Copilot key will eventually be required in new PC keyboards, though not yet.
So now Windows bloat is extending to the physical keyboard itself.
Looking at the Microsoft blog post they haven't said exactly how they want keyboard layouts to change. So on a full size keyboard this could be either new key entirely, or replace an existing (and arguably more useful) key.
They should put it adjacent to the up arrow key so that when I hit it accidentally, copilot can ask "did you mean to press the up arrow key?", which will cause me to smash the keyboard with my fists and then I'll need to buy another one. Sales will skyrocket.
Not particularly relevant, but my friend randomly told me to press Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Windows key+L one day. I’m still horrified.
I just tried this. Why does this exist? Why does this need to be a shortcut? Who uses LinkedIn so much that they need to use a 5 key shortcut to get there faster?
For anybody who doesn't want to try it, this key combo opens LinkedIn in your default browser.
It's not a setting you can change, the only way to disable it is to edit the registry.
WTF.
Lol Windows is so bad these days. What were they thinking?!
It’s not a setting you can change, the only way to disable it is to edit the registry.
So you are saying the setting can be changed. You can even do it over terminal if you like.
They have an "Office Key" on some official keyboards. Pressing Office+L opens LinkedIn. The Office key is actually mapped to that long modifier shortcut.
I don't remember the last time I pressed the "right click" contextual menu key, so honestly it's not like it'll be too annoying. Unless they do replace an actually useful key, at which point I guess the people making "make Windows actually work good" apps will get to live another year.
I pressed it like, 20 minutes ago? It's a pretty normal part of a lot of coding workflow, not to mention browsing, accessing context menu keyboard shortcuts without having to move your hand to the mouse for one buttonpress.
Fair enough. Alt used to be that before we decided to have a button to annoyingly pop up the menu strip. And there's still Alt Gr for that in full sized keyboards if we want to go back that way.
Alt Gr is something else. Non-english keyboards use it all day every day for typing their charactersets.
It could probably replace the right OS key, though.
Then you had all those "for the web" Windows 95 PCs that had all the extra buttons like the Calculator and Web Browser and Sleep buttons scattered around above the keyboard that I don't think people tended to use because Windows wasn't built with them in mind. It seems they're in the keyboard standard now as if they were any other key.
Yeah there were some wacky keyboard shortcut buttons in the 90s, particularly during the dot com bubble. Perhaps we could bring back the pizza key!
Before I even read it I knew it was more ads or AI of some sort and yep it's both. Sure yeah we need more ads. Can I get a Microsoft store button on mouses now? Ohoh a dedicated 2nd screen for ads on every monitor. We must please the share holders and the rich!
I'm plenty fine with all ads consolidated to a dedicated monitor, that would certainly never face the wall on minimal brightness
Attention citizen, your Economic Consumer Activity Monitor has identified error with your system and/or the Citizen Observation Rate to the unit. Your worldwide credits have been locked pending resolution.
I'm plenty fine with an OS that doesn't try to abuse me in the first place.
Do you remember a few years ago, it came out that some company was working on a new idea that, when you were given an advertisement on a TV, it could require you to say the product name aloud or it wouldn't continue?
I try not to concede anything related to advertising because everything they want seems so dystopian.
Please drink a verification can.
I remember another one proposing using eye tracking on a phone's selfie camera to make sure you were watching ads, with the ads pausing every time you looked away.
There was also another patent for a TV with an eye-tracker camera in it to make sure you were actually watching the ads, another one that would unmute itself if it was muted during ads, and one designed to count the number of people in a room to charge you for piracy if you didn't buy enough tickets for everybody for pay per view shows.
If only keyboards would have function keys for this purpose, named F1 to F10 for example, so any program could use them for their specific functions...
Nahh gotta place them where they're obvious in your face and a constant reminder of CONSUME PRODUCT and be accidently pressed! Can guarantee you it'll take up part of the space of a key hotspot
At least on the PC, it's easier to remap the buttons. What enrages me more are the TV remote controls with buttons dedicated to specific streaming apps. I mean... none of these services will outlive the TV itself. I'll just have to look at buttons that do nothing for years.
I need that for my Roku. I may just write an automation in Home Assistant that will switch to whatever app I programmed if I press the Paramount+ button. Unfortunately that means I need to install that app on the Roku itself.
Maybe even F13 to F24 if more is needed?
Because they used to exist, and support for them still does. Really handy for macro keys.
I'd like them to leave F13 onwards alone, purely because it's nice that they'll only ever do what I want them to do
Here's an idea... what if we had every key do all kinds of weird shit?
I remember those keyboard layout cutouts (were they called keyboard templates?) you got which you put on the keyboard with extra explanations of what each function key did in WordPerfect or Lotus or whatever.
Microsoft learns nothing from their continued pattern of going all-in on a trendy and unproven concept. Windows 8 "live tiles" that were supposed to create one look and feel across devices, Cortana was supposed to be the digital assistant of the future, they even did their own poorly executed folding phone.
They never really go all in. They go full force at something but they never really fully commit
Like live tiles was fine except the large sections of the Windows still used the old system, so you'd click a button in settings and suddenly you'd be reverted back to the old window system. Because they never bothered to upgrade that part of the OS.
Microsoft's problem is that they can never be arsed to be consistent.
Honestly, Windows 11 is the closest they've come to going all in. There are very few parts of the old system left, although I have found a few.
I feel like it's more pandering to investors than having actual faith it it taking off.
Sure but do you think that works in the long run? Wouldn't it be better if they just made things right? I don't have the answer but I know it's what I prefer
What the user prefers doesnt matter. Its what the investors prefer.
For users, the important statistic is tolerance. Find the point on the graph where you have the highest shareholder preference that allows the lowest possible tolerance of users before they break from the product.
Gee, I imagine this will go the same way as Cortana, but now there will be a key forever visible to be it's gravestone.
Just don't replace your keyboard.
I got a fancy custom keyboard for my birthday which is properly repairable and will most likely never need to be replaced.
Laptops bud
You say don't replace your keyboard and then within 6 words mention the thing that doesn't ever have to have some key ms has decided to add to keyboards. Leave the windows key off, too.
I don't know how long you think you have left to live, but I wish you to change that keyboard someday
Have been using the same Kinesis Advantage daily for 23 years now.
Not a single part has been replaced or repaired, only taken apart to be cleaned.
And again, install Linux and get rid of this Microsoft bullshit
100%. When Windows drops support for Windows 10 I'm jumping ship to Linux Mint Cinnamon. I tried it out on my old laptop and liked it. I even liked that neat hot corners thing you could use.
Unfortunately, that won't change the rise in price in new keyboards because all the companies are compelled to accommodate this change on Microsoft's behalf.
We’re in the early hype phase of a new innovation fad. It’ll die down and then we’ll find out what it’s ACTUALLY useful for.
Ugh. Why do keyboards have to have Microsoft logos. I hate it. I want nothing to do with them.
Well, somehow keyboards are now a niche boutique industry where people spend hundreds of dollars putting together custom-made minimalist builds like they're honing a weapon in an action movie. I find that's probably dumber than a corporate logo becominmg a default key (which to be fair has been a thing since the 80s, the C64 had a Commodore key), but it does mean that if don't want it, you can get a keycap with anything you want on it instead.
There's nothing dumb about a keyboard personalized to your exact tastes and preferences that also makes your job easier and reduces RSI. But like, that's just my opinion, man.
Your user name is "dyikeyboards", I feel like we're gonna agree to disagree on this no matter what I say, and I'm fine with that.
You might be surprised. I'll be the first to tell you there's a ton of overpriced, silly hype in the keyboard space. Exotic materials, lubes, and switches that have no measurable impact on performance are common. So are extremely detailed and expensive artisan keycaps. It's a collector hobby for many. That's not my thing.
OTOH, there are also some serious gains to be had for professional computer jockeys.
My daily board is just 42 keys, and I absolutely love it. There's a learning curve for sure, but once mastered you're on a new level. For instance, I can access all my standard keys, num now, function keys, and arrows without having to move my hands off the home position. It's brilliant.
The difference is that the C64's keyboard was physically part of the C64...
I feel like that caveat holds up until you buy a laptop.
You can still buy a cheap basic keyboard, or a decent Logitech at a reasonable price. You can totally ignore the "niche custom keyboard" market. Most people don't even know it exists.
What's annoying is that laptop will now come with that stupid key.
You can totally ignore the "niche custom keyboard" market.
With a place like this on every street corner?!
(Just kidding, anyway this little place is an hour south of San Francisco in San Jose.)
The VIC-20 removed the numeric keypad that the PET keyboards had, combining the numeric and punctuation keys on the top row with the unshifted keystrokes giving numbers and the shifted keystrokes giving punctuation (!, ", etc.). They also added colour and assigned character codes to change the colour of the text. A good guess would be that this is the reason they added the "C=": it's a second kind of shift that now allows three PETSCII codes to be produced from each key rather than just two. This allows all the original graphics codes still to be produced and adds enough extra keystroke inputs to cover the new colours as well. The same keyboard and decoding was used on the C64, with a few extra color codes added.
Thus, while SHIFT L produced PETSCII code 204 on both the PET and the C64, SHIFT 6 produced code 182 on the PET but an ampersand & on the C64, and to get that code 182 on the C64 you'd instead use "C= L"."
You can get a quality mechanical keyboard in a layout of your choice and take your pick from hundreds of keycap sets in whatever color, profile, material etc. you can think of.
Keychron.com is a good starting point that won't break the bank (but order them from a reseller or Amazon if you can, Keychron themselves aren't great with returns and support).
You can get far better than keychron for a fraction of the price. Keychron is over hyped.
Where can I buy these not over hyped but far better keyboards? I'm being serious, I need a new keyboard. Two actually, but one is like DIRE
I would imagine this isn't going to go over very well with a lot of companies. I would bet many already ban employees using copilot or other AI assistants because they don't want their company's proprietary data being sent to Microsoft or Google or whoever. Stick a key on the keyboard that, if accidentally hit, brings up copilot (and maybe sends data to Microsoft), and those keyboards might be banned.
Some companies will probably just deal with it by setting up their PCs so that copilot is disabled and that key does something else. But, other companies will either not be technically savvy enough to do that, or will not want to take a risk of someone accidentally reverting to the default behaviour.
If you press the windows key I'm pretty sure it brings up search already. It definitely used to bring up Cortana on Windows 10.
I'm not sure why they would add a new key to the keyboard to achieve a function that already exists.
Cortana is not Copilot but you can disable Cortana
Just from a naming things point of view, that's sad. Much as I dislike Microsoft, and was never interested in Halo, it's fun that one of the voice-assistant things was a nod to a video game character. It's sad to have that replaced by something boring.
As an observation, companies are embracing AI to inflict things on their customers, but are avoiding it for their own purposes. Take note.
I can only speak for my own company, but you're absolutely right, there are severe limits on how we interact with AI and what data can be fed into it.
I also can't imagine any company with their own interest in AI, your Intels, Oracles, Nvidias, Googles, etc. allowing their employees a 1 click access to Microsofts version.
I was going to say, currently working in K12 & this key would be a nightmare for us. We definitely can't pay Microsoft's minimums - disabling/remapping the key wouldn't be hard, but it's obnoxious it becomes a priority.
AI is absolutely "a thing", not sure there's really a debate about that. The desperation here is they want to be the first company to completely immerse itself in Generative AI, but they're moving so fast they're just shoving every experiment they can come up with down their customers' throats.
AI is going to be a huge part of the future, but Microsoft might not be a part of that future if they fuck up with over implementation of nascent tech.
My bad, I should be more specific. They're so desperate for a fancy chatbot to be a part of everybody's workflow that they're going to add a special key that is not needed, or wanted by the vast majority.
I hope this can be remapped to something useful.
You mean the Bixby button? (/s, but I think you can see my comparison of uselessness there)
Yeah, I'm glad the Bixby button was dropped. What a joke. I don't need an assistant to use my phone, thanks.
I’m surprised people didn’t instantly remap the Bixby button to something else.
On my S10 I had it long press to activate flashlight, and double press to silence my phone. It was really handy.
Wasn’t that impossible for awhile?
Maybe, but I’m trying to remember which model. My S8 and onward I always remapped my Bixby button via 3rd party app (no root) so maybe it was the S7 that wasn’t remappable?
edit: The S8 was the first phone with the dedicated Bixby button, according to Google, so maybe it wasn’t remappable initially. I got it a year+ into it’s life cycle and I never activated Bixby
That article claims the option came out when the s10 was out. I seem to remember being able to mod it on my phone as well S9. Can't test it though because while I've had this phone for 5 years now I may have not babied it enough. The physical bixby button has fallen into the phone itself so I can hear ot rattle around. If I were speculating, I would assume it either A. became available to all 3 phones during that same software update, or we remember it sooner being part of something like putting the phone into developer mode so we could have further modifications
I agree with you, AI is a thing alright, an overhyped chatbot thing. LLM's are going to be neutered by pandering, and the true potential will be limited by investor fear and paranoia.
What makes you think they'll be neutered? You think China is going to stop what they're doing with them because the US might do something stupid? The genie is out of the bottle.
It’s a trend lately, that potentially sensitive things will be said or output from the models, so you can see an increasingly crazier set of guardrails getting put around the LLM’s so that they don’t offend someone by mistake. I’ve seen their usefulness decrease significantly, but their coding assistance is still somewhat good, but their capabilities otherwise decrease significantly.
I haven't had those problems with locally run models (stable diffusion, llamafile)
Agreed, but in the context of this post, that copilot key on the keyboard will take people to the most inoffensive and "walled garden" variety of generative AI that will be so one-size-fits-all to the point that its usefulness will pale in comparison to local run models or SaaS hosted style services that give you a hosted model to run off of.
I understand why it would seem unimpressive someone that doesn't do something like research or programming in their daily life but when you do those things it's very clear the difference they're already making.
The thing I'm coding at the moment for example I've been using it to tear ideas for image processing scripts, it'd have taken me a day to do one before maybe longer but even the free gpt can have an idea working after half an hour or fiddling. Being able to focus on coming up with ideas rather than the finer details of implementation.
We're going to see people get used to using them properly and their uses spread into many other areas of life - you will be customising games UI and making complex control input using natural language tools 'Linux, remove the clock and put a system resource thermometer there instead for whatever bits are most likely to overheat' ten years from now you'll look back and wonder how people did anything without ai just like people often wonder how we lived without internet and mobile phones
I use copilot on a daily basis for programming. It has made me much more productive and it's a real pleasure to use it. Nothing overhyped about it.
Curious to see what it will bring for other domains, e.g. for dealing with emails.
I do agree that there's a lot of filtering happening. Not a huge deal for more applications. Luckily you can run your own models that are not filtered. I can definitely see a future where you run your own models locally. Afaik Apple recently did some stuff around that.
"It looks like you're trying to make 3d SpongeBob bukkake porn. Can I help?"
They should just rename the Menu key to the “Flavor of the Week” key. Then they can just rotate which pie in the sky, fetch feature is mapped to it during its period of non-use.
im not going to lie this is one of the stupidest things ive ever seen a major tech company do
I used to think the Windows key was the stupidest. I mean I still do but I used to, too.
I do find the super key really useful actually, for binding hotkeys for my window manager. But a key for some voice assistant is really dumb.
This. I'm used to using extra keys (like the menu key or Capslock) for chording macros and personal shortcuts. In fact I get gaming keyboards with the customizeable keys (usually perma-bound — perma-binded? — to ctrl-, -2, -3, -4, -5 respectively) so they can be easily trapped and redirected to common macros.
I think the Super key was developed on the same principle.
It's somewhat useful for some keyboard shortcuts that literally could be replaced with a different key but yeah it's somewhat silly on its own. This will be downright stupid.
Some Microsoft exec: "Hey, remember when TV remotes started getting a dedicated Netflix button?"
I can't even begin to articulate my hatred for the current Microsoft business model. People used to joke how evil they were but it's only continued to get worse
Uhhh it wasnt a joke when i was a teen in the 90s. Bill Gates was absolutely hated, like worse than EA
Can you elaborate on that?
Yes, they were so much better during the IE 6.0 era /s
This is way more about advertising Copilot than actually needing a new key. M$ gonna $.
I really hope it's the "Any" key. I have upwards of 40 ys of modal forms from which there is no escape because they demand I press any key to continue...
Whenever something tells me to press any key to continue, I take it as a challenge. "Okay, Imma press Scroll Lock."
I forget what game it was, but one of them had a "press any key" and actually reacted to Scroll Lock. Something like "I bet you didn't expect that to work."
Subnautica starts with a "Press any key to continue." and they seem to be serious. It reacts to numlock and scroll lock.
I wonder if the Fn key would work.
It wouldn't on my keyboard, because I don't think that key sends any data to the PC; it's talking to the keyboard's microcontroller.
Probably not.... but it's possible... I wonder if my GameCube Sharkboard with Fn1 Fn2 and Fn3 (shutdown the computer) would work...
I gave my wife a keyboard with an any key on it (custom design I made from wasd) and it doesn’t work for anything that says “press any key”. Quite annoying honestly.
You thought Clippy was dead? Think again, that monster never dies. and is not back bigger than ever in its physical form.
That was Clippy the Gray. This is Clippy the White.
Another useless key? Use Scroll lock or SysRq for that. Or even better, reuse that stupid "menu" key. They'll cram one more key to the left of the spacebar and make ctrl, alt, and windows keys smaller. Or change their order.
Bruh how am I gonna lock my arrow keys for screen navigation in Excel then??
That one is actually useful and I use it every day.
Can we also talk about stupid keyboard manufacturers putting media functions and whatnot on the F keys, but then requiring me to hold Fn to use it as a regular F key? Nobody wants to go Fn+Alt+F4 to close a window. What the hell?
It's because executives don't even know what the regular function keys are for, since the only program they ever use is Outlook. The media controls are much more useful to them.
And as everyone knows, executives are the only people who buy laptops. So it makes sense to cater to them.
It is my understanding that, because of the keyboard on a system that hasn't been used in 50 years, Unix-like systems understand 6 modifier keys: Shift, Alt, Ctrl, Super, Hyper and Meta.
Linux binds the "Windows" key on a typical PC keyboard to either Super or Meta. Seems to depend on the distro. In either case, in practice it's used to bind shortcuts and macros similar to how the Windows key works in Windows, a single tap opens the app menu, holding it as a modifier key is usually bound to shortcuts that talk to the desktop environment rather than the active application.
It was linked a little up thread, but since you're (probably) referring to the "Space-cadet" keyboard, it was seven.
Technically, they drew a distinction between the "shift" keys (of which there were three), and the other modifiers (four).
In modern times (or for Linux at least), Meta has essentially coalesced with Alt, so the modifiers we've retained are Control, Alt, and Super (Windows), with only "Hyper" having been lost along the way.
The remaining two shifts (also lost to time) were "Top" (symbols) and "Front" (Greek), with the Greek supporting combining with shift (there's a table on that Wiki page).
Here's the summary for the wikipedia article you mentioned in your comment:
The space-cadet keyboard is a keyboard designed by John L. Kulp in 1978 and used on Lisp machines at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), which inspired several still-current jargon terms in the field of computer science and influenced the design of Emacs. It was inspired by the Knight keyboard, which was developed for the Knight TV system, used with MIT's Incompatible Timesharing System.
It's weirdly difficult to remap the "office" key so that pressing it won't open an ad for ms office 365 and pressing office+L won't open linkedin.com, and a few more equally valuable core OS features.
In the end I just had to grab a small bit of C code from GitHub, compile it, move the exe to the startup folder, have Windows Defender yell at me for having obviously installed a particularly nasty brand of trojan, and make Windows Defender put the executive I had just compiled back.
But really, I deserve this for using a Microsoft natural keyboard in the first place.
I don't want a key to automate my hallucinations, I can do that fine enough with enough helium
Maybe if the copilot also made my voice sound funny I'd be interested.
Yeah, give me an autotune button plz.
Of fucking course lol. The cortana key
Oh great, another key to accidentally press when I’m in a game.
"It sounds like you're frustrated. Is there something specific you need help with? I'm here to assist you in any way I can."
please don't. if you knew how many times the windows key is pressed by accident...
I have pressed it more than a few times lol, but I also use it alllllllllll the time. I just press it and type in whatever program i wanna open. Faster than clicking on an icon. A registry edit to disable bing search definitely made it way nicer too. Now no web results show up
Now I know what to use for my push to talk key at least.
In the meantime, scroll lock is a wonderful alternative
If they could just make it like the ⌘ command key on macOS it wouldn't be so bad, but of course, they're going to make it just like the goddamn Windows key, yet another key that if you press, it will screw up your workflow and have some dumb pop-up thing come up. Another modifier key wouldn't be so bad (or just turning the Windows key into a modifier key that doesn't automatically pull up a dumb menu if accidentally pressed by itself). They really like beating people over the head with their useless features.
You can "disable" keys using an app like AutoIt or AutoHotKey to capture the input and just do nothing with it. Takes a 3 line script.
I've done this for years with my left Windows key, for playing games. I also add the left Alt-Tab when playing certain games, so I don't accidentally tab out.
I just got done learning how to turn off Copilot in group security policy, yay! Get away from me, even if you worked according to the spec in the marketing hype. I am the admin. I drive you out! :::holds up holy water and a crucifix:::
THE POWER OF SHELL COMMANDS YOU! THE POWER OF SHELL COMMANDS YOU! THE POWER OF SHELL COMMANDS YOU!
Thou shalt not confuse my volunteers today! I cast thee out in the name of Bob Ross!
Tcsh. Tcsh.
I am the admin.
You're never really the admin when it's a Microsoft product
Wait, the keyboard layout standardization has been done by Microsoft?!
It was made by IBM. Microsoft just added one key...
And the Keyboard Layout is standardized by regulations in multiple parts of the world, I'm not sure if Microsift can actually influence the layout there...
They got the "Win" key into the ANSI 105 key layout and the ISO/IEC 9995 layout.
I actually hate it because I end up with a Microsoft logo on hardware that is supposed to be generic.
Standardization boards aren't magical cabals of fallen-from-the-sky sage wizards. They're made of tech people appointed by the contributing parties and mayor market players, and sometimes government and academia. Which means MS, Google, Apple, IBM, Meta, etc. All sit at most of the boards of standards from ISO consultation to the W3C. That's one of the ways mega corps define the world.
They can probably just make it a requirement for OEMs that want to license Windows for a pre-install.
Two keys, and they've actually been useful. This one, errrrrrrr, not so much. Copilot is barely baked, if you ask me,
Has power management for laptops gotten any better in the last couple of years on desktop Linux? I distro hopped for a year 3ish years ago but just didn’t like the fairly significant reduction in battery life.
On Arch I installed the "auto-cpufreq" package and my battery life is fine
Nice so I can remap it to something useful… unless they’re jerks and the keyboard isn’t sending a key but a combo like that useless “office” key that they tried and failed years ago
Well what else can we do when a corporation we have no affection with does weird shit we don't really care about?
Using the right WinKey+Arrows to rearrange windows with one hand was the one most important thing I liked Windows for more than my current DE. It felt so natural, just like middle-mouse navigation I'm still struggling not having on Linux. If they'd replace exactly that button, it'd be a big L in my eyes. Feels like Win10 would be my last Windows.
You should be able to set up shortcuts for rearranging windows like that (often referred to as "manual window tiling") in most DEs. What DE do you use?
I don't know what you refer to by "middle-mouse navigation". 🙃
Edit: seriously though, this whole AI super spyware baked into Windows is a privacy violation on a whole different level.
Too bad most ppl don't give a fuck.
I use a custom keyboard, they can add as many new keys as they want.
I swear if this becomes mainstream I'm going back to ancient keyboards again. That's rediculous lol I am already annoyed at the volume buttons they have on my keyboard and that is not in the way.
Ah, the new sole button to summon the AI assistant.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The exact positioning, and the key being replaced, may vary depending on the size and layout of the keyboard.
If nothing else, this new key is a sign of how much Microsoft wants people to use Copilot and its other generative AI products.
Plenty of past company initiatives—Bing, Edge, Cortana, and the Microsoft Store, to name a few—never managed to become baked into the hardware like this.
If Copilot fizzles or is deemphasized the way Cortana was, the Copilot key could become a way to quickly date a Windows PC from the mid-2020s, the way that changes to the Windows logo date keyboards from earlier eras.
Chipmakers like Intel, AMD, and Qualcomm are all building neural processing units (NPUs) into their latest silicon, and we'll likely see more updates for Windows apps and features that can take advantage of this new on-device processing capability.
Microsoft says the Copilot key will debut in some PCs that will be announced at the Consumer Electronics Show this month.
The original article contains 543 words, the summary contains 165 words. Saved 70%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
No.
If it's gonna be the windows key being replaced... Why not just use that (just wild assumptions based on the mock up).
Tho they can't stop me from sending that key back to it's original purpose with via.
The Windows key is usually on the left side of the space bar but the key in the mock-up here is on the right, so I don't think they're replacing the Windows key.
So now Windows bloat is extending to the physical keyboard itself.
Looking at the Microsoft blog post they haven't said exactly how they want keyboard layouts to change. So on a full size keyboard this could be either new key entirely, or replace an existing (and arguably more useful) key.
They should put it adjacent to the up arrow key so that when I hit it accidentally, copilot can ask "did you mean to press the up arrow key?", which will cause me to smash the keyboard with my fists and then I'll need to buy another one. Sales will skyrocket.
Not particularly relevant, but my friend randomly told me to press Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Windows key+L one day. I’m still horrified.
I just tried this. Why does this exist? Why does this need to be a shortcut? Who uses LinkedIn so much that they need to use a 5 key shortcut to get there faster?
For anybody who doesn't want to try it, this key combo opens LinkedIn in your default browser.
It's not a setting you can change, the only way to disable it is to edit the registry.
WTF.
Lol Windows is so bad these days. What were they thinking?!
So you are saying the setting can be changed. You can even do it over terminal if you like.
They have an "Office Key" on some official keyboards. Pressing Office+L opens LinkedIn. The Office key is actually mapped to that long modifier shortcut.
I mean, they did it before with the windows/super button. Before that you just had ctrl and alt there.
I use mainly keyboard-controlled WM configurations, so a Super key or a Meta key is useful for me, to separate it from Alt and Ctrl.
Which reminds us of the fact that PC keyboards didn't have those or a Windows key obviously, but Sun keyboards, from googling, did have a Super key.
So it's not them.
(And it's not bad in my opinion)
I don't remember the last time I pressed the "right click" contextual menu key, so honestly it's not like it'll be too annoying. Unless they do replace an actually useful key, at which point I guess the people making "make Windows actually work good" apps will get to live another year.
I pressed it like, 20 minutes ago? It's a pretty normal part of a lot of coding workflow, not to mention browsing, accessing context menu keyboard shortcuts without having to move your hand to the mouse for one buttonpress.
Fair enough. Alt used to be that before we decided to have a button to annoyingly pop up the menu strip. And there's still Alt Gr for that in full sized keyboards if we want to go back that way.
Alt Gr is something else. Non-english keyboards use it all day every day for typing their charactersets.
It could probably replace the right OS key, though.
That's the key I use as a compose key
I’ve never even heard of this key that you are talking about, yet it’s mentioned several times in this thread.
So long Caps Lock/Scroll Lock
I remap Caps Lock to Escape.
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.
How did you know I am a Vim user?
Then you had all those "for the web" Windows 95 PCs that had all the extra buttons like the Calculator and Web Browser and Sleep buttons scattered around above the keyboard that I don't think people tended to use because Windows wasn't built with them in mind. It seems they're in the keyboard standard now as if they were any other key.
Yeah there were some wacky keyboard shortcut buttons in the 90s, particularly during the dot com bubble. Perhaps we could bring back the pizza key!
Before I even read it I knew it was more ads or AI of some sort and yep it's both. Sure yeah we need more ads. Can I get a Microsoft store button on mouses now? Ohoh a dedicated 2nd screen for ads on every monitor. We must please the share holders and the rich!
I'm plenty fine with all ads consolidated to a dedicated monitor, that would certainly never face the wall on minimal brightness
Attention citizen, your Economic Consumer Activity Monitor has identified error with your system and/or the Citizen Observation Rate to the unit. Your worldwide credits have been locked pending resolution.
Drink a verification can
You're joking but that literally exists
I'm plenty fine with an OS that doesn't try to abuse me in the first place.
Do you remember a few years ago, it came out that some company was working on a new idea that, when you were given an advertisement on a TV, it could require you to say the product name aloud or it wouldn't continue?
I try not to concede anything related to advertising because everything they want seems so dystopian.
Please drink a verification can.
I remember another one proposing using eye tracking on a phone's selfie camera to make sure you were watching ads, with the ads pausing every time you looked away.
There was also another patent for a TV with an eye-tracker camera in it to make sure you were actually watching the ads, another one that would unmute itself if it was muted during ads, and one designed to count the number of people in a room to charge you for piracy if you didn't buy enough tickets for everybody for pay per view shows.
Please drink verification can to continue.
If only keyboards would have function keys for this purpose, named F1 to F10 for example, so any program could use them for their specific functions...
Nahh gotta place them where they're obvious in your face and a constant reminder of CONSUME PRODUCT and be accidently pressed! Can guarantee you it'll take up part of the space of a key hotspot
At least on the PC, it's easier to remap the buttons. What enrages me more are the TV remote controls with buttons dedicated to specific streaming apps. I mean... none of these services will outlive the TV itself. I'll just have to look at buttons that do nothing for years.
If you're using Android TV, you can use something like https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=flar2.homebutton to remap the button to another apps or any other functions
I need that for my Roku. I may just write an automation in Home Assistant that will switch to whatever app I programmed if I press the Paramount+ button. Unfortunately that means I need to install that app on the Roku itself.
I personally find those useful, but I can never find the combination of services that works with my needs.
There's always like Vudu or Sling that just becomes a wasted button.
Anybody down to 3D print us some? :)
Maybe even F13 to F24 if more is needed?
Because they used to exist, and support for them still does. Really handy for macro keys.
I'd like them to leave F13 onwards alone, purely because it's nice that they'll only ever do what I want them to do
Here's an idea... what if we had every key do all kinds of weird shit?
I remember those keyboard layout cutouts (were they called keyboard templates?) you got which you put on the keyboard with extra explanations of what each function key did in WordPerfect or Lotus or whatever.
I'm old.
I'm getting Bixby button flashbacks.
Ho well, my wallet's gonna cry but I'm sure the mechkeyboard community will welcome my ass
Remember when PC keyboards had two Windows logo keys? Pepperidge Farm remembers.
I remember when laptop keyboards had numpads and unabused F keys.
I remember when PC keyboards had zero Windows keys.
Mine currently does. Well they're actually Cooler Master logos, which I don't really mind. And both of them are bound to Super.
Open your wallet and prepare your credit cards it's gonna be a helluva ride!
And yet another feature no one ever requested or ever will
I requested it, but I was only kidding!
Fuck that, and fuck you, Microsoft
Microsoft learns nothing from their continued pattern of going all-in on a trendy and unproven concept. Windows 8 "live tiles" that were supposed to create one look and feel across devices, Cortana was supposed to be the digital assistant of the future, they even did their own poorly executed folding phone.
They never really go all in. They go full force at something but they never really fully commit
Like live tiles was fine except the large sections of the Windows still used the old system, so you'd click a button in settings and suddenly you'd be reverted back to the old window system. Because they never bothered to upgrade that part of the OS.
Microsoft's problem is that they can never be arsed to be consistent.
Honestly, Windows 11 is the closest they've come to going all in. There are very few parts of the old system left, although I have found a few.
I feel like it's more pandering to investors than having actual faith it it taking off.
Sure but do you think that works in the long run? Wouldn't it be better if they just made things right? I don't have the answer but I know it's what I prefer
What the user prefers doesnt matter. Its what the investors prefer.
For users, the important statistic is tolerance. Find the point on the graph where you have the highest shareholder preference that allows the lowest possible tolerance of users before they break from the product.
linux laptops ain't gonna add the key
Many Linux laptops are also sold with windows
OR, hear me out, we just have it mapped to alt+win(meta) key and this will be a nothing burger.
Stop being such a socialist. They need to sell more keyboards, and to make the keyboards you own unique to their brand.
Have you met keyboard people? You don’t need to do anything to sell them more keyboards.
This is me. Saw a cool keycap set the other day, and before I knew it BOOM! New keyboard.
I only have 4 (working ones) so far, but that's still probably one too many. xD
True but we’re not interested in adding a dedicated adware/spyware button
M$ can get absolutely fucked
Gee, I imagine this will go the same way as Cortana, but now there will be a key forever visible to be it's gravestone.
Just don't replace your keyboard.
I got a fancy custom keyboard for my birthday which is properly repairable and will most likely never need to be replaced.
Laptops bud
You say don't replace your keyboard and then within 6 words mention the thing that doesn't ever have to have some key ms has decided to add to keyboards. Leave the windows key off, too.
I don't know how long you think you have left to live, but I wish you to change that keyboard someday
Have been using the same Kinesis Advantage daily for 23 years now.
Not a single part has been replaced or repaired, only taken apart to be cleaned.
And again, install Linux and get rid of this Microsoft bullshit
100%. When Windows drops support for Windows 10 I'm jumping ship to Linux Mint Cinnamon. I tried it out on my old laptop and liked it. I even liked that neat hot corners thing you could use.
Unfortunately, that won't change the rise in price in new keyboards because all the companies are compelled to accommodate this change on Microsoft's behalf.
Yeah I’m definitely starting to lean that way with everything I’ve been hearing. Fuck windows.
Oh cool, another useless gimmick just like the 'Office Key'
What about the LinkedIn key.
That’s actually a shortcut for ctrl+alt+shift+L… that is an (unconfigurable?) hotkey for opening LinkedIn in edge.
I swear I blinked and suddenly AI was so ubiquitous that I feel like I'm living, studying and writing incorrectly...
Now I know how the boomers felt when the internet went from dialup to pocketable
Boomers?
I’m a millennial and I remember that, I’m sure many Zoomers would as well.
https://imgix.ranker.com/user_node_img/50106/1002113362/original/1002113362-photo-u1
We’re in the early hype phase of a new innovation fad. It’ll die down and then we’ll find out what it’s ACTUALLY useful for.
Ugh. Why do keyboards have to have Microsoft logos. I hate it. I want nothing to do with them.
Well, somehow keyboards are now a niche boutique industry where people spend hundreds of dollars putting together custom-made minimalist builds like they're honing a weapon in an action movie. I find that's probably dumber than a corporate logo becominmg a default key (which to be fair has been a thing since the 80s, the C64 had a Commodore key), but it does mean that if don't want it, you can get a keycap with anything you want on it instead.
There's nothing dumb about a keyboard personalized to your exact tastes and preferences that also makes your job easier and reduces RSI. But like, that's just my opinion, man.
Your user name is "dyikeyboards", I feel like we're gonna agree to disagree on this no matter what I say, and I'm fine with that.
You might be surprised. I'll be the first to tell you there's a ton of overpriced, silly hype in the keyboard space. Exotic materials, lubes, and switches that have no measurable impact on performance are common. So are extremely detailed and expensive artisan keycaps. It's a collector hobby for many. That's not my thing.
OTOH, there are also some serious gains to be had for professional computer jockeys.
My daily board is just 42 keys, and I absolutely love it. There's a learning curve for sure, but once mastered you're on a new level. For instance, I can access all my standard keys, num now, function keys, and arrows without having to move my hands off the home position. It's brilliant.
The difference is that the C64's keyboard was physically part of the C64...
I feel like that caveat holds up until you buy a laptop.
You can still buy a cheap basic keyboard, or a decent Logitech at a reasonable price. You can totally ignore the "niche custom keyboard" market. Most people don't even know it exists.
What's annoying is that laptop will now come with that stupid key.
With a place like this on every street corner?!
(Just kidding, anyway this little place is an hour south of San Francisco in San Jose.)
Found the membrane lover
What did the commodore key do?! Launch the evil cat typing tutor?
https://retrocomputing.stackexchange.com/questions/3045/what-was-the-purpose-and-history-of-the-c64s-special-keys
"The Commodore "C=" Key
The VIC-20 removed the numeric keypad that the PET keyboards had, combining the numeric and punctuation keys on the top row with the unshifted keystrokes giving numbers and the shifted keystrokes giving punctuation (!, ", etc.). They also added colour and assigned character codes to change the colour of the text. A good guess would be that this is the reason they added the "C=": it's a second kind of shift that now allows three PETSCII codes to be produced from each key rather than just two. This allows all the original graphics codes still to be produced and adds enough extra keystroke inputs to cover the new colours as well. The same keyboard and decoding was used on the C64, with a few extra color codes added.
Thus, while SHIFT L produced PETSCII code 204 on both the PET and the C64, SHIFT 6 produced code 182 on the PET but an ampersand & on the C64, and to get that code 182 on the C64 you'd instead use "C= L"."
Thank you. May copilot be with you.
You can get a quality mechanical keyboard in a layout of your choice and take your pick from hundreds of keycap sets in whatever color, profile, material etc. you can think of.
Keychron.com is a good starting point that won't break the bank (but order them from a reseller or Amazon if you can, Keychron themselves aren't great with returns and support).
You can get far better than keychron for a fraction of the price. Keychron is over hyped.
Where can I buy these not over hyped but far better keyboards? I'm being serious, I need a new keyboard. Two actually, but one is like DIRE
I would imagine this isn't going to go over very well with a lot of companies. I would bet many already ban employees using copilot or other AI assistants because they don't want their company's proprietary data being sent to Microsoft or Google or whoever. Stick a key on the keyboard that, if accidentally hit, brings up copilot (and maybe sends data to Microsoft), and those keyboards might be banned.
Some companies will probably just deal with it by setting up their PCs so that copilot is disabled and that key does something else. But, other companies will either not be technically savvy enough to do that, or will not want to take a risk of someone accidentally reverting to the default behaviour.
If you press the windows key I'm pretty sure it brings up search already. It definitely used to bring up Cortana on Windows 10.
I'm not sure why they would add a new key to the keyboard to achieve a function that already exists.
Cortana is not Copilot but you can disable Cortana
Cortana is dead, replaced by copilot
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/end-of-support-for-cortana-d025b39f-ee5b-4836-a954-0ab646ee1efa
Just from a naming things point of view, that's sad. Much as I dislike Microsoft, and was never interested in Halo, it's fun that one of the voice-assistant things was a nod to a video game character. It's sad to have that replaced by something boring.
As an observation, companies are embracing AI to inflict things on their customers, but are avoiding it for their own purposes. Take note.
I can only speak for my own company, but you're absolutely right, there are severe limits on how we interact with AI and what data can be fed into it.
I also can't imagine any company with their own interest in AI, your Intels, Oracles, Nvidias, Googles, etc. allowing their employees a 1 click access to Microsofts version.
I was going to say, currently working in K12 & this key would be a nightmare for us. We definitely can't pay Microsoft's minimums - disabling/remapping the key wouldn't be hard, but it's obnoxious it becomes a priority.
They're so desperate for AI to be a thing.
AI is absolutely "a thing", not sure there's really a debate about that. The desperation here is they want to be the first company to completely immerse itself in Generative AI, but they're moving so fast they're just shoving every experiment they can come up with down their customers' throats.
AI is going to be a huge part of the future, but Microsoft might not be a part of that future if they fuck up with over implementation of nascent tech.
My bad, I should be more specific. They're so desperate for a fancy chatbot to be a part of everybody's workflow that they're going to add a special key that is not needed, or wanted by the vast majority.
I hope this can be remapped to something useful.
You mean the Bixby button? (/s, but I think you can see my comparison of uselessness there)
Yeah, I'm glad the Bixby button was dropped. What a joke. I don't need an assistant to use my phone, thanks.
I’m surprised people didn’t instantly remap the Bixby button to something else.
On my S10 I had it long press to activate flashlight, and double press to silence my phone. It was really handy.
Wasn’t that impossible for awhile?
Maybe, but I’m trying to remember which model. My S8 and onward I always remapped my Bixby button via 3rd party app (no root) so maybe it was the S7 that wasn’t remappable?
edit: The S8 was the first phone with the dedicated Bixby button, according to Google, so maybe it wasn’t remappable initially. I got it a year+ into it’s life cycle and I never activated Bixby
Tried to look it up: https://mashable.com/article/samsung-will-let-you-customize-bixby-button
That article claims the option came out when the s10 was out. I seem to remember being able to mod it on my phone as well S9. Can't test it though because while I've had this phone for 5 years now I may have not babied it enough. The physical bixby button has fallen into the phone itself so I can hear ot rattle around. If I were speculating, I would assume it either A. became available to all 3 phones during that same software update, or we remember it sooner being part of something like putting the phone into developer mode so we could have further modifications
The button itself wasn't bad Have such an extra button on my Sony too and it's very nice (I have it set to take screenshots).
The problem is when they don't let you map it to whatever you want.
I agree with you, AI is a thing alright, an overhyped chatbot thing. LLM's are going to be neutered by pandering, and the true potential will be limited by investor fear and paranoia.
What makes you think they'll be neutered? You think China is going to stop what they're doing with them because the US might do something stupid? The genie is out of the bottle.
It’s a trend lately, that potentially sensitive things will be said or output from the models, so you can see an increasingly crazier set of guardrails getting put around the LLM’s so that they don’t offend someone by mistake. I’ve seen their usefulness decrease significantly, but their coding assistance is still somewhat good, but their capabilities otherwise decrease significantly.
I haven't had those problems with locally run models (stable diffusion, llamafile)
Agreed, but in the context of this post, that copilot key on the keyboard will take people to the most inoffensive and "walled garden" variety of generative AI that will be so one-size-fits-all to the point that its usefulness will pale in comparison to local run models or SaaS hosted style services that give you a hosted model to run off of.
I understand why it would seem unimpressive someone that doesn't do something like research or programming in their daily life but when you do those things it's very clear the difference they're already making.
The thing I'm coding at the moment for example I've been using it to tear ideas for image processing scripts, it'd have taken me a day to do one before maybe longer but even the free gpt can have an idea working after half an hour or fiddling. Being able to focus on coming up with ideas rather than the finer details of implementation.
We're going to see people get used to using them properly and their uses spread into many other areas of life - you will be customising games UI and making complex control input using natural language tools 'Linux, remove the clock and put a system resource thermometer there instead for whatever bits are most likely to overheat' ten years from now you'll look back and wonder how people did anything without ai just like people often wonder how we lived without internet and mobile phones
I use copilot on a daily basis for programming. It has made me much more productive and it's a real pleasure to use it. Nothing overhyped about it.
Curious to see what it will bring for other domains, e.g. for dealing with emails.
I do agree that there's a lot of filtering happening. Not a huge deal for more applications. Luckily you can run your own models that are not filtered. I can definitely see a future where you run your own models locally. Afaik Apple recently did some stuff around that.
The Clippy Key.
"It looks like you're trying to make 3d SpongeBob bukkake porn. Can I help?"
They should just rename the Menu key to the “Flavor of the Week” key. Then they can just rotate which pie in the sky, fetch feature is mapped to it during its period of non-use.
Quit trying to make "fetch" happen
It's streets ahead, though.
im not going to lie this is one of the stupidest things ive ever seen a major tech company do
I used to think the Windows key was the stupidest. I mean I still do but I used to, too.
I do find the super key really useful actually, for binding hotkeys for my window manager. But a key for some voice assistant is really dumb.
This. I'm used to using extra keys (like the menu key or Capslock) for chording macros and personal shortcuts. In fact I get gaming keyboards with the customizeable keys (usually perma-bound — perma-binded? — to ctrl-, -2, -3, -4, -5 respectively) so they can be easily trapped and redirected to common macros.
I think the Super key was developed on the same principle.
It's somewhat useful for some keyboard shortcuts that literally could be replaced with a different key but yeah it's somewhat silly on its own. This will be downright stupid.
Some Microsoft exec: "Hey, remember when TV remotes started getting a dedicated Netflix button?"
I can't even begin to articulate my hatred for the current Microsoft business model. People used to joke how evil they were but it's only continued to get worse
Uhhh it wasnt a joke when i was a teen in the 90s. Bill Gates was absolutely hated, like worse than EA
Can you elaborate on that?
Yes, they were so much better during the IE 6.0 era /s
This is way more about advertising Copilot than actually needing a new key. M$ gonna $.
I really hope it's the "Any" key. I have upwards of 40 ys of modal forms from which there is no escape because they demand I press any key to continue...
Whenever something tells me to press any key to continue, I take it as a challenge. "Okay, Imma press Scroll Lock."
I forget what game it was, but one of them had a "press any key" and actually reacted to Scroll Lock. Something like "I bet you didn't expect that to work."
Subnautica starts with a "Press any key to continue." and they seem to be serious. It reacts to numlock and scroll lock.
I wonder if the Fn key would work.
It wouldn't on my keyboard, because I don't think that key sends any data to the PC; it's talking to the keyboard's microcontroller.
Probably not.... but it's possible... I wonder if my GameCube Sharkboard with Fn1 Fn2 and Fn3 (shutdown the computer) would work...
I gave my wife a keyboard with an any key on it (custom design I made from wasd) and it doesn’t work for anything that says “press any key”. Quite annoying honestly.
You thought Clippy was dead? Think again, that monster never dies. and is not back bigger than ever in its physical form.
That was Clippy the Gray. This is Clippy the White.
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
RM
Another useless key? Use Scroll lock or SysRq for that. Or even better, reuse that stupid "menu" key. They'll cram one more key to the left of the spacebar and make ctrl, alt, and windows keys smaller. Or change their order.
Bruh how am I gonna lock my arrow keys for screen navigation in Excel then??
Oh nice so now we have a Super Key, a Hamburger Key, and now a Meta key.
This will be great for Emacs.
Finally I can have dedicated control, meta, super, and hyper buttons.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-cadet_keyboard
Just another key to make grandma ask "OK, what does this do?"
Or more likely she'll accidentally press it and call you in a panic thinking she's been hacked and wondering why her computer is talking to her.
It's the context menu key all over again
That one is actually useful and I use it every day.
Can we also talk about stupid keyboard manufacturers putting media functions and whatnot on the F keys, but then requiring me to hold Fn to use it as a regular F key? Nobody wants to go Fn+Alt+F4 to close a window. What the hell?
It's because executives don't even know what the regular function keys are for, since the only program they ever use is Outlook. The media controls are much more useful to them.
And as everyone knows, executives are the only people who buy laptops. So it makes sense to cater to them.
Context menu key is really useful. :D
I use Linux, and I actually like the idea. Not because of the Copilot bullshit, but because I've always wanted a real
hyperkey.Isn't that just
super/ win key ?Nope, there used to be a fuckton of modifiers on early keyboards. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/47/Space-cadet.jpg
Wow, it even has a Like button. And a button to rub one out!
"Greek". They knew how to party back then! ;)
It is my understanding that, because of the keyboard on a system that hasn't been used in 50 years, Unix-like systems understand 6 modifier keys: Shift, Alt, Ctrl, Super, Hyper and Meta.
Linux binds the "Windows" key on a typical PC keyboard to either Super or Meta. Seems to depend on the distro. In either case, in practice it's used to bind shortcuts and macros similar to how the Windows key works in Windows, a single tap opens the app menu, holding it as a modifier key is usually bound to shortcuts that talk to the desktop environment rather than the active application.
It was linked a little up thread, but since you're (probably) referring to the "Space-cadet" keyboard, it was seven.
Technically, they drew a distinction between the "shift" keys (of which there were three), and the other modifiers (four).
In modern times (or for Linux at least), Meta has essentially coalesced with Alt, so the modifiers we've retained are Control, Alt, and Super (Windows), with only "Hyper" having been lost along the way.
The remaining two shifts (also lost to time) were "Top" (symbols) and "Front" (Greek), with the Greek supporting combining with shift (there's a table on that Wiki page).
Here's the summary for the wikipedia article you mentioned in your comment:
The space-cadet keyboard is a keyboard designed by John L. Kulp in 1978 and used on Lisp machines at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), which inspired several still-current jargon terms in the field of computer science and influenced the design of Emacs. It was inspired by the Knight keyboard, which was developed for the Knight TV system, used with MIT's Incompatible Timesharing System.^article^ ^|^ ^about^
you could use the fn key on any QMK keyboard for that tho. or any F key. or build a keyboard with one extra key. anything else.
Welp, time to disable TWO keys on my keyboard.
Just rebind them?
It's weirdly difficult to remap the "office" key so that pressing it won't open an ad for ms office 365 and pressing office+L won't open linkedin.com, and a few more equally valuable core OS features.
In the end I just had to grab a small bit of C code from GitHub, compile it, move the exe to the startup folder, have Windows Defender yell at me for having obviously installed a particularly nasty brand of trojan, and make Windows Defender put the executive I had just compiled back.
But really, I deserve this for using a Microsoft natural keyboard in the first place.
I don't want a key to automate my hallucinations, I can do that fine enough with enough helium
Maybe if the copilot also made my voice sound funny I'd be interested.
Yeah, give me an autotune button plz.
Of fucking course lol. The cortana key
Oh great, another key to accidentally press when I’m in a game.
"It sounds like you're frustrated. Is there something specific you need help with? I'm here to assist you in any way I can."
>see headline
"Oh cool. What fun and inventive thing is Microsoft doing?"
>reads first line of article
"Oh it's for AI. Gross."
Okay, next plan is to start buying non-windows keyboards.
please don't. if you knew how many times the windows key is pressed by accident...
I have pressed it more than a few times lol, but I also use it alllllllllll the time. I just press it and type in whatever program i wanna open. Faster than clicking on an icon. A registry edit to disable bing search definitely made it way nicer too. Now no web results show up
Is it supposed to look like a curled up bandaid?
Eeew, now that's all I can see.
Gross
The fuck is a copilot key and why do I need it on my keyboard, hmm let's see....
I love having a keyboard where every key is programmable.
ooooh, a KRunner key!
Now I know what to use for my push to talk key at least.
In the meantime, scroll lock is a wonderful alternative
If they could just make it like the ⌘ command key on macOS it wouldn't be so bad, but of course, they're going to make it just like the goddamn Windows key, yet another key that if you press, it will screw up your workflow and have some dumb pop-up thing come up. Another modifier key wouldn't be so bad (or just turning the Windows key into a modifier key that doesn't automatically pull up a dumb menu if accidentally pressed by itself). They really like beating people over the head with their useless features.
You can "disable" keys using an app like AutoIt or AutoHotKey to capture the input and just do nothing with it. Takes a 3 line script.
I've done this for years with my left Windows key, for playing games. I also add the left Alt-Tab when playing certain games, so I don't accidentally tab out.
I just got done learning how to turn off Copilot in group security policy, yay! Get away from me, even if you worked according to the spec in the marketing hype. I am the admin. I drive you out! :::holds up holy water and a crucifix:::
THE POWER OF SHELL COMMANDS YOU! THE POWER OF SHELL COMMANDS YOU! THE POWER OF SHELL COMMANDS YOU!
Thou shalt not confuse my volunteers today! I cast thee out in the name of Bob Ross!
Tcsh. Tcsh.
You're never really the admin when it's a Microsoft product
Wait, the keyboard layout standardization has been done by Microsoft?!
It was made by IBM. Microsoft just added one key...
And the Keyboard Layout is standardized by regulations in multiple parts of the world, I'm not sure if Microsift can actually influence the layout there...
They got the "Win" key into the ANSI 105 key layout and the ISO/IEC 9995 layout.
I actually hate it because I end up with a Microsoft logo on hardware that is supposed to be generic.
Standardization boards aren't magical cabals of fallen-from-the-sky sage wizards. They're made of tech people appointed by the contributing parties and mayor market players, and sometimes government and academia. Which means MS, Google, Apple, IBM, Meta, etc. All sit at most of the boards of standards from ISO consultation to the W3C. That's one of the ways mega corps define the world.
They can probably just make it a requirement for OEMs that want to license Windows for a pre-install.
Two keys, and they've actually been useful. This one, errrrrrrr, not so much. Copilot is barely baked, if you ask me,
Has power management for laptops gotten any better in the last couple of years on desktop Linux? I distro hopped for a year 3ish years ago but just didn’t like the fairly significant reduction in battery life.
On Arch I installed the "auto-cpufreq" package and my battery life is fine
I want them to add raise and lower so you can use custom layers on your keyboard. Not that crap.
Nice so I can remap it to something useful… unless they’re jerks and the keyboard isn’t sending a key but a combo like that useless “office” key that they tried and failed years ago
Emacs users rejoicing!
@Unpigged @jordanlund Linux users chuckling!
Well what else can we do when a corporation we have no affection with does weird shit we don't really care about?
Using the right WinKey+Arrows to rearrange windows with one hand was the one most important thing I liked Windows for more than my current DE. It felt so natural, just like middle-mouse navigation I'm still struggling not having on Linux. If they'd replace exactly that button, it'd be a big L in my eyes. Feels like Win10 would be my last Windows.
KDE plasma has the same win+arrows keymap.
You should be able to set up shortcuts for rearranging windows like that (often referred to as "manual window tiling") in most DEs. What DE do you use?
I don't know what you refer to by "middle-mouse navigation". 🙃
Sadly Microsoft didn't specify where on the keyboard the key has to be.
In order to find out, hit the keyboard with your head; wherever your forehead touches the keyboard first is where the key is supposed to be.
Yeah, just put it where the caps-lock key is. It's the best position for "frequent" use.
/s obviously
That's where CTRL is.
Or Escape 😅
No
Remove caps lock first I think
WHO NEEDS CAPSLOCK WHEN YOU GOT THE SHIFT KEY
I will never use the shift key, caps lock toggling superior.
I'm guessing you're not a gamer.
Oh, for toggling running to always on?
Sick of my Corsair keyboard having a Windows keycap now.
You're all blaming Microsof, when it's obviously a devious plan from big keyboard!
Oh no! That will fuck up my muscle memory!
Oh wait!
I don't use Winblows! Ufa!
Edit: seriously though, this whole AI super spyware baked into Windows is a privacy violation on a whole different level.
Too bad most ppl don't give a fuck.
I use a custom keyboard, they can add as many new keys as they want.
I swear if this becomes mainstream I'm going back to ancient keyboards again. That's rediculous lol I am already annoyed at the volume buttons they have on my keyboard and that is not in the way.
Dedicated volume wheel is god tier change my mind
Ha! No.
Ah, the new sole button to summon the AI assistant.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The exact positioning, and the key being replaced, may vary depending on the size and layout of the keyboard.
If nothing else, this new key is a sign of how much Microsoft wants people to use Copilot and its other generative AI products.
Plenty of past company initiatives—Bing, Edge, Cortana, and the Microsoft Store, to name a few—never managed to become baked into the hardware like this.
If Copilot fizzles or is deemphasized the way Cortana was, the Copilot key could become a way to quickly date a Windows PC from the mid-2020s, the way that changes to the Windows logo date keyboards from earlier eras.
Chipmakers like Intel, AMD, and Qualcomm are all building neural processing units (NPUs) into their latest silicon, and we'll likely see more updates for Windows apps and features that can take advantage of this new on-device processing capability.
Microsoft says the Copilot key will debut in some PCs that will be announced at the Consumer Electronics Show this month.
The original article contains 543 words, the summary contains 165 words. Saved 70%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
No.
If it's gonna be the windows key being replaced... Why not just use that (just wild assumptions based on the mock up). Tho they can't stop me from sending that key back to it's original purpose with via.
The Windows key is usually on the left side of the space bar but the key in the mock-up here is on the right, so I don't think they're replacing the Windows key.
Thanks, I definitely hate it?
At that point ill just buy a PC2 adapter and go back to the kids faithfull