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slowtrain

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 9, 2011
20
9
New England
I would love to be able to program a word or phrase that i could say when my headphones are on that would activate Siri rather than holding down the play/pause button.

The other day i was carrying a guitar in one hand and an umbrella in the other when i got a text message. I love the fact that i didn't have to get my phone out of my pocket but i ended up hitting myself in the head with my umbrella while trying to activate Siri from the headphones.

anyone else have a similar story?
 

DaffyDuck

macrumors 6502
Jun 18, 2007
472
3
I would love to be able to program a word or phrase that i could say when my headphones are on that would activate Siri rather than holding down the play/pause button.

The other day i was carrying a guitar in one hand and an umbrella in the other when i got a text message. I love the fact that i didn't have to get my phone out of my pocket but i ended up hitting myself in the head with my umbrella while trying to activate Siri from the headphones.

anyone else have a similar story?

I am sure this is coming. This company makes hardware and software for hands free activation and the demo is quite cool.
http://sensoryinc.com/

We just need Apple to license it or buy the company.

PS, I think they have planned for this because the name Siri is both easy to say and original enough to not get triggered in normal speech.
 

wellok

macrumors 6502
Oct 12, 2011
331
0
I do. Bellowing "SIRI!!!!!!!" when I need help is appealing to me and would make it that much more entertaining to demonstrate to others.

For now, I'll push the button (or turn on the raise to speak). It's so hard to be me.
 

CondorXIII

macrumors newbie
Oct 28, 2011
7
0
Calgary, AB, Canada
I feel like something like that should be available at some point, the only problem is battery life. You'd have to have something activated and listening ALL the time. From an engineering standpoint it'd be difficult to make it feasible while remaining practical on battery. Either way, that'd be awesome. I'm more excited to think that in a few months I'm sure they're going to have a feature on the iTunes store where you can change the voice of Siri much like with Garmin you can change the voice telling you where to turn. I would pay HUNDREDS of $$$ to make Siri sound like C-3PO!
 

FSMBP

macrumors 68030
Jan 22, 2009
2,712
2,633
I would love to be able to program a word or phrase that i could say when my headphones are on that would activate Siri rather than holding down the play/pause button.

The other day i was carrying a guitar in one hand and an umbrella in the other when i got a text message. I love the fact that i didn't have to get my phone out of my pocket but i ended up hitting myself in the head with my umbrella while trying to activate Siri from the headphones.

anyone else have a similar story?

It would be nice but that means the phone is constantly monitoring what you're saying in case you want to activiate Siri. I feel like the iPhone 4S' battery would suffer more than normal.
 

benhollberg

macrumors 68020
Mar 8, 2010
2,170
7
It would be great and I have thought about this before. The problem is I see in this is battery life since it would always be listening for Siri. Since I have Siri enabled when my phone is unlocked that would make it better if it listened when the phone is unlocked.
 

M87

macrumors 65816
Jul 18, 2009
1,259
290
I think the only problem is having the phone constantly listening would kill the battery.
 

DaffyDuck

macrumors 6502
Jun 18, 2007
472
3
Guys, look at the link I posted above. Sensory makes a IC chip and software that does this. Since it is not using the main processor, it can be done using far less energy.
 

e-steve

macrumors newbie
Oct 20, 2011
22
0
Guys, look at the link I posted above. Sensory makes a IC chip and software that does this. Since it is not using the main processor, it can be done using far less energy.

Still, you'd possibly have to have a pretty unique activation phrase or everyone saying Hello Siri would be controlling each other's phones. I think it seems like a button press, whether on the handset or on headphones is going to be the most trouble free solution.

Alternatively, there could possibly be a "Siri listening mode" that you could enable if you were say working on your car and needed to be totally hands free to get specific information...
 

DaffyDuck

macrumors 6502
Jun 18, 2007
472
3
Lift the phone to your ear....its the closest thing we have.

How is,

1. Push home button
2. Slide to unlock
3. Hold phone to ear
4. Talk

Better than,

1. Hold home button
2. Talk

For most of the things I use Siri for, my phone is in the locked state to begin with. I want to lie down on the couch and yell, "Siri, wake me up in 15 minutes" and Siri does it, and if the volume is too low, I want Siri to turn it up.

----------

Still, you'd possibly have to have a pretty unique activation phrase or everyone saying Hello Siri would be controlling each other's phones. I think it seems like a button press, whether on the handset or on headphones is going to be the most trouble free solution.

That is a potential problem. Perhaps it would be possible for it to recognize it's owner's speech well enough to not answer to the wrong person.
 

nepalisherpa

macrumors 68020
Aug 15, 2011
2,258
1,330
USA
This is when jailbreak comes in handy until Apple implements something. While there is no jailbreak tweak yet to do voice activation, one can still use Activator to make activation easier than holding the home button. I cannot wait for jailbreak to be released! :D
 

jake921660

macrumors regular
Aug 2, 2008
104
0
Australia
the main problem would be the battery life. my galaxy s2 had an option for you to say a phrase to activate the voice control. i turned it on and 6 hours later had lost most of my battery when i can normally get at least 2 days. with that being said it could be a good option if the phone was charging in the car or something.
 

rayyu882

macrumors member
Jan 18, 2010
95
3
Another thing is everyone's assistant is Siri, how do your neighbor's Siri doesn't responds to you? Either way they will need to know somehow which Siri belongs to you.

Or we could rename Siri to anything we like! :D
 

rosemary1

macrumors regular
Aug 9, 2011
226
4
Siri should absolutely be voice activated. This would bring us one step closer to Star Trek. :D

But more seriously, I'm working with a client who is a quadriplegic and she is really excited about the possibilities of a voice activated phone/device, but Siri just isn't to the point of being practical for her (yet).
 

davelanger

macrumors 6502a
Mar 25, 2009
832
2
It cant be because people would mess with your phone.
You could have your phone next to you, and a friend or whom ever could be like SIRI and give it a command.

It would not work, plus what if you and a friend have an iphone and are close to each other, and your friend yells a command, your phone could also pick up the command.
 

austinguy23

macrumors 6502a
Oct 8, 2008
621
19
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A334 Safari/7534.48.3)

Not gonna happen...it would drain the battery in a heartbeat if the mic were on all the time.
 

foljs

macrumors newbie
Dec 23, 2011
6
1
It cant be because people would mess with your phone.
You could have your phone next to you, and a friend or whom ever could be like SIRI and give it a command.

It would not work, plus what if you and a friend have an iphone and are close to each other, and your friend yells a command, your phone could also pick up the command.

You took all your time to think this BS?

We have had voice-id technology for decades now...

Thats a non problem
 

Givmeabrek

macrumors 68040
Apr 20, 2009
3,464
1,161
NY
Ha, ha...

I love how some people are in such a time warp they are answering a year old or older thread.

It's even funnier when they claim that they have had a certain technology for a long time while they are replying to an ancient thread, sometimes written before that feature was available. :D
 
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