Mary Branscombe

Contributor

Mary (Twitter, Google+, website) started her career at Future Publishing, saw the AOL meltdown first hand the first time around when she ran the AOL UK computing channel, and she's been a freelance tech writer for over a decade. She's used every version of Windows and Office released, and every smartphone too, but she's still looking for the perfect tablet. Yes, she really does have USB earrings.

Articles by: Mary Branscombe

Windows 8.1

Windows 8.1 review

By Mary Branscombe, Dan Grabham published

Recommended

Updated The Start button returns, and with Update 1, users can boot straight to desktop. But this is still refinement over reinvention.

Cortana

Machine language: Computers are on the brink of mastering speech recognition

By Mary Branscombe published

Microsoft is open sourcing the deep learning tools it uses to build Cortana's speech recognition, which it hopes will match humans by 2019.

Machine learning

How Microsoft beat Google at understanding images with machine learning

By Mary Branscombe published

Skipping some of the layers in a very deep neural network let Microsoft get the best image recognition results in the annual machine learning contest.

Microsoft Flight Simulator

15 products Microsoft should definitely open source – and 5 it won't

By Mary Branscombe published

Microsoft open sourced Live Writer – could that mean other Microsoft software might go open source too?

Microsoft HQ

Windows Server 2016 brings all the benefits of the cloud to your own servers

By Mary Branscombe published

Jeffrey Snover, lead architect for Windows Server, wants to take the drama out of running servers by making them more like the cloud.

PowerApps

Microsoft's PowerApps: The easiest way ever to create a mobile app

By Mary Branscombe published

Anyone who can use Excel or PowerPoint can develop mobile apps, says Microsoft.

Microsoft office

Microsoft's plans for Office: More features, more mobile, more intelligent

By Mary Branscombe published

Office on iPad, Office in the cloud, Sway, Outlook on Android – Office is everywhere but what is Microsoft planning next?

Windows 10

How to control updates on Windows 10

By Mary Branscombe published

Choose what to update and whether to stick with standard updates or try the future out faster as a Windows Insider.

Office 2016

10 long-lost Microsoft Office features which are sorely missed

By Mary Branscombe published

It's the 25th anniversary of the release of Office, so we thought we'd recall some of the features we pine for (and a couple we don't).

Project Oxford emotions

Can computers tell how you're feeling?

By Mary Branscombe published

Microsoft has released more machine learning tools for making apps that can detect emotions, recognise voices and more.

OneDrive

Has Microsoft been looking at user files to find the 75TB OneDrive hoarders?

By Mary Branscombe published

What exactly did Microsoft look at to find out who was using so much space that it had to reduce OneDrive storage limits?

Windows 10 upgrade

Should you upgrade to Windows 10?

By Mary Branscombe published

Updated Can't decide if you're ready for Microsoft's Windows 10? We can help on that score…

Windows 10 sharing backgrounds

How to share desktop backgrounds between PCs with Windows 10

By Mary Branscombe published

The Windows theme system has changed slightly but you can still share images.

Windows 10 Wi-Fi

How to manage Wi-Fi in Windows 10

By Mary Branscombe published

Making the most of wireless with Wi-Fi Sense and managing data usage for metered connections.

Windows 10

How to report problems in Windows 10

By Mary Branscombe published

For feedback and bug reports in Windows 10 we show you how to gather more info using built-in reporting tools.

Windows 10

How to use the Windows 10 touch keyboard

By Mary Branscombe published

The touch keyboard in Windows 10 is useful even if you have a real keyboard.

Windows 10

How to fix Windows 10 activation problems

By Mary Branscombe published

Windows 10 might be a free upgrade for many users, but it's not always easy to get your system to believe it's legitimate.

Windows Store

How to upgrade from Windows 10 Home to Windows 10 Pro

By Mary Branscombe published

Want to join the domain or encrypt your PC? You need Windows 10 Pro. Here's how to get it without reinstalling.

Windows 10

20 smart new and improved features in Windows 10

By Mary Branscombe published

Updated Windows 10 doesn't just go back to the Start menu – it's full of useful new tools and some things that are just different.

Office add-ins

10 of the best Office Store apps

By Mary Branscombe published

Office add-ins let you add more features to Office 2016 on multiple platforms, and here are our favourites.

Windows 10 Action Centre

How to manage notifications in Windows 10

By Mary Branscombe published

The smartphone-style Action Centre in Windows 10 collects alerts from multiple apps, and pop-up notifications have more features.

Edge IE prompt

How to set up Enterprise Mode and Edge to launch Internet Explorer

By Mary Branscombe published

Not all websites work with Edge, but you can still use Enterprise Mode to get them to run in the right IE mode.

Planner

What's ahead on Microsoft's Office 365 roadmap?

By Mary Branscombe published

Office 365 gets new features far more often than Exchange, Lync and SharePoint ever did on premise, and there are new consumer tools too.

Windows 10

How to get the most from the Windows 10 command prompt

By Mary Branscombe published

You can finally copy and paste in the command line, but Windows 10 adds some other clever tricks which we'll share with you here.

OneDrive

Can Microsoft make OneDrive its very own YouTube?

By Mary Branscombe published

YouTube is the home for video online – but could Microsoft turn OneDrive into the home for data?

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