iOS6 unexpectedly invites us Irish to the feature-richer Siri party

eorpach

Seeing as the longer iOS6 thread is getting bogged down with complaints of post-update bugs, I thought I would share my initial impressions of iOS to help any undecideds make an informed decision about whether to be early adopters.

As a 4S owner, I consider the unexpected Siri improvements for Irish users by far the single most important enhancements to arrive with iOS6.

As this recent article in SiliconRepublic indicated, Irish users were not expected to be included in many of the key enhancements coming with iOS6, notably Siri and 3D Maps:-

"Added knowledge about sports; local search; restaurant information, reviews and reservations; and information on movies, plus reviews and showtimes – none of this will be available to Irish iPhone 5 owners. They also won't be able to benefit from Siri's integration with Twitter and Facebook, which, in a limited number of countries, allows users to orate a status update.

Happily (for the most part) this isn't true!

Whats' new with Siri in Ireland? Plenty...

Q: I need a chinese restaurant near here. A: "I found twelve Chinese restaurants fairly close to you. I've sorted them by rating"

Q: List the movie theatres near here. A: "I've found fourteen movie theatres..eleven of them are fairly close to you"

Q: Show me a review for the Movie The Bourne Legacy. A: "The Bourne Legacy has a 55% rating from Rotten Tomatoes" (brings up user reviews from the site).

Q: Show me the trailer for The Bourne Legacy. A: "Here's yours trailer" (launches and plays automatically)

Q: Update my Facebook Status. A: "What would you like to say?" (launches Facebook notepad screen.

In fact, Siri is answering anything I throw at her, and seems to understand me more clearly than before. For example:

- Q. "Call Gourmet Burger Kitchen". A: "Call Gourmet Burger Kitchen on 14 South William Street in Dublin City?" (this restaurant is not in my Phonebook).

- Q. "Where am I?". A: "You are near X" (map of my location launches)

- Q. "Give me directions to Work." A: "Look up directions to [eorpach's] work..." (launches audio navigation features in new Apple Maps).

One thing Siri still won't provide is the actual times of movies playing locally, but hopefully that's just a matter of plugging Siri into a Cinema listings database and will happen sooner rather than later.

As regards the Map App, teething bugs should have been anticipated with its rollout, especially given that Apple is playing catchup with Google and that we are used to being a lower priority in the GPS mapping stakes than many other European countries. If you use Maps daily whilst driving (and you don't rely on Google Streetview), you might find that Apple's iOS6 Maps new offering is a big step in the right direction.

As an iPhone 4s user, I am very pleasantly surprised that Apple has quietly invited us Irish Siri users to join the party. Hopefully this marks the start of the iPhone 4S' flagship feature being of serious practical use here.

banquo

Also pleasantly surprised by this!

*Loses the afternoon to flying around 3D Dublin*

randombar

Anyone know what sites they are using for the reviews and restaurants?

bucks73

I think its Yelp.

mad muffin

Yeah it's yelp. It has their logo at the bottom.

banquo

Spent the morning putting half the businesses in my town on Yelp. It's not the kind of town where the businesses would think to do it themselves

120_Minutes

I'll counter the op's post by saying its not so great down in cork. Whilst stood in mahon point shopping centre i said to it: "i want to go shopping" and it found me 6 shopping malls...... none of which were mahon point. Plus, when i told it i was hungry the first result back was a pet grooming service!

Itssoeasy

For anyone in cork. Apparently side tracks is still open.

Athena14

Has anyone gotten the 3D part of the maps to work? I click on the dropped pin and it'll show me a satellite view but that's is :-(

harr

I can't get siri to list local business even though a lot of them are in yelp its keeps giving me places miles away any way around this

Light Switch

Call her a "Bastard"

See what the reply is

120_Minutes

harr wrote: »

I can't get siri to list local business even though a lot of them are in yelp its keeps giving me places miles away any way around this

Are we 100% sure siri is using yelp for ireland?

eorpach

Yes - Yelp's logo is featuring prominently. For example enter "The Aviva Stadium" in the Maps app and click on the blue ">" symbol that shows up.

@120_Minutes: Have you got Siri's location services disabled? Settings -> Privacy -> Location Services -> Siri ON

120_Minutes

eorpach wrote: »

Yes - Yelp's logo is featuring prominently. For example enter "The Aviva Stadium" in the Maps app and click on the blue ">" symbol that shows up.

@120_Minutes: Have you got Siri's location services disabled? Settings -> Privacy -> Location Services -> Siri ON

its not on my own 4s, cos i aint updating cos of the maps, but yes, i'm pretty sure it was.

harr

i have it turned on in the settings and it wont list any local business