Dos_Box Posted June 7, 2016 Posted June 7, 2016 I noticed this last week at the EDIT conf when it finally dawned on me that... a. The speech recognition on Android had got really good and... b. It actually does what you want it to! Mainly I had been using it for short-hop navigation but after going to the Lunar Festival in Warwickshire decided to see what it was like on the long run back to Lancashire. Remarkably it not only picked up a half hour delay on the M6 (at 1am!) but informed me about this via voice and after a confirmation took me on a 10 min detour which popped us out the other side of it. My wife had Waze verify this delay on her phone You can find a complete list of commands here: List of Google Now voice commands and as long as you have a decent data connection it makes using an Android phone my go to navigation device. Anyone else now using voice commands rather than faffing with menus?
stickman Posted June 7, 2016 Posted June 7, 2016 Nope, I disabled it. I'm sat in a corner wearing my tinfoil hat
Dos_Box Posted June 7, 2016 Author Posted June 7, 2016 Nope, I disabled it. I'm sat in a corner wearing my tinfoil hat LOL! I suppose the last thing you want to hear whilst driving at 1am is your phone quietly going 'They're not really your friends you know' and 'They all talk about you behind you back. Terrible, terrible things they say'
hardtailstar Posted June 7, 2016 Posted June 7, 2016 Yup use it all the time. Mainly if im wearing my smart watch. Just a lot easier then to unlock phone, navigate to app then do what I need to do.
foofighterjim Posted June 7, 2016 Posted June 7, 2016 Just got a Moto 360 and have done a few things with the voice control (mainly because it is the main input method for text), I have sent a few WatsApp messages using the voice prompt and made a couple of Google Keep notes. Voice recognition is very accurate but only useful for short messages and I don't like the absence of punctuation.
Arthur Posted June 7, 2016 Posted June 7, 2016 I use it a lot too. It's really good. as long as you have a decent data connection it makes using an Android phone my go to navigation device. You won't even need to be online soon. Google has created offline voice recognition that is 7x faster than an online system Using various machine learning techniques, Google has created a 20.3MB system that is 7x faster than a system connected to the Internet and only has a 13.5% word error rate. It was implemented and tested on a two year old Nexus 5 with a quad-core 2.26GHz processor and 2GB RAM. To achieve this size and save on resources, the system uses a single model for both dictation and voice commands. Additional compression techniques were used to get the size down. The system was trained by exposure to 3 million anonymous voice samples (approximately 2,000 hours) from Google search. Each voice sample also had 20 distorted versions created by extracting noise from YouTube videos.
jmak Posted June 7, 2016 Posted June 7, 2016 Nope, I disabled it. I'm sat in a corner wearing my tinfoil hat Is that because you knew they were recording everything you said: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/google-voice-search-records-and-stores-conversation-people-have-around-their-phones-but-files-can-be-a7059376.html On the other hand, I quite like the fact that you can listen back to everything you've ever said to Google: https://history.google.com/history/audio
elsiegee40 Posted June 7, 2016 Posted June 7, 2016 I noticed this last week at the EDIT conf when it finally dawned on me that... a. The speech recognition on Android had got really good and... b. It actually does what you want it to! Just not necessarily with the car that's supposed to be behind you getting to the same place 2
DJ-1701 Posted June 7, 2016 Posted June 7, 2016 OK Google...Anyone else speaking to their phones a lot now? I have given my phones a few choice words in the past. I haven't used Android phones much, but the comprehension factor on the Apple phones seems far greater to me than Windows.
6Foot2 Posted June 7, 2016 Posted June 7, 2016 Just not necessarily with the car that's supposed to be behind you getting to the same place A bit of Dirk Gently Zen navigation? Note: One expletive in audio. 2
Arthur Posted June 7, 2016 Posted June 7, 2016 b. It actually does what you want it to! Unlike this... 3
sonofsanta Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 I use mine all the time. It's marvellous for navigation (I'm not paying £80 for a TomTom "subscription" to update my maps, which are a good few years out of date now, so my phone is now my GPS) and a godsend when you suddenly catch up to an accident. A quick "navigate home" and you're off; and, like you say, the warnings about "there are delays ahead, do you want to divert?" that you can answer with a yes/no. Also brilliant for reminders: "Ok google, remind me at 6pm to check the oven", "set an alarm for ten minutes" etc. So much quicker than diving into the UI. I often use it for searches as well, because I still loathe touchscreen keyboards (I want someone to make the Nokia N9 again, but with Android & 1080p @ 5"), but I find it's not quite there for longer speech recognition if I'm trying to dictate story ideas, and it stops listening if I pause for a second or two.
synaesthesia Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 I'm surprised TomTom are still in business to be fair, they're doing a bit of a Blockbuster. Trying to catch up but they're way behind the times. I've been using Waze quite a lot, have yet to try the voice recognition. I wonder how well they cope with a stutter
abillybob Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 Been using my phone as a Sat Nav since I had the iPhone 4s Back when I was 18! Much prefer Google Maps to any SatNav alternative now, it's always kept up to date, it's accurate and never let me down. It's also free.. I love how it works through Bluetooth on my car stereo as well so that when I'm playing music at the same time it lowers the volume of the music and Google Woman speaks instead, very good integration. I use OK Google a lot also but more so when I'm in the car and I need to text people back. It does a very good job and it hasn't once got a word wrong!! Don't really know why people still use Sat Nav's, please somebody tell me why that's still a thing!?
Norphy Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 (edited) I still use the TomTom app on my phone because: 1) I find it better at routing me around traffic than Waze, Google and Apple Maps 2) The voices are better 3) The instructions are clearer (Seriously Google, "Head west"? I don't have a compass, I don't know which direction west is. Also, don't just tell me to go left at the roundabout, tell which which exit as well!) Add to that, for all of its faults TomTom and their ilk have been making navigation software for a long time. I find their apps to be much more polished and refined than Google/Apple Maps when it comes to navigation. TomTom has things like speed camera alerts, speeding alerts, average speed monitoring and other features that I miss when I try the built in apps. To each their own. Edited June 8, 2016 by Norphy
HarryMonkey Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 I use Navmii on my phone, mainly because it's free but also because it's reliable and gets updated regularly. I must admit I haven't used the google alternative, is it up to date on speed cameras?
hardtailstar Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 I still use the TomTom app on my phone because: 1) I find it better at routing me around traffic than Waze, Google and Apple Maps 2) The voices are better 3) The instructions are clearer (Seriously Google, "Head west"? I don't have a compass, I don't know which direction west is. Also, don't just tell me to go left at the roundabout, tell which which exit as well!) Add to that, for all of its faults TomTom and their ilk have been making navigation software for a long time. I find their apps to be much more polished and refined than Google/Apple Maps when it comes to navigation. TomTom has things like speed camera alerts, speeding alerts, average speed monitoring and other features that I miss when I try the built in apps. To each their own. Google Maps does tell you what exit to use and has lane guidance.
Norphy Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 Must be relatively new then, whenever I've tried it in the past it's told me the direction to go in but not the specific exit.
HarryMonkey Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 Whilst we're on the subject of talking to your phone, it seems that Siri is a bit of a lifesaver in one household ... Apple's Siri calls ambulance for baby - BBC News
synaesthesia Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 I hate that article. Siri did NOT call an ambulance, Siri did what it was told. That should pave the way for a load of articles "My Nokia 3310 saved my life because I could call 999 from it!". Buttons or voice, little difference. Crap news! 1
sonofsanta Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 Google Maps doesn't warn you about speed cameras, which is an annoyance. I'm habitually a slow driver, but if you're using maps it's because you're somewhere unfamiliar, and so you're concentrating more on the road than on your speedometer. Exit & lane guidance is in now, and very handy (my old TomTom doesn't have it), but it annoys me that the symbol it uses for an upcoming roundabout is often unrelated to what you'll actually be doing e.g. if your straight-ahead exit is slightly past the vertical, it'll display the "right at the roundabout" symbol. It shouldn't be that difficult for it to work out the actual angle and dynamically create a logo, and properly prepare you--because the other problem is it often zooms in too far when you slow down, like, say, for a roundabout, and you can't see which exit you're meant to be taking until you're on the roundabout... Anyway. Minor things. Definitely better than a GPS that doesn't know about the new A46 or the Peterborough bypass. The walking navigation is superb as well--"OK Google, navigate to the hotel", and if you have the hotel confirmation email in your gmail inbox it'll know what hotel you're staying at and walk you to it. It'll buzz every time there's a change in direction as well, so you can keep hold of your phone in your pocket without needing to hold it out as obvious thief bait. An absolute godsend when you're staying away.
DJ-1701 Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 Google Maps doesn't warn you about speed cameras, which is an annoyance. Although if you are in France, that is a good thing. Legalities and all.
sonofsanta Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 Although if you are in France, that is a good thing. Legalities and all. If I'm in France, then I have bigger issues with Google Maps' navigation
elsiegee40 Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 Although if you are in France, that is a good thing. Legalities and all. TomTom has "safety zones" agreed with the French authorities which just happen to coincide with stretches of road with cameras on them. It's not as specific as it is in the UK, but still handy... up to a point... gendarmes armed with handheld speeding devices in France than we seem to be far more common than police using handheld devices here.
casey Posted June 8, 2016 Posted June 8, 2016 Been using my phone as a Sat Nav since I had the iPhone 4s Back when I was 18! Much prefer Google Maps to any SatNav alternative now, it's always kept up to date, it's accurate and never let me down. It's also free.. I love how it works through Bluetooth on my car stereo as well so that when I'm playing music at the same time it lowers the volume of the music and Google Woman speaks instead, very good integration. I use OK Google a lot also but more so when I'm in the car and I need to text people back. It does a very good job and it hasn't once got a word wrong!! Don't really know why people still use Sat Nav's, please somebody tell me why that's still a thing!? On the rare occasion I need satnav I use my Android phone like many here, but I've just ordered a new car which has TomTom satnav built in. Maybe that's how they stay in business?
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