Microsoft is adding predictive text to the Edge browser for desktop users to make their daily life typing much easier and smoother, as spotted by Leopeva64-2 and shared on Reddit.
Edge is only the most recent of the company’s products to receive the predictive text treatment. Users are probably familiar with predictive text as it is found on a mobile phone (and are often very quick to turn the feature off as well), but the technology works differently on a desktop because, well, tapping with one’s fingers isn’t really all too available an option for the most part. At any rate, users will probably have encountered a variant of predictive text on desktops through Google products such as Docs or Gmail. Essentially, a user starts typing in a word, the predictive algorithm attempts to guess what the word is and offers it up, and all a user has to do is press Tab and voila! The word is there without you having to type it at all, how fun.
Then again, as an individual who earns their living by writing on a daily basis, I’ve personally never found predictive text on desktops to be particularly useful. For starters, suggestions only pop up when half of the word has been typed out, and unlike smartphones, there’s typically only one suggestion being offered up. At the pace with which I typically type, it’d honestly just be easier if I continued to type instead of pressing Tab and then hoping that the predicted word is exactly the one that I needed. Then again, predictive text on mobile gets a pretty bad rap as well, mostly because of how it literally forces options onto users. Trying to type out a new word, or one native to your language? Sucks for you, you were definitely looking to type an English word, and I will keep on editing that word until you patiently wait for an ignore option to pop up.
As of yet, the new predictive text feature isn’t really available on the Edge browser proper. Instead, it’s being shown off on the Dev and Canary channels, which are typically testing sites for all such browser features. The feature being on Canary could also mean that maybe Google might consider incorporating predictive text into the Chrome browser, but honestly I’d rather they pass.
Read next: Microsoft says its latest Windows version needs around 8 hours to update properly
Edge is only the most recent of the company’s products to receive the predictive text treatment. Users are probably familiar with predictive text as it is found on a mobile phone (and are often very quick to turn the feature off as well), but the technology works differently on a desktop because, well, tapping with one’s fingers isn’t really all too available an option for the most part. At any rate, users will probably have encountered a variant of predictive text on desktops through Google products such as Docs or Gmail. Essentially, a user starts typing in a word, the predictive algorithm attempts to guess what the word is and offers it up, and all a user has to do is press Tab and voila! The word is there without you having to type it at all, how fun.
Then again, as an individual who earns their living by writing on a daily basis, I’ve personally never found predictive text on desktops to be particularly useful. For starters, suggestions only pop up when half of the word has been typed out, and unlike smartphones, there’s typically only one suggestion being offered up. At the pace with which I typically type, it’d honestly just be easier if I continued to type instead of pressing Tab and then hoping that the predicted word is exactly the one that I needed. Then again, predictive text on mobile gets a pretty bad rap as well, mostly because of how it literally forces options onto users. Trying to type out a new word, or one native to your language? Sucks for you, you were definitely looking to type an English word, and I will keep on editing that word until you patiently wait for an ignore option to pop up.
As of yet, the new predictive text feature isn’t really available on the Edge browser proper. Instead, it’s being shown off on the Dev and Canary channels, which are typically testing sites for all such browser features. The feature being on Canary could also mean that maybe Google might consider incorporating predictive text into the Chrome browser, but honestly I’d rather they pass.
Read next: Microsoft says its latest Windows version needs around 8 hours to update properly