Microsoft Copilot for Windows 11:
Understanding the AI-Powered Features in Windows 11
by Anand Narayanaswamy
APRESS 2024
Apress is a premier publisher of technology books on a wide range of topics. Over the past year, they have released three different titles on various aspects of Microsoft's Copilot platform, and I am working through all three of them.
The first one is Copilot for Windows 11 - which talks about the features Microsoft has embedded into Windows 11 and within a host of other applications that run on the Windows 11 operating system. As with many new technologies, the road from initial implementation to the latest iteration is not always a straight one. The author covers the evolution of Copilot from the earliest releases of Large Language Models to OpenAI being embedded in Azure and the introduction of Bing Chat in early 2023, though the latest versions at the time of writing of Copilot. Along the way he manages to squeeze in details around ethics of AI and training models, a topic that does not look like it will be going away any time soon.
From the introductory topics, the book moves on to working with Copilot within Windows 11. There is a good deal of information here but the main takeaway is that Copilot works as a kind of virtual assistant for you. But it also shows how quickly information can become dated. When Copilot was in Preview mode, you were able to have it do many basic tasks for you in Windows 11. With the General Release in April 2025 - the functionality has been removed. Microsoft has not provided an explanation for the removal of the features but I would assume it has to do with security and the potential for systems to be hacked.
Later chapters are targeted for specific applications and how Copilot can be used with them. Starting with Microsoft Edge, and the Bing search engine (Copilot integration in Bing also works in Google Chrome), the author shows how Copilot augments the search engine by providing more detailed responses to queries. A chapter on Skype is not useful since Microsoft has retired that application, as is the chapter on Copilot Web, where much of the functionality has been removed in the free version.
A chapter on Image Creator gives a good primer on the use of the Bing enabled version of the Dall-E image creator tool, accessible at https://www.bing.com/images/create. Note that the version that is embedded in Microsoft Paint requires a Microsoft 365 account. Microsoft Designer is also covered and is useful to extend the Image Creator tool functionality. Its available on the web at: https://designer.microsoft.com/. Writing the best prompt you can is often a case of trial and error, but with time, you should get what you are looking for, or at least something close. Unfortunately some of the features highlighted in this chapter, like Generative Erase have since been removed.
Next up is a chapter on using Copilot in Microsft 365 (i.e Office) which requires a Copilot Pro license. There are a number of useful examples including how to use Copilot to analyze data in an Excel worksheet, and to draft a document in Word and the use cases are fairly open ended.
Finally the book wraps up with some additional information on using the stand alone Copilot application and two chapters on devices that have been engineerted to take advantage of Copilot with specific hardware implementations.
Summary
As the notes above point out, tech books have a limited shelf life, as the subject changes, often quite rapidly. While this book is not horribly outdated seven months after its publication there is a good deal of useful information, just don't pay full price for it!
Comments
Post a Comment