Microsoft plan to divorce Cortana from search in Windows 10 previewed in Insider Build 18317

Windows 10 search shake-up will also bring changes to Office 365

Microsoft is planning to separate its Cortana personal assistant from search in forthcoming iterations of Windows 10, if the latest Insider build is any guide.

The change, which has been previewed in Build 18317, is a response to criticism over the way in which search has been implemented in Windows 10. Because Cortana only works effectively with Microsoft's own Bing search engine, this meant that the integrated search facility in Microsoft also had to be tied to Bing - preventing users from making Google or DuckDuckGo their default search service.

In Build 18317, the text box will be solely for searching, while Cortana will require either voice commands or for the user to click the separate Cortana button on the Windows 10 taskbar. "This will enable each experience to innovate independently to best serve their target audiences and use cases," wrote Dona Sarkar and Brandon LeBlanc in the Windows blog announcing the new build.

However, it's not yet clear whether Microsoft will enable users to set their own default search engine in the future.

The separation isn't just a response to user criticisms, though, but will also be part of a broader shake-up of search by Microsoft that will also encompass corporate Office 365 subscriptions. Microsoft is planning to unify the search function across the various elements of Office 365 to provide more consistency, and to ensure that searches encompass the whole of the Office 365 package, regardless of which element they are launched from.

Other changes previewed in Build 18317 include a "better font management experience in settings", which doesn't especially sound like something users have been crying out for; and improvements to Start menu reliability by carving it out from ShellExperienceHost.exe out into its own separate executable.

On top of that, of course, is the usual series of bug fixes and tweaks.