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Cortana Can Now Replace Google Now On Android Devices

Posted by timothy on from the heterodox-approach dept.

The Verge reports that Microsoft's Cortana can now be used (at least for beta testers) as a drop-in replacement for the Google Now assistant on Android devices; that means users can select launching Cortana as their default on-board assistant, and launch it by holding down the device's home key. However, notes the article, "The update version still doesn't include 'Hey Cortana' support, largely because of hardware limitations that prevent Cortana from always listening for the command."

20 of 155 comments (clear)

  1. Yay! by binarylarry · · Score: 4, Informative

    Now I can have a voice assistant that works even less than Google now does!

    Microsoft innovating the future by copying the past. (TM)

    --
    Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
    1. Re:Yay! by jader3rd · · Score: 3, Funny

      You know, like how Bing used to scrape Google for results?

      Bing never scraped Google for results.

    2. Re:Yay! by cheater512 · · Score: 5, Informative

      http://searchengineland.com/go...

      They got caught red handed.

    3. Re:Yay! by guruevi · · Score: 2

      DuckDuckGo never claimed to be something else. They've always been a Google proxy that (as they claim) anonymizes the traffic.

      --
      Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
    4. Re:Yay! by sexconker · · Score: 5, Informative

      Wrong. They got "caught" doing the same thing every other search engine does with toolbars (or now, what Google does with Chrome). They were simply monitoring what a user clicks on and adding a +1 to that site's weight in their crazy algorithm.
      They weren't copying Google's results, they were copying users's clicks, just like everyone else. If a user clicked on a Google search result, the referrer and the page were fed to Bing, just like with any other user navigation.

      Google ran a smear campaign and clicked on extremely specific results thousands of times from many IPs in their offices n order to poison the result set and show Bing was copying Google. They only had a handful of successes in altering Bing's search results, but the "BING COPIES GOOGLE" campaign was very successful, because people believe it to this day despite the fact that it was debunked several times.

      I hate both companies, but let's at least be correct when talk about them being shitty.

    5. Re:Yay! by freeze128 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I would much rather have Google Now on my Windows 10 desktop instead of Cortana.

    6. Re:Yay! by teh+dave · · Score: 3, Informative

      That is dishonest because it is not the complete story.

      From the same article you linked, is a link to this one which reveals that it barely factors into most search result rankings. Furthermore, whilst Bing gets some information on result rankings from Google, they get that info from any search certain IE users make anywhere on the web, not just Google.

    7. Re:Yay! by vhogemann · · Score: 3, Interesting

      You don't know how right you are about this,

      I can't use Cortana even if I wanted to, not even if I owned a Windows Phone device. See, I'm from Brazil, and Cortana doesn't understand Portuguese. It also refuses to work even it I switch my system language to English, because it's only enabled for US and UK. Compare that with Google Now language support.

      It's kind of frightening actually how ahead Google is. That means that Google not only have a greater reach internationally, but means that they can extract information that Microsoft/BING doesn't have access to, since it's not limited to english. All this translates to better services, better local support, better AD targeting, and more dominance online.

      --
      ---- You know how some doctors have the Messiah complex - they need to save the world? You've got the "Rubik's" complex
  2. Re:Hey Google, you evil bastards! by mcrbids · · Score: 2

    Bash shell is not a tool for the masses. However, at least one app that lets you have your shell. In fact, there's more than one.

    For me, Linux is the OS, and the "Android" part is somewhat analogous to X11 on "normal" Linux.

    --
    I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
  3. I'm okay with this to an extent by MasseKid · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Honestly, I'm kinda happy that third party software can't continuously listen to my microphone.

  4. Re: No voice assistant for me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    This sentence also still applies if you replace the word cooking with masturbating.

  5. Re:Hey Google, you... contributor to Linux? by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 5, Insightful

    exploiting a Linux kernel made for free by volunteers

    Corporations like Red Hat, Suse, IBM, Texas Instruments, Linaro, Samsung, Oracle, and yep, even Microsoft, all contributed to Linux. In fact, corporate contributions now stand at about 80% of all submissions, according to the Linux Development Report. The notion that Linux is made exclusively by a bunch of unpaid volunteers is simply not true. It started out that way, but it has a lot of corporate support these days.

    In case you're wondering, Google was the 8th most prolific Linux kernel corporate contributor in 2014.

    --
    Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
  6. Meanwhile, in Canada by msobkow · · Score: 2

    Meanwhile Cortana is not available in Canada because Microsoft would have to provide French support as well as English in order to be legal here.

    --
    I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
    1. Re: Meanwhile, in Canada by semilemon · · Score: 2

      I'm in Canada, been using Cortana on my phone since I got it in December.

      --
      Why do today what you can put off until tomorrow?
    2. Re:Meanwhile, in Canada by Gumbercules!! · · Score: 4, Interesting

      No, Cortana is not available in Canada because Microsoft enjoys giving a massive middle finger to anyone who's not an American. Trust me. I have a Windows Phone and a Surface Pro 3. I couldn't be more in the "Microsoft Ecosystem" if I tried. But I'm not an American - I'm an Australian (and English is the language here). Despite Cortana being the selling point for WPh for years, they still don't have support for it in Australia (they recently offered "alpha" support on the phone only and it's missing most features) and you can't get Cortana on Windows 10, either. I routinely get emails from Microsoft about sales or deals in the "Windows Store" that only apply to Americans (so I can't get the discounts or free offers), despite the fact they can clearly see from the information they have on me that I am not an American. It's just one, never ending middle finger from them, and it's the #1 reason I doubt my next phone will be Windows based.

      Maybe someone at Microsoft should look around the WPh sales and realise that the vast majority of Windows Phones in the world are actually not in the USA and start offering support to the people who actually did buy their products??

      Considering Cortana is the #1 selling point - you think they'd put some effort into making it work for the 95.71% of the planet who doesn't live in America.

    3. Re:Meanwhile, in Canada by teh+dave · · Score: 2

      This is because Microsoft want to tailor Cortana to each country's culture. They want her to be more relaxed in Australia and more formal in Japan. This takes time.

      Personally, given Microsoft's position, I would have implemented a generic Cortana earlier and then customised her to each country later, in order to speed up the availability of it. But, that's just me.

      Either way, it's not that Microsoft is giving us Aussies the middle finger, they're just taking their sweet time tweaking her to our country's tastes.

  7. Re:It used to be a sure diagnosis... by amiga3D · · Score: 2

    Truth, people walking around talking into the air is the new normal.

  8. Re:Home key? by BradleyUffner · · Score: 2

    Long-press the home button

    Is the home button the little triangle, circle or square?

    http://files.tested.com/photos...

    It's the circle. The mini tutorial that comes up on a clean install points it out and explains it. Even if you skipped the tutorial, 15 seconds of button mashing will reveal it. But you knew which button it was already, you just wanted to be purposely obtuse.

  9. Competition helps EVERYONE! by gavron · · Score: 2

    This is awesome. I'm not a microsoft fan but regardless... having options and choices and being able to evaluate the competition is GREAT.

    Google Now. I love it.
    Cortana. Maybe it will be as good. Maybe it will be better. Maybe whatever it does better Google will add. Maybe what it does worse both will subtract. In the end, guess whom that helps - ME and YOU and everyone using Android. Which, of course, is the only mobile platform to use, right?

    E

  10. My brief review of Cortana by linuxguy · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Me: Set a timer for 30 minutes
    Cortana: Let me search the web for you...

    Me: How far is New York City from here?
    Cortana: I can't tell if you can get there by car

    Microsoft has a lot of work to do before they can play with the big boys.