Because the QOL from one is insane for me. While I’m cooking, I can set timers and look up conversions (one big country that produces a lot of internet content, including recipes, uses the most insane units). Everything else is a nice bonus, but those parts are major.
That said, I want to replace Alexa with something fully local, but the supply chain issues are currently a hindrance.
You have an “insane” QOL then if having a manual kitchen timer or a simple conversion chart on the wall would be a major difference.
At least with the manual kitchen timer, you can always know how much time is left just by looking. Set a ten minute timer on an Alexa, you have to threaten it with violence to keep the timer visible for more than 30 seconds of it, and that doesn’t always work either. I went so far as to literally turn off every single thing I could from the display and yet it’ll prefer showing a content less main screen over just keeping the timer displayed.
I often have multiple timers, that gets crowded fast. And even manual timers require me to touch them, while the whole point is that I can set a timer while my hands are full of raw sausage mix or whatever.
And my Alexa has no display, so it’s just "Alexa, timer [Name] status"
Oh, and a conversion chat is also somewhat horrible, because this one country uses volumetric measurements where the form a product is in changes how much X of that unit means.
> Oh, and a conversion chat is also somewhat horrible, because this one country uses volumetric measurements where the form a product is in changes how much X of that unit means.
If it’s so hard for you, then buy measuring cups in US sizes or stop using US recipes. These are trivially solved problems in a low tech way. You’re like an addict trying desperately to defend why they need a fix. Yeesh!
And you're desperately coming up with nonsensical solutions that aren't as practical in any meaningful way.
You honestly think having measuring devices for two entirely different systems or not using US based recipes is trivial compared to asking for the conversion out loud and getting it immediately? Yeesh!
EDIT: even going back to your timer comment (to which you completely ignored the response), your 'trivial' solutions effectively boil down to 'get more kitchen space'. Totally trivial.
> You honestly think having measuring devices for two entirely different systems
If you want to make recipes based on imperial measurements, YES, and I’d also say the vast majority of people here would agree with me.
Having a full set of imperial kitchen measuring cups costs less than any meal you are bothering to prepare and takes up less kitchen space than a single salad bowl.
For your follow up edit:
> to which you completely ignored the response
I’m under no obligation to rebut every thing someone says, whether I find it correct or not. I said why I hate using Alexa for timers, I didn’t feel the need to go any further there.
Measuring cups are an objectively terrible unit, since (1) the volume of a cup, while officially standardized, is not consistent across the measuring cups you'll find in stores, and (2) the amount (mass) of common ingredients in a cup can vary wildly--50% or more--depending on how densely packed the ingredient is.
A "standard" cup of flour is generally considered to be 120-130g, but if you buy a brand new bag of flour at the store and scoop a cup off the top you may be getting as much as 200g, since it's densely packed. This obviously has serious implications for whatever you're baking.
> A "standard" cup of flour is generally considered to be 120-130g, but if you buy a brand new bag of flour at the store and scoop a cup off the top you may be getting as much as 200g, since it's densely packed.
I’m not debating if the US method of measurement in recipes is terrible or not (it is!). But taking an imprecise unit of measurement and lossy converting it to another is better (edit for clarity what I meant) each time you cook, while in the middle of cooking!?
For baking, I'll generally weigh and, for flour, pretty much always. However, I use measuring cups all the time for other cooking where recipes may not even give a weight equivalent to a volume of something.
Setting a time, setting alarms, playing music, turning lights on and off, controlling media, (eg Netflix), checking the weather, etc. I'm just focusing on the universal use cases, and excluding varying degrees of niche usesnlike interactively displaying recipes and saying the rosary.
Especially in rooms where you don't already have a sound system, it's really a no-brainer. And I question that you've ever interacted with a smartphone if you think either the responsiveness or the convenience (not everybody is glued to their phone, and sometimes it's in the other room).
This need people have to think everything is either super-tubular-amazing or completely-useless-dross is _exhausting_. For anybody interested in understanding instead of posturing online to fill some emotional void, it's plainly obvious how smart speakers could be a modest improvement to QoL for many people.
I'm definitely in the middle ground somewhere. I do think they're mostly disappointing. That said, they understand properly phrased commands well enough and are somewhat useful, if hardly essential, for a variety of simple tasks.
>Especially in rooms where you don't already have a sound system, it's really a no-brainer.
I'm going to want some sort of speaker in my bedroom--used to have a CD player--and a smart speaker is as useful a candidate as anything, and it can function as an alarm clock as well.
Yea, it really is a no-brainer for a modest QoL improvement, unless you have objections to the privacy implications. I'm really just losing tolerance for this tendency to only express dumb, low-dimensional opinions that are so heavily detached from reality, like the GP comment's claim that they can't comprehend it having nonzero value to someone's workflows.
I wonder if it's the same dynamic that's contributing tk the polarization of political discourse: the structure of information flow in the social media era rewards being punchy, simplistic, and hysterical. The incentives feel inescapable for the masses of people out there that are too hollow to hold beliefs or engage with reality in any meaningful way.
Doing it on my phone involves taking my phone out of my pocket or figuring out where I left it. Doing it on my alexa devices means mindlessly speaking out loud anywhere in my house, also when my hands are full or messy.
It affects QOL when you get used to it along with a wide range of other features which are similarly tiny by themselves (turning the TV on/off; changing volume; searching for something on my FireTV instead of using the virtual keyboard; turning lights on/off; using it as an alarm clock; telling my son in his room upstairs that dinner is ready without yelling; having a single command to turn of the lights and turn on a playlist to fall asleep to) but that combined adds up to a whole lot reduced friction.
Yeah. Those are the sort of occasionally handy things that Alexa is somewhat useful for. But QoL? (I don't even generally use it as a timer in the kitchen as opposed to spending 5 seconds to set a timer by hand that shows me a countdown.)
My main usecase for Alexa is also multiple timers while cooking. It's very useful - prior, I would juggle multiple independent timers on microwaves/stoves/fridge.
I think it's definitely become more common, especially for baking. Digital scales are small and cheap and, if I'm going to work in weight anyway, I'd rather do it in grams than ounces (which would probably be mixed in with some volumetric units for small quantities).
Because nothing screams like "great UX" and "QOL" like a tablet in a greasy kitchen you can't operate when your hands are full, and having to learn to code in order to use a timer.
HN is a diverse bunch. There are lots of non-technical people here. But even ignoring that, there's a hell of a difference between 'knowing to how to code' and 'knowing how to write an Android app'. I've been writing code for 25 years, and I know for certain it'd take me several evenings to be able to make a working Android app, and a lot more to make one I was actually happy with to the point I'd use it.
> HN is a diverse bunch. There are lots of non-technical people here. But even ignoring that, there's a hell of a difference between 'knowing to how to code' and 'knowing how to write an Android app'
Absolutely, and absolutely. But if one is keen on QoL boosts, coding remains a foremost helpful skill, and currently coding for mobile devices is a further booster.
> several evenings ... and a lot more
I would suggest that the amount of competence to get you started to the point of applications usable to your satisfaction is probably lower than you seem to suggest (if you are already proficient in Java); and that the amount of blasphemy you could spend against the workings of the available libraries and time lost in code that "should just work" is probably not only in general underestimated, but really in this realm you would meet it a lot in practice.
I can code, and I already have a tablet in the kitchen as a recipe book. But my hands are often either dirty, or in nitrile gloves, both make using the tablet either awkward or impossible. My workflow is to open the recipe I want, and then not touch the tablet until I’m done.
Not to mention that voice enables me to do this while also doing something else with my hands, like cutting veggies.
Android? We should have libraries for voice command (probably around android.speech ). I checked once because I would like to be able to voice control a GPS and mapping system while driving. If you wanted to voice control the application, that would be surely much more challenging, yet possibly interesting and exportable to other future needs.
This given, for the specific needs as you presented them I would have taken an old tablet, coded the feats you needed (timer, converter etc) in a single interface, fixed it in some most appropriate part of the kitchen for that use, and covered it with some plastic wrap film (I think standard PVC should be capacitive display friendly) in order to keep electronics and mess separate.
Of course, if you are more comfortable with the assistant, that is anyone's prerogative. Just reasoning.
At the risk of sounding like a drug dealer, have you tried one?
The main reason why I'll probably never buy an Alexa is because it sucks at the specific things I need it to do, but I concede that there's something liberating about just yelling at the computer and getting a reply. If I'm about to leave and I don't know which jacket to pick, being able to yell "Alexa, what's the weather like?" keeps me from switching contexts and losing my train of thought. It may not sound like much, but once you combine a bunch of small tasks it adds up.
I just don't see those tradeoffs adding up for me. My days in the Bay Area taught me to dress in layers and always have extra layers when going out anyway, although I know it was just one example you were giving.
I don't even like to speak around them because I assume they are archiving every voice sample forever.
That's the thing, you won't really know how much they add up until you start using one. Even then it took a long time before I used it as much as I do now. My son uses it even more, e.g. preferring to ask it to do maths rather than opening up a calculator app.
But frankly "hands free" timers/reminders/alarms alone is enough of a killer feature for me alone.
I can see that. But I hope it never becomes standard.
I find them aggravating because of my disability.
An acquaintance has made every light in their home integrated into Google's services. I have a mild speech impediment and Google seems incapable of recognising my speech as speech. "Hey Google. HEY GOOGLE. Hey Gooooogle! Turn off the lights." I'm sorry, I didn't catch that. "Hey Goooooooogle! Turn. Off. The. Lights.". I'm sorry, I didn't catch that.
And of course, when I gave in and used the switch, my host immediately came upstairs and chastised me for causing device errors to pop up in the network. Use voice!
Not terribly impressed, to say the least. And don't get me started on the bank's voice recognition system on the phone.
You're an edge case, like the old, the young, the computer-illiterate, the very computer-literate, people who speak English but deal with a lot of things that aren't in English, and so on...
I'm struggling to understand their stance :(. The point of "smart" is that it makes things easier. If it doesn't make things easier, what's the point? And as a guest, it had better make it easier for you.
For what it's worth, which obviously isn't much, all my public rooms have smart switches as well as being able to be controlled by voice. And if someone needs to use the physical switch (they're all still uncovered and accessible) then that's a failure of my system not of whoever needed to bypass it.
The main benefit to me of smart is that I can automate transitions, so it's that much less likely that anyone will need to manually adjust the lighting.
This is a problem because your acquaintance have used smart bulbs instead of replacing their switches with smart switches. Lightwave rf switches and similar can be controlled with Google/Alexa or their own app, but still have buttons to push as well. I absolutely understand your frustration with that.
In terms of understanding, it'll improve. I have a broad Scandinavian accent. My Alexa handles that just fine for the most part. It's not more than a few years ago most speech recognition struggled with that (I remember a phone booking line that insisted on recognising me saying "London" as "Birmingham")
That said, I want to replace Alexa with something fully local, but the supply chain issues are currently a hindrance.