Maybe the title is a little exaggerated, because you’re going to need words to make it work, so let’s tone it down and just call it super awesome instead. Google just unveiled a new feature for Android 2.2 called Voice Actions that basically let’s you do just about everything with a tap on the Voice icon, and a voice command. That’s a little too simple though, since just about every modern smartphone will let you do voice dialing—a feature that you seldom use, right? The video demo (video after the break) shows it doing a lot more than though, letting you search for music online and play it, set alarms, send text messages, send emails with smiley faces, look for map directions and, well, just watch the video because it’s likely something you’d want your next phone to have. Or something you’d want to download right now if you have an Android 2.2 phone.
Super awesome, right? The application recognizes word cues for doing the right tasks after you tap on the Voice Action button. So a sentence beginning with “send text” will take you to the SMS screen, “send email” will write your message down as an email, “map of” will take you to Google Maps, “note to self” will take you to the note app, and so on. Saying anything else will take you to google search.
The Android 2.2 requirement kind of limits the number of phones that can support it, but it does look like a good reason to plan for a new phone. For the phones already updated to Android 2.2, Voice Actions is available through the Android Market. The new Droid 2, it already features Voice Actions.
Tags: Android, Google, Mobile Apps
