'Hey Cortana!' brings passive-listening to Windows Phone this fall for a hands-free experience

Berlin, Frg – Invoking Cortana on Windows Telephone is a straightforward affair with a single button printing of the Search key (or swipe-down on the HTC I for Windows with Dot View instance). All the same, newer engineering science found on the Xbox Kinect and another Android devices is making the jump to Windows Phone: passive voice activation.

Arriving after this fall with the newly announced 'Lumia Denim' firmware update, some Lumias are getting the hands-free feature named 'Hey Cortana.' Users with smartphones featuring the Snapdragon 80x chipsets, like the Lumia 930, Lumia Icon, and Lumia 1520 can all take advantage of the Cortana extension.

After a cursory training session whereby the phone learns your specific voice, users will be able to call upwardly Cortana by simply saying 'Hey, Cortana' (or any other name they bestow to the voice-assistant). Cortana and then wakes up and takes your enquiry. Such a characteristic allows users to use Cortana without e'er touching their phone, which is perfect if you are beyond the room, accept your easily total, are driving or other situations where it is more user-friendly to go easily-free.

Presumably other phones like HTC's new One M8 for Windows Phone can do the aforementioned, as that phone has the necessary hardware, merely it also needs a firmware/OS update to enable the new feature. For Microsoft and their Lumia line, 'Hey Cortana' is supposed to launch with the new Lumia Denim firmware and OS update expected later this fall.

Hints of passive-voice activation for Cortana existence enabled came earlier this summer from Microsoft's Marcus Ash who oversees development of the vocalisation-assistant.

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