Microsoft Siri clone ‘Cortana’ coming to Xbox, PC and mobile

It was revealed earlier last  week that Microsoft’s Siri-like digital assistant will be named “Cortana” after the blue holographic assistant from the Xbox flagship first-person shooter Halo. This personal assistant will be available on all Windows devices including mobile, PC and Xbox and is suspected of being a strong competitor in the field of digital assistance.

WPCentral revealed this in a leak that indicated that Windows 8.1 will feature a new Notification Center, multi-tile select and more interesting design features to come with Microsoft’s updated operating system.

Some of ZDNet’s sources seem to suggest that this technology will be able to learn and adapt while relying on the underlying “Satori” knowledge repository that powers Bing. Its sources also indicate that Cortana’s presence or service will be available across all platforms.

Very similar to Apple’s knowledge assistant Siri or Android’s Google Voice, Cortana is expected to combine Bing search information, TellMe speech technology and advanced social graph data.

The company is noted for saying that it will only reveal its progress when the feature is up to scratch. Microsoft’s actual words were that its knowledge assistant needs to be “more revolutionary than evolutionary” before being made public.

TellMe technology has been around for many years and was eventually acquired by Microsoft in 2007. The technology was eventually integrated into other services to form Bing Voice.

“We could come out with something now like them [Apple], but it wouldn’t be state of the art,” Microsoft Bing boss Stefan Weitz told CNET in July. “There are teams working hot and heavy on this right now.”

Microsoft has announced that the upcoming Xbox One console will have integrated Kinect which also features voice control. Kinect will in effect be a mandatory component of the system.

There has been no word from Microsoft if this personal assistant will also be an actual blue hologram. It probably won’t.

Image via Wikia