Cortana News (Coming from the inside) (OP being updated)

[Kacey Green]

thanks talderon!.
hopefully there will be an option for bing search results to be Optional. sometimes cortana will just search the web instead of answering.. She should be comanded be "search for" ..

wishful thinker here.. I know its one of her ability but I want her own answer. haha.

This! Sometimes I'm giving commands or asking for chit chat and she's Binging. Search for is a good cue or look up

 

[mozman68]

This! Sometimes I'm giving commands or asking for chit chat and she's Binging. Search for is a good cue or look up

I think that has more to do with the fact that Cortana is still on version 1.0 and the capability to provide more voice responses has not been added or even turned on while Microsoft eases into the launch.

 

[F3rzz]

thanks talderon!.
hopefully there will be an option for bing search results to be Optional. sometimes cortana will just search the web instead of answering.. She should be comanded be "search for" ..

wishful thinker here.. I know its one of her ability but I want her own answer. haha.

i think the bing search should always be there at the bottom with any query, but still give her own answer most times possible.

 

[bayanii]

Any word on if Cortana will support setting your preferred method of transportation (walking, cycling, transit, driving)? The "Time to Leave" alerts for calendar events only work for driving times, but asking Cortana how long it will take to get somewhere by transit gives accurate results.

Time to Leave alerts appear to only trigger for your set "home" and "work" locations. Any other saved locations don't trigger this reminder.

Also, some searches can be "pinned" to Cortana, like searching for the "Weather in New York" gives you the option to "show weather updates for this city". When you do this, that item remains in Cortana. Is it intended in the future to have the same option for other queries like the results for "How long will it take to walk home from here", and having the pinned item stay in Cortanas list, updating each time you open it with your current location.

I like this idea. Only a commuter would appreciate this.

 

[Jcmg62]

In response to an earlier post regarding cortana's official arrival in the UK, I read yesterday that its going to be in the second half of 2014, although I must say I'm impressed with how cortana is holding up with UK based searches already. At least 95% of my voice searches are accurate. She can find grocery stores, gyms, schools, restaurants......the lot. Where she does struggle is with more UK based general info. Example, ask her who the president of the usa is and she'll say its Barack Obama. Ask her who the prime minister of great Britain is and you'll be directed to a website.

I'm really hoping for very close integration between cortana and the here maps / here drive platforms. Like the vast majority of UK and European lumia users, I've invested a lot of time creating favourite places in here maps. I've also spent a lot of time updating here maps and providing reviews and photos of bars, restaurants and many other places of interest on the here maps platform. It would be a great shame if that volume of information wasn't accessible to cortana when I'm looking for directions.

 

[jaypatel19]

can't interact with front mic to cortana , everytimes I speak to her she just throw me back at homescreen, even other recording like whatsapp audio msgs eg. is also not working, tried every possible solutions, but failed.it only worked through text interaction or headphones. very frustrated. definitely it's bug of cortana.

so is there any news ,when the mic bug will be resolved? mostly 925 having this issue.

 

[bozza72]

good work guys & yes please mod make this a sticky

 

[azcruz]

Example, ask her who the president of the usa is and she'll say its Barack Obama. Ask her who the prime minister of great Britain is and you'll be directed to a website.

My experience is different, I asked "Who is the President of the United States" and she returned a web search result. I asked "who is the president of the philippines" and she replied by voice.

 

[armandojv]

I just woke up recently to get ready to work, when suddenly I hear a notification from my phone. When I go check is Cortana telling me that with the current traffic conditions I should start leaving in approx 10 mins if I want to make it to work on time since it will take 23 mins to get there. This is first time this happens and I am amazed. There is no place to add at what time I work just my work location. But she is able to learn this. I LIKE IT!!!

 

[Richard Culverhouse]

I'm loving this stuff as well!

 

[agmanuel]

I plan to update this post with news and information from the inside (Microsoft) that I am allowed to share that is not really being publicized.

[NOTE]Please note the following:

The team is currently working on a GDR1 update for Cortana and may have some updates for WP8.1 core as well. There is currently no timeline as to when the update will roll out, but the suggestion is As Soon As Possible.[/NOTE]

[NOTE]Cortana Chit-Chat

There was an issue with Chit-Chat a few days ago, the issue on our end has been resolved, so please report any new Chit-Chat issues.[/NOTE]

[INFO]04/17/2014

Cortana's "Getting to know you" reset.

This is a known issue and is being worked on. The ability to either manually kick off the questions or have it set to detect if you have not answered them and kicked them off will be implemented in a near future update.[/INFO]

[INFO]04/19/2014

Cortana's ability to turn on Wi-Fi at nearby places is being looked into and tested. There is hope that a fix will be rolled out soon.

Cortana not saying your name: Right now, this is by design while we work on some back-end stuff to get this working reliably.

Right now, the location based reminder system is best used with locations in your "Places" tab in Cortana's Notebook. Right now, generalized locations like "any supermarket" is more miss than hit, but that is being worked on. GeoFencing is still a WIP, but being worked on daily with regular updates on the back end.[/INFO]

Hi! Thank you for this post! Do you have any information about the progress of cortana in Spanish, do you knows if we'll have to wait a lot?

 

[Shinigami910]

So nice that you're doing this!

Can you shed any light on when Cortana is coming to, for instance, the UK?

Cortana is supposed to be in the UK mid to late 2014. Probably in time for the official release of 8.1

 

[Rasetech]

Do you have any information about germany?

 

[c0wb0ycliche]

A few different questions/remarks that hopefully you can address:

1. Geofencing - my experience has been that geofencing works when (and only when) the "address" matches the GPS location exactly. When I put in my home and work addresses manually, I didn't get any notifications. When I asked "where am I" and used that location as each (even though the unit numbers were way off, e.g. my apartment is 300X and it says 500X) it works. The problem seems to be a great margin of error in Windows Phone maps. So far, I have never been able to trigger a notification at an unsaved location. If I say "remind me at Wegmans" it finds the correct Wegmans, but when I am actually there, maps show me in Kohl's, which is in the same plaza. Is this a problem that Microsoft is aware of? Is there a plan in place to fix it? It seems like the core mechanics are working perfectly (e.g. it finds the place you are looking for every time) but the mapping is the problem. For what it's worth, I live in NJ, about 45 minutes outside of NYC/Philly.

2. Commuting/Traffic information - this for me has been the most frustrating element, mainly due to the lack of transparency here. From what I have read on here, Cortana will only start to show you traffic information if you adhere to the same pattern of driving between work and home for awhile. So for anyone with an inconsistent schedule, it won't work. What I don't understand is this - if it uses location (which it always does - if you watch the phone for awhile you will see it ping the GPS every now and then) why doesn't it always show the time to work or to home in the Cortland screen with news and flash it on the Live tile like a news story? This would be a much more useful functionality that almost all users would enjoy. If she knows I am work, she can show the distance home. If she knows I am home, she can show the distance to work. If I am at neither, perhaps it could show the time home. With regard to this same issue, there doesn't seem to be any consistent methodology for calendar appointments. I've made some with full address information, but it never shows traffic or any sort of information. Is there a surefire way of creating an appointment with a location and receiving "time to leave" notifications?

3. Movies - this is a weirdly jarring omission, as it worked with Bing search before. All attempts to get local movie times from Cortana result in a web search. With Bing, I could say or type movie times and it would show local times. Is this just a bug? It seems a very simple process and the mechanism is there from Bing, Cortana would just need to parse requests for show times as such.

 

[fc000]

I like this idea. Only a commuter would appreciate this.

Right exactly. Support for those of us who don't drive, or don't drive the whole way would be awesome. I normally walk to work or take transit everyday. It'd be great to have those travel times for transit. And being able to "pin" any searches like you can for weather locations, would be super powerful.

 

[Rasetech]

Same here i normally walk or drive to the train station. The time to leave to reach the train is the important to me.

 

[Talderon]

Some new updates to the OP. I'll try to get more news. Keep checking the OP!

 

[Chris_Kez]

Any word on if Cortana will support setting your preferred method of transportation (walking, cycling, transit, driving)? The "Time to Leave" alerts for calendar events only work for driving times, but asking Cortana how long it will take to get somewhere by transit gives accurate results.

I'd love to see a smarter, more flexible implementation of this stuff:
Me: Cortana, when's the next train from Station A to Station B?
Cortana: There's an express train scheduled to depart at 7:05am (5 minutes from now). There is another train departing at 7:45am.
Me: I'll take the 7:45am train
Cortana: Okay [Cortana then alerts me a few minutes later that I need to leave if I want to make the 7:45am train]

 

[Talderon]

I'd love to see a smarter, more flexible implementation of this stuff:
Me: Cortana, when's the next train from Station A to Station B?
Cortana: There's an express train scheduled to depart at 7:05am (5 minutes from now). There is another train departing at 7:45am.
Me: I'll take the 7:45am train
Cortana: Okay [Cortana then alerts me a few minutes later that I need to leave if I want to make the 7:45am train]

This stuff is coming. It really is. We just have SO MUCH going on, there is no timeline, but, it's coming.

 

[ajayden]

Some new updates to the OP. I'll try to get more news. Keep checking the OP!

Composing emails from Cortana would be a valuable addition. Hope this is coming soon.