Windows 10 Will Have DirectX 12 and Probably Cortana

It has previously been confirmed by official sources that DirectX 12 will come together with the next generation of Windows. Now that lose confirmation has been nailed to the ground and any doubt buried with the latest row of Microsoft blog posts. The latest in their DirectX Developer post introduces us to some more facts.

While it isn’t in the current technical preview version yet, gamers can expect it to become available in later preview versions. Gamers are encouraged to sign up to the insiders program and download the new Windows 10 preview. Game developers who are part of the DirectX 12 Early Access program will be the first to get it and will have instant access to the updated runtime, API headers, drivers, documentation and samples, all of which works with the technical preview. The public SDK will be released at a later time for everyone to try, but with the disappointment of not having any actual date or time-frame.

Members of the DirectX 12 Early Access program who subscribe to Unreal Engine 4 can receive source access to the DX12 port. Microsoft has worked with Epic to create a DX12 branch on the UE4 GitHub repository. This branch supports UE 4.4, the latest public released version of the engine. “Come join our open development project and help make DX12 great!,” the statement reads.

While we already know that they’ve worked closely with Nvidia on this, some people asked the questions if other graphic manufacturers are involved in the development as well. And yes, of course there are. We’ve already seen Intel demonstrate it with their HD4400 iGPU during the Intel Developer Forum. This is where they showed off the amazing Asteroids demo that showcased both the power savings and the performance compared to DirectX 11. But no mention of AMD yet, though they’re probably busy with their own Mantle SDK.

There has been no mention about a DirectX 12 for users of Windows 7 and 8 either. It’s also highly unlikely that it will come since DX 11.3 will be released too and it has almost all of the DX 12 function. On the other hand, if Windows 10 takes the route it looks to take, there won’t be many people that will hesitate to upgrade, as soon as possible.

And there is more news around the new Windows 10. Cortana is Microsoft’s voice based assistant for the Windows 8.1 mobile platform, and it has received quite a bit of positive attention in the media since it’s release. Ever since the first rumours of the next generation of Windows OS surfaced, so did the hopes for Cortana on the PC. This was further fueled by several leaks telling us that it would come.

The first presentation of Windows 10 sadly didn’t confirm those hopes for us, but the technical preview version released the next day might just have done just that. With the first version of the next generation operating system available, enthusiasts and curious people are going through every inch and crack, looking at every file, registry entry and what else they can get access to. The easiest way to find something is of course to use the search feature. After all Microsoft stressed during the presentation that it had been vastly improved.

#Cortana to get geo-fenced Wi-fi activation http://t.co/M119zsLJFZ pic.twitter.com/H6sqRvy5Sz

— Brad Sams (@bdsams) October 2, 2014

From the found information so far, we can draw some probable conclusions. Cortana will support geo fencing to know when to turn your WiFi on and off by itself. There have been found traces to commercial location tracking near your location, so you don’t forget to buy that milk before you get home. Other reminder functions have been found and so have several different Bing request configurations. Oh, and it might even be able to keep track of your flight reservations and parcel and package deliveries.

There has been a lot of wondering about the naming of the new Windows and as such a lot of theories have formed. The most likely however is the compatibility theory. This is backed by the phrase used during the demonstration where it was said “Windows 9 would not work”.

When a piece of software checks what windows version you have, it might compare that return with a wildcard to match multiple versions at once. Windows 95 and 98 are basically the same system, compatibility wise, and as such it’s a logic move to check for “Windows9*”. There are thousands of programs out there that use this simple check when determine compatibility and what functions to load and access. All of these would end up in some sort of conflict and possible not work all together. Skipping 9 and moving on to 10 solves this issue, as no previous Windows version will collide with a wildcard match on 10.

Thank you Microsoft and cnbeta for providing us with this information.

Images courtesy of Microsoft