Why Can't Siri Close Apps On Mac

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macOS Catalina introduces Voice Control, a new way to fully control your Mac entirely with your voice. Voice Control uses the Siri speech-recognition engine to improve on the Enhanced Dictation feature available in earlier versions of macOS.1

  1. There is a new Siri webpage where Apple shows all of the things you can do with your personal assistant. There is also a link to the Shortcuts app, but right now it takes you to Workflow since iOS.
  2. Explore the world of Mac. Check out MacBook Pro, iMac Pro, MacBook Air, iMac, and more. Visit the Apple site to learn, buy, and get support.
  3. Oct 23, 2011  tested Siri this morning and now I can't turn off Siri at all. I can't scroll on my iPhone 4S or do anything without Siri talking. Even went to settings and turned it off and it still talks. Also did several soft resets. I NEED HELP!!
  4. Aug 14, 2019  With the recent fuss about Apple contractors listening to some of our Siri conversations (see “Apple Suspends Siri’s “Response Grading” Eavesdropping,” 2 August 2019), I couldn’t help but wonder why we users can’t perform this task.If you’re anything like me, you already talk back to Siri when it makes mistakes or triggers unexpectedly.

How to turn on Voice Control

After upgrading to macOS Catalina, follow these steps to turn on Voice Control:

  1. Choose Apple menu  > System Preferences, then click Accessibility.
  2. Click Voice Control in the sidebar.
  3. Select Enable Voice Control. When you turn on Voice Control for the first time, your Mac completes a one-time download from Apple.2
    Voice Control preferences

Though the iPhone, Mac, and Apple TV all have Siri, so far Apple has only allowed 'Hey Siri' on phones, likely due to technical limitations: listening continuously to recognize spontaneous voice interaction is prohibitive in terms of power usage and processing power without a specialized coprocessor. Oct 16, 2018  I did the updates last night and did a reboot (doing more now, as it can't hurt!). I don't use the Nike app, just the Workout app (syncs best with HealthFit). It's so close. If I say 'start the run countdown' it asks for how long. I just can't seem to force it to go straight to an open outdoor run without further interaction.

When Voice Control is enabled, you see an onscreen microphone representing the mic selected in Voice Control preferences.

To pause Voice Control and stop it from from listening, say ”Go to sleep” or click Sleep. To resume Voice Control, say or click ”Wake up.”

How to use Voice Control

Get to know Voice Control by reviewing the list of voice commands available to you: Say “Show commands” or ”Show me what I can say.” The list varies based on context, and you may discover variations not listed. To make it easier to know whether Voice Control heard your phrase as a command, you can select ”Play sound when command is recognized” in Voice Control preferences.

Basic navigation

Voice Control recognizes the names of many apps, labels, controls, and other onscreen items, so you can navigate by combining those names with certain commands. Here are some examples:

  • Open Pages: ”Open Pages.” Then create a new document: ”Click New Document.” Then choose one of the letter templates: 'Click Letter. Click Classic Letter.” Then save your document: ”Save document.”
  • Start a new message in Mail: ”Click New Message.” Then address it: ”John Appleseed.”
  • Turn on Dark Mode: ”Open System Preferences. Click General. Click Dark.” Then quit System Preferences: ”Quit System Preferences” or ”Close window.”
  • Restart your Mac: ”Click Apple menu. Click Restart” (or use the number overlay and say ”Click 8”).

You can also create your own voice commands.

Number overlays

Use number overlays to quickly interact with parts of the screen that Voice Control recognizes as clickable, such as menus, checkboxes, and buttons. To turn on number overlays, say ”Show numbers.” Then just say a number to click it.

Number overlays make it easy to interact with complex interfaces, such as web pages. For example, in your web browser you could say ”Search for Apple stores near me.” Then use the number overlay to choose one of the results: ”Show numbers. Click 64.” (If the name of the link is unique, you might also be able to click it without overlays by saying ”Click” and the name of the link.)

Voice Control automatically shows numbers in menus and wherever you need to distinguish between items that have the same name.


Grid overlays

Use grid overlays to interact with parts of the screen that don't have a control, or that Voice Control doesn't recognize as clickable.

Say “Show grid” to show a numbered grid on your screen, or ”Show window grid” to limit the grid to the active window. Say a grid number to subdivide that area of the grid, and repeat as needed to continue refining your selection.

To click the item behind a grid number, say ”Click” and the number. Or say ”Zoom” and the number to zoom in on that area of the grid, then automatically hide the grid. You can also use grid numbers to drag a selected item from one area of the grid to another: ”Drag 3 to 14.”

To hide grid numbers, say ”Hide numbers.” To hide both numbers and grid, say ”Hide grid.”

Dictation

When the cursor is in a document, email message, text message, or other text field, you can dictate continuously. Dictation converts your spoken words into text.

  • To enter a punctuation mark, symbol, or emoji, just speak its name, such as ”question mark” or ”percent sign” or ”happy emoji.” These may vary by language or dialect.
  • To move around and select text, you can use commands like ”Move up two sentences” or ”Move forward one paragraph” or ”Select previous word” or ”Select next paragraph.”
  • To format text, try ”Bold that” or ”Capitalize that,” for example. Say ”numeral” to format your next phrase as a number.
  • To delete text, you can choose from many delete commands. For example, say “delete that” and Voice Control knows to delete what you just typed. Or say ”Delete all” to delete everything and start over.
Can

Voice Control understands contextual cues, so you can seamlessly transition between text dictation and commands. For example, to dictate and then send a birthday greeting in Messages, you could say ”Happy Birthday. Click Send.” Or to replace a phrase, say ”Replace I’m almost there with I just arrived.”

You can also create your own vocabulary for use with dictation.

Create your own voice commands and vocabulary

Create your own voice commands

  1. Open Voice Control preferences, such as by saying ”Open Voice Control preferences.”
  2. Click Commands or say ”Click Commands.” The complete list of all commands opens.
  3. To add a new command, click the add button (+) or say ”Click add.” Then configure these options to define the command:
    • When I say: Enter the word or phrase that you want to be able to speak to perform the action.
    • While using: Choose whether your Mac performs the action only when you're using a particular app.
    • Perform: Choose the action to perform. You can open a Finder item, open a URL, paste text, paste data from the clipboard, press a keyboard shortcut, select a menu item, or run an Automator workflow.
  4. Use the checkboxes to turn commands on or off. You can also select a command to find out whether other phrases work with that command. For example, “Undo that” works with several phrases, including “Undo this” and “Scratch that.”

To quickly add a new command, you can say ”Make this speakable.” Voice Control will help you configure the new command based on the context. For example, if you speak this command while a menu item is selected, Voice Control helps you make a command for choosing that menu item.

Create your own dictation vocabulary

  1. Open Voice Control preferences, such as by saying ”Open Voice Control preferences.”
  2. Click Vocabulary, or say ”Click Vocabulary.”
  3. Click the add button (+) or say ”Click add.”
  4. Type a new word or phrase as you want it to be entered when spoken.

Learn more

  • For the best performance when using Voice Control with a Mac notebook computer and an external display, keep your notebook lid open or use an external microphone.
  • All audio processing for Voice Control happens on your device, so your personal data is always kept private.
  • Use Voice Control on your iPhone or iPod touch.
  • Learn more about accessibility features in Apple products.

1. Voice Control uses the Siri speech-recognition engine for U.S. English only. Other languages and dialects use the speech-recognition engine previously available with Enhanced Dictation.

2. If you're on a business or school network that uses a proxy server, Voice Control might not be able to download. Have your network administrator refer to the network ports used by Apple software products.

With the recent fuss about Apple contractors listening to some of our Siri conversations (see “Apple Suspends Siri’s “Response Grading” Eavesdropping,” 2 August 2019), I couldn’t help but wonder why we users can’t perform this task. If you’re anything like me, you already talk back to Siri when it makes mistakes or triggers unexpectedly.

Apple never said precisely what its contractors were doing, but TechCrunch’s Matthew Panzarino, who Apple favored with the exclusive explanation, described the “grading” process like this:

This takes snippets of audio, which are not connected to names or IDs of individuals, and has contractors listen to them to judge whether Siri is accurately hearing them—and whether Siri may have been invoked by mistake.

His description brings to mind Apple’s famous “1984” ad, and its endless rows of gray-clad workers, except they’re all wearing headphones, listening to Siri audio snippets and pressing one of three buttons for each: Correct, Incorrect, Inadvertent Invocation. It’s a dystopian image, and we can only hope the actual job is less soul-sucking.

Whether or not the scene I’m visualizing has any overlap with reality, I see no reason that we users can’t provide the feedback Apple needs to improve Siri’s accuracy. Here’s my proposal.

Opt-in, for Starters

Regardless of anything else, Apple would need to make this proposed Siri feedback program opt-in, by asking users if they want to enable Siri feedback during initial setup and via a toggle switch in Settings > Siri & Search.

That’s just polite, given that inadvertent invocations can record speech that the user never intended to be public. Apple has already said it will make the current human-driven grading program opt-in.

Feedback via Siri Shortcuts or Buttons

When enabled, the Siri feedback switch would create three Siri shortcuts with the default phrases of “Good job,” “That’s wrong,” and “I didn’t invoke you.” The Settings screen should provide usage instructions as well. You’d be able to give Siri feedback after any response, either via voice or with buttons for devices with screens.

As with other Siri shortcuts, you’d be free to change the phrase however you like—I imagine the inadvertent invocation would become “Shut up!” for many people and there would be more colorful replacements for “That’s wrong.”

Obviously, there should be no requirement that you provide feedback on any particular interaction with Siri, so the “Good job” response probably wouldn’t get that much use. After all, if Siri works properly, there’s little reason to offer praise—you’re not training a dog. I’d reserve such feedback for when Siri surprises me with an accurate response to a difficult query.

I suspect the other two corrections—for an incorrect response or an inadvertent trigger—would be far more commonly used. I already have trouble restraining myself from admonishing Siri when it misunderstands my commands, and it drives me nuts when Siri pipes up for no apparent reason whatsoever. OK, I admit it, I’d be among the people changing “I didn’t invoke you” to “Shut up!”

Plus, when you correct one of these Siri mistakes, Siri should apologize for messing up. A simple “I’m sorry” would go a long way toward reducing user annoyance.

Ideally, Apple would enhance Siri so it could keep listening for feedback and followup queries after it responds to you, allowing you to avoid prefacing the feedback phrase with “Hey Siri” or a button press. Google Home already does this with its Continued Conversation feature, which listens for 8 seconds after it responds, and Amazon’s Alexa listens for 5 seconds after responding with its Follow-Up Mode.

I don’t know if Apple could get the results it needs by just taking user reports at face value or if it would still need to send some percentage of reports to humans for additional verification.

Don’t Take That Tone with Me

So far, what I’ve described is largely mechanical, and well within the capabilities of both Apple and users. I’d happily start correcting Siri tomorrow if Apple added such a feature.

But I’d like to see Apple’s vaunted engineers go further and start recognizing tone of voice and emotional state. I assume that a machine-learning algorithm could be taught to distinguish between a user’s normal tone of voice and volume and when they speak more abruptly and loudly. I’m sure lots of us raise our voices in irritation when Siri interrupts a conversation or completely biffs what seems like a simple command.

“Hey Siri, play a Beatles song.”

“NO. Not Ann Peebles! The BEATLES!”

With such recognition—and assuming the Siri feedback switch is enabled—Apple could detect signals that Siri had messed up without any extra interaction from the user. The accuracy level would undoubtedly be lower because your irritation might have resulted from the cat having just brought in a dead mouse rather than anything Siri did, but it would still be better than nothing.

More Feedback for Less Cost

How To Quit An App On Mac

Matthew Panzarino said that Apple’s grading program likely evaluated fewer than 1% of Siri’s daily requests. In 2015, Apple noted Siri was handling 1 billion requests per week, which works out to 143 million requests per day. That number has undoubtedly skyrocketed since 2015, but let’s go with it.

Why Can't Siri Close Apps On Mac Free

How many people would Apple need to hire to process even 1 million requests per day—a round number in that “less than 1%” range? Assuming someone could process 3 requests per minute on average, and keep that up for a full 8-hour day, Apple would need at least 700 workers. So unless Apple is really processing far fewer requests than “less than 1%” implies, it seems likely that the company has been employing thousands of people to improve Siri’s accuracy.

Replace those people with millions of Siri users, and I’d suggest that Apple would get vastly more feedback that was potentially more accurate and would save boatloads of money. Besides, this is the sort of thing computers should do, not people. That job must eat your brain.

This option provides sensible context throughout the web regarding the selected group of words. This is an improved version of the Define utility previously introduced from Word 2013. When you select and right-click on a word, options will be displayed. These options include a formatting toolbar, grammar, spelling, translation, synonyms and so much more. Word doc to notepad student hack mac.

Close Siri App Suggestions

How about you? Would you sign up to give Siri feedback if that were an option? Let us know in the comments.