Interestingly. the Voice Actions app isn’t that new. In fact, it was around even before Siri was announced as part of the iPhone 4S.
Voice Commands offers some of the same features that Siri sports, allowing users to send SMS messages, emails, set alarms and arrange for appointments to be added to a calendar. The app seems to understand what is asked of it at least as well as Siri does, though as is always the case your results will very much depend on which part of the world you are from. Thick accents, unfortunately, may cause a few problems. Considering Apple’s Siri also suffers from the same problem though, we’re not going to hold it against Voice Actions.
One area that Siri does have Voice Actions licked is, in the presentation department. While Siri gives users a scrollable list of commands issued as well as allowing them to be edited, Voice Actions simply offers up a large icon that can be tapped to initiate the recording of commands. If you ask something that the app can answer without throwing you out to Safari etc., then you’ll be given an ugly set of text on a solid black background. Functional, yes, but it does lack some spit and polish.
Cult of Mac had an conversation with Voice Commands, quite fun, take a look:
It could tell me the time in foreign cities, forecast the weather, define and spell words, and source simple facts from the internet.
And guess what – Voice Actions has a sense of humor too; just like Siri. Ask her “Do you love me?” and she replies: “I love everyone, especially you.”
Ask her: “What are you wearing?” and she replies: “A white robe.”
Ask her to open the pod bay doors, and of course, she replies with “I’m sorry Dave, I can’t do that.”
Voice Actions is $4.99 on iTunes, and it is available on Pandaapp too!
