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Siri’s voice recognition technology converts voice command into a text. This is how the user is able to see the command typed on screen. While this sounds like a fairly easy task to perform, what made it complicated is the number of accents that affected the speech recognition. To solve this problem, Apple has applied machine learning to train Siri recognise multiple speech variations. By doing so, the number of misinterpretations eliminated to 10%.
Launching SiriKit enabled using Siri’s technology in third-party applications. It means that developers can add customised features to Siri and implement them to third-party apps. This makes a positive impact on user experience. Previously, Siri had a limited integration with specific application types, for instance, VoIP calling, messaging, ride booking, payments, and health, etc. This list is constantly growing though.
The way the technology works is you use voice interaction and speak out a command for a desired action. From user’s perspective, it sounds easy. This, however, is a lot more complex for developers. The backend of the technology is quite complex, but with SiriKit developers will need to provide functionality, the rest will be done by Apple.
There are some limitations though. You will be able to benefit from Siri technology if you are a user of iOS 10 or later versions.
SiriKit does not support all app domains. Domains include number of things that SiriKit can recognise. These in their turn include intents that Siri can carry out. SiriKit supports the following domains: Lists, Visual Codes, Messaging, Photo search, Ride booking, Payments, Climate & Radio, VoIP calling, Workouts, Car commands, Car Play, Media, Restaurant Reservations.
As part of the setting up process, you will need to create a framework for your app. This is necessary because Siri provides support through the Intents Extension and you will not be able to copy code from your project. The Intent Extension makes it possible for Siri and the app to interact. Another extension that Siri uses is the Intent UI Extension, which allows extending the default UI and creating custom view. In many cases, the default interface is sufficient though.
The intent extensions can then be edited defining the requests that will be processed through the app. At this stage, you can add title, description, category etc. to help understand which intents the app will accept. To make life easier, developers may mention the words that will enable requests to get processed. In order to implement intents, select intents extension target, run it and choose Siri at the Xcode prompt menu.
This is the most important part of integrating Siri in your app. Once these are done, you can start interaction with Siri and check the intent extension in progress.
The popularity of Siri catches up with similar technologies of Alexa and Cortana. This became possible by virtue of enabling Siri to integrate with third-party apps.
However, like any technology, SiriKit also has its advantages and disadvantages.
Advantages
– The market of voice recognition technology grows in value and is expected to reach $18.3 bln by 2023. This framework will help developers to join the market.
– SiriKit boosts the app performance.
– SiriKit is a 4-step technology: Speech, Intent, Action, Response.
– All requests await confirmation, which eliminates the level of errors.
– SiriKit enables to customise the UI during the integration with an app.
– SiriKit demonstrates great potential for integration with compatible applications.
Disadvantages
– SiriKit is only available for iOS 10 and versions above.
– SiriKit has word limitations that developers can specify in Siri third-party apps integration.
– SiriKit is not yet available for MacOS Sierra with Siri.
– Speech accents leave a room for mistakes at the voice recognition process.
Despite certain technology imperfections, the following applications have proved successful integration with SiriKit: Pinterest, Car Commands, Whatsapp, Shy Guide, Citymapper, Square Cash, Trello, LinkedIn, Google News.
Here at Magnise we will be happy to provide you with guidance and professional advice on how to integrate SiriKit in a third-party iOS app. Our team of developers possesses the level of expertise required to help you with integrating an app with SiriKit. Contact us for more details.
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