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Alarms Alexa, stop alarm. silences alarm Alexa, what was that alarm for? "I have no alarms set" About the only thing we use it for is shopping list managem

Alarms Alexa, stop alarm. silences alarm Alexa, what was that alarm for? "I have no alarms set" About the only thing we use it for is shopping list management for the grocery/costco/home improvement etc and reminders, timers, and alarms. We routinely run into simple usage woes.

sokoloff 4y ago
See a yellow ring. “Alexa, give me my messages.” “You have no messages. <pause> You have one notification; would you like me to read it to you?” “Oh FFS, yes.”
- UncleMeat 4y ago
  Google Assistant has this with Alarms and Timers. They are different systems with some different constraints but no user on the planet would actually consider them to be different concepts.
  - danaris 4y ago
    I dunno about that. An alarm is something you set for a specific time of day, that you might want to go off every day (eg, to wake you up for work). It is important that it have options for snoozing for a relatively short period of time. A timer is something you set for a specific amount of time, that you might want several of at once (eg, when you're cooking), and you might want to repeat the same duration a few times (eg, as a focus/pomodoro timer), but you're unlikely to want repeated daily. It's important that it be very clear that the timer went off, but you rarely want to snooze a timer. They are very similar concepts, but they have fairly clear and distinct use cases, and it makes sense for the software to treat them as two different things.
    - stickfigure 4y ago
      I get what you're saying, but Google still fucked it up. If you tell Google "set a timer for 2 minutes" it counts down 120 seconds. If you tell Google "set an alarm for 2 minutes" it creates a clock alarm at a minute boundary between 1 and 3 minutes ahead, and is unlikely to be what you want. The point being, if you set an alarm/timer for "N minutes" it should be a countdown. If you set an alarm/timer for "3pm" it should be a clock setting. It shouldn't matter which word you use.
      - sokoloff 4y ago
        Alexa used to directly sum times. When you ask for a timer for "1 minute 30 seconds", that's exactly the right thing. If you are deciding or stuttering and ask for a timer for "1 minute 1 minute", it used to give you a timer for 2 minutes (probably not what you wanted). It now gives you a timer for 1 minute.
    - UncleMeat 4y ago
      I think it can maybe make sense for the software to treat them as different. But "you don't have any alarms" when I ask about my alarms but I had actually set a timer is an unacceptable response, in my opinion. Both kinds of things encode "make a noise a time in the future I specified." Differences beyond that are minor.
ben_w 4y ago
"Alexa, Badezimmer aus" "Ich kann nicht 'Badezimmer' auf Spotify finden" (We don't even have Spotify set up).
phkahler 4y ago
>> Alexa, what was that alarm for? For a long time I've been thinking a key to these thing is maintaining enough context to identify pronouns. For example, in the above question the key word is "that" or "that alarm". Being able to get a reference to the correct alarm should make it easy to answer. Not being able to do it certainly makes it impossible to answer.
- NBJack 4y ago
  IIRC, context is one of the most expensive parts of Alexa in their infrastructure.
UncleMeat 4y ago
My very very very favorite experience with my Google Assistant was when making a shopping list. "OK Google, tell me my shopping list." "Eggs, Kale, Chicken Thighs and four other items." I laughed until I cried.

sokoloff 4y ago

See a yellow ring. “Alexa, give me my messages.” “You have no messages. <pause> You have one notification; would you like me to read it to you?” “Oh FFS, yes.”

UncleMeat 4y ago
Google Assistant has this with Alarms and Timers. They are different systems with some different constraints but no user on the planet would actually consider them to be different concepts.
- danaris 4y ago
  I dunno about that. An alarm is something you set for a specific time of day, that you might want to go off every day (eg, to wake you up for work). It is important that it have options for snoozing for a relatively short period of time. A timer is something you set for a specific amount of time, that you might want several of at once (eg, when you're cooking), and you might want to repeat the same duration a few times (eg, as a focus/pomodoro timer), but you're unlikely to want repeated daily. It's important that it be very clear that the timer went off, but you rarely want to snooze a timer. They are very similar concepts, but they have fairly clear and distinct use cases, and it makes sense for the software to treat them as two different things.
  - stickfigure 4y ago
    I get what you're saying, but Google still fucked it up. If you tell Google "set a timer for 2 minutes" it counts down 120 seconds. If you tell Google "set an alarm for 2 minutes" it creates a clock alarm at a minute boundary between 1 and 3 minutes ahead, and is unlikely to be what you want. The point being, if you set an alarm/timer for "N minutes" it should be a countdown. If you set an alarm/timer for "3pm" it should be a clock setting. It shouldn't matter which word you use.
    - sokoloff 4y ago
      Alexa used to directly sum times. When you ask for a timer for "1 minute 30 seconds", that's exactly the right thing. If you are deciding or stuttering and ask for a timer for "1 minute 1 minute", it used to give you a timer for 2 minutes (probably not what you wanted). It now gives you a timer for 1 minute.
  - UncleMeat 4y ago
    I think it can maybe make sense for the software to treat them as different. But "you don't have any alarms" when I ask about my alarms but I had actually set a timer is an unacceptable response, in my opinion. Both kinds of things encode "make a noise a time in the future I specified." Differences beyond that are minor.

ben_w 4y ago

"Alexa, Badezimmer aus" "Ich kann nicht 'Badezimmer' auf Spotify finden" (We don't even have Spotify set up).

phkahler 4y ago

>> Alexa, what was that alarm for? For a long time I've been thinking a key to these thing is maintaining enough context to identify pronouns. For example, in the above question the key word is "that" or "that alarm". Being able to get a reference to the correct alarm should make it easy to answer. Not being able to do it certainly makes it impossible to answer.

NBJack 4y ago
IIRC, context is one of the most expensive parts of Alexa in their infrastructure.

UncleMeat 4y ago

My very very very favorite experience with my Google Assistant was when making a shopping list. "OK Google, tell me my shopping list." "Eggs, Kale, Chicken Thighs and four other items." I laughed until I cried.