[hcarvalhoalves]

> I then jokingly opened siri and said “Open the garage”. Siri responded with “I can’t find an app named ‘The Garage’”. Lightbulbs went off. We realized we could get around the fact that Siri has no API by making apps named the phrases we’d like to recognize.

Priceless!

I wish Siri had an API though.

[zmmmmm]

I find it curious that both Google and Apple have held back on this. It seems so obvious that there's an entire platform to open up here based on this kind of thing, but neither one seems to be interested in doing it. Instead they are privately noodling away, just incrementally building up their own vocabularies which are really pitifully small in the wider context of things. They must both know there would instantly be an explosion in 3rd party support the minute they add useful APIs, and it would be a major selling point for either OS ... I wonder why they are both so reluctant to do it?

[icoloma]

Google Now is integrating some information extracted from the user inbox, when the received e-mail includes the right schemas:

https://developers.google.com/gmail/actions/

By the moment it requires registration, but we are using it and works nicely. It's one step in the right direction, I suppose.

[tomschlick]

I feel like this has to come with iOS 8 for Apple to stay competitive against Google Now.

[mattchamb]

Also to compete with Cortana on windows phone, which lets you register voice commands to run specific apps and provide it input [1].

[1] http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/Build/2014/2-530 - Integrating Your App into the Windows Phone Speech Experience

[sibbl]

In fact apps can register for voice commands since the release of WP8. Microsoft just improved it so you don't have to register e.g. 1000 movie names to enable the WP voice recognition to understand them, but telling WP to listen for a movie name.

[k-mcgrady]

But I thought Google Now doesn't offer an API either? I use both Siri and Google Now (I have an iPhone and Nexus I find myself regularly switching between) and I feel like they are two different products, not meant to compete (yet). Yes, Google now can answer questions like Siri but because it's main focus is on showing me stuff I need when I need it I tend to forget about the Q&A part of the product. I also feel that's Siri's Q&A is better. Google Now needs to pull in more sources and open an API to keep competitive with Siri. Siri needs an API and more contextual awareness to keep competitive with Google Now.

[BitMastro]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjTj0ymhbBw

[sibbl]

Windows Phone user here: we got this API for 1.5 years and Cortana just brought it to a higher level :)