Amazon and Microsoft unveil ‘Gluon’ neural network technology, teaming up on machine learning

@Microsoft and @Amazon, which surprised the tech world with a partnership between their #Cortana and #Alexa virtual assistants, are back at it again. @AmazonWebServices and Microsoft’s #AI and Research Group this morning announced a new #opensource deep learning interface called Gluon, jointly developed by the companies to let developers “prototype, build, train and deploy sophisticated machine learning models for the cloud, devices at the edge and mobile apps,” according to an announcement just released by the companies. Deep learning involves training a computer to recognize patterns or unlock insights based on a set of rules for parsing a massive pool of data. As you might expect, this is an extremely complicated and time-consuming process that requires a fair amount of skill. Cloud companies offer ways to speed up the process, but a fair amount of skill is required to get meaningful results. And most software developers interested in incorporating deep learning technology into their applications don’t have nearly the amount of expertise on hand at either AWS or Microsoft; let alone their combined expertise. Gluon will give those developers a way to tap into that expertise without having to invest nearly as much time and effort in understanding how to use machine learning techniques. Gluon allows developers to write deep-learning systems in the popular Python language and take advantage of deep learning templates developed by Microsoft and AWS. This makes it much easier to get up and running and much easier to tweak those templates for an application’s specific needs. Developers interested in learning more about the technology can check out Gluon here. @Microsoft CEO @SatyaNadella and @Amazon CEO @JeffBezos talked about collaborating at Microsoft’s CEO Summit last year, and executives acknowledged after the #Alexa -#Cortana announcement that it might not be the last partnership between them. Microsoft #Azure and @AWS compete aggressively in the cloud, but under Nadella, Microsoft has made a point of partnering strategically with its rivals. “Amazon is a very impressive company,” said Nadella at the GeekWire Summit this week. “What Jeff and his team have done is something that I’ve long admired, and I think there’s a lot that we can learn. In fact, the good news is that between Microsoft and Amazon, we have a lot of cross-pollination of talent, and I think it’s helpful for this region, by the way, which is something that Silicon Valley always had.”

https://www.geekwire.com/2017/amazon-microsoft-announce-gluon-neural-network-technology-teaming-machine-learning/

VMware Fusion Professional for Mac 8.5.4

#VMwareFusion 8 and Fusion 8 Pro–the latest versions of its virtualization software for running Windows on a #Mac without rebooting–include full support for #Windows10, OS X El Capitan, and the latest Retina Macs, in addition to always-on access to #MicrosoftCortana. They support DirectX 10 and OpenGL 3.3 for up to 65% faster graphics, alongside compatibility with USB 3.0 and #multiplemonitors with different DPIs. The virtual machine platform also delivers full 64-bit support with up to 16 vCPUs, 64GB RAM, and an 8TB hard drive for a single virtual machine. Fusion 8 and Fusion 8 Pro are optimized for the latest Macs, including the iMac with Retina 5K Display and 12-inch MacBook. DirectX 10 support enables Mac users to run Windows virtual machines with native resolution on a 5K display, with USB-C support and Force Touch pass-through also in tow for the latest MacBooks. Fusion 8 Pro has additional advanced features and improvements, including the ability to connect to VMware #vCloudAir, IPv6 support for both bridged networks and IPv6-to-IPv4 Network Address Translation (NAT), improved integration with VMware #vSphere and support for several new #Linux distributions and other operating systems.

https://cmacapps.com/vmware-fusion-professional-mac-8-5-4/

Microsoft Plans to Back More AI Startups Through Venture Funding

That's according to information #Microsoft officials provided to the company's OEM partners at #WinHEC2016 in Shenzhen last week, in a session titled " #Cortana and the #SpeechPlatform," Microsoft Principal Program Manager May Ji outlined the ways that Microsoft wants its PC and device partners to make use of new "Wake on Voice from Modern Standby" and "Far-field Voice" support that's being added to #Windows10 with the Creators Update that's due out in the Spring of 2017. Wake on Voice from Modern Standby is a feature that allows Cortana to turn on PCs from off to a full-powered state on devices with Windows 10 "Modern Standby" power-management support. Far-field voice is what will allow Cortana to work in rooms with ambient noise at a distance of up to 13 feet/4 meters away. The Cortana on Windows 10 IoT Core rollout, which could lag by a few months the rollout of Windows 10 Creators Update for PCs and phones (if history is any indication) will begin with Cortana in English for the US and UK markets, she said, with additional language support coming over time. With the Windows 10 Anniversary Update, which Microsoft released in early August 2016, Microsoft provided a first step toward making Cortana work better with PCs from afar. The "immersive Cortana experience" in Windows 10 Anniversary allowed Cortana to work above the lockscreen. With the Creators Update, Microsoft plans to make these kinds of capabilities more robust, as Windows Insiders running test build 14986 on PCs began seeing last week. While some company watchers are expecting the addition of Far-field Voice to enable OEMs to build Windows-based devices similar to #Amazon 's #Echo and #Google 's #Home, Ji made it clear during her session that Microsoft's focus -- even with devices running the Internet of Things ( #IoT ) Core version of Windows 10 -- will be to have Cortana work on devices with screens, not those without screens.
http://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-to-bring-cortana-to-iot-devices-with-screens-in-2017/

Microsoft taps the brainpower of its legendary research unit in an artificial intelligence push

#Microsoft has decided it needs more real brains working on #artificialintelligence. The company said Thursday it is combining the team working on bots like #Cortana with its longstanding #MicrosoftResearchlab into a single 5,000-person unit. Research head Harry Shum will lead the effort. “Microsoft has been working in artificial intelligence since the beginning of Microsoft Research, and yet we’ve only begun to scratch the surface of what’s possible,” Shum said in a statement. The move comes amid the departure of Qi Lu for health reasons, as first reported by Recode. Shum will take over the search efforts that Lu had been responsible for, while Rajesh Jha will take over responsibility for all of Office and get a promotion to executive vice president. It also continues an effort under CEO Satya Nadella to get more product results out of the research team, which for years focused primarily on academic pursuits. An early example of this is #MicrosoftPix, an #iPhone camera app that uses artificial intelligence as a way to try to take better pictures. Pix is based on the idea that by the time a human takes a picture, the moment has likely passed, so it is recording pictures constantly and chooses the best photo from among those taken just before and after a person pushes the shutter button. Microsoft says that in particular, it is looking to infuse artificial intelligence into a range of products from smart agents like the Cortana assistant to apps like Skype and Office as well as into the infrastructure and services it makes available to others.

http://www.recode.net/2016/9/29/13107740/microsoft-combines-research-artificial-intelligence?mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiTVRFNE0ySmhNR0ZtT1RObCIsInQiOiJ4dDNDMk9ncmcrV0R4RjEzWTBDRUhoNjBSeFNIYU9sN0NwbFVtNXBQQ25JN3pxUkhRaEIrZ0FmaFdhZmhWU3g1QXZ6YlBzWXF0WnVodTFYWk1tZmJZK2RSUmEzaTJlQ3h0U2lIWmFcLzJNVWs9In0%3D

Cortana Taps Power BI, Wikipedia Leans On AI: Big Data Roundup

This week we have updates on some very cool use cases of machine learning, how Wikipedia is leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to improve its anti-vandalism efforts, #Microsoft 's #Cortana getting integration with Power BI, and more.

Plus we ask the question, is it #Pokemon or #BigData.

But let's start off with different question. What do competing in the Tour de France, prevention of white collar crime, and understanding legal documents have in common? They are all challenges that are being tackled using machine learning. We've got information on those use cases and more for a total of 11 that employ machine learning to work on a host of problems. Let us know in the comments if you've seen other interesting use cases.

http://www.informationweek.com/big-data/big-data-analytics/cortana-taps-power-bi-wikipedia-leans-on-ai-big-data-roundup/a/d-id/1323432