Changes we’re making to Google Assistant
Google Assistant will no longer support a number of underutilized features to focus on improving quality and reliability.
Looks like a bunch of features are being removed due to "underutilization"
Google Assistant has become so awful in the past few years.
Ok Google, give me directions to John's house
"Ok, navigating you to John's Lake House Restaurant"
Bitch, I have a SAVED ADDRESS in Google Maps titled "John's House." Why would you not assume I wanted to go there instead of some restaurant 3 hours away?
Yeah, Like, we are facing a world where faking a celebrity's voice and having it respond to everything you say completely life-like is a matter of minutes while the "smart" speaker in your house talks like a robocall from the 90s and doesn't understand a single thing when you don't adhere to a very specific command syntax.
While I agree with you Siri is plain awful, have you tried just saying “hey siri play Slayer”?
When you say “play some slayer on music” it makes it sound like you’re asking to play a band called “slayer on music”. Which it doesn’t understand so it needs to look it up for context, which means you’ll need to unlock your phone for security.
I just tested it personally and it played Slayer just fine.
The only use I have for Google Assistant is to call people when I'm in my car, and even then it doesn't work correctly.
Wtf really. Those two businesses must keep wondering who's that number that keeps calling them at absurd times from another country and never leaves a message, because I can never remember who I must use the full name of...
I just asked that the other day to do what I would consider. One of the most basic tasks, add something to my shopping list. It didn't and I got to the store and it said I had no list, so I really don't know why I have them anymore except for speaker abilities
This is fucking pathetic. I used to brag to people about how well Google Assistant worked on our Home's. My wife, who is not into tech in the slightest, would do the same.
Now it's gotten to the point where it can't do fucking jack shit right anymore. It fails to turn off lights. It can't figure out devices it's connected to, it can't get media requests right, it forgets the timers it's running, etc.
It's gone from a mediocre voice command interface, to an insanely impressive Google Now providing info before you think to ask for it, to an incredibly useful assistant that I can't think of anything it can't do.... To an inferior Siri that trips over itself left and right and can't respond to basic requests anymore.
A bunch of the things in the list of things being removed are things I used frequently like 6 years ago - I fucking bought a Home Hub because of the step by step recipes. I've stopped using them for the past 3-4 years because the thing can't even get a fucking timer right so why would I even bother asking it anything more complicated. They're removing them because "people aren't using them" but people aren't using them because Google fucking broke them or they didn't know they were there.
Google is a fucking clown show at this point. They can't get anything right without ram rodding it straight into oblivion and then killing it because no one's using it.
Funny they didn't mention the 1000 people they laid off across the various Assistant divisions being a part of the reason for the changes : https://www.theverge.com/2024/1/11/24034124/google-layoffs-engineering-assistant-hardware
Wow, they're neutering it quite a bit. And sure, most of these were hyper-niche, but that's a long list of niche stuff to stop supporting.
Looking through that list, I kept saying to myself, "I didn't know Google Assistant could do that!" and in a few cases, "I tried to do that and it didn't work, so I assumed Google Assistant couldn't do that."
I recall some of these things being advertised as great news features for their marketing drives.
They might have laid off or reassigned people tasked with maintaining these features
Rescheduling an event in Google Calendar with your voice. You can still schedule a new event.
This feature is underutilized because I could never get it to work.
Half the things on this list are things that I used to use but they've broken in the past 3 years. Hell, it can't even get a fucking timer right anymore.
I'm looking forward to never using Google's next generation AI assistant just as much as I never used the last one.
This company sucks. It's like they throw so many ideas and things at a wall and then never foster or care for any of it. And then they take away the wall so anything that relied on it gets fucked when the app isn't available or works correctly anymore. And this is CONSTANT!
They deserve each and every loss. Pretty sure the only new developments sticking around are the Google Pixel phones. Who knows, maybe they'll delete features for the old ones in the future too. Or remove support for their phones entirely and randomly leave.
I use to hate Microsoft so much for this with their early hardware I used to buy.
They would abandoned the devices by not providing the drivers needed for newer versions of Windows leaving the device a brick unless you want to still run 98 or XP.
just bring back google now
I miss being able to search my screen that was so useful
I didn't even know that most of these were possible. Voice commands are not very discoverable.
I mostly use it to set a timer/an alarm or to put things on Google keep lists. For the alarm you have to be very specific or it can be an unexpected time. Putting things on lists works mostly just for my shipping list and even that has problems.
And if I now can't even easily access it I will probably not even use it for that
Yep same. I set my alarm in the evening, I set a lot of timers while working in the kitchen, and I fill in my shopping list while going through stuff in the pantry.
Sometimes I let it play some background noise, pause/resume music or a video, and I have a routine that reminds me of things during work days. That's it. And it works well enough for that, but eh, still annoying that they now took both the smartness of Google Now and the sheer broad applicability of Assistant away.
it's just Google Voice Search with a fancy UI at this point
It's crazy to me how it started that way, got way better, then they broke 90 percent of what it could do, and now we're back where we started like ten years ago.
I disabled the google app years ago. I use my browser for search, and then when I get the results, the results actually show in my browser, and I don't have to switch apps or anything to get to my browser.
Plus, I don't have to look at the vestiges of all the features the app used to have, which now just feel like they've left the UI cluttered and pointless.
Plus, every time I open the app, I feel like I'm being spied on, because I am.
Plus, Google Assistant sucks ass. The voice commands are super unreliable, and as for search, I don't want AI to guess what I'm trying to search for, deterministic imperative searches are actually better.
That being said I wish android had a dedicated search browser similar to Google search app. I'm searching on my browser and I have soooooooooooo many open DDG tabs it's ridiculous. Nothing wild, just a searchbar with history that won't delete itself when I hit back too many times and a web view to open links.
Hmm, maybe look into something like the duckduckgo app? Set it as a digital assistant in default apps and you can invoke it like you would Google assistant. You can also add a search widget to the homescreen and simply search.
Has anyone had any success flashing a Google home? I'd be interested in putting a custom assistant on there
This is a shockingly good thing they're building! Thanks for linking this, I'm going to dive into it!
I recently stumbled upon this project, Onju Voice, and it's somehow related to what you're asking; It's a custom PCB (and selfhosted server software) for the Google Nest Mini (or your own custom enclosure).
Thanks! This looks like a very interesting project! I might sacrifice one of my minis to try this out
I'm sorry, you did what?
Does anyone here ever use assistant for more than the basics? I find that I need to remember to be way too explicit and verbose which makes the whole thing useless, because it's not the way humans talk so by the time I remember how to say it the right way, I could have already entered it in manually. Eventually I just stopped trying.
I found, ages ago, that I never used the google app for something I couldn't do in my browser. Like, this was back in the days just after Google Now died—all the features that almost worked just got scrapped because they really didn't work. It allowed me to keep up with one college sports team, but other than that, opening the app was just a slower version of opening up my firefox and searching there.
So that's what I do now. I disabled the Google app, and I don't miss it at all.
It depends what you mean by "more than the basics." Some things I used to do which could be considered more complicated have already been handicapped (like using 3rd party services). Others aren't reliable so I stopped using them. Personally, I have no problem trying stuff out and speaking in the way the assistant understands, but there are very few complicated actions which are supported and reliable!
I have a few of these devices in my place as a part of my home automation. It's been struggling the last year with not confusing the basics and not mixing up the beginning of a news podcast as my voice commands. It seems like the newest display I own has the most issues.
I generally just use it to control and schedule lights and devices with smart plugs. The odd time I try to set timers or reminders but I've never really been a big voice command person. I too struggle on the best way to get it to play my YouTube music likes list. I just cast from my phone instead.
One thing it mostly gets right is stopping whatever is playing.
With my Soundbar no longer being new enough to work with Google Assistant I'm not looking forward to when the rest of my smart lights, switches, and plugs join it as we go forward.
I gave up on it entirely probably a year or so ago, as I found if anything it was getting worse.
I use it for: general search queries, navigating to a place, turning on lights, setting timers, setting alarms, checking the weather, playing music, setting an appointment, setting reminders (though I prefer Todoist for this), listening to the NPR update.
Of the list of discontinued features here, I'll actually miss driving mode, which I found handy to reduce my distraction on the road by reading notifications to me, allowing me to open Pocket Casts or Libby in a couple clicks, etc. I also used the feature occasionally to resume audiobooks from Play Books where I left off.
I use it to make phone calls from my wireless headphones, that's about it.
I use it for screen translation and screen searches, but only on the days when those buttons exist because Assistant can't keep a UI on my phone for more than a week.
It's basically just a voice front end for Home Assistant at this point.
My Nest Hub 2gen is just an expensive clock now, and it isn't even working well at that.
It used to control all my home automation. Now it's a lot of "sorry, I don't understand" clock.
I hope this is a step that makes sense towards merging google assistant with bard and their new gemini model.
Hopefully this makes people realize that billion dollar corporations are not where innovation takes place anymore and instead abandons billionaire assholes and their enshittified companies. If we're going to dream nonsense, dream big.
The only time I use assistant is to turn my lights on and off, set alarms and routines, and to CALL SOMEONE WHILE DRIVING.
Why would they remove the ability to call someone while driving???
Interesting.
Google is a spy company. Don't use their products if you don't want to be manipulated like a lab rat.
There? Where?
Seek help.
Seek alternatives
