A neat new collaboration between Lenovo and Microsoft aims to make Cortana even smarter with REACHit, the two companies announced at Lenovo Tech World.
More specifically, Lenovo and Microsoft want to offer a new way to enable users to find content with Cortana and REACHit, aiming for better results and extra convenience.
Lenovo REACHit basically boosts the search capabilities of Cortana for Windows 10 devices by allowing users to search for content across any connected Windows 10-powered Lenovo PC or tablet, as well as major cloud services, not just the device they're currently using. This exclusive new platform integration is deeper than other options available so far, enabling Microsoft's digital assistant to reach a superior level of contextual search, have a larger pool of information to search, and deliver more relevant content in a more convenient manner.
With Cortana and REACHit, the search will include a wide variety of content including the user's personal photos, videos, emails, or other files. REACHit also extends to the user's personal cloud services, as well as their connected Lenovo PCs and tablets running Windows 10, in order to find the most relevant content to the user's searches.
"For example, a user wants to find a photo that she edited on her Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon laptop last week. Now she can access it while she's away from her laptop at the coffee shop by using her Lenovo ThinkPad 10 tablet. She no longer needs to go home and work on the laptop. And by using Cortana and REACHit, she doesn't even have to remember the name of the photo file - just the location where she edited it, or the date or another piece of relevant information. For example, she could search by saying: 'Cortana, find the picture I edited last week on my ThinkPad X1 Carbon.' Or 'Cortana, find the picture I worked on at Starbucks last week,'" explains the press release.
As previously mentioned, Cortana and REACHit also search within personal cloud accounts on major services such as Google Drive, Dropbox, and Box. Without Lenovo REACHit, users would only be able to have Cortana search for files on the device they're currently using, or on Microsoft's OneDrive. The two companies thought about security as well, and unique user-assigned Lenovo IDs will make the whole process safe. The ability to search for content with Cortana and REACCHit in a natural way is a great bonus as well.
"We are living in a world where technology has made it easy to amass unprecedented amounts of personal digital content," touted Mark Cohen, Vice President, Ecosystem and Cloud Services, Lenovo. "So much information that it can be extremely difficult to remember where it is stored. What you need is an assistant - a friend - who is always at the ready to help. That is where Cortana and REACHit comes in, enabling people to find their personal content in an incredibly natural way - by asking a friend for help."
"It's great to see Lenovo building on the Windows and Cortana platform to create a unique and valuable solution that will help our joint customers be more productive across their devices and services," further added Peter Han, Microsoft's vice president of Worldwide OEM Marketing. "Microsoft and Lenovo teams held creative design sessions, advanced hardware discussions, even late night coding marathons to deliver Cortana and REACHit."
The neat new Cortana and REACHit functionality will launch in beta later this summer, when Windows 10 rolls out to consumers, while general availability for download is slated for the fall. For more details, head over to Lenovo's dedicated website at this link.
