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Ask HN: Why is there no high quality method for voice control of a PC?

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Ask HN: Why is there no high quality method for voice control of a PC?

#1

Post by 4midori »

Like many people who have spent decades behind a keyboard, RSI (Repetitive Stress Injury) prevents me from writing code and doing graphic design through the usual keyboard and mouse inputs.

So I have turned to a complex and highly unreliable software stack that provides both voice-to-text, and clumsy but limited control of Microsoft Windows, Chrome, etc. This includes Dragon Voice-to-text, Voice Computer, and Talon, plus a browser extension and heavy customization.

Users of Dragon will acknowledge that: a) The software is a creaky dumpster fire built on archaic code b) There is no viable alternative on the market

My question is: *how is it that no one has built something better?* The market is huge, and the Natural Language Processing of "OK Google" and Siri are quite refined at this point.

References:

Dragon: https://www.nuance.com/dragon.html

Voice Computer: https://voicecomputer.com/

Talon: https://talonvoice.com/

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no high quality method for voice control of a PC?

#3

Post by ipnon »

Speech models today can mine the entire corpus of published conversation and return the most likely response to a given statement. That's not how we converse. Every relationship you have is a little model in your brain that we call a person's "personality." Every one talks differently, has different frames of reference, uses different codes of language, different assumptions. Cutting edge speech models work perfectly for the perfectly average speaker, but that person does not exist! The farther we stray from the mean, the more alienating these speech models become.

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no high quality method for voice control of a PC?

#5

Post by PaulHoule »

Google and Siri are good at what they do. They aren't good at other things, such as dictation.

I see the big problem in voice interaction is that a human being will ask you questions to clarify what you said if they don't understand and current systems don't even try. (Actually the search paradigm lets you do some refinement, "Ok Google" works amazingly well on Android TV.)

Superhuman accuracy at dictation doesn't translate to a useful ability to understand text. You're doing great if you only garble 1 out of 20 words. Some errors are inconsequential, but if it garbles every other sentence then you are going to feel 0% understood.

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no high quality method for voice control of a PC?

#6

Post by mertd »

As far as human computer interfaces go, keyboard and mouse probably win comfortably in both bandwidth and latency against speech to text in almost all tasks. Former also requires a less physical effort and is creates less noise for others. My guess is that this shrinks the demand for good quality voice HCI significantly and those who really need it end up being overlooked.

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no high quality method for voice control of a PC?

#7

Post by cptaj »

ipnon wrote: post #3

Speech models today can mine the entire corpus of published conversation and return the most likely response to a given statement. That's not how we converse. Every relationship you have is a little model in your brain that we call a person's "personality." Every one talks differently, has different frames of reference, uses different codes of language, different assumptions. Cutting edge speech models work perfectly…

I have massive issues with speech recognition software. It doesn't work for me in either english or spanish. Statements like "google and siri are so advanced now" feel like people are collectively pranking me.

That said, I too have wondered why we don't have speech control for computers or at least appliances.

You don't need to parse all language. Just a standard set of primitives like you'd find on a remote should be way easier to recognize and can even be selected for their ease of parsing. Simple things like on, off, next, back, louder, etc.

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no high quality method for voice control of a PC?

#9

Post by twright »

Have you looked at Talon[1] for programming and system control? I used it for a few months last year and while the first two weeks were difficult I was able to nail down a workflow that really suited me. After another few weeks I felt as comfortable and capable working with it as I did a keyboard and mouse. (Cannot attest to its capabilities on Windows)

[1] https://talonvoice.com/

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no high quality method for voice control of a PC?

#10

Post by floatingatoll »

Siri can’t understand “set a timer” more often than 3 in 4 tries for me, and any sentence with more than four words will have one error in it no matter what. I envy you the accuracy your voice assistants offer you, but for me, voice control makes me want to snap my phone in half from frustration at how terrible it is. I still can’t remember why I have a reminder set with the name “2910”, which is the transcription of my spoken English sentence at the time. So at the very least, I imagine the holdup is that voice control failure conditions are miserably bad, when it fails; and, “Delete this sentence” -> “Formatting C:\” misunderstandings are too easy in modern OSes still. (Windows still offers “Format” as a primary context menu choice on the boot hard drive!)
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