Microsoft Build 2024: news and announcements from the developer conference – The Verge

Microsoft’s new Windows chief on the future of the OS, Surface, and those annoying ads

2024-05-23T09:45:56-04:00

Pavan Davuluri hasn't even been the head of Windows for two months, but he's already been tasked with announcing Microsoft's transition to Arm-powered chips and its big AI-powered PC ambitions. There's a lot riding on this moment, and Davuluri now has to lead both the Surface and Windows teams through an AI era that has the potential to upend how we use computers.

I sat down with the new Windows chief at the company's Build developer conference this week to better understand what his vision is for Windows and Surface, whether Microsoft will still experiment with hardware, and if we should expect to see an end to the ads that are ruining the …

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Truecaller and Microsoft will let users make an AI voice to answer calls

2024-05-22T17:45:43-04:00

Caller ID company Truecaller will let users create an AI version of their voice to answer calls.

Truecaller is an app that identifies and blocks spam calls that some people prefer over their phone's default system. Now the service will let users with access to its AI Assistant to record their voice. The company partnered with Microsoft's Azure AI Speech, which will learn from the recorded clip to generate an AI version of the user's voice.

"This groundbreaking capability not only adds a touch of familiarity and comfort for the users but also showcases the power of AI in transforming the way we interact with our digital assistants," says …

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This Microsoft-approved website tracks how Windows games play on Arm

2024-05-21T16:45:30-04:00

With Microsoft's new Surfaces leading a wave of Copilot Plus PCs powered by Arm chips that could reshape our expectations of Windows laptops, you might be wondering: do they game?

We'd already seen a few examples, like Baldur's Gate 3 and Control - but at Build, Microsoft and Qualcomm just revealed a new website with far more examples. WorksOnWoA.com has apparently already tested 1,481 games on the Surface Laptop and other devices with Arm-based Snapdragon X Elite chips, and it lets you search to see whether your game of choice falls into one of four categories: "Perfect," "Playable," "Runs," or "Unplayable."

Here's what each of those term …

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Microsoft Build 2024: everything announced

2024-05-21T14:58:55-04:00

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella at Build 2024. | Screenshot: YouTube

Microsoft had a lot to say about Windows and AI - and a little to say about custom emoji - during the Build 2024 keynote. The company, like just about everyone else in the industry, is charging hard at cramming AI into every nook and cranny it can find. That means Copilot watching your screen to help you play Minecraft or giving you AI agent co-workers.

The whole event was over two hours long, but you can catch the highlights below.

Microsoft wants to put AI agents to work

Microsoft says Copilot AI agents can soon be used as something like virtual employees that businesses can use for menial tasks like monitoring emails, carrying out a seri …

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Windows now has AI-powered copy and paste

2024-05-21T14:58:36-04:00

Microsoft is adding a new Advanced Paste feature to PowerToys for Windows 11 that can convert your clipboard content on the fly with the power of AI. The new feature can help people speed up their workflows by doing things like copying code in one language and pasting it in another, although its best tricks require OpenAI API credits.

Advanced Paste is included in PowerToys version 0.81 and, once enabled, can be activated with a special key command: Windows Key + Shift + V. That opens an Advanced Paste text window that offers paste conversion options including plaintext, markdown, and JSON.

If you enable Paste with AI in the Advanced Paste …

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Microsoft is bringing ‘Windows Volumetric Apps’ to Meta Quest headsets

2024-05-21T14:08:48-04:00

“Windows + Meta.” | Image: Microsoft

You can already beam your flat Windows desktop and its VR games onto your Meta Quest headset - but what if Windows could send HoloLens-like 3D apps and digital objects to the headset, too?

At Build, Microsoft has just announced "Windows Volumetric Apps on Meta Quest," a way to "extend Windows apps into 3D space."

Details are slim, but the company showed off a digital exploded 3D view of an Xbox controller from the perspective of a Meta Quest 3 headset, a digital object you could manipulate with your hands - and says it took its software partner Creo a single day to bring that interactive visualization to Quest.

Microsoft says devs can sig …

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Microsoft is making File Explorer more powerful with version control and 7z compression

2024-05-21T13:48:31-04:00

Here's one more way to stay on top of your favorite programming projects: have them sync to the same File Explorer you already use to navigate your hard drive in Windows.

At Build, Microsoft now says it's adding native version control to File Explorer by integrating systems like Git, letting you see new changes and comments directly from the app.

Here's a cropped and zoomed version of the provided screenshot so you can get a better look:

I wonder if this would also let non-programmers keep the latest copies of a project they like synced to their hard drive. I can think of a few projects I like where that'd come in handy.

Microsoft says i …

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Microsoft’s new Windows Copilot Runtime aims to win over AI developers

2024-05-21T13:37:12-04:00

Microsoft launched a range of Copilot Plus PCs yesterday that includes new AI features built directly into Windows 11. Behind the scenes, the company now has more than 40 AI models running on Windows 11 thanks to a new Windows Copilot Runtime that will also allow developers to use these models for their apps.

At Microsoft Build today, the company is providing a lot more details about exactly how this Windows Copilot Runtime works. The runtime includes a library of APIs that developers can tap into for their own apps, with AI frameworks and toolchains that are designed for developers to ship their own on-device models on Windows.

"Windows C …

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Here’s the eight-inch Snapdragon PC for your Windows on Arm experiments

2024-05-21T12:10:10-04:00

The Snapdragon Dev Kit for Windows in a transparent shell; most if not all units will be black. | Image: Qualcomm

Excited for an era of long-lasting powerful Windows laptops with Arm chips and 45 TOPS for AI but would rather pay less and plug into the wall? Qualcomm has just revealed a Mac Mini-esque box that's ostensibly just for developers.

The new $899.99 "Snapdragon Dev Kit for Windows" houses the most powerful of Qualcomm's lineup of Snapdragon X Elite chips - the one with the 4.6 TFLOP GPU - as well as 32GB of LPDDR5x RAM, 512GB of NVMe storage, and lots of ports, all within roughly the same volume as Apple's mini desktop.

While the spec sheet unfortunately suggests the two-pound PC will only ship in black - not the transparent model at the top …

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Microsoft Teams is adding a Slack-favorite emoji feature

2024-05-21T11:30:00-04:00

Microsoft is adding custom emoji to Teams. | Image: The Verge

Microsoft is adding a new feature to its Teams communications platform that enables users to upload their own custom emoji to use in reactions and messages. Announced during its Build developer conference on Tuesday, Microsoft says the new custom emoji will be available to try next month via the Teams public preview, with the goal of helping Teams users collaborate and express themselves "more creatively and authentically."

IT admins for businesses that use Teams will have the ability to limit which users can upload or delete custom emoji, or they can turn the feature off entirely. Once custom emoji are uploaded into Teams, they'll only be …

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