Will Apple Let Siri and Apps Connect? 185
holy_calamity writes "Developers want to know when their apps will be able to connect to Siri, the virtual assistant built into the new iPhone 4S. Technology Review reports that providing APIs for Siri would not only make it possible to control apps with casual voice commands, but could also make Siri smarter if it is connected with other AI services able to do things like make very specific restaurant recommendations based on a person's past actions."
Word of warning (Score:4, Funny)
If Siri gets connected to your gps navigation app... well, just don't do anything to piss Siri off.
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If Siri gets connected to your gps navigation app... well, just don't do anything to piss Siri off.
"Second star to the right and straight on 'til morning."
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Isn't that true for everything else too? :P
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Siri has to digitally mate with Bob first.
We are safe until someone builds a 98 emulator into an iphone and then runs an old version of office. How likely is that?
Re:Word of warning (Score:4, Funny)
It's not Bob I'm worried about, it's Clippy.
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A quick search for "Clippy Fanfic" proves that yes, the internet has already stooped that low.
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First off, is Siri is an actual AI? Does it learn or is it just a chatterbox?
If so, the fact that Siri will be installed on millions of phones incredible. One of the biggest limitations for any intelligence (artificial or not) is input. Even a mediocre AI becomes a lot more convincing on the Turing test with Google's help. Each Siri will have access to GPS data, user search patterns, their email, texts, and potentially even their pho
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First off, is Siri is an actual AI? Does it learn or is it just a chatterbox?
It's just a chatterbot. Well, it's not a terribly good chatterbot, but what did you really expect?
I'm not sure what you mean by "actual AI", so I can't offer much of an answer there.
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Too bad if it's just a chatterbox, a distributed AI with access to all that smart phone data would be pretty exciting (or terrifying, whichever).
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Siri is based on a DARPA project named CALO [wikipedia.org], which aimed at much more than just a chatterbot. In how far this is "real AI" (whatever this may be) is arguable, but it definitely learns and adapts.
In theory Siri could read your emails, everything you write on your phone, whom you call and text (and what you text), could read the websites you visit... This would help greatly with learning about the contexts in your life, but I have no idea in how far Apple could do this without running into very nasty privacy
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Except that Siri doesn't do any of that. From what we've seen so far, it can't as it has no facility for "learning".
It's still just a chatterbot.
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"From what we've seen so far, it can't as it has no facility for "learning"."
You mean, since last Friday?
Did you look up the reference to CALO?
"CALO was an Artificial Intelligence project funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)[1] under its Personalized Assistant that Learns (PAL) program. Its five-year contract brought together 300+ researchers from 25 of the top university and commercial research institutions, with the goal of building a new generation of cognitive assistants that
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I've got to believe you're now arguing just to be arguing. Did you not even READ the articles you posted?
To quote, "You tell Siri to remember that your Father is John Appleseed, she acknowledges your request. Siri remembers your relations by adding their name to your contact info in a section called relations. But the Exchange Sync protocol does not support these “custom” fields so when the phone tries to sync with the server this info gets lost."
I told Siri to text my mom. Siri asked who my mo
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No, it added that to a database -- which gets erased. (read the article) This is no more machine learning than an SQL query. Do you know anything at all about AI?
Siri isn't even good at that Siri won’t "learn" locations based on GPS information [blogbaladi.com]
Go and compare Siri to a chatterbot like Alice and see how it holds up (hint: it doesn't). Siri is no more AI than Eliza.
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"No, it added that to a database..."
Where the **** did you EXPECT it to add it? Stick in a quantum dot or spread it across holographic storage?
"... which gets erased."
You add information to bunch of neurons in your brain. If I zap those, I'd expect that information to be erased too. If I delete all or part of the data store for a neural net, I'd expect it to forget a few things too.
"Do you know anything at all about AI?"
Yes, as a matter of fact. Your contact list, your calendar, your location, your music, t
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I told Siri to text my mom. Siri asked who my mom was. I told her. Siri recorded that information and relationship in the contact database. Next time I said, "Send a text to my mom," Siri did.
Siri learned the relationship.
If Siri had done that without you telling her, it could tenuously be construed as "learning". But Siri recording that information after you told her is not much more advanced than my computer remembering a setting once I click a checkbox.
Siri has very good voice recognition and amazing natural language processing, and remembers the things you tell her. But she doesn't learn.
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"If Siri had done that without you telling her, it could tenuously be construed as "learning". "
Bending over backwards there, aren't we? And just, how, pray tell, would Siri "learn" who my mom is without any input whatsoever? Hell, without more information, YOU couldn't do it, and I bet you consider yourself to be "intelligent." (grin)
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"What does Siri do that a chatterbot can't? Nothing!"
I just told Siri to remind me next week to drain the sprinkler system. Find me a chatterbot that will do that. (grin)
(BTW, ALICE said, "Try putting that in a more specific context.")
"Neural net? Nope! (No ANN, no genetic algorithms, nothing.)"
You, sir, are an idiot. You use those things to help TRAIN AI-based systems. You can then have it continue to "learn", or you can freeze the net once you've determined it's behaving as expected or if it's reached its
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Whatever CALO was capable of, it's pretty obvious that Siri doesn't take advantage of most of what CALO was hoped to accomplish.
From what we've seen so far, it's just a chatterbot.
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Siri is networked, nothing actually happens on your phone other than processing the voice into data to send off to the cloud to do the actual bit of turning what you said into a useful command of some sort.
Siri does not work without access to Apple's network, Siri is not in your phone, Siri is in Apple's data centers.
Siri is just a combination of several bits of code that reduce natural language to something useful to the computer, which then searchs several different things or performs some task that it al
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You might look up the definitions and differences between "weak" AI and "strong" AI. Go ahead. I'll wait.
Siri uses weak AI to perform NLP and command recognition. It's true that Siri only knows how to do the things it's been told how to do, but it's still a version of AI.
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Your Siri will outlive you (Score:2)
Live fast
Die young
Leave a pretty Siri configuration
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When Siri integrates with Slashdot, that will be my first test phrase.
How about Apple's Apps? (Score:5, Interesting)
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I would pay the $200 early upgrade fee for the privilege of paying another $200 to get an iPhone 4S if it did this.
Re:How about Apple's Apps? (Score:4, Interesting)
While you're at it Apple, it would be awesome if Siri could talk to all of Apple's apps as well. "Siri turn off bluetooth." etc...
Better yet: "Siri, when I leave the house, turn off wifi and turn on Bluetooth" .
"When I get to Lowe's, remind me to get lightbulbs." (Without have to store the contact "Lowe's" address in my Address book - you can do this with your contacts that have addresses, but would need to do that first.)
That or Apple could include some better geo location controls for phone functions like some Androids can do.k
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"Can I borrow your phone?"
"Siri erase all contents and settings" "yes, I'm sure"
"Noooo!!!"
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"Siri, turn off microphone". "Siri. Siri? SIRI?!"
Okay, maybe put in a fail-safe.
"I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that."
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Amusingly, they did put in a nod to HAL:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mNcnj2l6RE#t=5m35s [youtube.com]
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Er, that's from Wolfram Alpha.
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Ah, I didn't realize that. Thanks.
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"Siri, turn off microphone". "Siri. Siri? SIRI?!"
Okay, maybe put in a fail-safe.
Ah, the fun the medi-uh could have with people careless enough to leave it on...
"And then I told him, the guy can _____ his own ____ and the ____ horse he rode in on!"
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You have to understand why things work on an iphone. Each iphone has its own combination code, to prevent what we are attempting...to use our iphone...to order Reliant... to lower their shields...
WHERE'S THE OVERRIDE! THE OVERRIDE!!
Will Apple let... (Score:2, Funny)
NO!
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They might, however, enforce it. There's just nothing in between for them.
Prediction: (Score:2, Insightful)
At first, Apple will refuse to do this. They may integrate it with their own apps, but no third-parties.
Later, either after enough developers wave enough money in their face or Android integrates a clone of Siri, they'll open it up and suddenly get massive amounts of credit and praise for "revolutionizing the computer interface" and all that crap, proving once again that nobody in the media has any memory for events more than a year old.
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Uhm... Google has had a Siri-like Voice Search feature (it does a lot more than just "search") for a long time. There have been apps around for ages that add to its functionality too. I realise the rest of your post was a joke, but too many people are ignorant of the facts and probably would assume Voice Search was added to copy Siri. Apple has also had voice features in its OSes since the 90s of course, and iOS already had voice features too. Now people are acting like it's a gift from the gods just becaus
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Uhm... Google has had a Siri-like Voice Search feature (it does a lot more than just "search") for a long time.
I've seen these and Vlingo, it's comparable but Siri is probably the best for the time being. The main difference is you don't have to use canned expressions to do certain things, it will infer rather well what you wanted to do, and it will generally do a good job of maintaining an interactive conversation with you when you want to edit or elaborate on an action.
There have been apps around for ages that add to its functionality too. I realise the rest of your post was a joke, but too many people are ignorant of the facts and probably would assume Voice Search was added to copy Siri.
Google's ineptness at positioning its services to impact a large audience is well known. The entire organization revels in invitation-only betas,
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The main difference is you don't have to use canned expressions to do certain things
Vlingo isn't limited to canned expressions either. Pressing my convenience key and saying "I'm hungry for Mexican food" brings up a list of Mexican restaurants in the area, each with an address, phone number, and a button to call the business.
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Not really. Siri is different from Google search because it combines natural language with speech recognition. Try asking a Google phone, "Do I need an umbrella today" or "wake me up at 7", "set timer for 30 minutes". If it works as well as it has demoed and as well as the reviewers say it does the it is a big step forward. Vlingo is kind of close but not it doesn't seem to be as flexible and powerful as Siri.
Oh and I am an EVO 4g user so I am not a member of the Apple faithful. Really if it works as adver
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"The genius of apple has always been knowing the minimum they need to provide for success."
And then actually providing it, which puts them ahead of about 95% of their competition.
Is Siri out to kill Google? (Score:3, Insightful)
If people really like using Siri, then what's to keep Apple from using it as the front end for their own (or another party's) search engine?
It's all about who's closest to the user. Just as Microsoft feared their OS dominance would mean nothing if everyone spent their time in browsers, if search engines are pushed "beneath" these attractive voice interfaces, Google could be made irrelevant (on Apple devices anyway, especially because Apple will never let another company release something like Siri on iOS or Mac OS X).
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I made an argument similar to this several years ago.
When google first hit the market, search was a BIG deal on the Internet. Whether hosted at random geocities, edu sites, random .coms, etc, information was very dispersed. Nowadays, things are so much more centralized. If I want to find something on the web, chances are it's at wikipedia, facebook, youtube, flickr, or amazon (or yelp, twitter, tumblr, livejournal, etc). Probably 90% of the time, I use google like a bookmarks bar--I know exactly where I wan
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Google's smartest move to stay relevant, despite what may or may not happen to search, was AdWords. By extending their advertising network beyond their own pages, they've ensured they'll always be relevant (at least as long as they continue providing accurate ads through their network, that is).
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"If I want to find something on the web, chances are it's at wikipedia, facebook, youtube, flickr, or amazon (or yelp, twitter, tumblr, livejournal, etc)"
And in a few years the something might also be at fribble, yumlicks, blinckey! and zunebar.
Wouldn't it be cool if there were a single way to find something at all those different sites?
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What's to stop them from doing that with the built in search box on iOS, even without their own voice-control system?
Google has known that for quite a long time and has been working to address it for years. That's why they developed their own desktop browser to prevent a monopoly browser vendor from being able to direct people aw
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What's to stop them from doing that with the built in search box on iOS, even without their own voice-control system?
The real threat to Google is when such systems (and Siri already does this for a few things) not bring up a page with search hits, but just answer your question or otherwise come up with their own kind of offering you a choice.
Today people use Google for everything, but you could probably cover 90% of what people do via a Google search with a selection of more specialized services sitting behind such a frontend. Then there's no room for ads anymore. You say something and get an answer or get something done.
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Not really. Its not like Google isn't one of the leading players in both the voice-interaction space and the present-direct-actions space, and hasn't overtly stated that part of their strategic orientation is moving away from traditional wide-open search as the primary UI to more spec
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And with Apple's policy of not allowing apps that replicate existing functionality, they can effectively prevent others from offering services that they provide
The only time Apple has enforced this restriction is when the App was a blatant pile of shit or was doing something 'evil' in the process. There has yet to be an instance where a legitimate product was never allowed in to the appstore, delayed, certainly. Every single app I've seen rejected was rejected for obvious reasons that I've agreed with from a business and professional perspective when taking Apples target audience into account. (Know-it-all geeks who think they should always get their way is not
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You're basing your argument on two pieces of information that are simply factually incorrect. Google already has a void recognition app on the App Store, and there are other music stores on there too.
I assume you got the capabilities of the iPhone and the types of apps available on the store from slashdot comments, right? Probably from that guy who claimed that the iPhone couldn't view youtube videos because it doesn't support flash.
Apple already allows similar apps (Score:2)
Apple will never let another company release something like Siri on iOS
Oh really? [vlingo.com]
But who gets to control what key words? (Score:3, Interesting)
"Shut up friends! My internet browser heard us saying the word Fry and it found a movie about Philip J. Fry for us. It also opened my calendar to Friday and ordered me some french fries."
There would need to be a way to strongly restrict the ways that apps could hook in or else things could turn into a disaster quickly. Not to mention the fact that the larger you make the domain of Siri, the more poorly it'll perform. That's just how AI works.
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Additionally, if you said something like "Order me a pizza" in which there are numerous ways to do, at the very least it should say, "Here are some options for ordering pizza, Launch the Papa Johns app, Launch the P
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Why does there need to be word control?
A hypothetical pizza joint named "911 Pizza"
What part of "after" do you not understand (Score:2)
You said: A hypothetical pizza joint named "911 Pizza"
The post you responded to said:
The issue you described above could be easily solved by analyzing the words before and after,
An intelligent system would see Pizza after and assume it should look first for a 911 pizza. Siri is especially good at context of statements so that should not be an issue.
Also, Siri verifies who it is about to call.
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There would need to be a way to strongly restrict the ways that apps could hook in or else things could turn into a disaster quickly.
And if anybody can strongly restrict applications, it's Apple. I wouldn't worry about that part of it.
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There would need to be a way to strongly restrict the ways that apps could hook in or else things could turn into a disaster quickly. Not to mention the fact that the larger you make the domain of Siri, the more poorly it'll perform. That's just how AI works.
I very much doubt that apps will be able to hook into Siri on the device itself at all. What will hook in are backend services that will support what Siri does on the servers. If you see Siri as a user interface it's very much like a webapp, with the user interface being presented on the client but all the code and all the data sitting out there in a data center. "Apps" for Siri will be things like Yelp or Wolfram Alpha with an intermediate layer parsing user input and correlating it with other data. This w
Re:But who gets to control what key words? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why is this marked as Interesting? If you'd have bothered to even watch the demo of Siri you'd already know the answers. Siri isn't ALWAYS listening, you have to request its attention.
If you talk to Siri in an incoherent manner, its not going to do anything other than say 'what?' which is exactly the kind of response your going to get if you say 'fri' and nothing else at Siri now.
If you walk up to me on the street and just say 'fri', I'm going to be just as confused as Siri.
You narrow Siris domain by helping it with context .... you know, like you do in language with people, this isn't hard.
'Create a new appointment on Friday' or 'How do I fry sqaush' or 'what am I doing on friday'. And all of those things have enough easy to spot context that Siri can limit its search to an individual app very quickly.
Basically, you got marked as interesting for asking retarded questions that anyone who watched 10 seconds of video about the product already knows the answer too. Jesus, have you not even seen the TV commercials?
Siri (Score:3)
Will Apple Let Siri and Apps Connect?
Did anybody stop to ask what Siri wants?
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Will Apple Let Siri and Apps Connect?
Did anybody stop to ask what Siri wants?
Pending outcome of lawsuits, Siri doesn't get what Siri wants.
Sorry.
RememberTheMilk connects with Siri now (Score:4, Informative)
RememberTheMilk already has connected Siri to their task management app by basically redirecting the connection to the iPhone's reminder app. They talk about it on their blog, here: http://blog.rememberthemilk.com/2011/10/we-taught-siri-to-add-tasks-to-remember-the-milk/.
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It's a hack. A hack that works, but still a hack.
You can also do the something similar to "text" tweets to Twitter.
So ... (Score:2)
If I swear at it then it can actually damn itself?
The possibilities...are imaginable.
Siri SDK? (Score:2)
Siri & Angry Birds (Score:3)
Then if it's tied with Angry Birds you can just tell it, "Siri, knock down those pigs" and it'll do it.
Not just an alternate interface (Score:3)
Presumably they are using something like the OS X Services framework to allow Siri to carry out actions in Apple iOS apps.
But remember that Siri's brains are server-side. So there is a lot of coordination that has to happen regarding a) knowing which apps provide which services, and b) knowing which provider(s) of a given service are installed on the user's phone. If there are two competing providers of the "reminder" service, which one does Siri use?
Apple are pretty damn clever when it comes to developers, but it seems to me that opening 3rd-party apps to Siri services is going to take a lot of engineering on both sides, and potentially complicate things for the end user.
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It's my understanding that the voice processing is already open - you can use it in your app already (and probably already do since it's built into text boxes). But as you point out, the natural language processing is something that really has to be done in the context of the app itself.
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They built voice input into the keyboard, so any app that's expecting text to be typed into a field can do voice. From what I've seen, there's no API access, however.
Anime Robot Girl (Score:2)
There was an article last week about some anime "love-girl" robot that was being created.
How long until Siri is implemented on that? Y'know, so you can give it commands... just like a real girl.
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Y'know, so you can give it commands... just like a real girl.
Haven't actually met any real girls then I see..
Of course it'll happen (Score:3)
Apple is pretty predictable -- once they've started showing their hand. They consistently take successful ideas used in one place and expand them as far as possible. Successful user interface paradigms developed for one application later appear in others. The iOS App Store begat the Mac App Store. So it seems pretty obvious that Apple, having introduced Siri, will expand it.
Except for major OS releases to paid developer program members, Apple almost never releases anything with a "beta" label. Siri is labeled a beta, which surely is meant to indicate that more functionality is planned.
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The only other non-developer "beta" that I can remember is OS X Public Beta. And that was just so everyone could play with it, almost as a novelty. OS X has become much better since then. This is probably very similar.
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Siri on the Apple TV is the obvious next place to go with it.
Eventually, sure (Score:2)
Right now Siri is 4S only, which means the majority of app users (ie, anyone on an iPod Touch, iPad, or pre-4S iPhone) are shut out. When 4S has some more saturation, and the 3G iPod Touch is released (Siri requires always-on connectivity, making it a poor fit for a non-3G Touch), Apple will open a Siri API for developers.
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Am I the only one? (Score:2)
If I use it at home people or my dogs will assume I'm speaking to them.
Or the wife will respond with "What?".
Why use it in a public space, so people can hear what you're doing?
I'm sure there are hands free advantages for people, and I think Apple is amazing at pushing the envelope with new ways of doing things, so i'm sure I'll come around at some point.
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Kind of missing the point. Siri is about convenience.
For example, I could swipe to unlock my phone, find the clock app, open it, switch to the Timer, change the hours and minutes to one hour, then click start. Or I could say, "Wake me in an hour."
Or I could unlock my phone, find the weather app and open it, switch to Denver, and scroll down to Sat and Sun... or I could say, "What's the weather this weekend in Denver?"
Or I could again unlock my phone, find the message app and open it, switch out of my work t
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That said, I can see it being useful in the privacy of your own car if they can get it to work in such a noisy environment.
For reference, it works great, even with the radio playing louder than most would probably prefer. Though I hold the phone up to my ear to activate and speak to Siri so the mic is close to my mouth. Works great, in fact, just to test it out, I composed an email entirely hands free by starting siri then laying the phone in my lap while I drove and just told it what to do. Did the same with a text message the other day. I hate text message conversations, but in this cause I wanted to leave a quick message
I'm sure they will. (Score:2)
Isn't it great your phone, that you never turn off, can be turned on remotely by your carrier... who has shown multiple times they're willing to hand over whatever info the government wants with or without legal cause, can now listen to and understand not only what you say but your intent, and send this information as pain text to whomever the phone, app, apple, or carrier cares to send it?
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Isn't it great your phone, that you never turn off
What? I'm not sure what shitty phone you have, but mine turns off.
Siri should also connect to BT-connected devices. (Score:2)
"Siri, set a course for the Walmart on 13th Ave."
*Course laid in and set.*
"Engage!"
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They are using the RTM calendar in iCal, so no, not an API access at all. Just a calendar.
speaktoit (Score:2)
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oh, the beauty of closed technology... decades of software development and we still have to beg permission for the big guys to let us use the toys...
Only in Apple's and Microsoft's worlds.
Nobody is forcing you to use their tools, are they?
Sent from my iBrain Implant
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A lot of the fancy Android APIs are Google proprietary too. And it's not like Nokia (formerly) or RIM share everything either.
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Or you could STFU and write it yourself.
Stop being such a lazy self entitled worthless fuck and stop expecting everyone else to just give you everything in life for free.
Of course, if you had half a fucking clue and any motovation at all, you'd already know that are in fact OSS packages that do pretty much what Siri does, but without all the manual tweaking that Apple paid people to do for it.
God I hate twits like you, you're not only so lazy and self entitled that you expect everyone to just hand you all t
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"... you'd already know that are in fact OSS packages that do pretty much what Siri does..."
Okay, I'll bite. Got links? Demos? Anything at all to backup your assertion?
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What lie? The phones *are* restricted. Whether you can found out their restrictions before buying is irrelevant.
And that bit about "entitlement" is just a petty insult.
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Siri would just send you to
http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/1998-08-14/ [dilbert.com]
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Siri, find me a bar with single straight women who like geeks who are 30-45 ...
There are other bars?
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Yes, because 4 million people waited an extra 3 months to buy the iPhone 4s so their projections where wrong. This is standard operating procedure in the stock market and was actually expected in advance by pretty much anyone who owned Apple stock and actually follows it.
This wasn't even a little unexpected to anyone with half a clue.