The iOS 6 Review: Maps Thoroughly Investigated and More
by Brian Klug & Saumitra Bhagwat on September 19, 2012 2:21 PM ESTSiri
We put Siri through her paces quite extensively when we reviewed the iPhone 4S, and since then, she’s learnt some new tricks along the way. Also, Siri is no longer exclusive to the iPhone. At Apple’s Fall event last week, it was revealed that in addition to the 3rd generation iPad, Siri will also be available on the new 5th generation iPod touch. So with the iPhone 4S and the iPhone 5, that’s four devices with support for Siri now. Good stuff.
Well hello there Siri running on an iPad!
Location based Siri queries really depend on, as you might guess, your location. A lot of queries worked fine in the US, however we also did testing in Dubai where the results have been quite appalling. There’s very little that you can do with Siri in Dubai. Anything location-based simply doesn’t work, but other, more general queries work just fine.
I was actually quite impressed by Siri’s sports quotient; it pulls up game schedules and team rosters very accurately. Now this isn’t limited to American sports, because it pulled up information about teams and schedules for the English Premier League as well. Other stuff like Cricket and Table Tennis evoked a much humbler response; probably something we can expect to see a few years down the line. Siri can now also launch apps, but unless you have a ton of apps, it’s probably faster to do it the old-fashioned way. Just for fun, I was looking at some of the queries Anand ran for Siri in our iPhone 4S review and decided to replicate the one for calculating tips. I was pleasantly surprised to see the results, because it returned the answer in USD as well as AED (UAE Dirham). Its little things like these that go a long way towards fostering the kind of overzealous customer loyalty that Apple enjoys.
Siri's good with non-American sports too.
People may use Siri to do a lot of different things and I would argue that, because of the subjective nature of the results, primarily based on your location and other external factors, a review would simply not do justice to all the readers. So instead of focusing on Siri’s performance, we will be focusing more on its implementation on the iPad.
Now the iPad has a mammoth 9.7” screen compared to the 3.5” screen on the iPhone 4S and the 4” screens on the new iPhone 5 and 5th generation iPod touch. I expected Siri on the iPad to be more than a simple port of the iPhone version; but that’s exactly what Apple’s done. I’ve had a similar complaint with Notifications Center on the iPad as well. Apple’s entire argument with the iPad was that apps get a bigger canvas and developers can do a lot more with the extra screen real estate. But with Siri, Apple does not seem to be making good use of that space at all. You get the same-sized UI from the iPhone, and after one query, you’re left scrolling away to glory to keep track of your results.
It could have been helpful if Siri had a slightly more optimized UI to leverage the added screen space afforded by the iPad. Just as an example, I tried to get Manchester United’s team roster, and low and behold, I was scrolling forever to get through that list. At the very least, they could make the UI taller so that it displays more information. Apart from that, I do not have any major gripes with the way Siri works on the iPad, and it’s definitely a welcome addition.
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snoozemode - Wednesday, September 19, 2012 - link
With the increasingly more powerful hardware that runs Ipad and Iphone it only seems like a question of when, we will se Ipads and Iphones running OSX with something like a device-dependent skin and some under-hood tuning to fit the device. IOS feels aged in many ways and a merge in to something new seems natural.solipsism - Wednesday, September 19, 2012 - link
iOS is OS X. The took Mac OS X, brought down to it's core elements and built up iOS from that. At one point Apple advertised it as OS X Leopard and OS X Phone; I think at MacWorld 2008.You won't see the Aqua GUi, printer drivers, etc. on iOS because it doesn't make any sense. There is no advantage to have a user plug a mouse into their iPhone so they can navigate with a pointer. The UI was designed for touch. Why even consider scrapping that?
dcollins - Wednesday, September 19, 2012 - link
You obviously don't use the Mail App with Exchange. It still needs some work. My users have huge numbers of heavily nested folders (100s of folders, up to 5 levels deep) that they use to organize emails. When synced with Exchange, App pulls the entire list of folders and displays them fully expanded; you cannot hide/minimize nested folders! You cannot rearrange folders and moving emails between them is clunky at best.With more and more business users relying on iPhones for work, I would like to see a slew of improvements made to Mail's Exchange support.
robinthakur - Thursday, September 20, 2012 - link
I agree upto a point. Our advice to users is not to nest folders and store the emails to SharePoint, as well as minimise folders. This seems to trip up alot of devices though to be fair, which seem to have problems with Folders in Exchange. Being able to set Out of Office through the mail.app would be a go send also.dsumanik - Thursday, September 20, 2012 - link
or apple could just add collapsable folders.lol
yet another apple ifail
Stas - Sunday, September 23, 2012 - link
Give them a break. They have to invent them first.randomlinh - Wednesday, September 19, 2012 - link
"For now the sacrifice seems worth it as the payoff is something that works very well, but I worry about what happens down the road if you're forced to buy a device not because it's the best device for you, but because buying an alternative would hurt the experience on another, unrelated device"This is exactly what I fear. And I think we're closer to it than one might think
tekzor - Wednesday, September 19, 2012 - link
already happened with app storesGotThumbs - Wednesday, September 19, 2012 - link
Agreed.Apples walled garden offers zero choices for consumers when it comes to shopping for content elsewhere. The simple truth is that Apple controls each IProduct users access, and is expanding those controls continually, should be very concerning for its followers.
While I use two Android devices (Phone & Tablet), Google does not restrict/control my ability/freedom to shop for content outside their market place. Part of what makes an open market great is not limiting consumers options and allows price competitiveness. Consumers win.
Apple's currently in trouble (along with four publishing companies) for imposing price controls/fixing. Do you really care about Apples 30% share or are you more interested in getting the same product at the lowest price? At the end of the day....everyone wants their money to go as far as it can for them.
When you have options and time...you shop for the lowest price. Apple has eliminated ts collective users options/choices and wants to inflict its will on others...ie restricting Amazon's price structure and the economies of scale in selling the same books at a reduced price to consumers.
It simply amazes me how so many of the general public continue to willingly give up their freedom of choice. Do they really just want to be controlled and told what to do and how to hold their phone?
Microsoft NEVER EVER prevented a user from installing and using a different web-browser in Windows...yet they have been sued for millions all over the world....
. Apple builds a walled garden and forces its followers to shop ONLY at its market and even fixes prices so its sure to get its 30% cut on purchases....
...YET the DOJ continues to sit on their thumbs and does nothing.
What is wrong with this country?
OK I'm done with my rant.
btw. I wonder if the driver had followed Google Maps instead of Apples route....would he have avoided the traffic and arrived sooner? Just a thought.
Best wishes,
bplewis24 - Wednesday, September 19, 2012 - link
I'm glad somebody else is as baffled as I am about consumers' willingness to do the same. Eventually they will either wake up or get what they deserve.