AI-Infused iOS 18 Lauded as 'Ambitious and Compelling' by Apple Execs

[BKDad]

OK, ask yourself this:

If I was put into Tim Cook's chair and could push the company into any direction I wanted, what software features would I find "ambitious and compelling"? Not interesting to look at and never use, but actually compelling and worthwhile?

~~~

I'd bet that having the bugs squashed so that you don't get so frustrated might be very high on the list.

Nobody in my household or extended family even uses Siri. We've all tried it and found it fairly useless based on what it can really do for day to day activities. Same for a lot of the various super duper features and enhancements that were widely touted over the past several years.

I'm certainly not suggesting that my experience is relevant for anybody else, but, who knows?

 

[MallardDuck]

"If I only had a brain" from Wizard of Oz is Siri's theme song.

 

[LogicalApex]

It's all good. Just don't artificially limit features to the latest iPhones, or Pro models.

They absolutely will do so.

Remember, the iPhone 14 Pro lacks Smart HDR 5 when the iPhone 15 Pro has it on identical camera hardware and RAM amounts. As the “neural chip” in the 14 Pro just can’t handle it 🙄.

They’ll do the same here.

 

[Pirate!]

More offline, please! I just want things to work without having to go out to the net. Set timers, call people, send a text, etc. I don't want to have a conversation with my iPhone.

I know a lot of people go nuts got chatgpt and the like, but I can't find any use for it other than making Excel macros.

My Siri use is strictly related to setting timers for cooking. It works maybe 70-80% of the time, but the remainder I get try again later or whatever the message is. It’s really frustrating when I have dirty hands and have to try and set it on my watch.

I would like to see integration of Siri with Apps. I would like to be able to just order a pepperoni pizza from Dominoes and have Siri guide me through the process first (what size would you like, Small, Medium, Large), then order through the best app, pay, and keep me up to date on the delivery. I don't care what app is best to order pizza, I care that the pizza arrives.

We need to move to a post-app world.

(and while we are at it, can Apple store a copy of my apps in the cloud so I can use all apps via Siri on my Apple Watch...?)

I would love to see a text version of Siri in chatbot form that was added to spotlight.

To get rid of apps (or at least make them where you didn’t have to open them) Apple could use their apis to help with this. It’d be amazing to be able to do some of the following scenarios via chat, ideally for me, or voice:
1) me: reorder last order from chipotle for pickup at 6p tonight
2) Siri/spotlight: order placed and ready for pickup at 6p. Traffic is light and will take 15 minutes to get there.

Or,

1) me: order pad Thai
2) S/S: I see you last ordered from restaurant X using Grubhub, would you like me to place that order again (using Grubhub integration)?
3) me: same restaurant, but is it cheaper ordering via a different site?
4) s/s: with your chow now account, I can place an order for $1 less due to service fees. I have also found a website for the restaurant that is $2 cheaper which can be ordered as a guest and has 10 min less wait time.
5) me: use specifics from last order and reorder from the website for next available time
6) S/s: order placed, food will be ready at 6:10p

Or suggest newer restaurants or restaurants with better reviews, etc.

This could be done with pretty much any service group type out there, not just restaurants/food. Barbers, hotels, rental cars, groceries, … “I need to be in New Orleans for four days starting on 10/31/23, find me the lowest priced flight and rental car combination that arrives no later than 10a staring with my preferred vendors”

Currency would be a problem still, which is why I think apps wouldn’t be able to go fully away (references for latest offerings and prices would still need to be available). Making a lot of every day tasks take a little less time (like the above) could potentially provide a big aggregate time savings.

 

[LogicalApex]

My Siri use is strictly related to setting timers for cooking. It works maybe 70-80% of the time, but the remainder I get try again later or whatever the message is. It’s really frustrating when I have dirty hands and have to try and set it on my watch.


I would love to see a text version of Siri in chatbot form that was added to spotlight.

To get rid of apps (or at least make them where you didn’t have to open them) Apple could use their apis to help with this. It’d be amazing to be able to do some of the following scenarios via chat, ideally for me, or voice:
1) me: reorder last order from chipotle for pickup at 6p tonight
2) Siri/spotlight: order placed and ready for pickup at 6p. Traffic is light and will take 15 minutes to get there.

Or,

1) me: order pad Thai
2) S/S: I see you last ordered from restaurant X using Grubhub, would you like me to place that order again (using Grubhub integration)?
3) me: same restaurant, but is it cheaper ordering via a different site?
4) s/s: with your chow now account, I can place an order for $1 less due to service fees. I have also found a website for the restaurant that is $2 cheaper which can be ordered as a guest and has 10 min less wait time.
5) me: use specifics from last order and reorder from the website for next available time
6) S/s: order placed, food will be ready at 6:10p

Or suggest newer restaurants or restaurants with better reviews, etc.

This could be done with pretty much any service group type out there, not just restaurants/food. Barbers, hotels, rental cars, groceries, … “I need to be in New Orleans for four days starting on 10/31/23, find me the lowest priced flight and rental car combination that arrives no later than 10a staring with my preferred vendors”

Currency would be a problem still, which is why I think apps wouldn’t be able to go fully away (references for latest offerings and prices would still need to be available). Making a lot of every day tasks take a little less time (like the above) could potentially provide a big aggregate time savings.

Would you trust Siri for that?

Pickup would be like a box of chocolates. Never know what you’re going to get.

🤣

 

[d-klumpp]

Seemingly the favorite pastime of most forum readers here is contributing yet-another tired Siri joke, including the claim that Siri hasn't improved in a decade. However, for me Siri has recently become noticeably more accurate and responsive (much), and even is showing modest signs of courtesy. A couple times recently, she has surprised me by responding "No problem" when I say, "Thank you," following a well-executed or helpful response. Siri also is doing better at HomeKit requests when my wife doesn't quite get the named device correct. Of course, I cannot tell you how much better an Amazon or Google experience is because I won't support either company, but my personal experience is that Siri is making important strides, quietly.

 

[jjudson]

My iPhone is going to kill me in my sleep.

I just know it...

 

[Frantisekj]

Curious to see Apple’s take on LLM features. If we’re talking about deep integration not just between apps but also between devices that could be huge

If you have two devices they will be finally able to live without you and talk each to other lol

 

[Oestreich Dieter]

I want to use AI on my iphone and tell it to create complex automations, instead of having to do it manually through shortcuts app.

 

[WWPD]

Rumor has it that the AI will soon rival Holly from Red Dwarf.

 

[Frantisekj]

Just fix the bugs. Please. No one cares about any of this. Make it reliable and not drain battery. Please and thank you.

Yeah like totally horrible autocorrect and spellchecker in my language. Natural text to voice.

 

[sflagel]

I seem to recall Apple saying that the more you use Siri, the better it gets. When people give up after a time or two, they never give Siri enough time to be trained as to what to say. If that’s true, use Siri for a whole year on your device and she should be better than at the beginning of the year, although I never did get her to spell my sister’s name correctly after correcting it many many multiples of times.

she doesn't get better

 

[mxrider88]

Their developers can’t code and the management keeps pushing features.

It’s gonna be an absolute disaster.

 

[macduke]

LLM Siri, text Chase "Call recent and set meetings"
LLM Siri: "Erasing all content and settings..."

 

[Minato1990]

so I’ll be able to curse siri and get her to respond back instead of taking the high road

 

[smulji]

The M4 will debut next autumn with macOS 15, so that's 4 generations of M-series Macs.

Is it certain M4 debuts after only a year or does Apple keep to an 18-month upgrade cycle like they do with iPad?

 

[slb]

Just fix the bugs. Please. No one cares about any of this. Make it reliable and not drain battery. Please and thank you.

I care about this. It will be a major update to Siri's ability to understand prompts.

 

[MrPiper415]

Not being argumentative here, genuine question: what is it your care about? Can you give an example of something good you think it might do? I'd like to be excited, but like another poster said I fear it's just going to be gimmicky crap.

I would like Siri to be way, way more conversational.

I’d like to ask it for some restaurant recommendations when I’m in a new city. I’d like to ask it to narrow it to a specific cuisine, and within a budget and for the back-and-forth to be a single conversation. I’d like it to provide a verbal summary when prompted of recent reviews etc.

I’d like it to be more helpful and better integrated with native apps. I’d like to be able to ask it to set up a meeting with a colleague, and for it to find some mutual time and slot in a calendar invite. I’d like it to verbally summarise emails that I’ve received, or long group chats that I’ve missed, or websites that I’m viewing.

I’d like it to be much more reliable. If I’m driving and I ask it text someone, I want to be confident that the message has actually sent.

 

[mdriftmeyer]

More offline, please! I just want things to work without having to go out to the net. Set timers, call people, send a text, etc. I don't want to have a conversation with my iPhone.

I know a lot of people go nuts got chatgpt and the like, but I can't find any use for it other than making Excel macros.

Which is it? More battery life or more local processing? LLM on a phone would eat massive resources. You want the phone to be a light weight interface to instantiate calls to servers to offload these requests to access LLM.

 

[JordanCautious]

Please, please, please let them actually fix Siri so I can switch away from Alexa. I still can't believe a trillion dollar company has the worst assistant on the market. Wasting money on an Alexa device because I can't trust my thousand dollar assistant on my phone to control my devices for me smh

 

[aberdeenmeadows]

I'm sorry, but this should have been done a long time ago when SIRI was launched. It's lame for me to have to learn how to talk to SIRI rather than the other way around. Grateful that they are finally doing it, but come on!

I know many here have little problems with getting SIRI to do things, but dang... it's embarrassing when my GF is in the car and she lost her phone and she asks me to call her phone and I say "Siri, call my girlfriend" and SIRI responds "Which one?" Do you mean... and then lists three or four random names! j/k

 

[Tagbert]

More gimmicky features piled on to impress shareholders when theres a mountain of bugs still not fixed

Starting to hate this company

If you read other posts in this thread you will see that there is a widespread desire to have Apple improve Siri and to integrate AI into other apps to improve their functionality. This seems to be driven by customer demand, not shareholders. so far, iOS 17.1.1 seems to have addressed a lot of the earlier bugs.

 

[Tagbert]

I'm sorry, but this should have been done a long time ago when SIRI was launched. It's lame for me to have to learn how to talk to SIRI rather than the other way around. Grateful that they are finally doing it, but come on!

I know many here have little problems with getting SIRI to do things, but dang... it's embarrassing when my GF is in the car and she lost her phone and she asks me to call her phone and I say "Siri, call my girlfriend" and SIRI responds "Which one?" Do you mean... and then lists three or four random names! j/k

How is Siri to know who your girlfriend is?

 

[SoldOnApple]

Love AI ❤️ 🤖

 

[goonie4life9]

Apple used to make fun of Microsoft and Intel and all the specs porn they used, now all the Apple presentations are just specs specs specs. "Magic" vanishes the moment you know how the trick works.

Bingo! Plus, their "specs" are rarely actually specifications and are, instead, trite hyperbole: "fastest ever," "most powerful ever," "longest battery life ever," etc. Of course Apple releases the "best" version of each of their products, but using the same phrases every year makes it appear they are trying to hide something. Let the products, not the PR, shine.