Google’s new voice recognition system works instantly and offline (Pixel only) • Hacker News Board

Re: Google’s new voice recognition system works instantly and offline (Pixel only)

#11

Post by hathawsh » Tue, Mar 12, 2019, 9:08 PM UTC

I just switched my Pixel 1 to airplane mode and tried voice input. Sure enough, it worked offline and it was fast! Very impressive work. (I've tried that before, but in the past it could only understand a few special phrases.) I suppose this new feature came with the security update my phone downloaded a few days ago.

There are lots of ways to spin this, but I see it as a significant improvement for any app that could benefit from voice input. It's immediate and not susceptible to network glitches. The benefit for Google, IMHO, is primarily more sales of updated Android devices.

Re: Google’s new voice recognition system works instantly and offline (Pixel only)

#12

Post by penagwin » Tue, Mar 12, 2019, 9:10 PM UTC

Someone1234 wrote: post #4

Just to be clear: This has nothing to do with "Wake Words" (e.g. OK Google, Alexa, Hey Siri, etc) which have always been handled offline/locally. This is translating what you said after the wake word from voice to text on the local [Pixel] hardware rather than sending it into Google's Cloud. The biggest benefits here are speed and reliability. It could also handle some actions offline.

Another benefit is privacy, this eliminates an entire set of potentially personal data from being handed off to Google.

Re: Google’s new voice recognition system works instantly and offline (Pixel only)

#13

Post by penagwin » Tue, Mar 12, 2019, 9:14 PM UTC

dotdi wrote: post #7

Call me cynical but I cannot picture Google not tapping into everything you run through their voice recognition software, even if it does work offline. Doesn't mean it won't phone home later.

Right, but once this is implemented there is no excuse for audio to be "sent home".

Of course there will still be usage analytics, etc. But it does increase privacy to some degree, especially when compared to sending all audio after a certain phrase is mentioned.

Re: Google’s new voice recognition system works instantly and offline (Pixel only)

#14

Post by legohead » Tue, Mar 12, 2019, 9:14 PM UTC

been using Google Voice for several years now for most of my communications in text, email, slack, whatever (only on phone, of course).

it is quite good, and very fast. but it's still not there. it has trouble with nuances like "call" vs "called" -- can't hear that suffix very well in regular speech. for me, it also has a really hard time with pronouns.

many times I'll start off with regular speech, go to look at what was transcribed and notice a couple errors that would make me look like a fool, backspace the whole thing, and then repeating it all gain in a very robot like voice.

it's almost there.

Re: Google’s new voice recognition system works instantly and offline (Pixel only)

#15

Post by Someone1234 » Tue, Mar 12, 2019, 9:15 PM UTC

penagwin wrote: post #12

Someone1234 wrote: post #4

Just to be clear: This has nothing to do with "Wake Words" (e.g. OK Google, Alexa, Hey Siri, etc) which have always been handled offline/locally. This is translating what you said after the wake word from voice to text on the local [Pixel] hardware rather than sending it into Google's Cloud. The biggest benefits here are speed and reliability. It could also handle some actions offline.

Another benefit is privacy, this eliminates an entire set of potentially personal data from being handed off to Google.

I'm unclear on if this moves the privacy needle. It says they do offline translation, but they still may attempt to send the audio clip to compare with the resulting text translation.

It could be used to improve privacy, I just don't know if it will be used that way.

Re: Google’s new voice recognition system works instantly and offline (Pixel only)

#16

Post by lostmsu » Tue, Mar 12, 2019, 9:19 PM UTC

At the same time pre-pixel phones get features stripped. "OK Google" now requires phone to be awake and unlocked, or plugged in to work.

Re: Google’s new voice recognition system works instantly and offline (Pixel only)

#17

Post by Causality1 » Tue, Mar 12, 2019, 9:21 PM UTC

Finally. Over the past year or so I've noticed significant increases in the voice recognition lag across a handful of devices and across multiple wireless carriers.

Re: Google’s new voice recognition system works instantly and offline (Pixel only)

#18

Post by snaky » Tue, Mar 12, 2019, 9:23 PM UTC

penagwin wrote: post #13

dotdi wrote: post #7

Call me cynical but I cannot picture Google not tapping into everything you run through their voice recognition software, even if it does work offline. Doesn't mean it won't phone home later.

Right, but once this is implemented there is no excuse for audio to be "sent home". Of course there will still be usage analytics, etc. But it does increase privacy to some degree, especially when compared to sending all audio after a certain phrase is mentioned.

Google does not need any excuse.

Re: Google’s new voice recognition system works instantly and offline (Pixel only)

#19

Post by p1esk » Tue, Mar 12, 2019, 9:26 PM UTC

modeless wrote: post #6

Google AI blog: https://ai.googleblog.com/2019/03/an-all-neural-on-device-sp... arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/1811.06621

Interesting that they're using RNN transducer. I thought everyone's moved to CNN lately.

Re: Google’s new voice recognition system works instantly and offline (Pixel only)

#20

Post by shereadsthenews » Tue, Mar 12, 2019, 9:27 PM UTC

Hrmm, Gboard only? Does it mean they don't/can't use this model for voice commands? I do sometimes dictate messages to my phone but my main use of Android voice recognition is Android Auto commands to navigate or play music.