Artificial Intelligence in Office 365 – Part 3: Microsoft Word
Artificial intelligence AI is no longer just a dream of the future. AI is being used in more and more everyday areas, including the Office 365 Suite. The office apps we are familiar with suddenly contain completely new functions that were previously unthinkable. O365 is at home in Microsoft's Azure cloud and uses AI services such as Azure Machine Learning or capabilities from the Cognitive Toolkit. In a multi-part series, we show how artificial intelligence in Office 365 supports people and companies in their work. Part 3 deals with the word processing software Microsoft Word.
When it comes to Microsoft Word, we should probably speak less of an app and more of an international institution. The roots go back to 1989, when winword, the first Windows version of Word, was launched. A lot has happened since then. One of the best decisions in the history of Word was made by Microsoft in 2007 when they finally retired the talking paper clip. There is hardly anything in today's high-performance Word that reminds us of the previous editor, which came with the best Minecraft block layout.
The AI functions in the word processing app Word are of course based on machine recognition and understanding of language.
Dictate texts and let Microsoft Word do the typing
With the dictation function in Office 365 Word eliminates typing (almost) completely. The function can be found under Start in the menu ribbon. Simply select the dictation language, speak with clear and precise pronunciation and Word will write as if by magic. It is important that the text language displayed in the footer is congruent with the selected dictation language.
The dictation function still needs to be supported when setting punctuation marks. It will probably only be a matter of time before the language AI is sufficiently trained to be able to handle punctuation itself based on intonation and its experience. In the meantime, it is not necessary to set the characters manually using the keyboard. The following voice commands can be used to instruct the digital secretary to place punctuation marks:
- Comma = ,
- point = .
- Exclamation point = !
- Question mark = ?
- Parenthesis = (
- Parenthesis to = )
- New paragraph
- New line
- colon = :
- Semicolon = ;
The speech-to-text function is one of various cognitive achievements that Azure AI can achieve in the area of speech. Under the name of Speech Services various functionalities are summarized. This also includes speech synthesis (text-to-speech function), thanks to which applications can speak at once. Or the translation of spoken language, which enables real-time translations in apps and services.
Improve spelling, grammar and style in Microsoft Word
The language AI from the Microsoft Cloud supports writers in adhering to spelling and grammar and can provide valuable tips for wording. If errors or problems are detected, Microsoft Word underlines the corresponding place in the text with an individual color. Red stands for spelling problems, blue for grammatical inconsistencies and gold for stylistic issues. By clicking on the context menu, the details of the individual text passage are displayed. In the expanded editor, all the linguistic improvement potential of the entire document can be seen at a glance.
Overcoming language barriers and translating texts by machine
We have already gotten used to machine translation thanks to the numerous online services. Even in Microsoft Word, language barriers can be overcome within seconds. Simply mark the desired section of text, select Translate using the context menu and insert the text in the desired target language.
In order for the cognitive performance of a language translation to be completed in just a few seconds, several cutting-edge technologies are needed that work together in the background. These include deep learning, big data, linguistics, cloud computing and web APIs. There are two main methods used in the discipline of machine translation: statistical translation and neural translation. In statistical machine translation, the translation engine looks at as large a pool of existing, bilingual texts as possible and analyzes them. It derives rules based on the frequency of expressions and word combinations and applies these rules to new translation jobs. With neural machine translation, the engine - just like with the statistical variant - takes as large a corpus of bilingual texts as possible and uses machine learning to derive the connections between the two languages.
The Translation service from Microsoft In addition to Word, it also appears in many other products such as Bing, Teams or Microsoft Edge.
Structuring, enriching and shaping information: Microsoft Word Ideas
Exclusively available online in Microsoft Word “Word Ideas” function available. Ideas goes far beyond the capabilities of the spelling and grammar editor. Ideas shows that the language algorithms from the Azure Cloud can understand the meaning of entire sections of text. Even as you write, Word Ideas suggests how simpler structures can be used or gender-neutral wording can be implemented. A help function in Word Ideas explains acronyms or “translates” obscure jargon. If there is a company knowledge database with Microsoft Graph, company acronyms can also be included. The program is also able to recognize the key arguments contained in a text, which it then automatically assembles into short paragraphs that are perfect for speed reading.
Conclusion
The Office 365 Suite is created thanks to artificial intelligence Microsoft Cloud increasingly more powerful. Just like in Power point or Excel Word has also received various functions that impressively demonstrate the capabilities of the AI algorithms and make it easier to create correct, stylistically appealing and understandable texts. The fact that artificial intelligence (AI) is a key topic for Microsoft was demonstrated, among other things, at the Ignite 2019 in Las Vegas again clear (particularly in the Cortex project). One can expect that the AI functions in Microsoft 365 and thus also in the Office Suite will continue to improve in performance.
Find out more about artificial intelligence in part 1 and discover Microsoft PowerPoint. The third part deals with the same style Microsoft Excel.