The Archive

We adapt Microsoft's QuantumKatas -- a well-established quantum computing curriculum -- from Q# to Qiskit, the most widely-adopted quantum computing framework, and package it with an evaluation framework for systematic LLM assessment. The resulting benchmark comprises 350 tasks across 26 categories, spanning fundamental gates through advanced algorithms (Grover's, Simon's, Deutsch-Jozsa), error correction, key distribution, and quantum games. Each task includes a natural language prompt, canonical solution, and deterministic test verification via classical circuit simulation. By building on t...

Microsoft Copilot Cowork Exfiltrates Files The biggest challenge in designing agentic systems continues to be preventing them from enabling attackers to exfiltrate data. In this case Microsoft Copilot Cowork (yes, that's a real product name ) was allowing agents to send emails to the user's own inbox without approval... but those messages were then displayed in a way that could leak data to an attacker via rendered images: Because these messages can contain external images that trigger network requests to external websites, data can be exfiltrated when a user opens a compromised message sent ...

Microsoft, has started canceling Claude Code licenses, per the Verge

The Information reported Anthropic is exploring use of Microsoft's second-generation Maia AI server chips as a way to expand compute capacity for Claude beyond its existing AWS and Google Cloud footprint. The talks are early and may not lead to a deal; Maia 200 was announced in January but has yet to ship on Azure. A deal would mark a notable diversification away from Nvidia in the AI infrastructure race.

Reddit discussion of Microsoft economist's commentary on AI policy; lacks substantive detail or novel claims.

I actually use the Gemini app quite a bit on my phone, but let’s not get carried away. Gemini has a creep problem. A few years ago, that little sparkle icon started showing up in all of our Google apps. Gemini in your inbox! Gemini in your Google Drive! It was slow at first, and easy enough to tune out, but something has changed in the past few months. Gemini is creeping. It's showing up in all kinds of places at a relentless pace, and personally, it's starting to really cheese me off. The AI-everywhere fatigue is familiar to anyone who has ever used Windows 11. Microsoft went absolutely bana...

User deployed MCP server bridging Claude to Microsoft 365 via Power Automate, enabling email, calendar, task, and document automation without tenant admin access.

Microsoft AI chief predicts white-collar job automation within 18 months, citing rapid AI capability scaling.

Microsoft first started opening up access to Claude Code in December, inviting thousands of its own developers to use Anthropic's AI coding tool daily. It was part of an effort to get project managers, designers, and other employees to experiment with coding for the first time, and sources tell me that Claude Code has proved very popular inside Microsoft over the past six months. Perhaps a little too popular, as Microsoft is now preparing to walk back its Claude Code push. I understand that Microsoft is planning to remove most of its Claude Code licenses and push many of its developers to use...

Microsoft Edge is adding a new feature that will allow its Copilot AI chatbot to gather information from all of your open tabs. When you start a conversation with Copilot, you can ask the chatbot questions about what's in your tabs, compare the products you're looking at, summarize your open articles, and more. In its announcement, Microsoft says you can "select which experiences you want or leave off the ones you don't." The company is retiring Copilot Mode as well, which could similarly draw information from your tabs but offered some agentic features, like the ability to book a reservation...

Maybe I'm just punch drunk in my third week attending Musk v. Altman, but I have become very, very fond of Microsoft during the course of this trial. They don't want to be here any more than I do. Their opening statement was honestly one of the most Microsoft things I've ever seen. More than anything else, it was an ad for Microsoft that listed their products in some detail. The general implication, from that statement, was that this trial was absurd, their involvement was absurd, but you, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, might still enjoy an Xbox game. There's been a great deal of high dram...

Anthropic releases Claude integration for Microsoft Office (Excel, PowerPoint, Word GA; Outlook beta) with cross-app context persistence.

Reddit post title mentions Claude and Microsoft partnership; insufficient detail to assess business/technical significance.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Microsoft CTO Kevin Scott. | Image: Getty Images When OpenAI was busy experimenting with AI-powered gaming bots, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman were in the early days of forming an AI partnership. Court documents from the ongoing Musk v. Altman trial have provided a rare look at the communications between Microsoft's top executives about investing in OpenAI and fears the AI startup could "storm off to Amazon" and "shit-talk" Microsoft. Just days after OpenAI showed a bot beating a Dota 2 professional in the summer of 2017, Altman responded to N...

Reddit user shares subjective experience of using Claude in Microsoft Office suite; anecdotal product feedback without technical depth or novel findings.

Deal follows others with Microsoft, Amazon, and more.

Microsoft's LinkedIn CEO, Ryan Roslansky, took on an expanded role at the company as head of Office last year, and he's now getting more responsibilities as part of the latest leadership reshuffle inside Microsoft. Sources tell me that the Microsoft Teams organization is moving to report to Roslansky, who will now lead a new Work Experiences Group at Microsoft. The changes are part of a broader reshuffle triggered by Rajesh Jha, executive vice president of Microsoft's experiences and devices group, retiring from Microsoft after more than 35 years. Jha was responsible for the teams behind Wind...

Microsoft announces agentic business model shift; Apple faces chip/memory constraints despite Mac AI gains.

Xbox is "winding down Copilot on mobile" and "will stop development of Copilot on console," new Xbox CEO Asha Sharma announced on Tuesday. The move follows Sharma's reorganization of the Xbox platform team earlier on Tuesday, which added executives from Microsoft's CoreAI team - where Sharma worked before taking over Xbox - to the Xbox side of the company. Sharma, on X: Xbox needs to move faster, deepen our connection with the community, and address friction for both players and developers. Today, we promoted leaders who helped build Xbox, while also bringing in new voices to help push us for...

Anthropic releases ten Cowork and Claude Code plugins plus Microsoft 365 integrations and MCP app for financial services.

Google DeepMind, Microsoft, and Elon Musk's xAI have agreed to allow the US government to review new AI models before they're released to the public. In an announcement on Tuesday, the Commerce Department's Center for AI Standards and Innovation (CAISI) says it will work with the AI companies to perform "pre-deployment evaluations and targeted research to better assess frontier AI capabilities." CAISI, which started evaluating models from OpenAI and Anthropic in 2024, says it has performed 40 reviews so far. Both companies "have renegotiated their existing partnerships with the center to bett...

vibevoice.cpp: C++ ggml port of Microsoft VibeVoice enables TTS and long-form ASR with diarization on CPU/CUDA/Metal/Vulkan without Python.

OpenAI removed AGI trigger clause from Microsoft deal, replacing it with 2032 date limit; enables multi-cloud licensing but signals shift away from founding governance principle.

The deals come as the DOD has doubled down on diversifying its exposure to AI vendors in the wake of its controversial dispute with Anthropic over usage terms of its AI models.

The Pentagon has struck deals with OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Nvidia, Elon Musk's xAI, and the startup Reflection, allowing the agency to use their AI tools in classified settings, according to an announcement on Friday. At the same time, the Defense Department has left out Anthropic - which it previously used for classified information - after declaring it a supply-chain risk. This builds upon deals with OpenAI and xAI, which have already reached agreements with the Pentagon for the "lawful" use of their AI systems. A report from The Information suggests Google has struck a similar a...

Microsoft is launching a new AI agent inside Word that's specifically designed for legal teams. Legal Agent handles document edits, negotiation history, and complex documents to help legal teams handle tasks like reviewing contracts. "Instead of relying on general AI models to interpret commands, the agent follows structured workflows shaped by real legal practice, managing clearly defined, repeatable tasks like reviewing contracts clause by clause against a playbook," explains Sumit Chauhan, corporate vice president of Microsoft's Office Product Group. The Legal Agent can work with existing ...

Microsoft's relationship with OpenAI has always been complicated, so I expected the close partnership-turned-situationship to end in tears. After all, executive disagreements, rearranged contracts, and frustrations over AI infrastructure have all regularly been part of the partnership, creating plenty of tension along the way. But against all odds, Microsoft and OpenAI divorced this week in a way that looks strangely amicable. Microsoft announced the updates to its long-standing OpenAI deal on Monday, with the most important change allowing OpenAI to make its products and services available a...

Microsoft gets to offer OpenAI's tech to its cloud customers and doesn't have to pay for it. "We fully plan to exploit it," Nadella said.

Despite the lingering perception that no one really uses Copilot, Microsoft said on Wednesday that the number of users and engagement is growing.

Canonical's plan to add AI features to Ubuntu has some users asking for "a version of Ubuntu that does not include these features," while others say they'll stick with older versions of the Linux distro or even switch to a different one. After Canonical's announcement earlier this week that it's bringing AI features to Ubuntu, replies included requests for an AI "kill switch" or a way to disable the upcoming features, and comparisons to Microsoft's addition of AI features into Windows 11. Canonical's VP of engineering, Jon Seager, responded on Tuesday, stating that Canonical isn't planning to...