Siri

SiriToggles: Launch Apps, Control Brightness, and Toggle Settings Via Siri

Jeff Benjamin ∙ January 21, 2012

It has barely been a day, and we've already seen a plethora of new jailbreak tweaks to take advantage of Siri in new ways. The latest is SiriToggles, and it looks like it could be one of the most promising thus far.

SiriToggles is like SBSettings for voice. You can literally control most of the vital aspects of your iPhone that you normally adjust on a day-to-day basis. Things like brightness, Wi-Fi, 3G, Bluetooth, and more can all be controlled using Siri commands.

Even better, Siri Toggles allows you to launch apps; and when we say launch apps, we mean every app, jailbreak or otherwise. Folks, you do not want to miss our preview of this jailbreak tweak if you're in possession of an iPhone 4S. This is going to make your lives a whole lot easier...

OpenSiri: Launch Apps Natively Using Siri

Jeff Benjamin ∙ Updated December 25, 2017

Didn't we tell you? The floodgates are opening for Siri tweaks now that the iPhone 4S jailbreak is available.

OpenSiri is among the Siri tweak freshman class, and it allows you to launch stock Apple apps, plus Facebook and Twitter apps using nothing but your voice.

Check out our hands-on video of OpenSiri in action...

‘Hands-Free Control’ Takes Siri to the Next Level

Jeff Benjamin ∙ January 21, 2012

The potential is startling. Once you play with Hands-Free Control in a true Siri environment on the iPhone 4S, it really hits you how much potential jailbreaking adds to Siri. Truly, the sky's the limit here as far as voice recognition and the like are concerned.

Imagine laying in bed with your iPhone half-way across the room. Problem: You forgot to set the alarm. Actually, no problem at all. With Hands-Free Control, Siri is always at your beckoning call...

3 Great Siri Tweaks for Your Newly Jailbroken iPhone 4S

Cody Lee ∙ January 21, 2012

So after months of waiting, you finally got to jailbreak your iPhone 4S yesterday. What do you do now? Sure, you'll install SBSettings, Activator, and a couple other essential utilities. But then what?

Remember that the 4S has a feature that no other iOS device has: Siri. And jailbreak developers are already finding out ways to customize the assistant. Here's three Siri-related tweaks we've come across so far...

VoiceUtils: Execute Custom Siri Commands on a Jailbroken iPhone 4S

Jeff Benjamin ∙ January 20, 2012

Folks, the madness has started. One of the first jailbreak tweaks featuring custom Siri commands has officially made its way to the Cydia store, and it's called VoiceUtils.

VoiceUtils allows you to respring, reboot, power off, and enter safe mode — all via Siri. You're definitely going to want to check out our video of it in action...

How to Change Your Siri Microphone Color

Jeff Benjamin ∙ January 20, 2012

Now that the iPhone 4S jailbreak is finally among us, it's time to start the fun. One of the most obvious features to tweak is Siri, the extremely popular personal assistant that's pretty much exclusive to the iPhone 4S outside of tweaks like Spire and the like.

One of the first tweaks available for Siri customization is Siri Mic Colors; in fact, this tweak has its own dedicated repo that houses multiple tweaks to alter the color of Siri. And we've got it all on video, check it out inside...

Siri Patent Hints at More to Come from Apple’s Digital Assistant

Oliver Haslam ∙ January 19, 2012

If you've been reading the various editorials that we have been publishing of late then you'll probably already know that not all of us here at iDB are big fans of Siri. While some see it as a real paradigm shift, others think it has fallen short of its potential.

A new patent application may give an insight into where Siri could go from its current beta state however, and things look set to improve.

One possibility to come out of the patent is one which could see Siri, or software like it, react to external events and take appropriate action upon them...

iPod Touch Gets Siri From iPhone 4S Backup

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 24, 2016

This is kind of interesting. After all of the attempts we've seen by developers to try and port Siri to non-Apple-supported devices, it appears this guy did it by simply restoring his iPod touch from an iPhone 4S profile.

How'd it happen? Well as Gordon tells it, he recently purchased a late-model white iPod touch. And instead of setting it up as a new device, he decided to restore it from an iCloud backup made from his iPhone 4S...

Steve Wozniak Talks Siri, iPhone 4S Battery Life, and Android

Cody Lee ∙ Updated November 19, 2018

Apple co-founder and former engineer Steve Wozniak is well known for being openly opinionated. He's gone on record with his thoughts on a number of Apple-related topics including the white iPhone 4 and his former partner, Steve Jobs.

Over the weekend, The Daily Beast published a report with some of Steve Woz's latest chatter. The Woz sounded off about the battery life of the iPhone 4S, his gripes with Siri, and why he thinks Android is better than iOS in a couple of areas...

Will Apple Open Up Siri for Other iOS Devices?

Cody Lee ∙ January 11, 2012

A few days ago, evidence surfaced in the latest iOS 5.1 developer beta that Apple could be bringing Siri to the iPad in the near future. The idea sparked some controversy, as a lot of folks don't see a use for the digital assistant on a tablet.

But what if there's more to it than that? Cult of Mac has discovered that the Dictation reference everyone is talking about is also evident on the latest iPod touch model. Of course, this could mean nothing. But what if it means everything?

Yeah, I Use Siri Everyday. And it’s Awesome.

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 24, 2018

For some reason there has been a lot of negativity thrown in Siri's direction over the past few months. The digital assistant that was once referred to as a "major revolution in voice recognition technology" is now being written off as a mere novelty.

In fact, our very own Oliver Haslam wrote an interesting piece yesterday regarding the topic. He's obviously in favor of the latter sentiment, saying things like, "other than setting a timer once in a while — for the sheer novelty of it — Siri just does not get any use from me."

The post garnered quite a bit of responses from folks that were either for or against Oliver's argument. Today I figured I would share my 3-month impression.

After 3 Months of Siri, Do You Actually Use It?

Oliver Haslam ∙ January 10, 2012

With the latest news that Apple may be bringing at least the dictation part of Siri to other iOS devices in iOS 5.1, I got to thinking how much I actually use Siri on my iPhone 4S. The answer is both surprising and yet unsurprising at the same time.

When Apple first launched the iPhone 4S, Siri was hailed as a technological marvel; a real way of interacting with a device using the power of our voices in a way that resembled real language, not a set of canned commands that needed to be spoken in the right order. The theory was great, but it hasn't really panned out yet.