I want to turn off or hide the draft with copilot dingbat that follows my cursor around in MS Word.
I have seen a few articles on this website, and I know it's not possible but I'm going to ask anyway. For reference this is what I'm referring to: It's more I find the little thing following me around on my screen to be annoying and distracting, I've managed to hide or disable anything related to copilot on my system except this little dingbat. When a new document is open you get a little message that says "Select the icon or press Alt + i to draft with copilot" It would be nice if I could hide that as well, yes copilot is a *feature*, and I don't care about it. I also want to hide the paste with copilot and just used the local paste options that were built into previous versions of word. I suspect that there is a copilot dingbat that is stored somewhere on my system, possibly in a font, and as I have already made a few detrimental modifications to my operating system registry, I'm not wary of messing up my computer any more than it could be. The only saving grace I have at the moment is there is an issue with my account, so any accidental triggering of the feature causes it to crap out. (So long as I don't accidentally press the 'fix account" button) I know that if it was easy to turn off there would be a button for it, I know Microsoft probably wants us to use this feature because it means more data for them to collect, an I'm disappointed in the loss of user agency that's resulted from this rollout, and there's a spike in animosity towards AI in general.
Quantifying the value of Microsoft Accessibility and Assistive Technologies For Education
We recently commissioned Forrester Consulting to conduct a Total Economic Impact™ Analysis of Microsoft Accessibility And Assistive Technologies For Education to quantify the benefits of Microsoft accessibility tools for students, teachers and schools. Forrester conducted numerous interviews across K-12, Higher Education, and an alternative school. These schools were using the built-in accessibility tools that are offered with our Microsoft 365 platform, including Office 365 and Windows 10. These schools represent over 90,000 students and 5000 faculty and staff.Empower your organization to achieve more with the Accessibility Baseline
Do you ever wonder as an IT admin, "How can I empower and enable my users with disabilities and our workforce to be better A11y's?" Your solution has arrived. We welcome you to try the Accessibility Baseline to enable Accessibility group policies across your whole tenant or specific groups the choice is yours.
New accessibility features in Play My Emails
Microsoft is committed to creating products and services designed for everyone, including over one billion people with disabilities. In celebration of Global Accessibility Awareness Day, Microsoft is excited to announce new accessibility features for the Outlook Mobile app on iOS and Android phones that will empower blind and low-vision customers to achieve more. Cortana’s updated features were designed to be more compatible with mobile screen readers through innovative gesture controls and improved interaction models. This will enable customers to effortlessly switch between voice commands and screen reader controls to catch up on emails, organize their day, and take advantage of Microsoft’s powerful search capabilities. An eyes-free email experience We made it easier than ever to invoke Cortana and start listening to your emails. On an Android phone, simply say, “Hey Google, play my emails in Outlook.” iPhone users can set up a Siri Shortcut and add it to the Home Screen or widgets. For even quicker access, you can combine a Siri Shortcut with Apple’s new Back Tap feature, which allows you to start listening to your emails just by tapping the back of your phone. Once you’ve set up a Siri Shortcut for Play My Emails, go to Back Tap in the Accessibility Touch Settings, choose Double Tap or Triple Tap, and then select Play My Emails from the list of Shortcuts. To learn more about Play My Emails accessibility features for mobile devices see, Accessibility gestures in Play My Emails. As you’re listening to your emails on an iPhone with VoiceOver turned on, you can use customizable touch gestures to triage your inbox. The default setting lets you archive an email by swiping up with three fingers and flag an email by swiping down with three fingers. On both iPhone and Android, you can pause playback by double tapping the screen with two fingers and you can control the readout speed by asking Cortana to "speed up" or "slow down." Plus, you can switch to a different app or turn the screen off while continuing to listen to your emails in the background. With a more accessible Cortana, you can easily ask about upcoming meetings, emails from specific contacts, and even schedule focus time. Play My Emails is optimized for both Cortana and your screen reader to provide a seamless audible email experience. For a full list of things you can say to Cortana while listening to your emails, see What Can You Do With Play My Emails from Cortana? We’re committed to accessibility At Microsoft, we’re dedicated to providing inclusive tools and features that empower people living with disabilities to achieve more. To ensure we're creating products that effectively meet the needs of all our customers, all our products follow a set of accessibility principles based on transparency, accountability and inclusion. Throughout the development of Play My Emails, Microsoft worked with blind customers to understand and implement the necessary requirements to translate their needs into voice-enabled capabilities. As Play My Emails continues to evolve, we're committed to creating new features and experiences that are accessible to all our customers. This is achieved thanks to the insightful and valuable feedback we receive from you. When the Outlook Mobile app is open you can say, “I have feedback,” at any time to share your thoughts and suggestions. We want to hear from you! Frequently asked questions How do I customize the up and down swipe gestures on iOS? When using Play My Emails on iOS with VoiceOver turned on, you can archive an email by swiping up with three fingers and flag an email by swiping down with three fingers. These swipe gestures map to custom action buttons that appear to the left and right of the Play button on the Play My Emails screen. These gestures can be customized to perform different actions, like flag, snooze, delete, and more, by going to Settings > Play My Emails > Swipe Options. To change the action taken when swiping up with three fingers, you need to change the Swipe Left option. To change the action taken when swiping down with three fingers, choose Swipe Right. How do I change the speed of the readout? You can change the readout speed by going to Settings > Play My Emails > Readout Speed. Or while you’re listening to your emails, you can tap the mic and ask Cortana to “speed up” or “slow down.” Where can I learn more about Cortana in Play My Emails? For more information, see What can you do with Play My Emails from Cortana? How do I give feedback on Play My Emails accessibility features? When you have the Outlook Mobile app open, just say, “I have feedback.”
Inclusive Classroom round up for Microsoft Education at ISTE 2019
Microsoft Education’s mission is to empower every student on the planet to achieve more. This mission is founded on inclusive principles and aims to enable 100% of all students. Built-in, mainstream, non-stigmatizing and free! Coming into ISTE, Microsoft Education is releasing a wave of updates for the Inclusive Classroom. Today’s round-up of new updates are grouped across reading, writing, math and communication.
Building a digital guide dog for railway passengers with impaired vision
Catching your train on time can be challenging under the best of circumstances. Trains typically only stop for a few minutes, leaving little room for mistakes. For example, at Munich Main station around 240 express trains and 510 regional trains leave from 28 platforms per day. Some trains can also be quite long, up to 346 meters (1,135 ft) for express ICE trains. It is extremely important to quickly find the correct platform and platform section, and then the door closest to a reserved seat needs to be located. This already challenging adventure becomes even more so, if a vision impairment forces a customer to rely exclusively on auditory or tactile feedback. When traveling autonomously, without assistance, it is common practice to walk along the outside of a train, continuously tapping it with a white cane, to discover opened and closed doors (figure 1). While this works in principle, this practice has limitations, both in terms of speed and reliability. We therefore partnered with DB Systel GmbH, the digital partner for all Deutsche Bahn Group companies, to build the Digital Guide Dog. This is a feasibility study based on an AI-powered smartphone application that uses computer vision, auditory and haptic feedback to guide customers to the correct platform section and train car door. In this blog post, we are sharing some of the details and unique challenges that we experienced while the AI model behind this application.
