Siri from Apple: what can the program do and how to use it? Who is cooler: Siri or Alice

Apple continues to improve its Siri voice assistant. With iOS 8, the personal assistant has improved its understanding of voice prompts and more accurately in its responses, says Stone Temple Consulting, who compared the feature with Google Now. However, a competitor from Google does a better job of answering these questions.

Three assistants participated in the testing - Siri, Google Now and Cortana. As a reminder, Microsoft is positioning its technology as a specific mix of functions previously implemented by Apple and Google. There is full support for natural language and, according to the developers, in contrast to the "apple" product, the service adjusts personally to the needs of each user.

The essence of the test was that all three participants were asked the same questions. Siri, Google Now and Cortana had 3,086 questions to answer. Cortana and Google Now accept both written and oral requests. Nevertheless, for the purity of the experiment, the questions were voiced. Among them were both simple - "The height of the Eiffel Tower", and more complex - "What is love?", "Who is depicted on the 5 dollar bill?", "What does the fox say?"

Google Now won the competition. This was due to the fact that Google, unlike Apple, specializes in search results. Of the 3086 questions, the service managed to more or less accurately answer 1795 - that's 58%. Siri was able to correctly handle 908 questions (29%), while Cortana only 630 (20%).

The authors of the experiment separately calculated how often the assistant gives absolutely accurate information. For example, given to the question "How old is the Great Wall of China?" the answer “It was completed in 206 BC”, rather than a specific age, was considered incorrect. Here Google Now again won by a wide margin - 88% of exact answers versus 53% and 40% for Apple and Microsoft solutions.

Stone Temple Consulting noted that, despite its objectivity, the study is not deeply scientific, so it should be treated with a fair amount of irony.

In early October, Yandex released the assistant Alice. At first, we were skeptical about this assistant, who is able to understand the context of the conversation, because something similar already exists in. However, we were a little mistaken, because Alice turned out to be much more talkative and more pleasant in communication than her counterparts.

Due to machine learning and artificial intelligence, Alice feels more like a real person than Google Assistant. She will always have the answer to your question. Of course, while neural networks are not perfect, and the bot needs a long study in order to correctly answer various questions. Therefore, sometimes the bot can give an answer not related to the question, but this is a matter of time. In the future, this problem will be solved by a larger and more correct sample, as well as optimization of learning algorithms.

But the result is already very pleasing. In particular, we want to note the speech synthesis, the voice engine works perfectly here. One gets the feeling that each speech was recorded by hand - there are no gaps between letters, the speech itself sounds very realistic and pleasant.

Of course, there is still work to be done, and sometimes the bot doesn't understand the context. When asked to sing a song, the assistant opens Yandex Music, which, of course, we do not want, because we want to hear the assistant singing. To the question "Yandex or Google?" the assistant answers, and it is quite standard. The bot understands the question “Should I take an umbrella?” By displaying a weather card.

Doubt about the presence of AI was brought about by the question "Okay Google", to which the assistant answers each time with one phrase "It was a shame." Probably, the company combines the capabilities of AI and statically asked answers to questions. It is difficult to say exactly how the training is implemented here, but limiting the work of AI is necessary so that ordinary users cannot teach the bot bad phrases.

To the question "How do you feel about headphones?" the bot responded with the following:

As you can see, he did not understand the context, but at the same time, due to the AI, he tried to answer on his own, it didn’t work out very well, but anything is better than the answer “This is what I was able to find on the Internet for the query“ Why? ”.” Did you like Alice?

What is "Alice"

Alice works in the Yandex application for iOS and Android, as well as in the beta version for Windows. The creators promised to soon add the assistant to Yandex Browser and other company products.

Thanks to the SpeechKit technology, "Alice" is able to recognize speech, determine the meaning of what is said and synthesize a voice for a response. The service can improvise and give different answers to the same question, not limited to a predetermined set. The company claims that Alice is capable of handling incomplete phrases and is context sensitive.

The assistant speaks in the voice of the dubbing actress Tatyana Shitova, whose recordings were also used to train the service. Shitova at the Russian box office was voiced by Scarlett Johansson, including the operating system Samantha from the movie "She".

Alisa works with Yandex.Poisk, Yandex.Maps, Yandex.Muzyka and Yandex.Pogoda, but in the future it will be able to access other services. So far, the service cannot recommend a movie or call a taxi.

Yandex explained that Alice is needed to solve everyday tasks, including searching for information on the Internet, hints about a place for dinner, or checking the weather for tomorrow. "Alice" can run third-party applications, for example, Instagram or VKontakte.

You can talk to Alice the same way you talk to a person: she will understand. For example, you can ask her: "Where can I have coffee nearby?" - and not dictate something like "cosmonauts street coffee shop."

Alice will look at Yandex.Directory and suggest a suitable place. And in response to "Excellent, but how to get there?" - will give a link to an already built route in Yandex.Maps.

representatives of "Yandex"

How does he work

TJ asked Alice a few questions and compared the answers with Siri's results.

There are obvious differences, such as the reaction when calling a taxi. If "Alice" does not know how to do this yet, even if Yandex.Taxi is installed on the device, then Siri is synchronized with Uber and offers to choose one of the options.

Siri and Alice are having problems with politics.

There are more and more innovations in the modern world. What was previously considered fiction is already being introduced into our lives with might and main. Not so long ago, Siri, a voice assistant available to iPhone owners, has become a curiosity. Those with Android phones can chat with Alice. Let's figure out who is better: an assistant from Apple or Yandex.

Which is better Alice or Siri - Organizer

If you use applications as an organizer, then Siri has advantages. She is able to quickly create notes and reminders, while Alice tries to philosophize. Siri also quickly starts a timer, an alarm clock. Alice, on the other hand, does not know how to perform many functions yet, or is noticeably behind Siri. When asked to read out the to-do list for the current day, Siri clearly gives information, and Alice can start joking or asking again. When asked to call a specific person, the Apple assistant does it instantly, but the Yandex assistant does not know how.

Which is better Alice or Siri - Improvisation

If you start communicating with Alice and Siri, then Siri will have more mechanical phrases with no improvisation. Alice, on the other hand, can easily maintain a conversation, perform the function of a psychologist. She has interesting stories and funny anecdotes prepared. Siri has a bit of humor and conversation support.

Which is better Alice or Siri - Emergency call

Siri can call any contact at your request. It is also convenient if you need to call an ambulance or the police. Alice, however, cannot cope with such a task.

Which is better Alice or Siri - Data Search

When searching for data, both assistants work quickly and harmoniously. But there are differences: Siri mainly leaves links to the necessary pages on the Internet, and Alice prepares information and answers briefly and to the point.

Nevertheless, sometimes Yandex's assistant "enters" and she can respond with blanks, for example, when asked to recommend an interesting film, she responds with a stereotyped "look at the Matrix", and Siri throws a link to the top 10 interesting films and gives you a choice. The same is with the choice of cafes and restaurants. But Alice gives more extensive information about traffic jams and routes on the map. She even announces the approximate travel time.

It is also worth noting that Siri can be called by voice, while Alice should be spent more time by launching the application. But you can communicate with Alice not only by voice, but also by text. It is rather difficult to determine who is better. Here it is worth thinking about why you need an assistant. If for the search for information and heart-to-heart conversations, then Alice is better, and if for the smooth operation of the organizer, then Siri will replace your secretary.