Apple Says 'Hey Siri' Detection Briefly Becomes Extra Sensitive If Your First Try Doesn't Work

[lordofthereef]

Beyond simple tasks I don’t use it for anything. Even web searches are hit or miss. I don’t find myself even trying twice because I don’t often ever try at all lol.

On my watch I set reminders and timers just fine. Kind of amazing we are sitting on five years of Siri. Wish I could just use googles assistant instead.

 

[scaramoosh]

For you maybe so.
Siri plays my music, get me directions, reads my messages, allows me to respond to each message or create a message to someone else, and makes phone calls for me without hardly an effort.
That being said, conversation follow up type questions is where Siri is woefully inadequate.

It never gets anything right...

“Hey Siri set volume to 70 percent”

“Calling dean”

Oh **** off siri.


Sad thing is you cannot even turn it off or it gets replaced with voice control.

 

[Bswails]

I want another phrase that I can specify besides "Hey Siri". But I understand that Apple wants that branding on it.

I just want Apple to drop the “hey” and we can just say “Siri” like you can with Alexa..I’m on the fence about what assistant I want in my home because of this. It feels unnatural to always have to say “Hey Siri”

 

[Tiger8]

Hands down Siri understands me best (and so does speech to text, it's fantastic on Apple devices)

My problem with Siri is what happens after, she seems to be behind in terms of AI

 

[StandingGoose]

On many occasions over the past year, I've asked Siri to "flip a coin" - a simple command with a simple answer that helps me and the coworkers settle on a place for lunch (as an example). Well, April 1st rolls around and Siri couldn't give a real answer to that question all day long.

"Hey, Siri. Pick a random number between one and two."

random(1,2) equals 2

 

[kdarling]

I just want Apple to drop the “hey” and we can just say “Siri” like you can with Alexa..I’m on the fence about what assistant I want in my home because of this. It feels unnatural to always have to say “Hey Siri”

Same with having to say "Okay Google Now" on a phone, and waiting for the beep before asking a question.

Alexa at home has no mandatory prompt delay. You can either say "Alexa" and wait for the light to come on, or you can just do it all with one continuous sentence, as in "Alexa what's the weather?" because it listens immediately after hearing its name.

 

[dippnerd]

Apple would help Siri’s reputation a lot, by keeping an active Wiki going for the service, and what commands it will respond to. Because many people have tried to use Siri once for a specific task, found it didn’t work, and since given up. It is really hard for a general user to discover new tricks.

Like QuarterSwede said, just ask "what can you do?" This functionality has been around for a while but I feel like they must have updated it in iOS 11, I don't remember it being quite this comprehensive down to third party app support and everything. I actually discovered a few new things I hadn't realized were there, so that's handy

 

[840quadra]

Like QuarterSwede said, just ask "what can you do?" This functionality has been around for a while but I feel like they must have updated it in iOS 11, I don't remember it being quite this comprehensive down to third party app support and everything. I actually discovered a few new things I hadn't realized were there, so that's handy

Yeah I have been using that a little, but it is not quite the same thing as a wiki, and having it mapped out. Not asking for apple to produce a huge flowchart, but something that easily outlines the setup would be great.

 

[EdT]

"Hey, Siri. Pick a random number between one and two."

random(1,2) equals 2

Your way probably works reliably, but you shouldn’t have to awkwardly phrase a question to get a properly relevant answer.

 

[dippnerd]

Yeah I have been using that a little, but it is not quite the same thing as a wiki, and having it mapped out. Not asking for apple to produce a huge flowchart, but something that easily outlines the setup would be great.

Gotcha. I wonder if at this point there's just too many possibilities to properly define such a thing. A while back I found this PDF with a pretty comprehensive list of commands, but it's outdated so I'm sure the native one gives a better idea of commands these days.

 

[djlythium]

There's a lot going on behind the scenes with Siri. I don't think we give her enough credit.

Give it enough credit, not her.
[doublepost=1508423730][/doublepost]I like articles like these, which provide some insight into the processes behind seemingly simple actions like “Hey, Siri”.

 

[EdT]

Gotcha. I wonder if at this point there's just too many possibilities to properly define such a thing. A while back I found this PDF with a pretty comprehensive list of commands, but it's outdated so I'm sure the native one gives a better idea of commands these days.

Damn, so much for that being any smarter...

I don’t need her to understand sarcasm. I need her to understand phrases like “what time is ‘Restaurant X’ open?”

 

[dippnerd]

I don’t need her to understand sarcasm. I need her to understand phrases like “what time is ‘Restaurant X’ open?”

It understands that fine for me (assuming the restaurant has hours in Maps though, it offers to call if not), is it giving you some other result?

 

[Tinmania]

Is Siri a "participation trophy" kind of gal? Here inner working are interesting but ultimately her timely result is all that matters. If I as a consumer get frustrated with her it's a fail no matter how hard her coprocessor is churning.

94% of the time she works just fine. But those other 6% times I want to toss a brick at my iPad or smash my phone.

I have similar, if not higher, success rates with Siri, and Google Assistant. But, for me, it seems worse since the times they fail are usually when I need them to work the most (e.g., in a hurry).

Now that I have Echos around my home, I don't use the assistant on my phone much anymore. Alexa's accuracy is just so much more reliable. Google Home was just as good and it was nearly a toss-up over whether to go with Home or Echo. Oddly enough the key word Alexa Vs. Hey Google (or OK Google) was the decider. For me, and more so for my wife, it feels more natural to just say, for example, "Alexa, what is the weather like today?" then starting with OK/Hey Google or Hey Siri (though out the latter two, I'd choose Hey Siri).



Mike

 

[9081094]

There's a lot going on behind the scenes with Siri. I don't think we give her enough credit.

Credits needs to be earned... sofar it falls short. When it's on pair with Alexa, Google Now I'll definitely give my kudo's. I just want to be honest to myself.

 

[TurboPGT!]

There has to be something new going on with regards to it’s understanding. After initiating Hey Siri in the car, her comprehension through the Bluetooth system has been notably better for me during the past year. I was wondering if the 7 was doing some machine learning locally, or if the cloud was parsing my questions better with this device. My 5S still struggles with my voice, though it could also be the mics on that device too.



Apple would help Siri’s reputation a lot, by keeping an active Wiki going for the service, and what commands it will respond to. Because many people have tried to use Siri once for a specific task, found it didn’t work, and since given up. It is really hard for a general user to discover new tricks.

Places like iMore do a decent job of documenting, but, it would be AWESOME if the source had a good manual for it..

It wouldn't help the average user, it would help someone interested in looking up a wiki for Siri commands.

The core problem remains. Siri needs to be able to deliver some kind of response to virtually every request. That is the kind of Siri that I expect true AI and Machine Learning to deliver. Apple talks this up and rightfully so because that is its potential...but still we're stuck with a Siri with hardcoded commands that even slightly adjusted fail to work. I can pay my Discover bill $200, but I can't pause my Apple TV. I'm hoping the effects of ML and AI are a long term play.

 

[OPUSDigitalAudio]

Siri is completely useless and gets over 85% of everything wrong - and completely. Google Assistant is on my iPhone and that's what I use.

 

[Tech198]

I always thought that would be "Wait a minute,, You actually *need* me ?" as the reason to go into sensitive state

Almost like u wake people up, and it takes them 10 seconds to get out of their grumpy state.