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Google Now vs. Siri vs. Cortana – The Great Knowledge Box Showdown

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Re: Google Now vs. Siri vs. Cortana – The Great Knowledge Box Showdown

#131

Post by Houshalter »

mrfusion wrote: post #90
Houshalter wrote: post #67

A while back I created a toy IRC bot that answers questions like this just by searching reddit and taking the top comment. It works surprisingly well for questions that are likely to have been asked before. And when it does work, the result is much better than a dry wikipedia excerpt. I then added some simple machine learning to filter search results for the most relevant threads which improved it quite a bit.

That might actually make a new kind of search engine. You should put it on the web?

It's currently running on a few IRC channels on snoonet. People seem to have lost interest in it though.

As I said, it only works for questions that are likely to have been posted on reddit before. Not a general search engine.

Re: Google Now vs. Siri vs. Cortana – The Great Knowledge Box Showdown

#132

Post by pinkyand »

mark_l_watson wrote: post #113

I think these results were slightly biased because questions seemed to have been chosen to trigger Google search infobox results. BTW, I worked with Knowledge Graph last year when I consulted at Google. It is an incredibly nice project. The team, who helped me when I needed help, was great - constantly improving the platform. I am also using the IBM Watson APIs right now while helping another customer, so I feel like…

How does Watson compares to the Google technology in your opinion ?

Re: Google Now vs. Siri vs. Cortana – The Great Knowledge Box Showdown

#133

Post by pinkyand »

Houshalter wrote: post #67

A while back I created a toy IRC bot that answers questions like this just by searching reddit and taking the top comment. It works surprisingly well for questions that are likely to have been asked before. And when it does work, the result is much better than a dry wikipedia excerpt. I then added some simple machine learning to filter search results for the most relevant threads which improved it quite a bit.

Sounds interesting. Do you mind sharing how did you trained your machine learning algorithm ? It seems like an awfully hard task, since in a sense you are competing with the Google algorithm and the order it offered you.

Re: Google Now vs. Siri vs. Cortana – The Great Knowledge Box Showdown

#134

Post by wil421 »

gtk40 wrote: post #99
wil421 wrote: post #92

I havent used Cortana but in my experiences Siri has been much more accurate in guessing what I said. Google now on my S4 is horrible when I try to use it. Most of the time I have to talk like a robot to get something right. That being said I really like Google Now but the accuracy of speech to text is what killed it for me.

That's interesting. What accent do you have? I am consistently surprised at how well my S3 reads my voice. It can get it even when I am tired and half-pronouncing words or even singing them (at least with "What does the fox say"). But I also generally use it at my apartment (very quiet) and I have a pretty standard American accent.

My accent is "standard American" if you met me you wouldnt be able to tell where I was from unless I said certain words. I'm from the South but by no means do I have any sort of Southern drawl.

I use it frequently in the car so maybe the background noise is affecting it.

Re: Google Now vs. Siri vs. Cortana – The Great Knowledge Box Showdown

#135

Post by eco »

ironcrucible wrote: post #125
Toddarooski wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google Now does do location-based reminders. I've never tried the "Next time I'm talking to my mom" thing, though.

I'd be interested to know if Google Now can do people reminders. Unfortunately I sold my last Android device so I'm unable to test it myself, but a quick search brings up this article[1] which suggests that it doesn't exist yet. Either way, I'm sure it's only a matter of time until both Siri and Google Now can do it too (which is a good thing, I've found it incredibly useful). [1]. https://support.google.com/websearc…

It can't do reminders when you are around people yet but there have been clues[1] that it's coming found when poking inside the Google Search app. It's expected to make use of the leaked Google Nearby[2] which will "...periodically turn on the mic, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and similar features..." to aid with proximity.

1. http://www.androidpolice.com/2014/03/17/rumor-remind-me-when... 2. http://www.androidpolice.com/2014/06/06/exclusive-google-wil...

Re: Google Now vs. Siri vs. Cortana – The Great Knowledge Box Showdown

#136

Post by toxican »

escapologybb wrote: post #94

Having used both of them, I really couldn't live without Siri to be honest. I'm quadriplegic, and whilst obviously I wouldn't die without Siri my life is immeasurably better with her. Some of the killer features of Siri for me are being able to to write emails, send messages and get quick answers to general questions throughout the day. She is much better at the first two than she is at the last one though, but even…

I really like the "Hey Siri!" feature, although why it's only usable while the phone is charging is beyond me. I thought maybe battery concerns since it has to be constantly listening, but I wouldn't think it would be that taxing on the battery.

How do you handle typos in iOS as a quadriplegic? They're a pain in the ass to fix by hand and I didn't even know you could do it by voice.

Re: Google Now vs. Siri vs. Cortana – The Great Knowledge Box Showdown

#137

Post by beams_of_light »

Anecdotal I know, but it's strange that so many responses in this thread find Siri more useful than Google. I use an iPad and a Galaxy S3, and when I ask Siri questions, more of than not, she fails to give me an answer or provide meaningful search results. I can ask Google to find me any retail business locally and get proper results, call them with voice commands, etc. Siri chokes on a lot of those requests.

Re: Google Now vs. Siri vs. Cortana – The Great Knowledge Box Showdown

#138

Post by Houshalter »

RBerenguel wrote: post #73
Houshalter wrote: post #67

A while back I created a toy IRC bot that answers questions like this just by searching reddit and taking the top comment. It works surprisingly well for questions that are likely to have been asked before. And when it does work, the result is much better than a dry wikipedia excerpt. I then added some simple machine learning to filter search results for the most relevant threads which improved it quite a bit.

Interesting! Care to share some sample question that is likely to be answered by reddit? I tried it manually and can't find answers to any question I can think of right now (looks like I could be failing a Turing test any time soon)

You can try it at https://kiwiirc.com/client/snoonet.org##bottest, if it's online just do "!ask question". Examples:

>!ask what is the largest prime number?

For primes of the form 2^n - 1 (known as [Mersenne primes](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mersenne_prime)), a very fast primality test known as the [Lucas-Lehmer test](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucas%E2%80%93Lehmer_primality_...) is available. The ten largest currently known prime numbers are all Mersenne primes.

>!ask what's the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?

African or European?

> !ask tell me a joke

I was eating chicken tonight last night, and got a little bone in one of the fillets. So I said "Fillet? More like fill-it with bones! Haha!" Then I looked around at the empty table and quietly sobbed into my bowl.

Re: Google Now vs. Siri vs. Cortana – The Great Knowledge Box Showdown

#139

Post by modfodder »

chetanahuja wrote: post #78
modfodder wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, as accurate as I feel your statement is, I'd also say sometimes it depends on the 10% missing from the products not done by Apple. If it's an important 10% that Apple has nailed (or close enough) then sometimes the 50% is more valuable than the 90%. But we all have our biases as well. (Even as an Apple user I fully expect Google to always win the Knowledge Vault race. Its in their wheelhouse more so than Apple'…

"Well, as accurate as I feel your statement is, I'd also say sometimes it depends on the 10% missing from the products not done by Apple. If it's an important 10% that Apple has nailed (or close enough) then sometimes the 50% is more valuable than the 90%" Heh, you not only proved kumarm's point about apple fanboi'sm but served the proof on a silver platter with a little side of dessert.

I believe that is fanboi'sm in general, but if you feel better you about yourself you can keep thinking it is just apple users.

Re: Google Now vs. Siri vs. Cortana – The Great Knowledge Box Showdown

#140

Post by Houshalter »

pinkyand wrote: post #133
Houshalter wrote: post #67

A while back I created a toy IRC bot that answers questions like this just by searching reddit and taking the top comment. It works surprisingly well for questions that are likely to have been asked before. And when it does work, the result is much better than a dry wikipedia excerpt. I then added some simple machine learning to filter search results for the most relevant threads which improved it quite a bit.

Sounds interesting. Do you mind sharing how did you trained your machine learning algorithm ? It seems like an awfully hard task, since in a sense you are competing with the Google algorithm and the order it offered you.

The reddit search engine isn't very good. It's just logistic regression with a number of features, like the percent of 1, 2, and 3-gram matches, it's score, number of comments, and if it's a selfpost.
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