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“Alexa, set lights to 40%” “Alexa, set an egg timer for 12 minutes” “Alexa, set an alarm for 6:45am” “Alexa, play Stories Podcast on Spotify” These or varia

“Alexa, set lights to 40%” “Alexa, set an egg timer for 12 minutes” “Alexa, set an alarm for 6:45am” “Alexa, play Stories Podcast on Spotify” These or variations of these are the most used commands at my house. Passive assistants can’t really figure out that I or my kids want to play a specific podcast or when to set a timer when cooking. Lighting is another tricky one. Sometimes I’m reading and want bright lights. Sometimes I want scenic lights. Sometimes I want very low lights while falling asleep. I suspect most people don’t use their smart assistants for shopping. I do occasionally ask it a random question like “what year was Einstein born” when I don’t feel like whipping out my phone or play an occasional round of 20 questions with my kids. But that’s rare compared to the typical usage.

WalterBright 5y ago
I have an egg timer I just turn the dial on. Replacing it with a billion transistors scratches a non-existent itch for me. What I want is an assistant that will handle all my bookkeeping for me. Right now, I have to log in to the account, then download all the statements for the last tax year. Evidently, no bank has such an option. Nope. You gotta do it month by month, click, download, save, back, back, click, download, save, back, back, until you scream. Then ya gotta download the transactions for the last year in a format that quicken can use. You can download transactions for last week, last month, last 12 months. No option for "last tax year". So you have to manually enter 1/1/2021, then 12/31/2021, then confirm, then download, then save, then do it all over again for the CVS version. Then you gotta poke around looking for the tax documents. Then I gotta get the transactions for a credit card I canceled 6 months ago. But since I canceled it, I can't download the transactions. It must be only me that has these problems. Why is that? Does nobody else need to pay taxes? No, I doan need no help setting a $%^&# egg timer :-) Maybe if I become bedridden I'll need help flipping a light switch. Until then, nope.
- IgorPartola 5y ago
  Depends on how you cook. I like to cool big complicated meals that take hours. At any given time I will have 3-4 timers going concurrently. I need to know which timer is going off. Also my hands are often covered in food as I am cooking and washing them to set a timers slows me down. When walking into a dark room carrying a heavy box it is often easier to use a voice assistant to turn on lights. It’s also frankly more fun. What you are looking for is not a home assistant. You want an accountant + QuickBooks. For $1000/year or so you can get both and be happy. Intelligence is often cheaper than artificial intelligence.
  - WalterBright 5y ago
    I admit I don't cook much. As for turning on lights when carrying, that's why I have an elbow! The switch is at elbow height. > It’s also frankly more fun What, this isn't fun? https://www.amazon.com/Clapper-Sound-Activated-Switch-White/dp/B000O7L364 https://www.amazon.com/Clapper-Sound-Activated-Switch-White/...
    - jjeaff 5y ago
      I'll wager you don't have kids. I'd have to spend half an hour a day traveling around the house turning off light switches countless times if it weren't for an easy "hey Google, turn off the kitchen lights" or "turn of all the lights".
      - f1refly 5y ago
        We didn't have home automation when my grandparents where kids, when my parents where kids, when me and my brother where kids. We managed to turn off the lights. Have you considered to just teach your kids to turn off lights? It's not like flipping a light switch is an impossible task for a kid, they even managed to flip it when turning the light on!
        jjeaff 5y ago
        My grandparents got along fine as kids with an outhouse and no computers at all. So I'm not sure what your point is. For one, my grandparents, didn't have nearly the number of light switches even with a comparable house size. And "just teaching" kids to turn the lights off is quite laughable. My kids know how to turn off lights and know they should turn them off when they leave the room. But knowing and always remembering to do it are two different things. I also forget to turn them off sometimes. I remember my dad grumbling quite a bit about having to go around turning off the lights or having to run back in the house after you get outside and see the lighted windows. Just one less little hassle.
        f1refly 5y ago
- 8n4vidtmkvmk 5y ago
  fwiw that bothers me too. i don't know why bank websites suck so hard. while we're at it, they should offer read only api keys for accessing such information. ai assistants won't solve this.
- Hedepig 5y ago
  Though there is no "last tax year" option, nationwide do allow specific dates to export and there is an export format in a banking standard I forget. Slow steps
  - WalterBright 5y ago
    Even Quicken finally added a "last tax year" on the menus. BTW, Quicken is the most rube-goldberg-esque program I've ever encountered. There's no UI consistency anywhere, the screen constantly clears and flashes and redraws, some check boxes cannot be clicked on, you have to Alt-key them, some places Paste does not work, and it blocks you while it updates itself every week or so. What a mess of a program. I bet it was written by squirrels and poodles.
- dmje 5y ago
  Totally agree. Voice assistants IMO are doing that thing that tech sometimes does: hinting at what could be great but failing to actually deliver anything useful. One insanely simple thing that'd be useful to me: local tide times. Can Siri or Google do this for me? No, not a chance. Best I get is "here's a web page", ie just a higher friction version of the thing I could have done myself. I'm ok turning my music up and down or choosing a song. Let's make these devices actually useful and then I might sit up and start using them.
- franga2000 5y ago
  Regarding the bookkeeping thing (this happens to be my specialty): with the prerequisite knowledge (how websites work and basic Python or JavaScript), you could have that automated in a weekend. You don't even have to deal with authentication - if you don't run it often, you can just log in manually, then run the script to collect data. Alternatively, try calling you bank and asking you can get the statements emailed to you automatically. Most banks offer this in one way or another, although you usually get PDFs so some programming might still be necessary to transform the data.
  - WalterBright 5y ago
    I actually did write a program to deal with Paypal. I used it once a year to process the Paypal information. Which worked fine, until Paylap changed the data format, so I had to recode the program. Then next year they changed the format. I had to recode the program. Then next year they changed the format. I had to recode the program. See where this is going? Spending a weekend automating a program that you use only once, and have to recode every year, does not work. Also, quicken cannot import PDFs. As for getting the statements via email - it's just as much work getting them one by one out of my email and into the proper place in my accounts. What I want: Download in one operation ALL the data in one zip file. Now that would save me significant time. I've never had an account that allowed this. They're all different, but all about 20 minutes or so of clickety-clickety-clickety. BTW, at least they finally stopped downloading each statement with the same file name (named "download.pdf", naturally). So I had to rename it as an additional step for each statement. It lead me to wonder didn't anyone who worked at that bank on the web site have an account at the bank?
    - WalterBright 5y ago
      BTW, I have submitted suggestions to these banks on making this easy. They're all nice and polite, but they act astonished that anyone would want to download all the last tax year's information. But nothing ever changed, so I stopped bothering them with suggestions.
    - joshspankit 5y ago
      I can’t remember the acronym right now (and am too lazy to search through my scripts to find it), but there is an older banking standard that can be used to download transactions. Some regular banks support it, you can use your existing credentials, and there are Node.js libraries for it. Downside is the metadata is lean. I think there’s a ~10char limit on the description? Like you get “2021-11-01 14:35, LONGNAMECO, $500” and that’s it. Don’t quote me.
- visarga 5y ago
  Seems like you need RPA to automate the UI. You can use tools that record your actions and script the desktop (UiPath for example).
lysp 5y ago
I often use mine for weather when I'm getting ready, or "is it going to rain". A friend of mine does a shopping list on his "add eggs to shopping list".
pjerem 5y ago
> “Alexa, set lights to 40%” > “Alexa, set an egg timer for 12 minutes” > “Alexa, set an alarm for 6:45am” > “Alexa, play Stories Podcast on Spotify” It’s not that it looks useless. It’s sure looks pretty cool to be able to switch on the light with the sound of my voice. But the privacy cost is extremely huge for something that isn’t that much revolutionary. I’ll just keep pressing the button. That’s less cool, I admit that and I’m even somewhat jealous. But I’m never going to allow Amazon (or any company) listen to me constant just not to press a button. I respect and have no issue with your choice but it feels wrong justifying the utility without mentioning the drawbacks.
- Semaphor 5y ago
  > I’ll just keep pressing the button. Not always possible, I heavily make use of Alexa while both my hands are dirty from baking or cooking. Both dumb units to metric, and setting timers. But I am pretty happy with the voice recognition, so I’m currently waiting on Pi Zero 2 W’s becoming available again and replacing her with Rhasspy.
  - TedDoesntTalk 5y ago
    > Not always possible What did you do before your voice assistant? Did you leave the light on until such time that your hands became clean?

WalterBright 5y ago

I have an egg timer I just turn the dial on. Replacing it with a billion transistors scratches a non-existent itch for me. What I want is an assistant that will handle all my bookkeeping for me. Right now, I have to log in to the account, then download all the statements for the last tax year. Evidently, no bank has such an option. Nope. You gotta do it month by month, click, download, save, back, back, click, download, save, back, back, until you scream. Then ya gotta download the transactions for the last year in a format that quicken can use. You can download transactions for last week, last month, last 12 months. No option for "last tax year". So you have to manually enter 1/1/2021, then 12/31/2021, then confirm, then download, then save, then do it all over again for the CVS version. Then you gotta poke around looking for the tax documents. Then I gotta get the transactions for a credit card I canceled 6 months ago. But since I canceled it, I can't download the transactions. It must be only me that has these problems. Why is that? Does nobody else need to pay taxes? No, I doan need no help setting a $%^&# egg timer :-) Maybe if I become bedridden I'll need help flipping a light switch. Until then, nope.

IgorPartola 5y ago
Depends on how you cook. I like to cool big complicated meals that take hours. At any given time I will have 3-4 timers going concurrently. I need to know which timer is going off. Also my hands are often covered in food as I am cooking and washing them to set a timers slows me down. When walking into a dark room carrying a heavy box it is often easier to use a voice assistant to turn on lights. It’s also frankly more fun. What you are looking for is not a home assistant. You want an accountant + QuickBooks. For $1000/year or so you can get both and be happy. Intelligence is often cheaper than artificial intelligence.
- WalterBright 5y ago
  I admit I don't cook much. As for turning on lights when carrying, that's why I have an elbow! The switch is at elbow height. > It’s also frankly more fun What, this isn't fun? https://www.amazon.com/Clapper-Sound-Activated-Switch-White/dp/B000O7L364 https://www.amazon.com/Clapper-Sound-Activated-Switch-White/...
  - jjeaff 5y ago
    I'll wager you don't have kids. I'd have to spend half an hour a day traveling around the house turning off light switches countless times if it weren't for an easy "hey Google, turn off the kitchen lights" or "turn of all the lights".
    - f1refly 5y ago
      We didn't have home automation when my grandparents where kids, when my parents where kids, when me and my brother where kids. We managed to turn off the lights. Have you considered to just teach your kids to turn off lights? It's not like flipping a light switch is an impossible task for a kid, they even managed to flip it when turning the light on!
      - jjeaff 5y ago
        My grandparents got along fine as kids with an outhouse and no computers at all. So I'm not sure what your point is. For one, my grandparents, didn't have nearly the number of light switches even with a comparable house size. And "just teaching" kids to turn the lights off is quite laughable. My kids know how to turn off lights and know they should turn them off when they leave the room. But knowing and always remembering to do it are two different things. I also forget to turn them off sometimes. I remember my dad grumbling quite a bit about having to go around turning off the lights or having to run back in the house after you get outside and see the lighted windows. Just one less little hassle.
        f1refly 5y ago
8n4vidtmkvmk 5y ago
fwiw that bothers me too. i don't know why bank websites suck so hard. while we're at it, they should offer read only api keys for accessing such information. ai assistants won't solve this.
Hedepig 5y ago
Though there is no "last tax year" option, nationwide do allow specific dates to export and there is an export format in a banking standard I forget. Slow steps
- WalterBright 5y ago
  Even Quicken finally added a "last tax year" on the menus. BTW, Quicken is the most rube-goldberg-esque program I've ever encountered. There's no UI consistency anywhere, the screen constantly clears and flashes and redraws, some check boxes cannot be clicked on, you have to Alt-key them, some places Paste does not work, and it blocks you while it updates itself every week or so. What a mess of a program. I bet it was written by squirrels and poodles.
dmje 5y ago
Totally agree. Voice assistants IMO are doing that thing that tech sometimes does: hinting at what could be great but failing to actually deliver anything useful. One insanely simple thing that'd be useful to me: local tide times. Can Siri or Google do this for me? No, not a chance. Best I get is "here's a web page", ie just a higher friction version of the thing I could have done myself. I'm ok turning my music up and down or choosing a song. Let's make these devices actually useful and then I might sit up and start using them.
franga2000 5y ago
Regarding the bookkeeping thing (this happens to be my specialty): with the prerequisite knowledge (how websites work and basic Python or JavaScript), you could have that automated in a weekend. You don't even have to deal with authentication - if you don't run it often, you can just log in manually, then run the script to collect data. Alternatively, try calling you bank and asking you can get the statements emailed to you automatically. Most banks offer this in one way or another, although you usually get PDFs so some programming might still be necessary to transform the data.
- WalterBright 5y ago
  I actually did write a program to deal with Paypal. I used it once a year to process the Paypal information. Which worked fine, until Paylap changed the data format, so I had to recode the program. Then next year they changed the format. I had to recode the program. Then next year they changed the format. I had to recode the program. See where this is going? Spending a weekend automating a program that you use only once, and have to recode every year, does not work. Also, quicken cannot import PDFs. As for getting the statements via email - it's just as much work getting them one by one out of my email and into the proper place in my accounts. What I want: Download in one operation ALL the data in one zip file. Now that would save me significant time. I've never had an account that allowed this. They're all different, but all about 20 minutes or so of clickety-clickety-clickety. BTW, at least they finally stopped downloading each statement with the same file name (named "download.pdf", naturally). So I had to rename it as an additional step for each statement. It lead me to wonder didn't anyone who worked at that bank on the web site have an account at the bank?
  - WalterBright 5y ago
    BTW, I have submitted suggestions to these banks on making this easy. They're all nice and polite, but they act astonished that anyone would want to download all the last tax year's information. But nothing ever changed, so I stopped bothering them with suggestions.
  - joshspankit 5y ago
    I can’t remember the acronym right now (and am too lazy to search through my scripts to find it), but there is an older banking standard that can be used to download transactions. Some regular banks support it, you can use your existing credentials, and there are Node.js libraries for it. Downside is the metadata is lean. I think there’s a ~10char limit on the description? Like you get “2021-11-01 14:35, LONGNAMECO, $500” and that’s it. Don’t quote me.
visarga 5y ago
Seems like you need RPA to automate the UI. You can use tools that record your actions and script the desktop (UiPath for example).

lysp 5y ago

I often use mine for weather when I'm getting ready, or "is it going to rain". A friend of mine does a shopping list on his "add eggs to shopping list".

pjerem 5y ago

> “Alexa, set lights to 40%” > “Alexa, set an egg timer for 12 minutes” > “Alexa, set an alarm for 6:45am” > “Alexa, play Stories Podcast on Spotify” It’s not that it looks useless. It’s sure looks pretty cool to be able to switch on the light with the sound of my voice. But the privacy cost is extremely huge for something that isn’t that much revolutionary. I’ll just keep pressing the button. That’s less cool, I admit that and I’m even somewhat jealous. But I’m never going to allow Amazon (or any company) listen to me constant just not to press a button. I respect and have no issue with your choice but it feels wrong justifying the utility without mentioning the drawbacks.

Semaphor 5y ago
> I’ll just keep pressing the button. Not always possible, I heavily make use of Alexa while both my hands are dirty from baking or cooking. Both dumb units to metric, and setting timers. But I am pretty happy with the voice recognition, so I’m currently waiting on Pi Zero 2 W’s becoming available again and replacing her with Rhasspy.
- TedDoesntTalk 5y ago
  > Not always possible What did you do before your voice assistant? Did you leave the light on until such time that your hands became clean?