A simple to, "What is "Alexa", "? (because I did not know what "Alexa", is)

[Stuart G]

Last edited Sun Dec 29, 2019, 04:41 PM - Edit history (3)

..."Alexa", is the answer that one gets when someone talks into Amazon's device and gets a voice answer to a question. Simply put, Instead of looking on the internet for an answer, the computer gives you the answer (through "Alexa", ) without looking. That voice that you hear with the answer is, ""Alexa", "

No I don't have a "smart phone" and I do not use ""Alexa", "...I have seen it used, but I honestly did not know the name of that response was, ""Alexa"

...Yes today I learned something new at Democratic Underground.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. Do you mean the Alexa voice from the Amazon Echo device?

My iPhone has a voice but it's called Siri.

[Stuart G]

2. Yes, that is the one. I have described it more completely in the original post.

(which I needed to do, sorry) I didn't know the voice had a name. Since I don't have it, and don't use it, I didn't know it.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. I think Alexa is only the Amazon Echo voice. My iPhone's voice is called Siri.

[Stuart G]

4. Yes, I have heard the name "Siri" before. And I understand that name.

...So instead of looking up an answer, you just ask the phone for information...
...Think about that one for a while. The computer enables someone to get an answer if one looks up the question... For example: How tall is the Statue of Liberty?

................So, now instead of typing in the words on the computer, as we used to do, we get the answer just by asking.........Oh, this rings a bell in the brain. YES IT DOES, INDEED

..Now wait, I saw this when I was a young lad, on a Sci Fiction show....Let me think??..stuck somewhere in the brain...Yes, that show was called, Star Trek and it was all fiction.

Spock ,or Scotty would ask the computer a question, and the computer would answer.. (if I recall, usually it was Scotty)

Now that was ..fiction

But Siri and Alexia are fact...I need to think about that for a moment!!.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

5. It's just voice recognition software, which has been around for decades.

In the late 1990s I had a word processing program that used voice recognition. It was slow and not always accurate, and you had to "train" it to recognize your voice, accent and speech patterns. It's improved so much now that the new devices recognize and respond to almost any voice, and pretty accurately. The software translates the spoken question into a form that the system can use to look up the answer, probably from a source like Google or Wikipedia. It's just an improvement in long-extant technology.

[MineralMan]

9. Even earlier, there was a voice system for MS-DOS. I did a demo for the

PC User's Group I ran. I carried on a conversation with it that included some jokes. The voice was very HAL-like. It was pretty useless, but a lot of fun as a demo.

Now, of course, everything is amazingly better.

[MineralMan]

12. If you're using Office 365, you can dictate text into Word.

You do have to have a mic connected to your computer, of course, but laptops have one built in and so do a lot of monitors.

It works remarkably well, and the speech recognition is very, very good. No training is needed. Along with dictating text, you can also say the names of punctuation marks to add them, and say "new line" or "new paragraph." It doesn't have a command language, though, so you can't use other functions in Word, like italicizing, as far as I can determine.

The only drawback of it is that all dictation goes to the cloud where the speech recognition stuff is located. It's fast, but not as fast as I can type.

According to Microsoft, when you turn the feature off, all of the cloud storage is deleted.

To use it, just click the microphone at the far right of the ribbon at the top of the Word window.

I don't use it on a normal basis, but I have used it for note-taking a few times, It can be useful for that. For example, if I'm reading a technical book, I can open Word, start the microphone and just speak the notes I want to record.

If you use Google Docs, you can dictate into that application, as well. I haven't tried that, because I don't use Google Docs. Before long, I'm sure, you'll be able to use it anywhere in Chrome, like on DU, to dictate text. Maybe you already can. I don't know. All speech recognition is done in the cloud, so your words are sent off into space somewhere.

There's a free Chrome extension called VoiceIn that lets you dictate text anywhere text can be input from Chrome. Like on DU, for example. You just right click in the text entry area or field, and click Record in the drop down menu. Then you speak. You can say punctuation words to punctuate and say new line or new paragraph. I haven't tried this yet, but will.

[muriel_volestrangler]

13. Except your OP still says it's on a phone, not on Amazon's device

and you still misspell it - it's "Alexa", not "Alexia".

[Stuart G]

16. Of course, I cannot spell either...those corrections have been made.

Back to the drawing board...

[EX500rider]

6. On my Android Galaxy phone I say "Hey Google". nt

[MineralMan]

7. There's also Microsoft's Cortana.

I don't know anyone who uses it, though. I shut it off on my desktop PC.

[XRubicon]

14. My Samsung refrigerator answers to Hi Bixby

[MineralMan]

17. Ah, Bixby. It's available on my Samsung A10e Phone, but I

can't see how I'd need to use it. So, I've never enabled it.

[MineralMan]

8. I've used "Hey, Google" a few times in the car.

I just push the talk button on my dashboard and say, "Hey, Google. Give me directions to 123 second street in Minneapolis, Minnesota."

My cell phone is plugged into my car via a USB cable and the Android Auto app is running on the phone. Next thing I know, a voice is telling me where to go and where to turn. Not a bad thing at all. I use it a lot.

[TheBlackAdder]

10. The funny thing: People trust Amazon & Google not to eavesdrop the way Microsoft Cortana does! 😂

.

Talk about wanting to buy something, without invoking Alexa.

Then, count the minutes before AWS generated emails start hitting your in-box.

.

[JenniferJuniper]

11. I have a kid named Alex,

and got an Alexa for last Christmas.

Alexa keeps butting into our conversations! To make matters worse, Alex has a friend named Alexa.

I keep meaning to change the voice to Computer.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

15. all you need to know about Alexa and Siri ...

[pansypoo53219]

18. this has to suck for my uncle. his daughter was named alexa who had CP + died at 18.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

19. Or as I refer to it,...

“Creepy House Robot.”

[edbermac]

20. Got one for Christmas. Anyone else have one?

Still playing around with it.