Lets talk about siri, baby.
All the good things and the bad things that may be, lets talk about siri and voice control for iPhone users!
Siri says… open the Shortcuts app. Now close it. Ooops! Siri didn’t say… Ok but seriously, open the Shortcuts app. There are dozens of pre-uploaded shortcuts for you to try on and if it’s not already in there, there are websites and other downloadable apps that consist solely of shortcuts made shareable by other friendly iPhone users. At its very core, the tech industry upholds the virtues of sharing knowledge. This is why you may often see “Open Source Software” hidden in the bottom banner or websites with pages dedicated to showcasing the software they’re using. Tech is the epitome of its principals in this way, proving that with peer collaboration our capacity for growth is exponential.
In this segment of Making Your iPhone Work For You we are going to go over some of the basic features of the original smart assistant, Apple’s very own, Siri.
We should set her up first though…
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Find the Accessibility Settings page in the Settings app. Then Siri down near the bottom of the page. This is where you’ll adjust how you communicate with Siri. Since Siri is most commonly used for basic voice commands, you probably won’t need to be able to type to her, but as you get more comfortable with her you may choose to toggle that feature on. The next setting is Siri Pause Time. As stated, this controls how long she will wait for you to finish speaking. I personally like “Longer” that way she won’t cut me off while I’m finishing a thought.
The following setting is Spoke Responses. It should say “Automatic”. If you want Siri to always speak her responses to you though, you can select Prefer Spoken Response. When in Automatic mode, Siri will use smart technology built into your iPhone software to determine if she should speak out loud or type her responses back to you.
The next point of our set up is a feature that I like turned on, but if you find your iPhone is constantly calling out “I didn’t catch that” from your pocket, it may be best to toggle it to the off-position. This is the Always Listen for “Hey Siri…” button.
The other important settings are Call Hangup and Announce Notifications. You’ll want to select Announce Notifications if you want your iPhone to announce the name of the person calling/texting you through your headphones, speakers, or iPhone itself. Instead of just hearing your (new custom) alert tone for John, you’ll also hear Siri say “Text from John”.
Call hangup is important for when you’re using Siri hands-free, like driving in the car, to make calls. This feature allows you to hang up the phone by saying “Hey Siri”.
The Internet Patrol is completely free, and we don't subject you to ads or annoying video pop-ups. But it does cost us out of our pocket to keep the site going (going on 20 years now!) So your tips via CashApp, Venmo, or Paypal are appreciated!
Receipts will come from ISIPP.