Develop Bugs

Google Voice Actions - Your Experiences

How you all finding this?
It can dictate a text no problem, but doesn't seem to pick up the TO: field for me.
So if I say "send text to bob how are you" it will fill in "2 bob how are you" in the message field and leave the TO field empty. how are you getting on? It's still pretty cool. And you can say things like "call 08665242424" and it gets that perfect. Although when I say "call Joe" it just won't find the appropriate entry on my SIM card.

hey,
So far with the actions, i had a little bit of troubling getting it to call my contacts e.g. "call Paul C" an it suggests everyone else in my list with the surname C except "Paul C" also the text thing doesnt seem to work at all, but i have found it's very good at web searching and also when you have already entered the texting menu, i think once it gets the support for different countries it will be really good and fun to use.
At the minute its more of a novelty, but it could become very very useful.

We had a lot of fun earlier as what I said and what the phone thought I said was so different!
e.g.
Send a text to Teresa to say hello
=
Send a text recycle au
I did manage to get the thing to give me directions to Skegness (although I was trying to call somebody at the time).
Maybe I need to lay on an american accent and try again

But... But... But... It worked so well in the little video!

Very hit and miss for me. If it works, it works spot on 100% and great. If it fails, it fails epically.

Same here. If it works, it works, if not, well I just hope I'm not showing it off to a friend as it can make an ass of itself.
The text action? Doesn't work for me at all. Neither does setting an alarm. Getting directions is perhaps the most reliable voice action of all. Calling people is hit and miss. Sometimes it works, sometimes it just doesn't complete the action. I'll say, "Call Claire XYZ Mobile", and it displays a list of 'did you mean?' options. The top one is usually right, but when I click it it Googles it as a search term!

The Alarm is still in development

the fact it requires a data connection means its learning as it goes. Recording 10000s of new words per day and linking them based by region. In time it should be able to learn words with accents etc so well that its hard to fool.
at the moment it is certainly more novelty than technological wow. but.. I think it will get there. I wish you could "teach it" by sampling your address book. I mean you click on a contacts name and then say it 5 times and the google learns how this name is pronounced in your region. then it recognizes it next time. I think they'll get there. this is a good start.

If it learns as it goes, then all those who set theory phone to US English may not be helping out develop the software for their own language if each voice request is sent out with a language tag from the phone.
Sent from my HTC Desire using XDA App

How do I know what version of "voice search" I have?
I used the QR code from the google blog and and doesn't recognize some of them.
For example, it will recognize "note to self I am cool" but it will ask to do a search instead of noting to self.

It picks up very few words I say correctly. Usually "call" it always gets correct. Brilliant concept but not very practical for the masses yet.
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- Sent via my HTC Desire -

I've found this terrible so far, 0% success rate! Even speaking in most clearest English with no background noise.
Maybe you have more success with an American accent??

But the odd thing is that the previous "search by voice" and technologies such as Translate both recognise voice really really well.

As with most of you, no success at all.. another interesting thing is set it to US English and hold it up to your speakers and play the guy from the Youtube video talking and it fails to get correct anything he says as well so I would like to know how they got 100% success rate in the video.

I have had limited success with it set to US english, one big problem is the "listen to" command, it insists that I need to install a music player, I have spotify installed (which is on the approved list) but voice action does not appear to recognise that it is there.

thejinx0r said:
How do I know what version of "voice search" I have?
I used the QR code from the google blog and and doesn't recognize some of them.
For example, it will recognize "note to self I am cool" but it will ask to do a search instead of noting to self.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is looking for the nearest psychiatrist, as it has deduced you are in urgent need thereof

Like the previous voice to text, it mainly accepts US english inflection, for the moment being.
However in my fake mafioso-US-english accent I could manage to type some emails, but I couldn't, for the hell of it, make it recognize the 'to' field most of the times. I think you really have to speak it all together "send email (no pause) to xyz (pause) how are you ?"

Too many "SERVER PROBLEM" .... not good.

OK, I've figured it out. It works and works just as accurate as in the Google vid. You just have to speak at your normal pace and the phone no more than around 6 inches away.
I can use US and UK accents to get it working. I've moved around enough to know them well.
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- Sent via my HTC Desire -

I have tried it for directions, navigation, voice dialing good.text message no go on generic htc sense 2.2.
Northern irish accent.
Just saying one word searches for pizza, thai, pubs god tho.bruins up google search entries by location.plus point
Sent from my HTC Desire using XDA App

[Q] Bing Maps next to useless outside USA

I just moved from an iPhone 4 to a HTC Mozart and so far am loving everything about the phone bar a few little problems. The main one being Bing Maps doesnt do anything useful. Example being yesterday I was in the city and was going to post a few things for Xmas at the post office, on my iphone I would have loaded up google maps and typed in "Post Office" and it would have shown me all the post offices around me and I could then make my way there. Bing Maps on the other hand when I typed in the same thing takes me to a park in "IL" somewhere in the USA. SO i typed in "Post Offcies in Sydney" and this just brought up an error. The Bing Maps is useless and I tried to find a lot of things and it always finds something useless for me in the USA or shows an error.
Anyone outside the USA got this app to work successfully or even remotely relevant to where you are???

I'm with you, its just a bit ****. I used to have an Xperia x10 which had Google maps and my tracks, I often used it to navigate through forestry tracks in Wales but they aren't on Bing Maps at all!
Actually is Bing **** or is Google Maps just so good?

Works fine in the UK (with the exception of voice searches).

I listen to wp7 radio podcasts and they say they are working on better bing implementation in other countries, so they are aware that the problem exists.

bnathan said:
I just moved from an iPhone 4 to a HTC Mozart and so far am loving everything about the phone bar a few little problems. The main one being Bing Maps doesnt do anything useful. Example being yesterday I was in the city and was going to post a few things for Xmas at the post office, on my iphone I would have loaded up google maps and typed in "Post Office" and it would have shown me all the post offices around me and I could then make my way there. Bing Maps on the other hand when I typed in the same thing takes me to a park in "IL" somewhere in the USA. SO i typed in "Post Offcies in Sydney" and this just brought up an error. The Bing Maps is useless and I tried to find a lot of things and it always finds something useless for me in the USA or shows an error.
Anyone outside the USA got this app to work successfully or even remotely relevant to where you are???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree with you on that, when i searched for post office in Bing maps, it got auspost but alot of other random results, as well as missed alot of the post offices here in sydney. I noticed the Google search app results are alot more accurate and shows address' under 'places'
If you don't have the 'local' results in Bing search yet, there is a way around it which will bring SOME local results.
Under Settings > region & language, make sure 'display language' and 'Browser & search language' is set to 'English (United States)' It will ask you to restart your phone. While not as accurate as Google search, it's a good thing to have as some results do show up. Microsoft really needs to stand by their saying that they're a 'global' company, rather than a US only company.

Bing Maps frustrations

So last week I went to stay in a condo with some friends. They texted me the address and it conveniently created a link that took me right to Bing maps. I was a half-hour late because Bing Maps dropped me off THIRTEEN MILES AWAY from the actual address. This is fully the THIRD time that I've been late or completely missed an event because Bing maps couldn't get me to the right place. Worse, every time someone asks why I was late and I respond "my phone took me to the wrong place," they ask what I'm using. When I reluctantly admit that it is Bing, I always get something to the effect of, "oh, THAT'S why."
In the end, I used the gMaps app to get to the right place. The weirdest thing is that when I went to Bing Maps on a browser at the condo, it GOT THE ADDRESS RIGHT! It's only the Bing Maps on my phone that dropped me off far, far away.
Try it for yourself on your Windows phone "Maps" app, on Bing Maps on a browser, or on Google Maps:
4010 Silverheels Dr, Silverthorn, CO 80498
(I know "Silverthorne" is misspelled, but that's how it was in the text message, so I'm leaving it as-is for troubleshooting reasons.)
WHY?!?!?!?

Interesting. Maybe it's whatever certain APIs are exposed to the mobile Bing app? Clearly, the web version has some kind of auto correction the mobile version doesn't/can't access.
Btw, how come you didn't question why it was placing the marker on the green side of a mountain?

I can not verify this. I typed in the adress just as you specified, and this is what it came up with. I checked in google maps and bing maps. Bing maps is identical google maps is ~500 feet west of the spot, so practically the same.

in my city some zip codes are wrong!

ScottSUmmers said:
Btw, how come you didn't question why it was placing the marker on the green side of a mountain?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
lol...my wife was navigating from her Focus. I never saw the thing. Even then, I probably would have believed it, as I've been up many crazy mountain roads in this state, and it wouldn't have surprised me at all if the condo had been 13 miles out of town on a mountainside.
Localhorst86 said:
I can not verify this. I typed in the adress just as you specified, and this is what it came up with. I checked in google maps and bing maps. Bing maps is identical google maps is ~500 feet west of the spot, so practically the same.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Weird. Apparently ScottSUmmers gets the same result I do. What your screenshot shows is where I was SUPPOSED to be. I wish I could take a screenshot to show you what I'm seeing. Thanks for checking!

Localhorst86 said:
I can not verify this. I typed in the adress just as you specified, and this is what it came up with. I checked in google maps and bing maps. Bing maps is identical google maps is ~500 feet west of the spot, so practically the same.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
PS: Google maps would still be more accurate based on your screenshot, as the actual address was no more than halfway down that street, not all the way at the end.

I think the misspelling is the key. If I put the address in my phone exactly as shown (without the 'e') it is way wrong. But if I add the 'e', it goes to the right spot.
When I use the web version of Bing Maps, it tells me that the city is spelled incorrectly, and auto-corrects it. That seems to be the piece that is broken/missing on WP7.

RoboDad said:
I think the misspelling is the key. If I put the address in my phone exactly as shown (without the 'e') it is way wrong. But if I add the 'e', it goes to the right spot.
When I use the web version of Bing Maps, it tells me that the city is spelled incorrectly, and auto-corrects it. That seems to be the piece that is broken/missing on WP7.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That was also my experience. Strange, since there's not two similarly-named towns out there or anything. How one letter could confuse their system so much I have no idea. I'm waiting for an address for my wife so I can demonstrate one of the other two times Bing has steered me way wrong.
Maybe it's just my state, but if I can't trust Bing, then I can't use Bing.

weird, though. I left out the "e" as well on my phone, it still found it...
EDIT: I just realized this. I typed it without the "e" and it showed up as "Silverthorn" in the destination entry. But as soon as I hit enter to calculate the route, my phone would automatically change the town to "Silverthorne". I cannot at all search for "silverthorn"

13 miles is nothing, try 8668 miles. see this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wNQVTjw4vU
I get the same results every time.

drokkon said:
So last week I went to stay in a condo with some friends. They texted me the address and it conveniently created a link that took me right to Bing maps. I was a half-hour late because Bing Maps dropped me off THIRTEEN MILES AWAY from the actual address. This is fully the THIRD time that I've been late or completely missed an event because Bing maps couldn't get me to the right place. Worse, every time someone asks why I was late and I respond "my phone took me to the wrong place," they ask what I'm using. When I reluctantly admit that it is Bing, I always get something to the effect of, "oh, THAT'S why."
In the end, I used the gMaps app to get to the right place. The weirdest thing is that when I went to Bing Maps on a browser at the condo, it GOT THE ADDRESS RIGHT! It's only the Bing Maps on my phone that dropped me off far, far away.
Try it for yourself on your Windows phone "Maps" app, on Bing Maps on a browser, or on Google Maps:
4010 Silverheels Dr, Silverthorn, CO 80498
(I know "Silverthorne" is misspelled, but that's how it was in the text message, so I'm leaving it as-is for troubleshooting reasons.)
WHY?!?!?!?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is probably because Windows phone doesn't force autocorrect. (instead suggests unline the iphone for example and others) it underlined it as possibly wrong on mine with correct suggestion (when doing search in bing maps on phone) Bing maps on the pc just assumes you ment the correct one and takes u there.

I was driving to the airport one day and decided to use map on my HTC HD7. I don't know if its my phone company's fault or my phone.
1)The refresh rate on my phone was so slow i couldn't even see where im going on my phone
2)For some reason when I enabled always facing where my car is facing the Map app on Wp7 doesn't work at all
3)The voice which is suppose to help you doesn't work at all.
I gave up using the map app on my phone and switched to Outdoor navigation instead

Same here, some street numbers are inverted... almost missed a meeting...

I've had a long list of experiences where bing maps gave the wrong street, city, ghost locations, etc and I have come to the realization that I can't trust it... I use it for directions in the city (nyc), and you would think that businesses would be well mapped. Oh well... maybe ovi maps can step up to google maps :/

searching "fedex drop off location" took me to dairy queen last night. needless to say, the package was late, but, i got an oreo blizzard. so i'm torn with bing maps right now. yes, i missed my shipment, but, i got a blizzard...
it was like, "sorry i screwed you up, here's some ice cream to make you feel better... by the way, you got $2.99 i can borrow?"

Count yourself lucky if Bing Maps or Local Scout actually works in your country. They're *still* broken in most regions of the world.

Happens to me all the time. Even if I type it right into the map search.
That's why I always find it on google maps on a desktop first, then crosscheck it with the Bing result. I don't trust it. Probably never will.

Yeah typing the full address is usually important but I tend to leave out the city and state and just do 4010 Silverheels Dr 80498 reason being is there are sometimes cities or sub divisions near eachother that contain the same name and can have the same street name. This is why UPS/FEDEX/USPS don't give a hoot about your city name (that is really just there for you) they like to use zip or even better zip + 4.
Now it sounds strange but look up your friends address http://zip4.usps.com/zip4/zcl_0_results.jsp here at the USPS. It dosent exist!
---------- Post added at 08:16 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:54 PM ----------
Ok so now this is funny. Go lookup "80498" in google maps. Now look it up in Bing. Now with yahoo.
They all place 80498 in roughly the same place.
You will notice that that center is over 25 miles away (via roads) to the city you were looking for. 80498 shares the same zip as Heeney, CO.
I would consider 80498 as a rural area and therefore the single zip code covers a very very big area. Bing's Default search radius is somewhere between 5-15 miles. There definately is a bug in how Bing Mobile resolves a typo (yeah if you typed it right you would have gotten there right away).
The way Tom Tom (for example) looks up address is in logical order:
State -> City -> Street -> Building Number.
GPS' have to do this so they give you context and a filtered view. Imagine if you started typing 4010 how many address would popup!
Anyways...just submit a bug report by clicking the address in the map clicking the "..."'s and then clicking suggest changes. They will change it for you.
Don't think that Bing is the only one that screws up however, I've seen Google, yahoo, mapquest (yeah remember them?), Waze, TomTom, and garmin all give me wrong directions.

I guess they must have fixed this, I got linked to this discussion from another thread, yet when I tried it on my HD7 (TMOUS 8107), it automatically corrected it for me from the bing maps search and showed me the same thing the web app does (although it didn't warn me like the web app that it was corrected). Just for giggles I emailed the address to myself to see if it was a link related thing and got the same correct result. I noticed how old the thread is but just wanted to say that it looks like it was fixed at some point (which is an assumption since I never got to see it broken). Perhaps the partnership with Nokia included address resolution logic changes?
4010 Silverheels Dr, Silverthorn, CO 80498

My list of Bing Maps frustrations:
- It doesn't map a route from one country to another, otherwise everything works well.
Wouldnt it be fab if Bing can actually route directions from your location to another, worldwide? Like with public transits included from and to.

[Q] Google Search Assistant - Does it work out of the USA?

I've been trying Jelly Bean on my GN for a couple days now and, while the whole experience has been awesome, there is a particular feature announced at I/O that does not work: the Search Assistant. You know, those Siri-like cards with info that show up after you perform a Google search while a voice reads them out.
Is that working for you guys living in the USA? What about those who, like me, live abroad? Does it have a geographical restriction? Is it just still not live yet?
Would welcome some help about this.

one of the option in the google now/voice thing is "use google.com instead of localised google". If you check that as 'yes' then you would get the cards with pics how up, but if you say "what is the weather" or "what is the time" it would always default to Washington DC, USA no matter where you are outside USA (And other issues like "what is the weather in waterloo shows me waterloo, USA instead of waterloo, canada).
that being said...
the voice search works fine otherwise with localised search. As much as it bugs me to not have those cards with the pic show up after a voice search, its mosly a "for looks" thing. voice search assisstant works perfectly however, it also shows cards (just not with pictures) for results as it should.

TjPhysicist said:
one of the option in the google now/voice thing is "use google.com instead of localised google". If you check that as 'yes' then you would get the cards with pics how up
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not in my case. I asked it to use google.com, disabled using my location and even changed the language to US English, but to no avail. Maybe it just also works in Canada?

frandavid100 said:
Not in my case. I asked it to use google.com, disabled using my location and even changed the language to US English, but to no avail. Maybe it just also works in Canada?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
try turning it off and back on, or erasing data/cache for that app, sometimes resetting it does the trick.

Hm... no, no dice. What I would really like is to know if this is also happening to other folks in Europe.

frandavid100 said:
Hm... no, no dice. What I would really like is to know if this is also happening to other folks in Europe.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Works "alright" here in the UK. I can set alarms, send texts and if I say "weather" it brings up the weather in my location as well as speaks it back. Also works for weather in other locations. Cards with images and data DO pop up, but it is a bit hit and miss. A lot of the time you just get a google search. However, the navigation if I have just searched for a place on Google works well. I done a search for an address earlier to see where it was in relation to me, 30 seconds later I had a navigation card informing me of the route a possible delays. I'm happy with it, when it works (which is most of the time) its a fantastic addition.
Sent from my Jelly Belly using xda app-developers app

tbe cooklys
If you are still having trouble, you may want to check out this tutorial which made it work for me in Germany: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=28043720&postcount=1
Interestingly, after I had google.com set as search engine, Google Now always thought I was in Washington and thus only showed Washington-based Information to me. Thus I switched back to google.de, now getting local information about my actual location. Google Now still works for me without having the search engine set to google.com
Cheers
CT

Contacts App Questions

Hi guys,
I am thinking of buying a Pixel XL. I played with one today at the store and I found a disturbing issue to me. If I add a contact it only gives me one line for the address. Exactly the same BS like on the web portal of gmail.
Usually, you can click somewhere and expand the address field to more but single fields for street, city, country and so on.
This one line might work just great if you use only US addresses, but as soon you get into international addresses from countries around the world. Google can't handle the input anymore and gets confused what is what.
Was I just to blind to see how to expand the field or is it really that bad? Now I would need to install a second contacts app with this option. Great job Google!!!

Not sure if this a feasible work around but you could possible try a differnt contact apps?
See here: https://play.google.com/store/search?q=Contacts&c=apps&hl=en

Scott said:
Not sure if this a feasible work around but you could possible try a differnt contact apps?
See here: https://play.google.com/store/search?q=Contacts&c=apps&hl=en
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That was my thougt too. but thats stupid. Esepcially if its just used to add addresses. So far I havent seen a phone which doesnt have the expandable address field except the PIxels

Snake-Plissken said:
Hi guys,
I am thinking of buying a Pixel XL. I played with one today at the store and I found a disturbing issue to me. If I add a contact it only gives me one line for the address. Exactly the same BS like on the web portal of gmail.
Usually, you can click somewhere and expand the address field to more but single fields for street, city, country and so on.
This one line might work just great if you use only US addresses, but as soon you get into international addresses from countries around the world. Google can't handle the input anymore and gets confused what is what.
Was I just to blind to see how to expand the field or is it really that bad? Now I would need to install a second contacts app with this option. Great job Google!!!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I may not be understanding correctly, but I just tried adding a new contact and I was able to add a multi-line address. I just hit enter after each line and a new line appeared.
Eg.
1234 Street name
City
Province
Postal Code
Is this what you meant, or did I misunderstand the problem?

As I'm German and only save German, a few French, Danish and some addresses from Luxembourg I too don't see the problem.
As mentioned above you can always hit enter for another line but even if you don't and write it all in one line Google is always smart enough to know where to navigate me.
Correct me but if you have saved a contact with an address and you hit it you get directed to maps, maps searches instantly for the address and it doesn't even matter if postal code, town or even country is missing.

DanVanDamn said:
As I'm German and only save German, a few French, Danish and some addresses from Luxembourg I too don't see the problem.
As mentioned above you can always hit enter for another line but even if you don't and write it all in one line Google is always smart enough to know where to navigate me.
Correct me but if you have saved a contact with an address and you hit it you get directed to maps, maps searches instantly for the address and it doesn't even matter if postal code, town or even country is missing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tried to do the same before in the web portal of gmail. No matter if i enter everything in one line or hit enter. Google got confused. I dont remember what addresses gave me problems. I think one was Butan, Kazachstan, Peru and Chile I believe.
Also if i view the entry from the web portal on my mobile (galaxy note) and I go to edit contact. The address is completly mixed up. In the city field is the street, street is country and so on. It was a big mess up. I dont know if Google already improved that. I stopped using the web portal and entered the addresses on mobile where I had the actual fields for City, Street, ZIP and so on...
I dont have a Pixel yet so cant try a lot. I played with it in a Verizon store....