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Siri for Mac

42streetsdown

42streetsdown

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Feb 12, 2011
655
3
Gallifrey, 5124
So the Siri Assistant thing on iPhone 4S (still hate the name) looks pretty awesome. So when can we get similar functionality on our Macs? I mean some of the mobile features aren't super useful, but the current voice control in OS X is ancient. They added new voices in Lion; does that mean new voice control isn't too far off?

Has there been any indication in the developer builds of future functionality? Full sized computers are obviously powerful enough to handle it.
 
I certainly hope so...

I feel like there hasn't been any indication of this though.
 
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Maybe Apple will release an App after awhile. Probably not before the holidays.
 
Siri

BornAgainMac said:
I bet it will be in 10.8.
Click to expand...

Tim Cook should get this out as a FREE Mac OS Lion add-on for the holidays, a gift to the world. Can't believe they aren't working on a Mac version--and if they can hook in some functionality with Pages a la Dragon (and make it really work) then that will be worth the price of admission (buying a Mac in the first place).
 
Siri for Os X

It's gotta happen. It would be like sitting on the bridge of the Enterprise.

Make it so.
 
Oh I see, thanks :)

Doesn't make much of a difference though, I believe. What would you do? Say "Open Firefox" instead of dragging your mouse and clicking? I don't really mind having to use my mouse (or touchpad in this case)..
And in a crowded office or in a school classroom with everyone saying commands, well you get what I mean...

If it can write down stuff in Word as you're saying it, that'd be pretty cool. But still not much useful in my opinion. Apple will probably end up adding it sooner or later anyways as a "novelty"
 
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPod; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

Considering that Aplle already has Speech Reconition built-into the Mac OS clear back in the System Software 7.5 days, this would be the next step: a step up. I just hope that they don't offload it to the cloud like they do with Siri.
 
ISJB said:
Oh I see, thanks :)

Doesn't make much of a difference though, I believe. What would you do? Say "Open Firefox" instead of dragging your mouse and clicking? I don't really mind having to use my mouse (or touchpad in this case)..
And in a crowded office or in a school classroom with everyone saying commands, well you get what I mean...

If it can write down stuff in Word as you're saying it, that'd be pretty cool. But still not much useful in my opinion. Apple will probably end up adding it sooner or later anyways as a "novelty"
Click to expand...

I see it more like streamlining navigation of the OS and apps with words instead of gestures.. "tab 2" "back" "forward" in Safari. "Desktop 3" "Open mail" "Email to Steve: where's my $10" "Send" in Lion and Mail. "Open "Hit Me with Your Rhythm Stick" in Garageband" "new track" "guitar" "Turn up one DB." "Pan right one".... etc... It would be a lot faster than pointing and clicking and/or swiping and pinching. It would be a lot faster than typing this post.

"submit reply"
 
Could you imagine what would happen if you left a tv on next to your mac with SIRI, leave the room for an hour, and see what the two produce?
 
I remember playing around with the speech recognition software built into MAC OS 8. I had so much fun saying "tell me a joke".
Just go to "Speech" in system preferences. It's still there.

HOWEVER, it kind of sucked. It was fun to play around with, but not good enough to really rely on for anything.


Siri seems just like that, but better. Though I'll have to see it to believe it. And then it doesn't seem too hard for them to move the full feature set over to Mac OS X.

My hypothesis: If Siri turns out to be as popular on the iPhone as Apple is hoping it will be, then it will be implemented in Mac OS 10.8
 
darster said:
Could you imagine what would happen if you left a tv on next to your mac with SIRI, leave the room for an hour, and see what the two produce?
Click to expand...
Apple's older speech recognition software required a customizable first word that served to mitigate this issue. If you wanted to open a file, then you had to say something like: "Computer, open MyResume." Your Mac would then open a file named MyResume in its default application. Without beginning the command with "Computer" or a name of your choice, no command was executed. The older software also needed to be trained to understand your voice. That said, a computer lab in school with a bunch of students or an open work area with everyone speaking to their computers could drive you to distraction.

Siri does not appear to use a preface word to begin commands. On a phone, this may work. On a Mac, I am not so sure. The other thing is that the old speech command software appeared to have a fairly rigid structure. Siri appears to be the most natural language system short of biological systems available to consumers. As science fiction, it is wonderful. I can only wonder about the possible ramifications of a system that understands plain language in a crowed room. There may even be unexpected results for users conducting telephone or personal conversations near their computers.
 
I wold really like to see this. Wold be nice working on a project and just ask Siri a question without interrupting your workflow and she would answer. The use for this is only going to advance to more devices from the iPhone. As they said its still in Beta right now.
 
If it does ever come for Lion, it won't be free. Accounting rules mean Apple would have to charge for it, a la FaceTime on Snow Leopard.
 
Aidoneus said:
If it does ever come for Lion, it won't be free. Accounting rules mean Apple would have to charge for it, a la FaceTime on Snow Leopard.
Click to expand...

I was just thinking the same thing. They could totally add this to a Mac no problem (and iPhone 4 for that matter), especially since it’s primarily a server based function.

But yes, they would definitely charge for it, just like Facetime thanks to Apples so called “Accounting Rules.” You know, the rule that says they should charge you for any feature they think is cool enough for you to pay for.

There is no “rule” that says they have to charge for a software update or program. Case in point: why is Safari a free download? Or Quicktime? Or iTunes? Every version offers significantly more functionality, and there is no rule that says that they have to charge for them.

Looks at Windows. Service Pack 1, 2, 3, all free, all adding significant new features.

Bottom line, yes, they could add this to OS X no problem, no it won’t be free, no there’s no reason why it can’t be free.
 
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