How To Find Cortana Settings Windows 10
Windows 10 and 11 tips
4 quick tips for Cortana in Windows 10
Microsoft'south digital assistant Cortana can make your life easier and more efficient — if you know how to take reward of information technology.
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Contributing Editor, Computerworld |
Microsoft's digital assistant Cortana was one of the major additions to Windows x when it outset came out. Simply it was launched dorsum in December 2015, and it's changed quite a bit since then. Over the years, it's had new features added, and then others taken away. Depending on which version of Windows you lot're using, it may be integrated directly into the Windows Search box, or run as an entirely divide app.
No matter which version y'all apply, though, it'south a very useful tool and tin practise a lot for yous, including alerting yous to upcoming meetings; searching your PC and the spider web; telling you about the weather, news, and sports; and a lot more. To assist you go the almost out of Cortana, I've put together some of my favorite tips for using it — including using Cortana to manage your Google Calendar and to send yous reminders.
Note that this article covers tips for Cortana in the Windows 10 May 2021 Update (version 21H1), so if you accept a unlike version, things may look different or may not work. If that'due south the case for you, meet the "Cortana and search" section of Computerworld's "Windows x cheat sail" or the Cortana section of our Windows x May 2020 Update review.
Cortana nuts
Before nosotros head into the tips, we should cover a scrap of background. Cortana used to be integrated in the Windows search box: Whether yous performed a search past speaking or typing, the results were delivered in the Cortana pane. But that's changed over time. Start, Microsoft separated Cortana from the Windows search box. And and then Microsoft went ever further and turned Cortana into its own app that works like any other Windows 10 app, including running in a resizable window that can be moved effectually the screen.
That'south the way it works now. So the only way to use Cortana is to run the app. Yous can offset information technology by clicking the Cortana icon in the taskbar merely to the right of the search box, pressing the Windows fundamental + C, or maxim "Cortana."
Once you lot showtime the app, to perform a Cortana search, you say "Hey Cortana" and speak your search, or click the Cortana icon to the right of the search box and speak, or press the Windows key + C and speak or type.
When you enquire Cortana a straightforward question or issue a straightforward command, Cortana displays the outcome onscreen and reads it to you lot. Yet, if you ask a more than complicated question that requires a brandish of web links, Cortana volition show the links in the Edge browser.
IDG Cortana displays the results of your request and reads them to you.
In the previous version of Cortana, you lot often had to make full out on-screen forms to create reminders. However, the Cortana app now offers a chat-like experience, so you instead speak or type using patently English language words. Cortana may ask questions to analyze what you lot want done, tell you lot it's created the reminder, or say it can't create the reminder. Equally with conversation or texting, it displays your previous interactions, and then you lot tin scroll dorsum and see your questions and Cortana'south answers.
You may need to customize Cortana and so you can activate it by voice or by pressing the Windows key + C. To do it, yous kickoff need turn on vox activation on your PC, and let Cortana use be activated by voice. Go to Settings > Privacy > Voice activation and movement the slider from Off to On under Allow apps to use phonation activation. And then coil down to "Choose which apps tin can use vox activation" and nether Cortana, move the slider to On for Permit Cortana respond to "Cortana" keyword. If you want Cortana to reply even when your PC is locked, move the slider to On for Use Cortana when my device is locked.
After you've done that, yous'll have to turn on permissions in Windows 10's settings app. Go to Settings > Privacy > Microphone. If y'all see the bulletin, "Microphone access for this device is off," click the Alter button and motility the slider to On. Then in the Allow apps to admission your microphone section turn the slider to On.
You lot tin also remove the Cortana push button to the right of the search box. Right-click the taskbar and uncheck Evidence Cortana button from the menu that appears. (You can even turn off the search box in this way. Right-click the taskbar, select Search, and click Subconscious.)
One final note before we begin: Cortana's capabilities were significantly scaled back in the Windows x May 2020 Update. It can no longer play music, command streaming video services like Netflix or Hulu, control smart home appliances, or do other consumer-oriented tasks. And it can't practise many smaller tasks either, such equally creating location-based reminders — for instance, having information technology tell you to buy Red Garcia water ice cream when you're at a Whole Foods store.
Those familiar with previous versions of Cortana will probable notice that it has been stripped down in another way every bit well. There's no longer a notebook that lets y'all do things such view and edit your reminders. In many cases, you simply tin't do the things with Cortana that you used to set upward through the notebook — the diverse consumer tasks, notably.
We're watching Cortana closely, though. So bank check back regularly in case Microsoft decides to give information technology some more than ability in the futurity.
1. Use natural-linguistic communication queries
Cortana is a lot smarter than you recall: Information technology lets you lot use natural-language queries — in other words, make requests of information technology using apparently English (or whatever your linguistic communication is), rather than having to utilize specific words.
For instance, to send an electronic mail to a contact, you can say, "Transport an email to Jane Doe." Cortana will look through your contacts, discover the person to whom you lot want to send the email, and and so let you fill out a form onscreen to create and transport the electronic mail without having to go into a postal service app. If you've linked your Outlook account to another account, such as a Gmail account, information technology will look through that as well. And if it finds multiple matches for the person'due south proper noun, it will inquire you which address you lot want to send the mail to.
2. Set and use reminders
One of Cortana'south near useful features is the mode in which it tin can remind you most tasks or upcoming events. It's very simple to set a reminder — merely say or type in patently English what you desire to be reminded about — for example, "Create a reminder for my weekly Wednesday 1 pm Zoom meeting."
IDG To create a reminder in Cortana, just speak or type in patently English.
In order for Cortana to pop up alerts nigh the reminders y'all've set, you need to turn on Windows ten'southward notification feature. To do it, become to Settings > System > Notifications & deportment and then turn the slider on in the Get notifications from apps and other senders department.
Notation that if you don't give Cortana plenty information to create the reminder, it volition inquire you a follow-up question. So if you say "Create a reminder for my weekly coming together" but don't specify at what fourth dimension you lot want to be reminded, Cortana will ask "When should I remind yous?" Speak or type the answer, and your reminder will exist created.
You can set reminders in the same way for time and contacts. If you desire to be reminded to fill your car with gas tomorrow morning, for case, say or type "Remind me to get gas tomorrow morning." A screen will pop upward asking for more details, such as the exact time and whether information technology should be a recurring reminder.
IDG You can ask Cortana to create reminders based on the time of solar day.
Y'all can also tell Cortana to remind you to practice something when you interact with someone in your contact volume. So if you want to remind yourself to enquire your friend Lydia about a dinner invitation, say "Remind me to ask Lydia about a dinner invitation." A screen pops up request for the contact's proper name if Cortana didn't recognize it. So the next fourth dimension you send or receive an email with that person, you'll get the reminder.
When you've set a reminder, and it'south time for the reminder to alert you to do something, the alert doesn't come via Cortana. Instead, it's sent equally a Windows notification.
In previous versions of Cortana, y'all could easily view, manage, and edit your reminders via Cortana's notebook. Simply Cortana no longer has a notebook, and so it's non easy to practise anymore. Withal, you lot can practice it using a little-known Microsoft tool called To-Do. Head to https://to-do.alive.com/ and log in using your Microsoft account information. (You can install the Microsoft To Do app from the Microsoft Shop if yous adopt to use an app rather than exercise information technology on the web.)
Click Tasks and you lot'll come across a list of all of your reminders. Click whatsoever reminder, and you tin can edit it, for example by having it repeat, changing the day and time, adding information technology to your agenda, dismissing information technology, and then on.
IDG If you want to edit your reminders, you'll have to do it using Microsoft To Do. (Click image to enlarge it.)
3. Manage your Google Calendar with Cortana
Windows 10 includes a congenital-in calendar app that works with Cortana. However, if yous're a Google Calendar user, y'all tin can get Cortana to integrate with that likewise, so you can use Cortana to create and edit appointments, and testify you lot your schedule with Google Agenda in the aforementioned mode as you exercise with the born Windows x Calendar app.
To practise it, y'all first need to integrate your Google Calendar with the Windows 10 Calendar. Starting time, launch the Calendar app by typing agenda into the Windows x search box, so clicking the Calendar app icon that appears.
Next, click the Settings icon on the lower left of the Calendar screen — the icon is in the shape of a gear. When the Settings pane appears, select Manage Accounts > Add business relationship. From the screen that appears, select Google. You'll be asked to sign in with your Google account information. Follow the prompts to create the account.
IDG You lot can create an engagement in your Google Calendar using Cortana if yous add together your Google account information. (Click image to overstate it.)
That's all information technology takes. From now on, your Google calendar volition sync with the Windows 10's Calendar app. So, for example, if you lot ask Cortana to "create appointment," you'll be able to tell Cortana the details, including the date, time, and purpose. If whatsoever information Cortana needs is missing, it volition inquire you, and you merely need to provide the answer. Cortana will add together the event to your Calendar. Regardless of which agenda you lot add an event to, both Google and Windows x Agenda will remain in sync.
Besides, when you inquire to run across your schedule — such as past asking "What's my schedule today?" — Cortana will show y'all the events from all of your calendars, including Google.
I downside is that you tin't add events to sub-calendars on Google Calendar (like "dwelling house" or "work") with any regular success. Sometimes information technology works, and sometimes information technology doesn't.
4. Apply alternate search engines and browsers with Cortana
The latest version of Cortana is designed for tasks such as setting reminders, interacting with your calendar, and similar tasks, simply it too answers many general questions, such every bit "Why are deepfakes dangerous?"
It does this by using Microsoft's Bing search engine to do the search. Bing then sends the results to Cortana, and Cortana reformats the information and reads and/or displays information from the first search result. You can also click the Meet more link at the bottom right to see the information on the Bing spider web site. Microsoft'southward Edge browser displays the results.
In some instances, Cortana won't requite an reply to your query, and instead responds with a phrase such as "Distressing I don't know the answer to this one." In that case, Cortana will offer you a link that you can click on to exist sent to a Bing search for the question, which will exist displayed in Border.
(Note: I did an investigation and establish that Cortana won't tell you even the most bones data nigh protecting yourself against COVID-xix, including whether masks aid protect against the spread of COVID and whether vaccines are effective against COVID. It won't even answer the question, "Will the COVID-19 vaccine implant a microchip in me?" or whether measles or polio vaccines work, even though it will offer you communication on what to exercise if you get a cold. For details, encounter "Cortana is AWOL in the state of war confronting COVID-19 disinfo.")
If you prefer, when you click a link in Cortana you can have unlike browser than Edge display the results. It's easy to practise. Just change your default spider web browser. To do information technology, go to Settings > Apps > Default Apps and scroll downward to "Web browser." Click the Microsoft Edge icon. Information technology volition display the browsers y'all've installed. Click the browser you want to use, and from so on, Cortana will employ that browser to brandish results of searches. And it will also exist your default browser for using Windows in general.
Even when you do that, though, Cortana will however utilize Bing to perform the search. You can, though, instead accept Cortana employ Google, DuckDuckGo, Yahoo, or Baidu to perform the search. To do that, y'all'll as well accept to brand your default web browser either Chrome or Firefox.
If y'all desire to change from Bing to an alternate search engine and use Chrome equally your default web browser, first follow the above steps to tell Windows to user Chrome as your default browser. And then launch Chrome and install the Chrometana Pro extension. Ignore the instructions about having to download and use a program chosen Border Deflector — y'all only need to do that if you lot have a Windows 10 version previous to the May 2020 Update.
Click the Chrometana Pro extension on the upper-right of the screen in Chrome, then choose your new default search engine for Cortana. From now on, your web searches launched from Cortana volition use whatsoever search engine y'all choose and will brandish the results in Chrome.
IDG The Chrometana Pro Chrome extension redirects your Cortana searches to Google, DuckDuckGo, Yahoo, or Baidu rather than Bing.
Note that there's likewise a version of Chrometana Pro for Firefox. To utilize it, first make Firefox your default web browser, then install Foxtana Pro in Firefox, and use the same instructions outlined for Chrometana Pro for Chrome.
This article was originally published in March 2016 and most recently updated in September 2021.
Copyright © 2021 IDG Communications, Inc.
Source: https://www.computerworld.com/article/3043552/4-quick-tips-for-cortana-in-windows-10.html
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