Microsoft wants to put Windows PCs fully in the cloud – but what will that mean for you?
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Microsoft wants to put its Windows operating system fully in the cloud, or at least that’s the suggestion – going by recently-revealed information from a company presentation that took place last year.

That 'state of the business' presentation from June 2022 has just come to light as part of the FTC vs Microsoft hearing that’s currently underway, The Verge reports. It includes a lot of talk about the cloud relating to business and gaming, but also to consumers who use Windows.

And as part of its ‘Modern Life’ consumer space, Microsoft is planning for a long-term opportunity to move “Windows 11 increasingly to the cloud”, and to use the “power of the cloud and client to enable improved AI-powered services and full roaming of people’s digital experience”.

In short, this suggests that rather than letting you install future versions of Windows on a drive nestling inside the PC on (or under) your desk, Microsoft wants your copy of Windows installed on a machine in a big data center somewhere, probably many miles away from you.

The overall aim is to build on “Windows 365 to enable a full Windows operating system streamed from the cloud to any device”, we’re told.

Analysis: Clouds on the horizon

It’s no secret that Microsoft sees the cloud as its future. After all, the software giant already makes an absolute stack of cash from its cloud services, which are expansive, to say the least.

In the business world, Windows 365 is a service that offers a streamed Windows installation to devices. That’s likely to be the future for consumers, too, certainly going by this presentation. As The Verge points out, there’s already a move to introduce Windows 365 Boot for Windows 11, which will allow a computer to log into a cloud PC instance rather than the local version of Windows (installed on the drive).

In the future, rather than such a choice (local or cloud dual boot, effectively), there may be no local installation at all, and all you’ll do is log into your cloud instance. Although it’s important to note that the presentation materials don’t specifically talk about doing away with local copies of Windows entirely – so it’s something of a jump to reach that conclusion (admittedly not a particularly large one).

At any rate, the cloud offers benefits and drawbacks for any service based in it. Broadly speaking, you’re getting a whole lot of flexibility and convenience, but trading that off against security concerns (and privacy worries, plus issues around control of your data).

File Explorer tabs in Windows 11

(Image credit: TechRadar)

With a fully cloud-based Windows PC, you’ll be able to go anywhere, and as long as you can get online, you’ll be able to log onto your Windows installation and work away from any device – with all your files and apps immediately to hand, wherever you are. The convenience of this is a major and undeniably attractive facet of the experience here.

As long as you have an internet connection being the key caveat, and the most obvious weak point for an entirely cloud-based PC. Can’t get online? Then you can’t get onto your PC (whereas with a physical desktop PC, you can use it offline, of course).

The other main concerns for users will be security and privacy as mentioned. With your files, data, and preferences in the cloud, you’ll be reliant on Microsoft to look after it, and keep everything safe from hackers and breaches. And those who get paranoid about Windows telemetry and monitoring are clearly going to have a fit when it comes to the privacy issues around having a cloud PC, with everything you do on that PC happening in the beating heart of Microsoft’s servers.

The further worry here might be the cost of a cloud PC – is this an ideal opportunity for Microsoft to bring in a monthly subscription charge for consumers using Windows? It feels that way, and that’s bound to be an angle the more cynical focus on. Or, Microsoft might offer a choice between payment and adverts in some manner, with the possibility of cheap cloud-connected systems implemented along such lines being an idea floated late last year.

One way or another, the future of Windows for consumers is likely to become just as cloudy as it is for businesses already, with pros and cons around that. The key aspect really will be whether local installations will still be facilitated (and dual boot options offered, cloud or local), or if that’s something Microsoft is hoping to entirely push to one side eventually.

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Bing AI gets some handy new features in Microsoft Edge browser
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Microsoft has bolstered the capabilities of its Bing AI in the Edge browser’s side panel with a couple of welcome new features.

As flagged up by Leopeva64, a regular source of Edge leaks and developments on Twitter, there’s now an export button built into the Bing Chat pane in Microsoft’s browser.

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Click it and you get the choice of exporting whatever content you’re currently looking at in the chatbot to a Word document, PDF, or text file.

A second change for Edge spotted by Leopeva64 is that the Bing Chat side panel has a new section entitled ‘Mentioned’ which picks out highlights of things that are, well, mentioned by the chatbot.

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As you can see in the example provided in Leopeva64’s tweet, selected movies are shown as images (movie posters, in this case) that you can click on to learn more about the film (with the AI pulling info from Wikipedia in this case).

Analysis: Next up – the huge change for browsers

Clearly, it’s good to have the export feature in the Edge side panel. If you’ve found something particularly interesting, it’s great to have the ability to export it as some kind of document file with a couple of clicks.

Microsoft actually announced that this feature was inbound at the start of May (in one of those many Bing blog posts which are crafted on a weekly basis), so it has taken a little while for it to go live.

The new ‘Mentioned’ box has arrived more out of the blue, but again, it’s a useful addition to have and provides a jumping-off point for deeper exploration into related materials from any particular query.

Bing is steadily being built out in all kinds of directions, then, but in terms of the browser experience, the biggest change is going to be the introduction of the chatbot to browsers outside of Edge. That should be happening soon enough, going by chatter from sources at Microsoft, so you’ll be able to use the Bing AI in Chrome, for example, without having to resort to an unofficial (and clunky) extension.

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Windows 11 change proves so unpopular that Microsoft reverses course
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Microsoft has reversed a decision it made to change File Explorer in Windows 11 following complaints from testers.

This happened in the freshly introduced build 23486 in the Dev channel, and as Microsoft announced in the blog post to go with that preview version: “Thank you to all the Windows Insiders who gave us feedback on the Folder Options changes in File Explorer that removed a handful of old settings in Build 23481.

“We’ve rolled back this change. As is normal for the Dev Channel, we will often try things out and get feedback and adjust based on the feedback we receive.”

If you missed it, the change (brought in just over a week ago) was removing what Microsoft felt were outdated options for the folders that sit on your desktop.

That includes the setting to ‘Show drive letters’ and ‘Hide protected OS files’ among a number of other options (nine of them in total).

Build 23486 also brings in some work on the passwordless front, with Microsoft enhancing the passkey experience in Windows 11, allowing users to go to any supporting website or app and use passkeys via Windows Hello. (Speaking of the latter, you may get a head-scratching pop-up related to Windows Hello, as we reported yesterday).

Analysis: Registry workaround was not well-received

We should note that Microsoft did leave a route to still access those folder options in the build where they were dropped, namely editing the Registry. But that’s obviously a pretty clunky way of doing things, so it’s no wonder folks weren’t happy with being thrown that ‘bone’ as a consolation of sorts.

To be fair to Microsoft, as the company makes clear in its statement, this is what test builds are for. Someone has an idea – in this case, for streamlining the interface – so they try it out and see whether it works okay, and what the reaction is to the change.

In this case, there was quite a good deal of feedback from users – power users in the main – not happy about having these folder options stripped away in Windows 11, because they still find many (or at least some) of them useful. After they made their feelings known, Microsoft dropped the idea.

It’s good to see the software giant is listening and taking the feedback from testers seriously (as it should, of course: this, and finding bugs, is the entire point of the Windows Insider scheme). There are those out there, mind, who can’t understand why Microsoft would even think about ditching some of these choices.

We may find that in the future, when a broader redesign happens – and a big File Explorer revamp is indeed in the pipeline – that Microsoft might again try to shed some of these options in the name of tidying up the interface. (Hopefully, they can be left in and tucked away in an ‘Advanced’ panel somewhere, though).

Via Neowin

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Microsoft Outlook is getting an AI upgrade that will make the Mail and Calendar apps redundant
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Microsoft plans to shut down its Mail and Calendar apps and merge the two into an updated Outlook for Windows, and use this as an opportunity to introduce more artificial intelligence features.

In a blog post from Microsoft earlier this month, the company noted that Windows 11 devices that will be shipped next year will include the new Outlook for Windows as the default mailbox app. The updated Outlook will include both mail and calendar tools that will eliminate the need for the respective Mail and Calendar apps: so you’ll just use the newer Outlook instead.

The Register notes that the Mail and Calendar apps will still be available to download through the Microsoft Store up to the end of 2024, but the move doesn’t seem to be a popular decision going by reactions online – and tweet from a systems engineer and Office 365 specialist Michael Reiners suggests that Microsoft might be rethinking the plan, or at least the timing.

The tweet below shows a screenshot of an email or memo from Microsoft that says “We are reevaluating the timing and implementation of this change and will provide updated information shortly.”

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It's unclear why the tech giant is hesitant to roll out these changes, and the company has not responded to a request for comment from the Register as of yet.

Microsoft is giving users a chance to look at the latest Outlook for Windows. If you’d like to give it a try head over to the Mail and Calendar app and hit the 'Try the new Outlook' toggle. Merging the mail and Calendar Capabilities into Outlook is part of Microsoft’s larger One Outlook plan laid out in 2020 to create a single Outlook for PCs, Macs, and the web.

These changes present an opportunity for Microsoft to implement AI into Outlook, and hopefully streamline everyday tasks within mail and calendar capabilities, in a similar way to how Google has introduced Bard and generative AI into the Google Workspace.

Whether you're for AI integration into your daily workspace, it seems like that is the direction companies like Microsoft and Google are adamant to head towards. It would be interesting to see exactly how Microsoft plans to introduce artificial intelligence to declutter and improve your task management. 

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There’s trouble in AI paradise as Microsoft and OpenAI butt heads
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OpenAI warned Microsoft early this year about rushing into integrating GPT-4 (a more advanced but less ‘stable’ language model) into Bing without further training. Microsoft pushed ahead anyway. 

This led to a rush of unhinged and strange behaviour from the Bing AI tool. Now, a new report by the Wall Street Journal details how there is “conflict and confusion” between the companies and their fragile alliance.

Keeping in mind Microsoft doesn't own OpenAI outright (something it often does to up-and-coming companies), but instead invested a 49% stake in the startup, the arrangement gave Microsoft early access to OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Dall-E to boost Bing’s search engine.

It’s a setup that benefits both parties, as OpenAI gains a stable financial investment and servers for hosting, where Microsoft gets early access to the previously mentioned tools, forcing Google and others to scramble to catch up. The WSJ article describes this as an “open relationship” where Microsoft maintains significant influence without outright control. 

Retro illustration of a man and robot butting heads

(Image credit: studiostoks / Shutterstock)

Butting of heads

Microsoft's rush to incorporate GPT-4 into Bing search without the necessary further training has built resentment on both sides. 

According to the article, some Microsoft employees feel slighted by the fact that Microsoft's in-house AI projects are being overlooked in favour of OpenAI, which despite their partnership is free to work with Microsoft’s rivals. 

Apparently, there's also a feeling that OpenAI is not allowing some people at Microsoft full access to its tech. Some also feel that OpenAI's warning about not rushing into using its tech is hypocritical, as many feel OpenAI rushed out ChatGPT.

This has led to a situation where the pair are working together, and yet against each other at the same time. Time will tell whether that leads to healthy competition or a very messy breakup. 

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Microsoft just made its Bing AI chatbot much better for iPhone owners
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Microsoft’s Bing chatbot is now more readily accessible for iOS users thanks to a new widget, plus the AI has been bolstered to perform more responsively when using voice input on an iPhone.

Windows Central spotted that Microsoft has implemented a Bing Chat widget that can be added to the Home screen, allowing you to initiate a session with the chatbot with a simple tap. That’s a handy ability indeed for regular users of Bing AI on iOS devices.

For instructions on how to add a widget to the iPhone Home screen, check here.

In the Bing blog post announcing this new feature for iOS, Microsoft also tells us that it has made progress on another front for iPhone owners – namely better performance for the voice input button on the Bing mobile app (for iOS, and Android as well). When you tap the button it should now indicate that it’s listening instantly.

Analysis: Catching up with Android

The widget is a very useful touch in terms of convenience for regular users on the iPhone, and it brings the Bing Chat experience up to parity with the Android version (which already had this feature).

Overall, Microsoft’s setting a pretty fast pace of development with its Bing AI, as considerable progress is being made on a weekly basis, with both the mobile and desktop incarnations of the chatbot.

Regarding the latter, we’ve just seen that Microsoft has brought voice input to desktop PCs (previously this had been a mobile-only feature). The idea is to make for a more natural chatting experience with the Bing chatbot, allowing you to speak to the AI, and have it reply via spoken words, too.

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Microsoft makes Bing’s AI chatbot easier to talk to in Windows 11
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Microsoft’s Bing AI just got a smart new feature, namely the ability to accept voice input on desktop PCs.

Voice input was already supported on mobiles, but now you can engage with the Bing chatbot asking queries via a microphone attached to your desktop PC. What’s more, the chatbot can reply with its own voice response (as Windows Central reports).

There are only a limited number of languages supported for voice input, mind you, at this stage. Those are as follows: English, French, German, Japanese and Mandarin.

We can doubtless expect more languages to be covered in the future, as Microsoft builds out this feature.

To use voice input, simply click the microphone icon in the Bing Chat box, and say your piece, then wait for the AI’s digitized voice response. The experience remains the same otherwise, as you might guess.

Analysis: Voice of the future

This is an important feature for the Bing AI, as it means that sessions with the chatbot feel like a more natural exchange – you’re talking, and the AI is replying with its voice. In other words, it’s more like a conversation than a search engine-like experience, which is Microsoft’s overall goal.

With the facility being on mobile already, it was only a matter of time before it was ported over for desktop users. More broadly, voice has been an area Microsoft has focused on considerably – witness the swift progress with Voice Access in Windows 11 in recent times (and in-line dictation in Microsoft Word, for that matter).

When Copilot lands in Windows 11 (supposedly testing will begin later in June), it’s easy to envisage that this infusion of AI will come with more voice-based controls, too.

However, the next big move for the Bing chatbot will be its introduction to other browsers besides Edge (with official support for Chrome and other major browsers inbound, as opposed to third-party plug-ins which are the only option currently).

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This Windows 10 version is officially dead – and Microsoft is now forcing upgrades
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Windows 10 version 21H2 is no longer officially supported by Microsoft, so those still running that incarnation of the operating system need to act now.

As of yesterday, the last security update was released for Windows 10 21H2, namely the June cumulative update.

That’s the final bunch of fixes for vulnerabilities that’ll be provided to users still on 21H2, hence the need to upgrade in the next few weeks, before July’s round of patching happens (and you miss out if still on 21H2).

In a release health update, Microsoft informed us: “On June 13, 2023, Home, Pro, Pro Education and Pro for Workstations editions of Windows 10, version 21H2 will reach end of servicing. The upcoming June 2023 security update, to be released on June 13, 2023, will be the last update available for this version.”

At this point, PCs still running Windows 10 21H2 will have a forced update initiated before too long.

Microsoft explained: “Windows Update will automatically initiate a feature update for Windows 10 consumer devices and non-managed business devices that are at, or within several months of reaching end of servicing.”

Analysis: Enforced upgrades are a necessary evil

That forced update will push users to Windows 10 version 22H2, but of course, that has to happen. When the rug is pulled for support on an older version of Windows, and security updates are no longer provided, you shouldn’t keep the OS on your PC (unless you’re not going to connect to the internet at all).

Staying online with vulnerabilities present on your system (which is bound to happen in time, as new security flaws are discovered and not patched) is a foolish thing to do.

So, your choice is an upgrade to 22H2, or as Microsoft would prefer, you could make the leap to Windows 11. If, of course, your PC is capable of running Windows 11, which it may not be (if you have an older CPU, or your computer lacks TPM support – there may be ways around these problems, but such hardware upgrades can be fiddly, naturally).

As you may be aware, Windows 10 will not get any new features going forward – Microsoft is only supplying security updates now (and maybe the odd very minor feature tweak here and there, but nothing of any substance). All of this is part of Microsoft’s not-so-subtle pushing to get you to upgrade to Windows 11, an OS which has struggled with its pace of adoption compared to Windows 10.

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