Windows 10 will be free for a year.
This has already been talked about in our earlier stories. All devices running on Windows 7 and above will be able to upgrade to Windows 10 free of charge. Windows 10 has brought in a new concept on “Windows as a service”. It will also run on all devices including desktops, laptops, tablets, phones and hybrid devices.
It a huge change from the way Microsoft has been licensed in the past. The trick though is that you will have to pay after the One year trail period. Microsoft, however, confirms lifetime free service after the upgrade.
All devices will be able to access the Windows 10 experience
Microsoft pointed out the concept of a continuous experience across all devices. There have been reports of disruption that users get when they move from their desktop to their phone or tablet and vice versa. With a feature called Continuum, Microsoft wants to fix this problem. Users will be able to switch from desktop to tablet mode depending on the device being used at the time. It is also bridging the gap between the desktop and mobile versions of their OS such that apps work seemingly similar across all platforms.
This was followed by a demo on how Window 10 behaves on tablets. New features include a floating keyboard, replying instantly to notifications and pulling up the keyboard with a voice command.
Cortana to be brought to Desktop
Cortana will be launched from the task bar and will be used for search the same way the integrated search functions. Cortana will be sermoned by simply saying “Hey Cortana” then followed by your query like “What will the weather be tomorrow?”
Users on desktop can also type in simple commands like a name of the app and a shortcut will be presented by Cortana which you can use to launch it. The Start menu is still present but Cortana is now caring out some of the functions there. She will also have a notebook which contains information about you of course. This is aimed at improving suggestions and you can remove anything Cortana learns about you to maintain privacy
Universal apps will work across all devices
Microsoft is aiming at developers building apps once and be able to run them on all windows devices from Desktops to Xbox consoles-so cool. Microsoft showcased how these apps will behave and be distributed.
The image you see is of the Calendar app that automatically adapts to the different interfaces. It also showed off the Ribbon interface in Word the way it appears in Windows Phones, this; it described as “nearly no compromises” experience. The advantage in this is that once you get used to a menu in a single device, the same functions are placed in nearly the same locations with a slightly different layout on different devices or platforms. This is a closely similar way Android handles its phone-tablet approach.
Project Spartan: The rebirth of the Internet Explorer
Internet Explorer has really face it rough. It has been beefed by most internet junkies despite it growing into a decent browser. Microsoft is said to be looking to the future with a project code named Spartan.
The whole browser has been torn apart and rebuilt from scratch. It has a ton of new stuff like an in-built notebook mode that enables you to freeze up a page and annotate it, some reading mode that strips down a website into plain text that will make reading easier, and lastly; an inbuilt PDF reader-cool stuff. Cortana is also integrated into the browser so most of the voice commands will work within the browser’s search bar. The browser also has auto prediction incorporated. For example, during the event; Cortana gave flight information when “Delta” was typed because it knows you are looking out for a flight. It also pulls up more information depending on the website you have visited. Like when you are looking up a restaurant, direction, menus, hours and more information pops up.
There will be an Improved Suite of built-in Apps
When Microsoft launched Windows 8, there was a bunch of new and improved apps. Not many were used unfortunately because the Modern-style interface was somewhat hard to use. Many of these apps are getting upgrades and updates that will not only stop at making them easy to use but also contain more handy features that make them more useful.
These apps for example contain Photos, Maps, Music, OneDrive, the People contacts app and more. These have been around for a while, no doubt but check them out when Windows 10 is unboxed.
Xbox also gets an app on the Windows 10 desktop
Picking a leaf from Steam’s generation, Microsoft has brought a new Xbox app for its Windows 10 operating system.
This handy app for Xbox live users will come pre-loaded on all Windows 10 devices allowing them to chat and also voice chat with all their friends, they will also be able to see all their games, screenshots and videos from players and record your own videos for any Windows app all on the app.
Xbox can now Stream to Windows 10 devices then play with a PC player
Gamers will surely love this one. Microsoft will enable Xbox One users to stream their games live to PC, games running on your console and stream across a Wi-fi connection to your desktop.
This means an Xbox player will be able to play live with a PC player. This will not however be running for all Xbox one game but some games will definitely exploit this feature.
Source: Life Hacker, Gizmodo
Remmy Bisimbeko
