Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Siri Support for Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, and Russian Languages Coming Next Month?

MacRumors

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
63,509
30,784



siri_icon.jpg


Tech in Asia reports on an article [Google translation] from Chinese information technology website DoNews claiming that Apple is preparing to bring support for the Chinese language to Siri on the iPhone 4S next month. According to the report, Apple is also preparing to launch support for Japanese and Russian, but the initial Chinese support will only include Mandarin, with Cantonese and other dialects being left out for the time being.
The Chinese tech site DoNews claims to have heard from an Apple engineer who's working on the Chinese-language version of Siri, the clever voice assistant on the iPhone 4S. From this source it claims that Siri will launch in Chinese next month, and is already undergoing internal testing this month. [...]

The rumor also contends that the Chinese version will only support the standard Mandarin (aka: putonghua) Chinese, which would leave out Cantonese-speaking people, as well as some Taiwan folk who effectively speak in a different dialect. Plus, it alleges that Japanese and Russian will arrive next month as well.
Click to expand...
Siri currently supports only English (United States, United Kingdom and Australia), French, and German but in Apple's Siri FAQ the company promise support for additional languages, including Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Italian, and Spanish, this year.

Chinese support for Siri is likely a high priority for Apple, given the strong growth the company is experiencing in the country. The iPhone 4S launched on partner carrier China Unicom last month and rumors are swirling that it may debut on China Telecom in the very near future.

Japan is another key market for Apple, with the company having enjoyed long-standing popularity with users and where the iPhone 4S debuted as part of the first round of launches in mid-October. Apple has placed less emphasis on Russia, but along with Brazil, India, and China the country is considered to have one of the world's up-and-coming economies where Apple would certainly like gain momentum. The iPhone 4S launched there in mid-December.

Article Link: Siri Support for Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, and Russian Languages Coming Next Month?
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2012/02/08/siri-support-for-mandarin-chinese-japanese-and-russian-languages-coming-next-month/
Nunyabinez

Nunyabinez

macrumors 68000
Apr 27, 2010
1,758
2,230
Provo, UT
When they do this it will impress the crap out of me. I have been learning Mandarin for a long time and am still far from fluent. The complexity of the tones makes this no small feat. And being able to combine the various syllables in the correct way has got to be really hard. I would love to have it on my phone just to see if I could speak Mandarin clearly enough for Siri to understand me. I hope I won't be the equivalent of the poor Japanese guy who kept asking "Wha wedder lie" trying to get a forecast and Siri had no idea what he was saying.
 
Apple Key

Apple Key

macrumors 6502a
Jan 4, 2012
561
0
Siri is so young... less than a year old and already she is learning 3 more languages. She will only get better with time.
 
N

Nielsenius

macrumors 6502a
Apr 16, 2011
565
1
Virginia
It's nice to hear that Apple is continuing to work on and expand Siri. Otherwise, I'm sure that the jailbreak community will expand upon it on their own.
 
T

Themaeds

macrumors regular
Feb 4, 2011
174
0
Nunyabinez said:
When they do this it will impress the crap out of me. I have been learning Mandarin for a long time and am still far from fluent. The complexity of the tones makes this no small feat. And being able to combine the various syllables in the correct way has got to be really hard. I would love to have it on my phone just to see if I could speak Mandarin clearly enough for Siri to understand me. I hope I won't be the equivalent of the poor Japanese guy who kept asking "Wha wedder lie" trying to get a forecast and Siri had no idea what he was saying.
Click to expand...


I picked up a little Mandarin while I was in the Orient. You know, you sound a lot like you're from Kowloon Bay as opposed to Hong Kong.
 
Nunyabinez

Nunyabinez

macrumors 68000
Apr 27, 2010
1,758
2,230
Provo, UT
It will also be interesting to see if Siri and related apps force a convergence in spoken language. As the folks in Scotland have seen, people have a better ability to make sense out of your accent than do electronic assistants, though I have to admit I even have trouble with a strong brogue.

I could see regional dialects dying out faster if voice recognition really takes off. This happened to some extent in the US with Television. Many people in the South heard TV english and worked to lose their drawls since there is still some prejudice in the US towards southern accents.

When my wife was a child she visited her cousins in Minnesota (she was living in Oklahoma). When she met her cousins they laughed at her and said "you sound like the shake-and-bake girl" (it's shake-and-bake, and I helped). My wife then decided to speak standard "TV english" and today you would have no idea she grew up in the south.

I could see Siri having a similar influence. Certainly companies will try to accommodate the major variations (British English, Australian English, etc.), but I don't see Bostonian, or Jersey as a Siri language. And which dialects of other languages will end up excluded? Cantonese is spoken very differently than Mandarin although they are written the same. It will be interesting to watch no doubt.
 
bushido

bushido

Suspended
Mar 26, 2008
8,070
2,755
Germany
add more features too cant believe the jailbreak community came up with "turn off wifi" etc commands within a day while we are still waiting for offiial support on that part
 
Yvan256

Yvan256

macrumors 603
Jul 5, 2004
5,081
998
Canada
gotluck said:
Lol why is this getting down rated? Its not like the jailbreak community hasn't already expanded siri's capabilities.
Click to expand...

How can the jailbreak community be expanding something that is done server-side? Care to link to an example?

Edit: adding a new command is not the same as adding new capabilities to Siri itself.
 
WeegieMac

WeegieMac

Guest
Jan 29, 2008
3,274
1
Glasgow, UK
Yvan256 said:
How can the jailbreak community be expanding something that is done server-side? Care to link to an example?
Click to expand...

Siri Toggles for one. You can tell Siri to turn WiFi on or off, reduce or increase your backlight brightness to a certain percentage, or to launch a specific app.
 
spazzcat

spazzcat

macrumors 68040
Jun 29, 2007
3,673
4,771
WeegieMac said:
Siri Toggles for one. You can tell Siri to turn WiFi on or off, reduce or increase your backlight brightness to a certain percentage, or to launch a specific app.
Click to expand...

You can also make siri voice acitvied and make her say "Yes" when you activate her. All of which I used, until she started thinking she heard "Siri" and would say "YES" in the middile of meetings at work. I would get looks like why are your pants talking....
 
H

heyyoudvd

macrumors regular
May 13, 2011
218
74
Now when are Siri's location features going to finally come to Canada?

It was stated that we'd finally get them in 2012 but we're 1.5 months in and there's still no word. I'm tired of only having access to half of what Siri can do.
 
4

480951

Cancelled
Aug 14, 2010
639
914
I wonder if it's possible to have Siri on Macs. For those who don't own an iPhone, speaking into the mic on the computer to bring up Siri would be pretty cool.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom