不用双手也可操控智能手机

不用双手也可操控智能手机

Look, Smartphone: No Hands!

　　Controlling an iPhone or Android phone with just your voice and a noise-cancelling headset is doable, but frustrating.

　　By Rachel Metzon March 17, 2014

　　Why It Matters

　　As gadgets continue to get smaller, we’ll need new ways to interact with them easily, such as with voice or gestures.

　　So controlling:There are plenty of things you can do on your smartphone via voice control. Texting isn’t always that easy, though.

　　I usually enjoy making fun of people who walk around wearing Bluetooth headsets, seemingly talking to themselves. So of course I felt like a hypocrite this week wandering around downtown San Francisco doing exactly that.

　　I had an excuse, though. The rise of wearable gadgets means touch displays are getting ever smaller, and in some cases they may not be the best way to interact with these new devices. Voice-activated assistants like Siri and Google Now, meanwhile, are becoming increasingly popular. So I wanted to see how easy it would be to control both an iPhone and an Android smartphone with my voice, without having to touch them (spoiler: not very, but voice control does show promise).

　　For the experiment, I used Jawbone’s new Era Bluetooth headset($100), which has noise-cancelling technology meant to help it pick up your voice even in loud places, and which can control both Siri and Google Now without your taking your phone out of your pocket (though you’ll still have to press a button on the headset itself). It also supports wideband audio(aka HD voice), which is emerging on some handsets and networks and can make speech recognition easier.

　　The Era is extremely compact—a bit less than two inches long, about half an inch tall—and weighs just six grams. Like Jawbone’s other products, it has a sleek, high-fashion look: it’s a faceted bar with a power switch hidden next to the earpiece and a single button on its rear end. The matte black one I tested nestled close to my cheek, easily hidden if I wore my hair down (which I did when using it in public, since even though it’s good-looking relative to other Bluetooth headsets, I didn’t want to show it off).

　　As with other wearable technology, power is a major concern. You wouldn’t be able to get through an entire day of ordering your smartphone around via the Era, as you get just four hours of talk time on a charge. But realistically, you probably wouldn’t be using it nonstop, and its optional charging case ($130) will give you about six more hours of juice if you plug it into the case when not using it.

　　Jawbone has created an app for iPhones and Android devices that lets you customize some of the Era’s functions. I set it to know that one long press on the button meant I wanted to use either Google Now or Siri, depending on which smartphone it was connected to at the time.

　　First I tried out the Era with Siri on my own iPhone 5S. In the middle of the day I headed to San Francisco’s Union Square—a bustling shopping district—and started talking to my phone, which was hidden in my back pocket. The Era was able to pick up my voice so Siri could accurately respond to my commands on crowded streets and in busy stores. I had it read my work e-mail aloud and composed a response for it to send; I had it post undoubtedly clever tweets and define words for me while I walked through a busy shopping mall and its surrounding neighborhood.

　　It was easier to interact with my iPhone this way than by holding down the button on its face to summon Siri, and I was impressed by how much I could get done without even looking at the phone’s screen, which my eyes are normally glued to. Although I felt weird talking to my phone in public, I could imagine using the Era to interact with it and other gadgets at home, especially in the kitchen when my hands might not be free.

　　Siri still had a hard time understanding some things, especially when I tried to play music by musicians like Ferraby Lionheart and CeeLo Green, or used words with “ee” sounds. In one particularly vexing exchange about an upcoming party, I learned that Siri really doesn’t like the word “theme,” at least not the way I pronounce it. Instead, I got “FEMA,” “Tina,” and “fee” (twice).

　　Despite some difficulties recognizing artists’ names, the Era was best for simply playing music, as it has excellent sound quality and I could use Siri to skip tracks and pick artists (when I was multitasking, having tunes in one ear was fine). Adjusting sound or switching tracks was kind of a pain, though: to turn sound up or down via the Era, you have to hold down its one button and let the volume cycle all the way down and then all the way up, releasing your finger when it gets to the right level.

　　All ears:Jawbone’s new Era Bluetooth headset can be used with an iPhone or Android smartphone to control Siri or Google Now.

　　Then it was on to testing the Era with an Android smartphone. I quickly realized that Google Now’s ability to understand what I was saying was superior to Siri’s, but it still had some problems doing things like creating and sending messages if I didn’t enunciate as clearly as possible.

　　The Era also had trouble launching Google Now if the phone was asleep. Holding the button would bring me into the phone’s voice dialer; I had to do a short button press to cancel that before another long press brought up the general voice search that let me do things like check my appointments and get directions.

　　Whether on the iPhone or Android, the Era did a good job of cancelling noise when I was walking or standing still in crowds, but when I was cycling the wind generally drowned out my attempts to tell it to do things like play music or place a phone call. This is important. If your voice is the only way to control a gadget like a smart watch or head-worn computer, you will need the microphone to be robust enough to counteract wind so you can use it for all kinds of outdoor activities.

　　Oddly, both handsets had a really hard time understanding when I tried to dial sources and editors who weren’t in my address book, resulting in a lot of frustration. And when I finally got through, while I could hear the person on the other end just fine, several of them complained that I was hard to understand or cutting in and out. In two of those cases, I was alone in my office or at home, so it wasn’t an issue of background noise.

　　To get the perspective of someone who’s been in the speech-recognition trenches long enough to know how far the technology has come (and how far it still has to go), I called Jim Glass, who heads MIT’s Spoken Language Systems Groupand studies automatic speech recognition and spoken-language understanding. (I actually called him first using the Era and the Android handset, but he said he couldn’t hear me well, so I hung up and called him back from my land line.)

　　Glass does think that as gadgets get tinier, voice will become an increasingly natural way to interact with them. Still, he says that while speech recognition will improve, there will continue to be people for whom it won’t work well, such as nonnative speakers of the language that’s being scrutinized. For this and other reasons, he thinks it’s best if wearable gadgets offer multiple ways to interact. People might not mind chattering alone in the car, but not everyone is comfortable doing so on the bus.

　　“I think giving people choice is always the best option when you can,” he says.

　　I agree, in part because I couldn’t shake the feeling that I looked completely bizarre muttering to myself while using the Era in public. I suspect erasing that feeling will prove to be even more difficult than improving the speech recognition.

只用声音和耳机就可以操控iPhone或安卓手机，但效果并不十分满意。

为什么如此重要？

随着机型越来越小巧，我们要找寻新方法与之进行快捷易行的互动，例如声音或手势。

我经常会拿那些走在路上带着蓝牙耳机的人们开玩笑，因为他们就像在自言自语一般。所以当我这周走在旧金山市区也带着蓝牙耳机时，我感到自己多少有些虚伪。

但我有自己的理由。便携式产品的崛起意味着触控面板会变得更小，而有些时候，这并不是与新产品互动的最佳方式。像Siri，Google Now这样的语音助手越来越受到大众的欢迎。所以我想知道不触控IPhone和安卓智能机，只用声音操控手机到底有多便捷。（剧透：并不那么便捷，但声控技术还是很有前途的。）

在实验中，我使用了Jawbone的新款Era蓝牙耳机（100美元），这款耳机所具备的减噪功能可在吵闹的环境中分辨你的声音，并以此控制Siri和Google Now，你根本不用从口袋里掏出手机（但是你还是要去按一下耳机上的按键）。它还支持宽带音频(即高清语音)，该功能已在一些手机和网络上开始应用，它可以使声音识别更加简单。

Era蓝牙耳机的外形十分紧凑--长度不到两英寸，高度不过半英寸，重量只有6克。如Jawbone其他产品一样，它造型优美时尚：耳机侧面有开关按键，后面有单钮一个。我所使用的是磨砂黑款，它完全贴合人脸，将头发放下来，耳机完全可以隐藏其中。（我公共场合经常这么做，因为和其他蓝牙耳机相比它的确美观许多，但我个人不想炫耀。）

对于其他可携带科技产品相比，人们所担心的主要是电源。你不可能整天通过Era耳机来操控手机，因为一块电池只能供你打四个小时的电话。但是事实上，你根本不可能无休止地使用它，而且附加的充电座（130美元）可为你额外提供6个多小时的电量，你只需在不用耳机时差上电源即可。

Jawbone还推出了一款IPhone和安卓机的手机应用，使用此款应用你可以自己设置一些耳机的功能。根据手机的实时连接状态，长摁可选择是否使用Google Now或Siri。

首先，我是用Era控制IPhone 5S上的Siri。中午我去了旧金山的联合广场--那是个繁杂吵闹的购物区--把手机放在口袋里，开始打电话。Era可以准确辨别我的声音，就算在拥挤的街道，繁忙的商铺，Siri也可对我的指令做出准确回应。我命令它阅读我的工作邮件，并起草邮件回复；我还用它发了几条推特，在我穿梭于各大商场之间时，也用它查询词语涵义。

这样比手控使用Siri方便很多，不用盯着手机屏幕可以腾出时间去做很多事，而我经常眼睛不离手机屏幕。虽然我还是觉得在公共场合和手机说话很奇怪，但我可以想象在家里使用Era或其他配件的便捷，尤其是在厨房，双手忙于其他事情时。

Siri在识别一些词语时还是比较迟钝的，尤其是当我想要播放想Ferraby Lionheart和GeeLo Green的音乐，或是当我使用有“ee”读音的单词时。有一次，因为要举办聚会，我和Siri展开了十分艰难的交流。那时我才发现Siri真的不喜欢像“theme”这样的单词，至少它不喜欢我读这个单词的发音，而相应的，“FEMA”，“Tina”和“fee”（说了两次）也不易识别。

尽管在识别音乐家名字时遇到了困难，但就播放音乐方面，Era真的可谓最佳选择。它音质高，我也可以通过Siri跳过某些曲目和挑选音乐家（当我在忙其他事时，耳朵听着音乐不是问题）。但是调整音量和转换曲目却很痛苦：想要调音量，你必须一直按着它的按键，等着音量一直变小，然后一直变大；听到合适的音量时，放开按键。

图片说明：只需耳朵：Jawbone的新款Era蓝牙耳机可与IPhone和安卓手机连用控制Siri和Google Now。

之后就是检测Era和安卓机了。我很快就感觉到在理解指令上，Google Now要优于Siri。但是如果我不尽可能清晰地发音的话，它还是在编辑和发送信息时有困难。

如果手机处于睡眠状态，Era无法启动Google Now。长摁按键有会转至语音拨号界面。所以在查询行程或获取路径时，我只能在短摁按键后，再长按按键启动语音搜索。

无论是IPhone还是安卓机，就算我是处于人群中，取消语音的功能都表现良好。但是在我迎风骑车时，命令它播放音乐或打电话就比较费劲了。这一点很重要，如果你所使用的语音识别设备只能通过识别你的声音工作的话，那你一定要保证话筒可以抵挡风的影响，只有这样，你才可以在室外活动时使用它。

奇怪的是，两款手机在拨打通讯录以外的电话时都遇到了困难，结果让人很抓狂。最后我终于搞定了这一切，听见了对方的声音，但是据反映，我的话语断断续续，很难理解。其中有两次，我是独自在家或办公室，所以说这个问题与周围环境的噪音无关。

为了了解那些在语音识别领域资历深厚并熟悉这个技术发展历史（和未来发展）的人士的看法，我打电话给了Jim Glass。他是麻省理工大学口语系统团队的领头人，他们主要研究自动语音识别及口语理解。（事实上，我第一次给他打电话时，用的是安卓机和Era耳机，但是他说他听不清楚，于是我又挂了电话，重新用座机给他打了一通。）

Glass认为，随着设备体积进一步变小，声控自然会成为与之互动的方式。而且，他还说到，就算语音识别再发展，也会有无法识别的人声，比如母语不是查阅语言的人群。由于这样或那样的原因，他认为最好是可携带设备具有多种互动方式。人们也许不会介意在自己车里一个人聊天，但是，不是每个人都可以适应在公交上自言自语的。

“我觉得能力允许的话，给用户多种选择往往是最佳的选择。”他说。

我很认同他的话，部分原因是我认为在公共场合用Era耳机自言自语很奇怪，这个想法难以动摇；而且我觉得改变这种想法的难度不比完善语音识别系统的难度小。

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