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Siri Envy? Iris Brings Some Voice-Assistant Features to Android
Of all the upgrades that distinguish the new iPhone 4S from its predecessors, probably the feature that's gotten the most attention is the voice-based personal assistant app called Siri, which allows a user to accomplish certain tasks almost entirely by voice. A few days ago, as reported by TechCrunch, a team of Android developers came up with an Android equivalent to Siri called Iris (spell that backwards). It took them only 8 hours to have a working, if imperfect, app to play with and submit to the Android Market. This quick video review of Iris says the app is unpolished, but shows promise. For now, it generates some accurate results, and some amusing ones.
Siri was developed from technology created at the SRI in Palo Alto. It was a company which used technology spun of from CALO and PAL, two major (and intertwined) research initiatives funded partially by public funds. Siri spun off and began developing for iOs, Android and the Blackberry.
Apple simply bought Siri and shut down development for Android and the Blackberry. The core technologies remain available at https://pal.sri.com/Plone - it is not a matter of Apple having developed anything original at all.
Siri is much more than voice recognition. However, it was not developed by Apple. It was a 3rd party application created out of a bigger AI product, and was originally going to target all the smartphone platforms. Apple simply bought the firm and the technology, and shut down development for other platforms.