[John20212]

I still don't get why Cortana on PC is still cloud based and not 100% local using your PC resources and only allowed to access online resources to the extent the user allows. Most PC's especially if you have a high end gaming rig are more than capable of supporting Cortana AI locally and not having your data on Microsoft servers if you want to fully use Cortana.

The worst part is that people seem to be completely ok with having all their personal data on someone else's cloud, and don't seem to realize the benefits a true personal assistant has over one that is cloud based under someone else's control.

Microsoft advertises Cortana as a true personal assistant/secretary, the problem is a real personal assistant is private while Cortana is far from that until Microsoft allows Cortana to be fully housed on a users PC, with users fully deciding what, if any online resouces she can access to.

[ttsoldier]

I still don't get why Cortana on PC is still cloud based and not 100% local using your PC resources and only allowed to access online resources to the extent the user allows. Most PC's especially if you have a high end gaming rig are more than capable of supporting Cortana AI locally and not having your data on Microsoft servers if you want to fully use Cortana.

The worst part is that people seem to be completely ok with having all their personal data on someone else's cloud, and don't seem to realize the benefits a true personal assistant has over one that is cloud based under someone else's control.

Microsoft advertises Cortana as a true personal assistant/secretary, the problem is a real personal assistant is private while Cortana is far from that until Microsoft allows Cortana to be fully housed on a users PC, with users fully deciding what, if any online resouces she can access to.

Where is your email stored? Not on someone else's cloud? (Unless you're hosting your own email server). Whether you use, yahoo, Microsoft, gmail or even buy your own hosting; your data is stored somewhere else.

It does not bother me and Cortana is the beauty of Windows 10, syncing between your Windows 10 devices. If you don't want your "personal data on someone else's cloud", just don't use Cortana. Microsoft is not forcing you to use it.

People worry too much about their "personal data" these days. I don't get it.

[John20212]

Where is your email stored? Not on someone else's cloud? (Unless you're hosting your own email server). Whether you use, yahoo, Microsoft, gmail or even buy your own hosting; your data is stored somewhere else.

It does not bother me and Cortana is the beauty of Windows 10, syncing between your Windows 10 devices. If you don't want your "personal data on someone else's cloud", just don't use Cortana. Microsoft is not forcing you to use it.

People worry too much about their "personal data" these days. I don't get it.

You are kind of missing the point I am trying to make. What exactly is the benefit of having Cortana be cloud based if your PC can fully handle running Cortana locally?

The data privacy is just a side benefit, if somewhat significant one. As just one example, data privacy is critical if you are running a law practice where client data and its security is paramount and you can't have it on servers that are not local, or have something like Cortana access it if she is not fully local and fully under your control.

The best comparison, as Microsoft likes to make in their ads, is to a real-life personal assistant. You want the stuff you tell them to be private and know what data they have access to. If Cortana and her data is housed with Microsoft and Microsoft has access to your data for "quality", "feedback", "testing" and other purposes particularly your voice and hand writing data then that is far from the trust and security a real personal assistant has, and far beyond what many people are comfortable with.

But my main point is why not make Cortana local when your PC has the power to run her AI? Unless the only reason behind Cortana is so Microsoft can have and profit from their users data, if you think that is BS, then you should have no issue with Cortana being local.

[ttsoldier]

You are kind of missing the point I am trying to make. What exactly is the benefit of having Cortana be cloud based if your PC can fully handle running Cortana locally?

The data privacy is just a side benefit, if somewhat significant one. As just one example, data privacy is critical if you are running a law practice where client data and its security is paramount and you can't have it on servers that are not local, or have something like Cortana access it if she is not fully local and fully under your control.

The best comparison, as Microsoft likes to make in their ads, is to a real-life personal assistant. You want the stuff you tell them to be private and know what data they have access to. If Cortana and her data is housed with Microsoft and Microsoft has access to your data for "quality", "feedback", "testing" and other purposes particularly your voice and hand writing data then that is far from the trust and security a real personal assistant has, and far beyond what many people are comfortable with.

But my main point is why not make Cortana local when your PC has the power to run her AI? Unless the only reason behind Cortana is so Microsoft can have and profit from their users data, if you think that is BS, then you should have no issue with Cortana being local.

But if Cortana is local, how does my information sync to my other Windows 10 devices

Cloud is the future. Embrace it.

If the data is stored locally and your pc is connected to the internet can't someone remotely access your pc and retrieve your data? Then why use the internet?

[Chintan Gohel]

The issue with Cortana is precisely that part where it has to access internet for it to work. I'm with John on this.

Can you ask Cortana to play a certain song on your pc while being offline? Or take notes while being offline? It should be able to do that. I cannot have data on all the time just so Cortana can work - that's asking for disastrous results. Not all of us have unlimited data for every little request

[John20212]

But if Cortana is local, how does my information sync to my other Windows 10 devices

Cloud is the future. Embrace it.

If the data is stored locally and your pc is connected to the internet can't someone remotely access your pc and retrieve your data? Then why use the internet?

The options menu is for that, if you would like to sync you data over Microsoft's cloud then you could just have an option to enable that, as you do now, that should not affect the core of Cortana and whether she is local or cloud based.

There is a huge difference between Cortana being fully cloud based with unlimited access to anything online and unlimited/unknown scope of the data Microsoft stores on you, as opposed to a true personal assistant with a local Cortana that fully runs on your PC, and can be configured to only access online resources you allow her to, like e.g. if you want her to tell you the weather you could program her to be allowed to access your favorite weather website, but nothing more. Or if you want her to track your flight allow her specific access to your flight data or email, while keeping all the information gathering and processing completely local, unless once again you allow her to sync that info with your cloud storage to be available on less powerful devices. There should also be an option for local direct sync of Cortana by connecting your phone to your PC, without having to store your data on Microsoft's cloud.

The only plausible reason why Microsoft would not want to do this and make Cortana a true personal and private assistant is because it would effectively cut them off from all the data collection they are currently doing in Windows 10 (on default settings), but that is a discussion for a different thread.

[ttsoldier]

The options menu is for that, if you would like to sync you data over Microsoft's cloud then you could just have an option to enable that, as you do now, that should not affect the core of Cortana and whether she is local or cloud based.

There is a huge difference between Cortana being fully cloud based with unlimited access to anything online and unlimited/unknown scope of the data Microsoft stores on you, as opposed to a true personal assistant with a local Cortana that fully runs on your PC, and can be configured to only access online resources you allow her to, like e.g. if you want her to tell you the weather you could program her to be allowed to access your favorite weather website, but nothing more. Or if you want her to track your flight allow her specific access to your flight data or email, while keeping all the information gathering and processing completely local, unless once again you allow her to sync that info with your cloud storage to be available on less powerful devices. There should also be an option for local direct sync of Cortana by connecting your phone to your PC, without having to store your data on Microsoft's cloud.

The only plausible reason why Microsoft would not want to do this and make Cortana a true personal and private assistant is because it would effectively cut them off from all the data collection they are currently doing in Windows 10 (on default settings), but that is a discussion for a different thread.

ohhhhhhhhhh. Ok now I understand what you're saying and I agree with you.

When it comes to commands, we should be able to make certain commands without having internet. Eg. Settings and alarm, making a reminder etc etc.

Hopefully it will come one day. In the beginning we could not use Cortana with location off, now we can.

[Chintan Gohel]

The options menu is for that, if you would like to sync you data over Microsoft's cloud then you could just have an option to enable that, as you do now, that should not affect the core of Cortana and whether she is local or cloud based.

There is a huge difference between Cortana being fully cloud based with unlimited access to anything online and unlimited/unknown scope of the data Microsoft stores on you, as opposed to a true personal assistant with a local Cortana that fully runs on your PC, and can be configured to only access online resources you allow her to, like e.g. if you want her to tell you the weather you could program her to be allowed to access your favorite weather website, but nothing more. Or if you want her to track your flight allow her specific access to your flight data or email, while keeping all the information gathering and processing completely local, unless once again you allow her to sync that info with your cloud storage to be available on less powerful devices. There should also be an option for local direct sync of Cortana by connecting your phone to your PC, without having to store your data on Microsoft's cloud.

The only plausible reason why Microsoft would not want to do this and make Cortana a true personal and private assistant is because it would effectively cut them off from all the data collection they are currently doing in Windows 10 (on default settings), but that is a discussion for a different thread.

well explained. That would make a lot more sense than the current model and it would be cheaper too for those on limited data packs