Siri

Apple has just announced from the iPad 3 event that their popular voice assistant, Siri, will be making its way to customers in Japan. It will be part of iOS 5.1 which will be available starting today. Siri will be rolled out in Japan over the next few weeks.

Siri is currently available in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Germany, and France. This aligns with Apple's plan to roll out Siri to even more countries during 2012.

Siri on the iPad would need to address connectivity, user interface scaling, and some long missing apps

I would love to have Siri, Apple's voice-controlled virtual assistant, on the iPad 3. I wrote in my iPad 3 event preview preview that I anticipate it, and not a day goes by that I don't instinctively reach for the Dictation button on the iPad 2 keyboard and then grumble when I realize for the umpteenth time that it's just not there.

But as much as I love the idea of Siri on the iPad, there are some challenges Apple would need to overcome.

Mercedes Benz has announced that its new A-Class range of cars will have a new infotainment system which will be centered on the iPhone 4S and Siri. The new system will be announced and demonstrated at the Geneva Motor Show; which takes place next month.

The New York Times is reporting that Siri, a feature exclusive to the iPhone 4S, currently accounts for nearly 25 percent of all search queries conducted on the computational knowledge engine Wolfram Alpha.

AssistantExtensions is a jailbreak app for iPhone 4S that greatly enhances what you can do with Apple's Siri virtual assistant, including voice activation, app launching, translation, and more. Developers can even add their own, custom commands via a new plug-in architecture. That means, unlike the limited built-in functionality Apple provides, many more powerful, and interesting, commands become available.

It turns out that Apple's Siri voice assistant is enabled by special noise reduction hardware called earSmart, wired right into the Apple A5 processor. The technology is made by Audience, which has an earSmart-less chip in the iPhone 4. The difference is, the iPhone 4 chip was designed to reduce noise when speaking directly into the microphone (like when you're on a phone call), while the chip in the iPhone 4S is designed for a wider field of sound, so you could talk to your phone at arm's-length (as one tends to with Siri) and still benefit from noise cancellation. The bundling of earSmart with the processor explains why the A5 chip was so much bigger than expected, even after taking into account the second core. It also means that, if you're still desperately clinging to the hope that Apple will someday update the iPhone 4 with Siri functionality, now's the time to let go.

In the latest episode of CBS's "The Big Bang Theory" titled "Beta Test Initiation", Raj Koothrappali starts a relationship with a well-known woman - Siri.

There's a new virtual personal assistant in town and her name Evi. Created by True Knowledge and running Nuance’s voice recognition technology, Evi is going to give Siri a run for her money - once the servers aren't slammed, that is.

While Nuance can't comment about any relationship with Apple, it's widely believed their technology powers the voice recognition and dictation behind Siri, the iPhone 4S artificial assistant. It also powers several of their own apps in the iPhone and iPad App Store, including the industry leading Dragon Dictation and the new Dragon Go.

Live from CES 2012, we talk to Nuance about the current state of voice recognition, how it's helping to re-define mobile, and where it's heading in the future.

9to5 Mac has uncovered what could be Apple's plan to bring Siri dictation to the iPad once iOS 5.1 is released.

Our own tipster Sonny Dickson was looking through the iOS 5.1 beta 3 settings application on the iPad and discovered a new section in the keyboard menu called “About Privacy and Dictation.” When opened, as shown above, the iPad provides the user with the standard legal literature and feature information for Siri Dictation.