HomePod private beta could be testing voice calls, multiple timers

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Comments

  • Reply 21 of 24
    SoliSoli Posts: 10,035member
    jcs2305 said:
    hagar said:
    The biggest news is multiple timers? What about multiple user support? Or are the majority of Apple users hipster single home dwellers?
    No one in my home really uses the voice functions. I set the HP up with my account initially, but everyone in the house has an iPhone that they use to play music, a Youtube video or whatever. Same with the majority of family and friends. They want to play something out comes the iPhone or Ipad and it's on via airplay.

    So I guess I fit into the hipster single home dwellers category.. ??  I am confused why a single person household would be referred to as "Hipster", but hey.. it sounds cool. Hahaha 

    My personal usage is airplay speaker first, and voice assistant..never.  B)
    That reminds me of the facepalming, circuitous efforts of people that run macOS apps by mounting disk images from the initial download instead of putting the app in the /Applications folder… except those people don’t know better.
  • Reply 22 of 24
    StrangeDaysStrangeDays Posts: 12,844member
    smiffy31 said:
    How the heck does Siri not already allow you to set multiple timers.  Baffling.
    iOS does not have multiple timers, Siri is is a voice interface to iOS functionality, so it is normal that Siri does not allow this. There are probably hundreds of apps that allow multiple timers on the app store so this has never been a major problem, It still amazes me how much noise this one function can generate on the echo chamber.
    Yeah. It's also a difference of work flow mentality -- what are these multiple cooking timers used for? To remind you. Remind you to "check the vegetables in 10 minutes", etc. Well iOS does support this, via multiple Reminders -- "Remind me to check the vegetables in 10 minutes" and then "Remind me to braise the chicken 15 minutes", etc. Whereas the countdown timer functionality in iOS has just always been a single app function, much like there is just one stopwatch.

    But it's nice to see that they're re-tooling the timer functionality for those that wish to use it that way.
    edited July 2018 watto_cobramjtomlinwilliamlondon
  • Reply 23 of 24
    StrangeDaysStrangeDays Posts: 12,844member

    zroger73 said:
    Here's an idea: How about fixing what's broken before adding new features?

    1. When using the HomePod as an AirPlay speaker, not all apps use it as an audio output even when the HomePod is set to the audio output device in the settings.

    2. Every time the Apple TV goes to sleep, it disconnects from the HomePod and defaults the audio output back to the TV.

    3. After playing audio to the HomePod using the Apple TV, the HomePod will no longer fulfill requests such as "Hey Siri, play smooth jazz". Instead, Siri says, "Hmm. I'm having trouble..." However, if I play then stop music from my iPhone, the HomePod will work properly.

    I've stopped using the HomePod as an Apple TV speaker because of these issues and reverted back to my Bose SoundLink via a Bluetooth connection. The connection is maintained and all the Apple TV's audio is output properly.
    Those sound like enhancements needed for tvOS, not HomePod. So nope, no reason to stop implementing new features in HomePod, thank you very much.
    watto_cobrawilliamlondon
  • Reply 24 of 24
    mjtomlinmjtomlin Posts: 2,673member

    How the heck does Siri not already allow you to set multiple timers.  Baffling.

    I would argue the reason Apple has not yet implemented multiple "timers" is because they view that as the domain of the Reminders app.

    As StrangeDays said:

    Yeah. It's also a difference of work flow mentality -- what are these multiple cooking timers used for? To remind you. Remind you to "check the vegetables in 10 minutes", etc. Well iOS does support this, via multiple Reminders -- "Remind me to check the vegetables in 10 minutes" and then "Remind me to braise the chicken 15 minutes", etc. Whereas the countdown timer functionality in iOS has just always been a single app function, much like there is just one stopwatch.

    It seems most people want to use the timer as a reminder, not realizing that the system (and Siri) is perfectly capable of filling the actual need of reminding you of anything at any desired time and/or interval, making it a much more versatile system then just having basic timers.
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