Microsoft to advance Windows Phone 8 with Cortana

A recent software development kit leak has reportedly revealed a lot of feature changes that is said to put Windows Phone more on par with iOS and Android. One of the main highlights is addition of Cortana, a personal digital assistant named after Microsoft 's Halo game series.

According to the Verge, Cortana will replace the built-in Bing search feature, which is currently launched through a dedicated hardware key, and acts as a digital assistant with a mix of Siri and Google Now functionality. Cortana will be backed by data from services like Bing, Foursquare, and others in order to lend it some of the contextual power of Google Now.