Getting Cortana in India

So all around the Internet (or at least in the Windows Phone world) people are saying,

If you want Cortana outside of US, change your region to US.

This video suggest the same, and it also has a background audio which was used in the commercials for the Apple iPhone, how ironic.

I had other ideas, I thought of something else that works for now. I had an idea that Cortana might work if you keep your region  unchanged as India and you just change all the language settings into US, at least the Bing services works that way now.

But nope, you have to set everything to US to use Cortana. No other way, no other workaround. But we din’t stop there, I tested what I endorse as an alternative idea, but found that it didn’t work that way. They are right, you only can get Cortana if you fully choose US in everything. No playing cheaters with Microsoft 😦

Sorry if that video kind of turned out to be bad, filmed  with a phone while i was trying out things, no script.

And here is a list of things that are coming with the Windows Phone 8.1, for you. You may or may not have seen this already, if you have seen some points already, fine. If something is new to you, viola! A new leak 🙂

• Show your caller id to all/no one/contacts
• You can use apps for video calling (sadly no operator video calls via front cam)
• Speed Dial (swipe left when in the call history)
•  The frequently used emoji’s is now represented with a heart symbol
• Data Sense savings in IE – Off/Standard/High/Automatic
• Reading View (with custom font sizes and background colors)
• Ability to ask or even automatically remember passwords
• Session from PC IE comes under the other pane, when you press tabs in WP IE
• iCloud support, rejoice Apple users
• You can view your download history now right from the phone without having to go into the windowsphone.ccom’s purchase history
• App updates can be done automatically, with an option to only use WiFi for the task
• Manually check for app updates within the Store app
• Music app has a new headset flash screen
• Features music, just like featured apps
• New calender views, with the ability to show weather based on location
• Battery saver, Music, Videos, storage Sense and FM Radio now shows up in the app list, but cannot be uninstalled
• New Camera UI/View Finder
• Select upto 5 shortcuts to see in the viewfinder
• Delete burst mode captures after specified periods of time
• You can turn on or off, tap to capture a photo
• Podcasts app, again you cannot uninstall it
• App Deals can be presented via toasts by the Wallet app
• Batch uninstall apps / batch move them to SD
• Show More titles in the start screen, background image for the start screen tiles
• Action Center, with custom notifications, even if the phone is locked
• Auto reconnect WiFi along with WiFi sense
• Under SIM settings, you can select from Global/LTE/GSM/UMTS/CDMA depending upon your hardware and carrier
• VPN
• Workplace accounts to use your personal phone as your BYOD work phone
• Battery Saver shows the battery usage statics on per app basis
• Connect to a projector via USB
• Quite Hours, which only works if you have Cortana enabled
• Advertising ID for Microsoft Targeted advertising
• You can now hide the location indicator icon
• GeoFence Monitor
• USB data connection, and the ability to notify if your charger/charging source sucks
• Swipe keyboard, auto emotion suggestion with  options to disable them
• Narrator mode to read aloud, with an option to quickly toggle it on/off via “Vol Up + Start”
• Zoom on web contents, even if the web page doesn’t want you doing so
• Custom fonts & colors in the browser (Style, Effects, Color, Transparency –  in Background/Window/Font)
• Navigation bar color customization if your hardware doesn’t have a physical capacitative front keys
• And Off Course, Cortana
• Improved Maps integration in the OS level
• You can choose from which time frame you can retrieve messages, previously all of your messaging history will be restored flooding your phone, unless you have deleted them via Outlook in web
• You can now hide the porn images you have saved in your phone from appearing in your start screen, can shuffle images or can make the OS display images in the start screen tile in a row
• Camera inbuilt is renamed into Microsoft Camera
• Revamped Store.

This post originally appeared in NokiaTips, written by the same author i.e, Le Me 🙂