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While Siri is the most popular personal assistant around right now there others out there and just because they aren’t the most popular doesn’t mean they can’t be better. One of the best Android Siri alternatives available today is Robin.
Robin is an Android app that is designed around Android users that do alot of driving. It allows voice communication with Android devices without taking your eyes off the road. While this isn’t a full on competitor to Siri it is easily more usefull when driving.
Robin for Android Features:
- Navigation
- Real-time traffic
- Parking information
- Gas Prices
- Weather
- Twitter Feed Reading
- Yelp Reviews
- Tells Jokes
- And much more…
Want to see first hand how it works check out the video below brought to you by the makers of Robin.
One of the best features of Robin is that all of its features are hands free and everything is read to you by Robin. Even though Robin is still in its beta stages it has no issues that we can find. You can get it now free from the Google Play store
Last fall Apple announced its personal assistant called Siri and just last week the new and improved Siri with iOS6 without any competition from Google. Google seems to have noticed and have reported that they will be accelerating the launch of a competitor to Siri.
We already know that Google has had competition in the works for some time know called Majel (unknown if this is internal or its actual name planned for release). While Google hasn’t had their plans to compete with Siri out in the open they now see the need for it. Since the average Android user does not realize that it does already have voice commands since its not in your face when using Android Google sees the need for the average consumer to have this seemingly small feature.
While we all wonder why it is taking Google so long to respond to Apple’s Siri we will likely see a competitor very soon. With Google I/O coming up next week we hope more information is made available then. We have already heard about the possibility of an upgrade to Android being announced at Google I/O we can only hope that one of the features within this update will be Majel (or whatever they decide to call it).
When the iPhone 4s launched everyone went nuts over the new feature called Siri and Android developers have been trying to create a version of it ever since. If your looking for Siri on your Android phone you won’t get it although if you want an app close to it then try Dolphin Sonar.
While Dolphin Sonar is a great competitor in the voice recognition area there are many things that it lacks that can be found in iPhones personal assistant. Dolphin Sonar is of course created to be a Siri for Internet and not an overall personal assistant. While surfing in your Dolphin browser you can shake the phone and tell it what you want. Search Facebook, Google, Ebay, open a new tab or even just scroll the webpage with your voice alone.
I would love to say that Sonar will take the place of Siri one day but it seems it will only be a piece of the “personal assistant” we all want on Android devices. The developers of Dolphin Sonar have promised that they will be updating rapidly to try and give the best experience possible with the new voice interactions while browsing the web.
The fact that Google has had voice command applications before Siri was ever added to iOS has not changed the fact that people are intrigued by Apple’s Siri. With this in mind Google has started a project called “Project Majel” to leave Siri in the dust. Google’s Project Majel is named after Majel Roddenberry who was the voice of the Enterprise computer in Star Trek. Google expects their new virtual assistant to act like the Starship computer in a way that it will answer any question you have.
Quote to a former Google X Project member:
This is in total violation of the NDA, but I don’t care anymore. Sue me.The central focus of Google X for the past few years has been a highly advanced artificial intelligence robot that leverages the underlying technology of many popular Google programs. As of October (the last time I was around the project), the artificial intelligence had passed the Turing Test 93% of the time via an hour long IM style conversation. IM was chosen to isolate the AI from the speech synthesizer and physical packaging of the robot.
The robot itself isn’t particularly advanced because the focus was not on mechanics, but rather the software. It is basically a robotish looking thing on wheels. Speech recognition is somewhat better than what you would get with normal speech input, mostly because of the use of high quality microphones and lip-reading assistance.
I have had the chance to interact with the robot personally and it is honestly the most amazing thing that I have ever seen. I like to think of it like Stephen Hawking because it is extremely smart and you can interact with it naturally, but it is incapable of physically doing much. There is a planned phase two for development of an advanced robotics platform.
Project Majel is said to start really showing itself off in 2012 and we can only hope to see it sooner than later in an Android OS update at a minimum. Do we think since Google will be putting so much effort into this project that it will bury Siri? We can only hope 
When Apple announced their iPhone 4s there was really nothing special about it besides its personal assistant “Siri”. This created quite a buzz in the mobile world and proved to be a great selling feature on the new iPhone placing the speed increase on the device as the number two reason to get the upgraded device. Android developers quickly started developing or promoting their own versions such as Iris and Speektoit. Now there is a new personal assistant for Android called Cluzee that seems to be the best alternative to Siri for Android yet.
Cluzee was released on the Android Market in November and claims to be “Your Intelligent Personal Assistant”. It utilizes “cutting edge technologies like voice recognition, voice synthesis, personal analytics, smart filters and machine learning to help users manage all aspects of their personal and digital lives”
We have taken the time to use Cluzee and notice that it goes a little further than Siri in details of answers. We asked Cluzee, “Whats my schedule like today?” and Cluzee started from the beginning of my calendar and also looked online for traffic delays and other factors that could effect my appointments.
The developers of Cluzee are Tronton and the CEO Ashish Patwa states:
“We don’t need all of the information available, all of the time. We just need the right information at the right time, which Cluzee intelligently provides, making us more productive. Technology created the problem, but we’re using smarter technology to solve it.”
As long as Tronton continues to improve Cluzee we could see the best personal assistant available and real competition for Siri. Give it a try by search the Android Market for “Cluzee” and let us know what you think.
The only reason the iPhone 4s is selling is the fact that it has Apple’s new feature “Siri” built in. Siri is a really cool feature but its not unique, there are other alternatives out there. A few developers from Dexetra.com created a Siri alternative for Android called Iris within only a few hours.
This new app like Siri will work by asking a question, then the app will look over the internet and find the answer and respond. It was said to just be something to pass the time and have a little fun but now seems to be a worthwhile development.
One of the Developers on the project Narayan Babu says:
When we started seeing results, everyone got excited and started a high speed coding race. In no time, we added Voice input, Text-to-speech, also a lot of hueristic humor into Iris. Not until late evening we decided on the name “iris.”, which would be Siri in reverse. And we also reverse engineered a crazy expansion – Intelligent Rival Imitator of Siri. We were still in the fun mode, but when we started using it the results were actually good, really good.
The app has been named Iris and will be available on the Android Market shortly although if you would like to try it out now in its beta stages it is available. Of course those of us that are die hard Android fans knew it would only be a matter of time before Android had its version of iPhone’s Siri.
