Original 2015 Article… Microsoft is deeply integrating its virtual assistant, Cortana, into Windows 10. This gives you a customized experience by tracking your calendar appointments, typing patterns, flights, search terms, and similar items. But if you’re concerned about privacy and the amount of information that you’re giving to Microsoft, via Cortana, you can turn the feature off, and erase the collected content. Windows 10 Cortana Privacy On a tablet or PC running Windows 10, head to Settings > Privacy and select Speech, inking & typing from the left column....

Editor Update – The rumors were true as released in a Microsoft Announcement. Here’s the details from Microsoft. According to Paul Thurrott and Mary Jo Foley, sources tell them the promotion will start on June 2nd. This comes as no surprise as Microsoft has always offered a similar promotion prior to the launch of a new version of Windows. After all, if no such promotion was offered sales would take a dive as users waited it out for the new operating system....

Windows Phone 8.1 Action Center First, a quick look at Action Center. It’s similar to the notification centers on Android and iOS, and you access it the same way – swipe from the top of the screen down. Some of the information displayed are recent texts, reminders, app updates, etc. It also provides quick access to turning features on and off like Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and toggling Airplane Mode on or off....

The update came quietly on Tuesday, with no fanfare from Microsoft, a blog post, or even a tweet from a Microsoft exec. There don’t seem to be many changes other than the Start menu on the RT desktop – which actually doesn’t include the full benefits of the Windows 10 menu but should make navigation a bit easier for some users. I downloaded it on my first-gen Surface RT, and the actual update appears to be located in the Optional Updates section....

One of the most common changes that users look to make to images is to make it transparent. This helps push an image into the background, allow your words and other content take greater focus. If you want to know how to make a picture transparent in PowerPoint, here’s what you’ll need to do. Making an Image Transparent Using Shapes Unless you have a Microsoft 365 subscription, you can only make an image transparent in PowerPoint by inserting it into an empty shape, then changing the transparency level of the shape itself....

With different styles and customization options, you can create a useful pie chart in Excel and an attractive one simultaneously. How to Create a Pie Chart in Excel While some of the features for customizing a pie chart differ slightly, the process for creating one is the same in Excel on Windows, Mac, and the web. You’ll see that pie chart pop right into your spreadsheet, ready for you to customize!...

Tweeting with a Time Limit Spirit is a simple Twitter app that allows you to set your tweets to disappear after a set time limit. To start using the app, go to the Twitter Spirit website and click Get Spirit. Now, allow Spirit to use your Twitter account by signing in. You’ll get a confirmation message, just like the one below. It basically tells you everything you need to know about using the application....

How to Manually Update Chrome OS on a Chromebook To get started, launch the Chrome Browser on your desktop and, click the Options menu (three dots) in the upper right corner and choose Settings. Alternately, you can also click on the clock in the lower right corner of the desktop and select Settings (gear icon). That opens the “Settings” page. From there click on About Chrome OS on the lower-left corner of the screen....

First, Pair Your Remote App With The Apple TV You’ll need the latest version of iOS and tvOS to start the pairing. Open up the Remote App and Add a Device. You’ll then go to your Apple TV and go to Settings > Remotes and Devices. There you’ll put in your pairing code, using the Siri Remote for input one last time. You can use your iPhone’s keyboard when you need to select text on your Apple TV....

Step 1: Configure your .htaccess file All the work will be done using your .htaccess file. You can find this file at the root of most Apache Websites. The screenshot was taken from a vanilla install of WordPress running on Windows 2003 Server: The .htaccess file is checked by Apache before displaying web pages. Typically it’s used for ReWrites or ReDirects however you can also use it to leverage the built-in security features of Apache....

Anyone with a phone that supports HTML 5 (Android 2.1+ and iOS 3+) can instantly and easily print Google Docs from their phone via the cloud. It’s a snap, and today I’ll show you how to do it using both a groovy screencast video and our standard step-by-step instructions. Let’s jump right into printing Google Docs via an iPhone. Update: Google Cloud Print is no longer supported by the company:...

In this guide, you’ll learn how to set up and enable your webcam and microphone so you can record video and sound. Enable Your Webcam and Microphone Before you can start recording, you’ll need to make sure the webcam and microphone you want to use are enabled. Select the Start button and select the Settings gear icon. Select Privacy from the Settings window. Scroll down to the App Permissions section in the left navigation menu and select Camera....

It could be a devastating malware attack, unforeseen hardware failures, or just general system instability—a system image lets you restore your PC to before there was a problem (assuming your hardware is working). If you’re unsure how to recover Windows 11 using a system image backup you’ve previously created, you can do so quickly by following these steps. How to Restore Windows 11 Using a System Image Backup Before you begin to restore Windows 11 from your system image, you’ll need to create a bootable Windows 11 USB installation drive or have a Windows 11 USB recovery drive ready to go....

How To Use The New Windows 7 Paint Program For Image Resizing 1. Right-click the image you want to resize, then on the context menu, click Open with > Paint. Alternatively, depending on what software you have installed, you may also click Edit. 2. Once Paint loads, Click the Image button on the ribbon and then click Resize. Note: If your Paint window is large enough for the Ribbon to auto-expand, the Image button will become its ribbon menu....

Earlier this week we looked at power management in Windows 7. This article will follow up on that same topic by checking in on the efficiency of your power settings. The report will help you isolate power hungry components and tell you where all of your energy is going. This knowledge is helpful for people running Windows 7 on laptops since battery life is always something on the mind. To ensure accurate results, make sure you don’t have any programs running that usually wouldn’t be running when your computer is just sitting idle....

Do you have multiple Google accounts that you use to chat with people? Google Talk is an effective way to chat with other Google and Gmail users from your desktop without using an internet browser. But, by default the program isn’t set up to work with multiple accounts. I’ve found trouble with this because I happen to have a handful of different Google accounts myself, and it is a pain switching back and forth....

Back in September, I demonstrated How-To begin playing with Microsoft Office Web Apps during its technical preview by using your Microsoft Live SkyDrive online storage. Although pretty nifty, the process of saving documents up to your SkyDrive for cloud storage/sync was manual (Browser Upload Only,) and not terribly easy for new/grandpa users. This process has all changed with the launch of Microsoft Office 2010 Beta. With Office 2010, Microsoft has included the ability to leverage your SkyDrive cloud storage (25Gigs Free) right from inside their Core Office Suite of products, including Word 2010, Excel 2010, and Powerpoint 2010....

Since its rebranding, Microsoft has continued to update and refine Outlook.com with features and functions, making it one of the best webmail services. One new feature I discovered is the ability to send your emails to Microsoft’s popular note-taking app, OneNote. Save Email to OneNote To set this up, sign in to Outlook.com, select an email message, right-click it and select Save to OneNote. A dialog will pop up on the screen to choose an existing section or create a new one....

For example, if you want to schedule an email to send to a Gmail or Proton Mail address, there’s no extra work required. If you need to get a message to someone at a specific time, we’ll show you how to schedule emails on your iPhone using the default Mail app on iOS 16 or higher. How to Schedule Emails on an iPhone Sending an email on a schedule is helpful for both you and the recipient....

I’m not the only one to notice this as a Reddit user pointed this out as well. Just like in their situation, I am getting an ad for something that I already pay for. A big complaint among Windows 10 users is this trend of ads being displayed in different areas of the OS, such as the Start menu, on the Lock Screen, from the taskbar, and in some Microsoft apps like News....