Google Releases Voice Actions for Android
Serving as handheld computers, phones, music players, notepads, and countless other applications — smartphones have become a modern day Swiss Army knife. Android phones are no exception.
Recently, the Droid phones have come out with a new feature called “Voice Actions.” With this capability, we are now able to speak various commands to Android phones for specific tasks, including checking emails, placing calls, and sending texts.
A list of the commands that can be used by Voice Actions is below:
* send text to [contact] [message]
* listen to [artist/song/album]
* call [business]
* call [contact]
* send email to [contact] [message]
* go to [website]
* note to self [note]
* navigate to [location/business name]
* directions to [location/business name]
* map of [location]
And of course, the Google voice search feature is still available. Both Voice Actions and the new Google search widget require Android 2.2, and will be pre-installed with the new Droid 2 phone. Voice Actions are currently available for U.S. English speakers, but will be expanded upon for other languages.
This article was written by Akshay Jetli. Akshay Jetli was a Pulse2 intern in August 2010. Following the internship, he resumed undergraduate studying at the University of Michigan.