It's 10 am and I'm busy at my desk, trying to finish up urgent work. Inadvertently, my finger slides in a particular way on the touch pad, and bling! the Cortana help pops up, with a barrage of questions: Would you like to know the weather outside? Would you like me to tell a joke?
I could not find any connection between the weather outside and my work, and a joke was the last thing I needed now.
To her credit, she's trying to assume the persona of a friendly, charming, office assistant who presumes your needs (help me!) and proffers assistance.
Purely altruistic. Except that she is preventing me from doing what I opened the laptop for.
In the beginning, I thought it was funny, when she asked me to call her into action (voice activation) or ask to tell a joke.
But there's a time for everything. Or does Microsoft think there isn't? That any time is good enough to market goodies? For that's what Cortana often leads us to, the app store.
I tried my level best to first, temporarily disable her. Temporarily because new stuff always fascinates me.
However, that didn't work. Cortana kept butting in, regardless of what I was doing.
Finally, out of exasperation, I started searching how to disable Cortana permanently.
That's when I realised my hapless plight, and that of millions of other Windows 10 users: Microsoft has decided that Cortana shall be your virtual assistantforever! She's here to stay.
Is there a way to escape Cortana?
For tech savvy users, there are methods to keep her from being too obtrusive. See here. It involves tampering with the registry, and that isn't my cup of tea. It's pretty risky, unless you know how to fix registry errors.
The only way out: Wait for Microsoft to remove her or add a command to shut her up. Or there's a more drastic solution:
Learn Linux/Ubuntu. I find this option enticing, because (1)it's free (2)Ubuntu is reputed to be more user friendly and easier to learn (3) both are robust against virus/trojan attacks.
Even as I type this, Cortana sprang out. Did she understand what I am typing?
What has been your experience with Cortana?
