this post was submitted on 04 Aug 2023
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Microsoft shuts down Cortana, Apple should do the same with Siri::Cortana is Microsoft’s virtual assistant, which was introduced in 2014 back when Windows Phone was still a thing. Similar to...

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[–] ren@lemmy.world 209 points 1 year ago (5 children)

nah

Siri, while not great, handles timers, reminders, and dumbshit like that just fine without typing. I have yet to find another good use for these assistants.

[–] Gowens@lemmy.world 56 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yep. I’ve used my Google assistant for timers, alarms, weather, and music. Anything more complex is a headache. Even music is half the time.

[–] SlopppyEngineer@lemmy.world 18 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Asking the thing to handle music in another language was terrible. Asking it to play a French song to an assistent set in English gives stupid results for example. "Que sera, sera" becomes "Oh Sarah".

[–] Psyduck_world@lemmy.world 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This! I live in Taiwan, but 99% of my entertainment is from the US. I can’t use Any of these assistants in English otherwise street names or other Mandarin stuff won’t work, but if I use Mandarin assistants none of my music or shows works.

[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Can you use two? I use both Siri with push to talk from my Watch and Alexa through Echo dot, whichever is convenient. Either one will do times, music, lights, etc

If you took a similar approach, you might use one with each language

[–] Psyduck_world@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago

This is actually a great idea!

[–] jtk@lemmy.sdf.org 41 points 1 year ago (3 children)

"Hey siri, set a timer for 50 minutes" (time my dryer takes). "Timer set for 15 minutes". Every god damn time. I say 49 minutes now.

[–] ren@lemmy.world 14 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I turned off "hey siri", just hold down the power button now, but absolutely, you. GOT. To. Uh-Nunce-Ee-Ate. Ev-Ver-Ree-Thing. Vare-LEE. Clear-LEE.

[–] spongebue@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] RivenRise@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

Just out of curiosity, does siri not have a setting where you can have it get used to your voice? I remember cortana had a whole set up process that had you say a bunch of things. I don't enunciate well but it was able to always pick up my regular voice for stuff.

[–] dontpanic@lemmy.blahaj.zone 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

You can just say ‘five zero’ and it’ll be interpreted as 50, I just tried it.

[–] noodle@feddit.uk 4 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Meanwhile, Google Assistant has no issues with anything like this. You can even set multiple timers. Which, for some inexplicable reason, is not possible in iOS.

[–] CmdrShepard@lemmy.one 2 points 1 year ago

It's not a big deal if you setup a spreadsheet showing when you need each timer to go off and then simply tell Siri to set a timer for the interval between each as they complete one by one. Easy peasy.

[–] echodot@feddit.uk 2 points 1 year ago

But stupidly time is a not synced between your various devices.

[–] Misconduct@startrek.website -1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah but it suuucks for some other things. On iOS I can say cancel my alarm and it does it. Android says something and then opens the clock app to make me do it manually. Also things like saying nevermind change that timer to xx minutes works considerably better on siri imo. They both have their strengths and weaknesses but I personally think Siri is much more optimized with iOS than any assistants ever manage to be on Android.

[–] PancakeLegend@mander.xyz 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

My android phone doesn't do that at all. The nest devices definitely don't either.

[–] Misconduct@startrek.website 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I mean... Yes it does? What device do you have because I'm using stock? Actually nevermind. This is some highschool android vs iOS stuff and I just realized I don't actually care if you agree with things I know to be true anyway so I'm out.

[–] lorax@lemmy.ca 19 points 1 year ago

Agreed. I find myself using Siri on walks via AirPods quite a bit. Siri what’s the weather going to be like tonight . Siri what’s in my calendar tomorrow. Siri what’s the latest news. (That opens up podcast app and plays local news I love it. ). Siri let me know when it’s 12:30. I just wish it got better at answering simple questions. A few articles mentioned Apple started looking at incorporating a GPT style AI with Siri.

[–] supercheesecake@aussie.zone 4 points 1 year ago

Shit. I use it to tell me how to spell words.

“Hey Siri, sophistication”

[–] notthebees@reddthat.com 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I can never get Siri to set a timer. Idk why.

[–] spacedancer@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I just say "Hey sir, start timer 15 (or whatever) minutes". Works every time. I sometimes even ask how many minutes left.

[–] dad@feddit.uk 1 points 1 year ago

You can say "Hey Siri, 15 minutes please"

[–] notthebees@reddthat.com 1 points 1 year ago

I just trigger Siri manually but that's what I ask every time. It fucks it up all the time. I even did the voice training thing.