On the show this week we're delighted to have back with us Stephen Howell, Senior Program Manager with Microsoft Ireland. Stephen tells us about the latest accessibility features and enhancements to look forward to in Windows 11.
We also find out from Stephen all there is to know about the much-anticipated Surface Adaptive Kit being brought out by Microsoft to make its hardware more accessible. Showcased at the recent Microsoft Surface Event, the Adaptive Kit features a variety of tactile and high-contrast labels to help people with impaired vision identify keyboard keys, ports, and cables more easily.
Finally, we reveal our top tips and tricks to try out with the Apple HomePod Mini smart speaker, including making calls, sending texts, and playing music.
On the show this week we're delighted to have back with us Stephen Howell, Senior Program Manager with Microsoft Ireland. Stephen tells us about the latest accessibility features and enhancements to look forward to in Windows 11.
We also find out from Stephen all there is to know about the much-anticipated Surface Adaptive Kit being brought out by Microsoft to make its hardware more accessible. Showcased at the recent Microsoft Surface Event, the Adaptive Kit features a variety of tactile and high-contrast labels to help people with impaired vision identify keyboard keys, ports, and cables more easily.
Finally, we reveal our top tips and tricks to try out with the Apple HomePod Mini smart speaker, including making calls, sending texts, and playing music.
[Music]
[Music]
hello and welcome to ncbi labs
so you're very welcome to this week's
live event from ncbi labs this is jude
maher here back in the hot seat this
week after daniel Dunne stood in for
the last show i always like listening to
the show when i'm not in it i can rob
good ideas from them as well so glad to
hear daniel doing the the show the last
time
daniel uh thanks very much for looking
after that did you did you get a bit of
a taste for it by any chance
i
did dude and i'll tell you one thing
it's safe to say your job is safe
do you know what i i was so glad to get
that on on a live event here that you
said you did get a taste for it can i
just reiterate that you did get
[Laughter]
good to have you with us again this week
as well daniel
good stuff and jp corcoran is back with
us as well and this week and he'll be
making sure to keep us up to date with
our tech news a little bit later on any
preview for it jp what can we expect in
this tech news this week sure dude and
welcome back to the live event this week
dude great to have you back with us um
yeah so for tech news today we're going
to be going through uh some new commands
that we can use with offline in in ios
15 with siri
lots of things with siri now offline
like setting timers alarms opening up
apps changing our um accessibility
features and turning them on but we'll
be going to all that later along with
one or two issues actually come up as
well in ios 15
around
using the feature to siri to check email
and send email and check your call
history some issues around that as well
but we'll go into all that later on the
show
very good thank you so we look forward
to that a little bit later on as well
and we have regular joe lonergan joining
us later on as well so welcome back joe
what what are you going to be talking to
us about today joe
hi jude um i'm going to be talking about
the apple homepod mini uh some of its
features and um how it might be useful
for you if you're in the if you're an
apple user
very good excellent so plenty to look
forward to on the show all coming up a
little bit later on of course and
throughout the show for anyone who wants
to get in touch please do you can do
that through the q a panel on microsoft
teams or of course you can email us at
labs at ncbi dot ie but first of all
this week we're going to be talking
about windows 11 among other things and
to help us with that it's my pleasure to
welcome back to the show senior program
manager with uh microsoft
uh stephen howell you're very welcome
stephen
thank you jude it's lovely to be welcome
back
good to have you back we had some great
uh feedback about your last appearance
on the show and i just have to apologize
for that like i'll try and do better
this time you know you know what
i was going to say don't let that go to
your head because that was also a show
that i wasn't done so that might explain
that
where we see a pattern emerging here
yeah that's it yeah that's it i tell you
what i'm always quick to pick up anybody
else who's been on the show when i
haven't been on the shows have been
going so well so you know let's let's go
let's go with that
very good so great to have you back with
us anyway this weekend uh as we said
we're going to be talking about um
windows 11. we're also going to mention
a bit about the surface adaptive kit
a little bit later on as well but maybe
just to start with um stephen would you
mind just kind of outlining a little bit
for us
um just
about windows 11 what what is it when
was it released
uh just give us the kind of bare bones
if you like
well windows 11 is our new baby it's the
operating system that a lot of people
have on their computers like a laptop or
a desktop and most people you know don't
think deeply about what operating system
they have you know it should get out of
the way and help you do whatever it is
you need to do
so we're very excited because it doesn't
happen very often that there's a big big
new release of an operating system this
one's brand new it's literally just out
and some people already have it might be
listening already have it and some will
be getting it in the future or have the
option of getting it so it's all very
new it's all very interesting and i
think for most people it's something you
don't think about very often but i think
some of your listeners will be very
happy to hear about some of the new
features that are in this new operating
system
yeah very good well just speaking of uh
maybe you can just outline some of the
features that are in the the new
operating system for us
well from my use of it and i'm not
always using a screen reader sometimes
i'm experimenting with different
accessibility technologies but the one
big thing that jumps out to me
speaking as someone who's interested in
the accessibility features in particular
is that it's streamlined it's focused
so
in the past there might be accessibility
features you wanted but you had a bit of
menu hunting to find the exact right bit
of control panel that had the settings
that you wanted
and now it's one key press it used to
bring up the ease of access that they
called it now it's windows accessibility
or straight in
and it's not just that sort of visual
front end that's been streamlined behind
the scenes i don't want to get too geeky
and nerdy about the guts of an operating
system but for anyone who's technical
out there any software engineers or
developers or interested in it you'd be
interested to hear that the pipelines
behind the scenes that do all the
accessibility integration with
third-party tools they've been updated
as well so there's been a real focus on
making it may easier to get started with
the accessibility find the features you
want switch them on and get working with
them straight away so it's been a i
would say a very um very clear to me
when i'm using it that the polish and
the focus has gone into that sort of a
user experience so accessibility is not
just oh yeah by the way there might be
an accessibility feature there in our
app that you like it's front and center
in the operating system so you can get
productive
straight away without getting lost in
the settings
excellent very good and and obviously
that would be the kind of biggest
part of what a lot of people um
listening and will will be interested in
just as kind of a little bit of a thing
to
to give us context with that what would
be some of the other kind of features if
you were explaining just about how
windows 11 is different from windows 10
in general even outside of the
accessibility issues so outside of
accessibility it's actually very similar
to what i said the the main thing most
people notice when they're using it is
that there is a
consistent look and feel which is very
to me
i don't know what word to use i keep
thinking of the word shiny but i don't
think that's the word that i should
officially use but it just seems
prettier and it seems to get straight to
the point for me so i'm one of those
people and i don't know if you are but
maybe some of the people listening when
i get a computer i
spend a lot of time making it my
computer and i change every setting to
exactly the way i want it now most
people don't do that i know that and i'm
an old crusty guy i've been working on
computers for so long i remember like my
first windows was windows 2.1 not 11. so
i'm
used to going into the guts and making
it the way i like it and i didn't have
to do that much of that this time i
could set a few things the way i liked
it but mostly it was already the way i
liked it and that was really really
unusual to that that that you're really
quickly up and running
if you're using it in a
like the mode i use it i'm a developer
i'm creating content i want that content
to be
um front and center of everything i do
if i sit down at my computer today i
don't have to say what was i working on
yesterday evening when i switched off
the computer and went off for my dinner
no there's your files ready to go it
reminds you what you're working on and
you can go find whatever you're working
on in different apps very quickly the
new menus bring
where you were productive yesterday to
the for so you can get productive again
and that's just little things like that
it's the polish
it's the workflow it's how do you
get productive with your computer
because it shouldn't be always noticing
the operating system is there it should
nearly fade into the background and let
you be productive and that's what i find
and i notice about it and again i'm not
always using the same accessibility
technology that some of your listeners
will be using i don't have jaws
installed but
i i am confident that if someone said
can you install jaws and test it out
that that wouldn't be a struggle for me
because the system knows what i'm trying
to do and supports me on that journey so
streamlined and lots of little sort of
um window dressing like little widgets
and like things yeah where you expect
them to be
and that for me is really nice so again
it's hard to put your finger on exactly
the big difference i mean a lot of
people are talking about the android
apps being integrated
that feature hasn't arrived yet but it's
being announced so things like that i
think would be very cool but you'll have
to get me on maybe next year to talk
yeah i'm afraid yeah yeah absolutely
yeah well definitely we'll have you back
on the show to talk about that that'll
be great i think you've kind of answered
this already anyway in in the the
previous questions but even just i think
it bears kind of
repeating
uh quite pointedly almost just even for
those other um
changes to the operating system that
wouldn't necessarily be
accessibility focused
it sounds like there's there's not
really going to be any
um sort of follow-on if you like from
from an accessibility point of view
there's nothing that's an issue that's
created by one of these other changes it
sounds as if it's quite logical in the
in the way that it's presented so it
won't cause any accessibility issues
either well well i haven't hit any yet
personally speaking and i haven't heard
of any and though that doesn't mean
someone won't discover something and
there's there's this thing in software
development that many of your listeners
will know the law of unintended
consequences sometimes you make a fix on
something it might be for security or
maybe update i don't know something to
use the printer or something and you've
no no realization something so complex
like you're talking millions and
millions of lines of code
thousands of people working on this one
thing that you accidentally and
unintendedly cause an issue somewhere
else so i'm not going to say it'll never
ever be an issue with an accessibility
feature that could happen anytime with
any system but i am confident that the
way they've approached designing in the
new accessibility features and they've
worked with so many external partners
they've worked with so many different
communities like your own
and they have gotten so much
really useful usable and real
information and feedback about what's
really needed and how it should really
work that that sort of overall approach
to developing software
means that
there shouldn't be any uh there
definitely any intentional things yes
you know and of course there's always
new features coming for instance we're
talking today on teams and i've spoken
to several uh people who are listening
who contacted me saying when i try to do
this on teams with this screen reader in
this menu there's this issue and of
course that's amazing because i wouldn't
know that and i can then feed that back
to a team who can then say oh we didn't
know that or we did know it and we'll
add it to the list of things that we we
have to fix or or look at so you know
it's an evolving process but so far if
you're comfortable and using windows 10
and being productive and effective and
all your stuff is using working with it
microsoft's uh windows operating system
you know as i said i've windows 2.1 here
and it's famous for being backwards
compatible so it's very very rare i mean
there's whole teams dedicated that if
you have a piece of software which works
on windows now
it is very unusual that it won't work on
the next windows and you could even
probably go back some windows and it
would still work and like as a software
engineer i'm embarrassed to say that i
have written software that ran on um you
know i want to say windows 7 but if i'm
honest it was even earlier than that
and i i wrote that software from about
the age of 18 and i'm in my 40s now and
my 17 year old well he's 18 next month
was on ty work experience last year
and they showed him some software
sitting on an ancient dell that i had
written when i was nearly his age and
they were afraid to upgrade the computer
for fear that software would stop
working yeah yeah yeah and i'm delighted
to say through no amazing coding skill
of my own the software worked just fine
when my son upgraded the computer to a
modern desktop simply because the
software talks to the operating system
and the smart operating system talks
back to the software it doesn't say oh
no no i i don't know who you're talking
to here i don't live here anymore i'm a
new version i mean it just works
so you shouldn't notice any huge
shocking changes
and if you are worried about that if
you're comfortable on windows 10 it's
working for you and you haven't gotten a
message about upgrading yet you know
there's nothing to stop you continuing
being productive and working on windows
10.
it's not going to stop working tomorrow
i mean it'll be years of security
updates for your windows 10. it's not as
if you're suddenly going to have no
computer in the morning if you don't
update straight away so this is
something to look forward to in the
future when it comes your way
and you can even test it out and you can
figure out will it do what i need it to
do but it shouldn't be a sudden shock to
the system certainly not and it hasn't
been for me
interacting with it i would hope it
won't be for for any of the listeners
and to be honest we mentioned kind of
quite a few times anytime there's a new
version of something brought out or a
new product in some way that feedback is
always kind of the lifeblood of making
sure that there's
kind of the changes that are needed as
well so if there is some sort of uh
thing that plays into that law of
unintended consequences and somebody
notices feed it back
and look
we love feedback i mean genuine
constructive feedback particularly from
a community that are doing something
specialized like your own is always
welcome and you know
it's it's wonderful to see the feedback
that's coming
about screen readers and teams and
windows and office and everything else
because
on the inside even though you can't see
it you might think it goes nothing ever
happens but i can actually see it being
actioned and and looked at so that's
wonderful that it's not just ignored
your feedback is valued and it is read
and you know if at all possible they do
try to achieve achieve a good uh
resolution for you
yeah very good there's just a question
that's coming there about um zoomtext
software um which we might mention to
you as well um there's a magnifier
reader zoom
zoomtext software
uh user here and uh are there any issues
with that
so i don't know if you've had a
particular chance to well i'm just
trying to specifically is it the
magnifier just to clarify is it the
magnifier the magnifier reader okay uh
sorry um with zoomtext
zoomtext software so it's a separate so
if it's third party i haven't actually
used that but i haven't on the list of
um
accessibility issues i haven't seen that
on the list but that doesn't mean it's
not there because i wasn't looking for
it and i just missed it but uh one thing
i would say the magnifier in windows has
been
is there and
is working so if there's is any issue
you can test that out but another one
that i use is zoom it which is not quite
um
not quite a zooming screen reader it's
more for when you're presenting and
you're trying to focus on something but
uh it's so far so good um no issues
there so
if it's working well in windows 10 i
would give as an answer i i would hope
that there'd be no issue with it working
on windows 11 but you can actually email
the team and i'll actually share not
email there's a
a webinar coming up dedicated on these
type of things and you can actually
attend that and they will probably know
better than me on that specific
third-party app question
speaking of which do you want to give us
the details of the is that okay upcoming
good well yeah so it's the windows 11
accessibility overview and i'll give a
link to it but hector minto who i think
you know yeah and uh
jeremy curry will be presenting now
unfortunately it's on u.s time so it'll
be kind of late in the evening for us
but not too late hopefully so it's
october 27th 12 to 1
in the pacific times that's over in
seattle but for those of you who are
interested in windows 11 with a screen
reader there's another webinar uh coming
up on november 17th
12 to 1 again on
pst
with jeff bishop ann taylor and brett
humphrey who all work in windows
accessibility and teams
and i think there would be no better
webinar to attend to get some of those
really interesting
nitty gritty type questions that
unfortunately i don't know all the
details of yet because i'm still
learning and figuring it out but um
i'm
i'd be
happy to share that link and i think
you'll be really really good if anyone
listening taught and they have an hour
free in the evening of october 27th or
november 17th
it would be worth attending absolutely
yeah great and of course anybody can
check back the uh the recording of this
interview as well on youtube or the
podcast to get those details as well um
so that that's ideal yeah brilliant um
now obviously kind of
we we put that question to you you
weren't ready you weren't particularly
ready for that question because we're
talking mostly about the kind of the
initial kind of phase of the rollout and
just the major differences um but we
appreciate as well
that these things are ones that uh
whenever there's any specifics it's
always going to be awkward in an
interview like this but we'll definitely
back to that actually can i just say i
welcome those questions
you know i wish i knew the answers but
you know if i actually knew the answers
to every single
third-party software that works with
windows um
i would be amazing and so
it's it's it's worth understanding that
it is quite possible when you have
certain combinations of software
computer hardware
and specialist software that's very
useful to you that you may accidentally
be the expert in ireland on it even
though you know intentions of it because
you're using something that happens to
be unique or specialized and then
there's some times something that
everyone knows about because it's so
commonplace
and you're just using a different way to
everyone else and that's happening to me
so so i won't always know the answer
but i would encourage anyone listening
uh to ask the question don't don't don't
be afraid to ask just because i don't
know i don't mind i don't know i'll do
my best to answer it if i don't exactly
yeah it triggers us to go and find the
answer so that's that's a good question
so just before we move on to the surface
adaptive kit for for anybody who is sort
of thinking okay windows 11 i've heard a
bit about it i like what i'm hearing
how do i upgrade is it something that's
going to be kind of prompted to them if
they're eligible for an upgrade if you
like or if their system is compatible or
do they need to go out and instigate it
so you can do both but i would
differentiate between the listener who's
a user at home like i am using their
computer you know for whatever reason
maybe it's school maybe it's college
maybe it's their work but it's not
supplied by work so it's not your work
desktop or laptop and i know what kovid
a lot of us are working at home and
there might be a big distinction between
your home computer and your work
computer but many people might still
have a personal laptop and a work laptop
or a desktop that they go to and they
might have slightly different software
set up on it and maybe they have windows
10 on their home device because when
they bought it in in the shop it came
with it and maybe they have windows 10
or whatever on their work device because
that's what work gave them and you know
they said thank you and started working
so
to differentiate between the two
your work will decide your i.t people
and you may be the ideal person in your
work and when windows 11 gets rolled out
to your fleet of computers and that will
depend on each company deciding when how
and what they do
for the uh average home user like like
me and uh hopefully like many of the
listeners and your computer if it is um
possible to run it and compatible and
all that
uh will pop up a message you know you
are eligible to update and it's a free
update for the home users who are on
windows 10 already
and you can say yes i'll update or you
can put it off and you'll still get
security updates on windows 10 but
eventually you won't be getting fancy
new features that you might want to try
out that are only on windows 11 so
you'll have to make that choice yourself
yeah for for most people it'll be a
um it's your turn now do you want to get
this or not a lot of people don't read
those messages but please read them and
uh the update is fairly seamless and
painless you might even notice it's
happening i know some people
have told me that their computer has to
do an update they didn't read it they
hit yes next thing it's all updated and
shiny and you know they
they didn't realize it was
the process was that simple and i think
if you're my age you remember installing
you know an operating system could take
a while and could be complex and none of
that anymore it's a very streamlined
update system and in fact it's really
hard to explain it because there's not
much to it i mean unless something goes
horribly wrong which thankfully hasn't
happened to anyone i know yet uh it's it
sort of happens by itself and it'll ask
you but you don't you
you have to read it and decide if that's
what you want the other thing i would
note is if you really really wanted you
know right now you can join a program
and saying i want to test it out on my
computer and all that but you know i
would say for unless you're a techie a
developer i wouldn't i would just let it
arrive when it's good and ready and
there will be some people whose computer
is too old to run it and that is
possible but you know
it is there's a certain set of computers
that are either of a certain age or
missing a certain feature for security
reasons that may not be able to run it
right now
that could change i'm not on that team
that decides what works when and where
and how and all that but it's really
interesting to see that you know if i
go out to buy a computer today the shop
will tell me
this has got windows 10 and now but it's
windows 11 compatible and they'll
confirm that with me because you know i
could be back to that shop if i can't
get the latest and greatest thing
because i just bought it so if santa is
bringing a computer to you this year
hopefully
and you know if it's running windows
it'll either already be running windows
11 or capable of it and you shouldn't
have to worry too much
if you bought your computer years ago
there could be an issue but don't worry
you can check it out before you jump so
it'll tell you if there's an issue so
don't worry you won't be left without a
computer okay
very good
just just while we still have you uh
stephen because i noticed uh we've just
got you for another few minutes just
before we finish up tell us a little bit
about the surface adaptive kit because
that was announced recently as well
maybe just even mentioned to us
what exactly is the surface adaptive kit
so this is very new and it's really
really um
unusual i actually was on a call with
our head of accessibility jenny lay
flurry when this was uh announced and
it's you know at first
it's hard to for people outside the
community to really get what it is but i
think everyone listening will will like
this so
it's a series of stickers and uh bumpy
stickers so you you know they're
textured
and different shapes and
they are very strong stickers so you can
actually attach some of them to your
laptop lid and it's strong enough to you
know they're a type of plastic that's
strong enough to attach a cord and
literally open a laptop without tearing
the sticker which you can imagine would
happen if you had a normal sticker and
they're shaped so that they fit keys and
certain different keys and different
parts of your device so you might have a
bumpy x that's near where your charging
port is on the side of your device and
it doesn't i know it's called a surface
kit and they do fit the surface keys
perfectly but you could attach it to
anything as long as the shape fits a
bunch of space just put the sticker
and the bumps are very tactile i'm told
but i'm going to be honest folks they're
not out in ireland yet and i haven't
gotten mine yet they didn't send me one
to try out
the nice thing about this um
is that uh what i'm told from the people
who do have them is that the textures is
very
discernible you can tell one texture
from the other
and they are there's different shapes
different textures and the shapes are
symbols so like dots circles dashes and
x's
and then there's some i'm not sure how
to properly describe it but they're like
latches i would call them and so they
have places to put a cord so you could
maybe attach them to a device where you
need to hold it and you maybe only have
one arm to hold it and maybe you need to
open a laptop lid and everyone thinks
hey you just hold the base of the laptop
you hold the lid with your other hand
and you move them apart well what if you
have only one arm you mean how do you
make it so that it's easy for you to
open your laptop lid
and this is the type of thing that many
of your listeners will be used to
putting something uh that's sticky or
textured in places where they need to
press say maybe a button on their
computer that's not obvious which button
it is or it's not maybe it's very
recessed and it's you know you have to
actually know where it is
to press it it's not sticking out and
well that's what this is focused on
making it easy for you to customize and
find your device
simple idea
nice uh nice implementation they're
colorful they look pretty i wish i could
say i had them on my device i will have
them as soon as they give me one but uh
they haven't they haven't come out here
yet i don't have a release date so um
they are they the price in america is
very affordable i'm hoping it'll be
similar here but i don't have prices or
release dates here yet but it's already
in the microsoft store which is an
online store where you can buy stuff but
there's no price yet so there it is
coming you can see that
hopefully it will appear um soon and uh
i will be getting one myself at home
here uh to customize my own devices and
uh i will definitely update the
the podcast when when they do arrive i
don't get any yes i'm afraid but yeah
very good feedback on anyone who does
get them as well yeah yeah absolutely
and uh certainly sounds like it's an
aptly named surface adaptive kit so it's
uh yeah really useful one one that
hopefully will get a bit feedback on
when people do start getting those as
well so really good to have you on the
show with us this week thank you
appreciate your time as well and we look
forward to having you back on at some
point ah that's wonderful and uh i
really really enjoyed both times now
i've been on this podcast and thank you
for
um the uh lovely chat and uh i hope to
see you all soon take care great to talk
to you thanks very much steven so that
was stephen howell senior product
manager with microsoft and of course if
you have any questions about what we've
been talking about there
uh
you can get in touch with us on the q a
panel on microsoft teams or you can
email us
at labs at ncbi dot ie you'll be able to
listen back of course to that interview
as well on youtube or on any of the
podcast platforms as well let us know if
you've already upgraded to windows 11 or
when
the surface adaptive kit comes out if
you uh have the opportunity to get your
hands on that let us now know how how
you get on with that as well
so our thanks to stephen for joining us
there but we're going to move on with
the show now we're going to change tack
a little bit and we're we're going to be
talking now about the world of smart
speakers
for a little bit we've covered the the
amazon echo and the google home or the
google nest as they are now but we
haven't yet looked at the apple approach
to the smart speaker so today we're
going to talk a little bit about the
apple homepod mini and for this part of
the show joe lonergan is going to be
helping us out so you're welcome again
joe good to have you back with us hi
jude how's it going
yeah not too bad it's not too bad so joe
tell us a little bit about the the apple
homepod mini first of all actually
let's get the the most important thing
out of the way do you like it
i do i actually really like it yeah um
well first of all it's a it's a smart
speaker from apple and um
it only works with your apple products
so if you have an iphone or an ipad
um it'll work great with the apple
ecosystem yeah and um
so that that's that's your your your
first probably positive for someone
maybe negative rudders that don't have
apple devices but um
that means if you have an apple device
it's really easy to set up
so yeah
you can you can just hold your
iphone over the device and it will
recognize it's close by
and it will
a little notification will pop up
to set up the homepod mini
and you'll have to confirm your
um
apple id
and go to the next step
set up your accessibility click continue
and then siri will be ready to um take
commands from you on the homepod mini on
the speaker pretty good yeah it's very
good i'll tell you about the size of it
i suppose next year yeah yeah describe
the device itself for us yeah well it's
got a touchscreen on the top um
just a couple of little
touchscreen options on it i don't find
the touchscreen on the top that
that major useful really um
it's not as i suppose
easy to touch as a touchscreen on your
on your phone it's kind of takes a a a
little bit of a more definite tap or
something you know what i mean it's not
the exact same you can change it in the
in the settings if you want to mess
around with the
sensitivity of the touchscreen you can
mess around with that in device or
settings in the home app
but um under you have increased volume
and decreased volume and um
play and pause there
um
it
it's it's
round it's about
it's a little bit bigger than a tennis
ball and it feels a little bit like a
tennis ball because it has fabric
going all around it yeah apart from the
base which is plastic and the top which
is kind of a glassy glass maybe
perfect or glass substance
and the flex is really sturdy as well
it's kind of um
not like your normal flex it feels um
maybe stronger you know what i mean so
yeah um
in terms of just like comparison if
somebody's used to the the
amazon echo dot is is it similar sort of
size and shape
yeah the new echo dot is
the exact same shape it's circular as
well
but it's a tiny little bit the new echo
dot is a tiny bit smaller by about a
couple of centimeters
yeah as i said this is about an inch
bigger than a tennis ball
yeah yeah okay very good yeah so
so that gives us a bit of an idea about
the actual device itself and the kind of
first impression i feel like
how different is this is it basically
are we talking about just the same sort
of thing as the google nest device or
the amazon echo and it's pretty much
exactly the same and it doesn't really
make any difference
well no it's not the exact same um
it's different in some ways it is a
smart speaker and it is very smart um
but it probably doesn't connect to as
many services because you are
locked into the apple ecosystem so you
have to do things through the
home kit app
so um whatever connects with the home
kit app will work with it
there um for example
you can't listen to audio you can't ask
to listen to audio books or audible you
you have to play the audible book on
your phone first and then
bring the phone over to the homepod
minion player that way
but
it it does play music it does listen to
radio stations um
well one of the i suppose one of the
bigger bonuses to it or has over some of
the other speakers is you can make phone
calls
on it to any number you know what i mean
so
as opposed to the amazon
echo dot or the um google home you have
to go through
google duo to make phone calls and uh
um echo you have to use the amazon
um alexa app
and you have to add your contacts
through there whereas this will
once your phone is is
in the vicinity you can
just say that
uh i don't want to activate it nobody
can say the siri word and you can make a
phone call i'll demonstrate it now in a
minute but um other things you can do
and you can you can set timers um
you can play ambient
sounds in the background like forest
sounds ocean
um nighttime sounds that kind of thing
just to help you relax or
yeah maybe play a white noise in the
background maybe help the baby go sleep
duck anything um you can set calendar
events on it as well
yeah
as i said it's really good for apple
users so you can you can ask it to find
your iphone if your iphone goes missing
and it'll play a sound on your iphone
um
if you subscribe to apple music
the sound of the apple homepod mini is
amazing so for the size of it really it
is amazing
and again that's going to be quite an
important thing to to people when you
are getting a smart speaker and people
who use it quite a bit for
for music you're going to want the sound
quality to be to be up there as well so
yeah it's good to know that that's right
we have a few demos um kind of arranged
and prepared for us i think one or two
anyway um joe you're always a fan of the
live demo
yeah
i'm always a bit nervous
so let's see how this goes
so um
i suppose i'll i'll
try by sending a text message just so as
i said it sends a normal text message
and one of the bonuses also
over the other speakers you can also
send a whatsapp message
yes so um
i'll send one to one of our team uh
john um jp so i've been doing with john
paul here um
so i'm going to say
send a text message to john paul cochran
i'm sorry hey siri send a text message
to john paul cochran
what do you want to say
hey jp how are you i hope you get this
message
your message to john paul cochran says
hey jp how are you i hope you get this
message
ready to send it
yes
yes great i said sometimes it's um
reaction is slightly slower but um it's
still fine you know
um so i can see it it does a good job on
sending a message i'm going to um
call j jp um i don't want i don't want
him to answer um
and then i can um
i can check the message then see did um
he replied to me so i'll just show you
how i make a quick phone call and i'm
going to hang up with siri
before he answers so i'm going to say
hey siri call john paul kirkhorn
calling john
i'm going to let it ring three times and
then i'm going to hang up
hey siri hang up
okay
and you see so you could do that in a
normal phone call as you can imagine
and i find it really good as a desk kind
of uh accessory an apple desk it says
because i can make phone calls on it and
put um
people on obviously loudspeaker you know
and the microphone is really excellent
it's um anybody that has spoke to me on
the homepad mini i said uh are you
talking on your earphones or or what you
know what i mean because it's
so good and it sounds good at a distance
as well
so
yeah
you've got uh jp corcoran there is the
recipient it's great when he's already
on the call here we can we can just
verify everything the actual work
totally is just saying notice jp uh
muted his microphone so we couldn't hear
his ringtone we wanted to hear what
ringtone he had
you'll have to take my word for it the
text message was received and the call
was a incoming call as well but uh no
very very handy feature though joe um
being able to use your voice on the
homepod to to be able to make calls and
texts
yeah i kind of saying about reading text
messages as well yeah
like imagine that that's really useful
for some people um especially anybody
has any trouble accessing there
some other things on the phone i i know
it's really important to be really
proficient on voice over but sometimes
if
or if you want if you want to just to do
things hand free in general it's handy
i'm going to check the text message now
see that i receive money back so i'm
going to say hey siri read my new text
messages
you have new messages from john paul
cochran and super value
john paul cochran said hi joe best of
luck with the live demo
would you like to reply
yes
what do you want to say
thanks jp
your reply to john paul cochran says
thanks jp
ready to send it yes
okay it's set as you can see you're
replying to mrs
it's really easy as well yeah no thanks
okay yeah let's not hear all the rest of
your message no because i don't want to
hear what um
you know
yeah yeah super value all the special
offers today
we won't waste your time yeah it's a
good thing that was the that was the
most recent text message from
jp
but uh what's up what's that message
that really um i know it'll be more or
less the same thing but whatsapp
messages
people who um that's one thing i don't
think you can do that on the other
speakers maybe i'm wrong but um i
haven't
seen it um been advertised yes as a
feature so
at least when you have um
the the homepod mini you can act you can
access whatsapp so i could say um
hey siri send a whatsapp message to john
paul cochrane
what do you want to say
hey jp this is another test message i
hope you get this
your whatsapp message to john paul
cochran says hey jp this is another test
message i hope you get this
ready to send it
yes
okay it's sent
yeah and just not to be repetitive i
won't go through the same it's the same
experience again you can say um say read
my new whatsapp messages um but joe i
sent you a whatsapp message would you be
able to like can you read it you'll go
on i'll read it okay hey siri
read my new whatsapp messages
you have new messages in three
conversations
first john paul cochran said hi joe what
did you order value
would you like to reply
hey jp it's none of your business
[Laughter]
your whatsapp reply to john paul cochran
says hey jp it's none of your business
ready to send
how easy that is to use you know it's
really yeah absolutely yeah
and if somebody's used to siri anyway on
their phone it's kind of basically the
same
idea isn't it the same operation if
somebody knows how to give voice
commands like that yeah exactly same
operation but add to what's after you
can't actually make well i tried earlier
to make a phone call
um
it didn't seem to work so it's it does
the messages but i don't think you can
do the calls um i'll i can try again
later but i haven't seen that worked
into whatsapp yet but look
even senator messing what's up that's a
great feature because everybody is
watching
chat now
yeah absolutely i think you were you
were telling us about um one or two of
the other kind of features that
differentiate it from
the other smart speakers as well or at
least kind of quite quite good little
features i know that it's not always
hard to
set up um for example some of the the
other smart speakers it can be fairly
easy process you mentioned earlier about
how how easy it was to set up the
homepod mini bringing the your iphone
um
uh near to the speaker and it does the
the setup of itself there's there's
something else that that works for as
well isn't there the idea of bringing
the phone close to the speaker yeah
there's a handoff feature as well so if
you have um
music
on your phone and you played it for
example on youtube or something like
that
or spotify
yeah
any other
audio that comes out of your phone even
a phone call you can move your um
phone over near the speaker
and hold hold it above it or some people
say tap above above your phone like like
if you're tapping your card on a machine
basically um you can transfer the audio
from your phone onto the homepad mini
okay so is that something that you can
demonstrate for us i'm going to try and
try and do that now
so i'll see can i find some music
i'm gonna play
i'm gonna play something on on my phone
now
and it's and i
i'm going to hold it over the home part
and hopefully this works
yeah so it's transferred over now and i
can i'm gonna turn up the volume hey
siri volume sixty percent
so you'll probably hear it there now
let's play it at least your keys and if
i want to transfer it back for example
if i was leaving the house and i wanted
to put the
music back onto my phone and i'm leaving
the house i'm passing by the home part i
can hold the phone over the home pad
again
so i'm going to do that now
yeah there it is it's back on my phone
again
so i'm using the background back on my
phone yeah so
um that will work for any audio and i
found it good for using it on youtube
for example if i play youtube videos and
i have a playlist on youtube i can
actually ask
siri to go to the next video as well
when the videos are playing and um when
i'm watching my phone or um
maybe i'm watching with somebody else on
the phone that kind of thing and it's
great to have the external speaker
yeah very good that's great actually
just to to get that demo as well because
it's uh we can't obviously um
see how the the action works but we
could definitely hear the the difference
in the sound quality so we can tell when
it was successful it wasn't just it
wasn't just joel argue and tell us no no
it's all working fine actually
yeah and radio stations can be a bit
quirky on it sometimes so
yeah for example playing rt radio 1
sometimes it goes off and tries to play
something from apple music or whatever
so you have to be kind of specific and
say play
rt radio 1 from tuning our play rt1
radio put word radio afterwards um and
some radio stations will just play no
problem without adding the word radio
are
tuning at the end but generally i i
added just to be sure because it just
it's a quirky thing with little speakers
like this there's always um a couple of
things you might need to try if the
first attempt doesn't work
yeah very good yeah so and the ambient
sounds as well are really good on it um
if anyone is interested in that like
with our feet for meditation or
massage or as i said even getting
kids to sleep and i think it's they're
very realistic and um yeah yeah the
speaker is so good
it sounds so real you know so um that's
the command for that
um so if you want to say siri play
forest sounds
and then you can say if you want to hear
all the rest of the sound you say so you
play the net play next
and then keep saying next until you go
through all five different sounds i
think it i think it's five or maybe six
at the moment
very good
very good and joe a quick question um
[Music]
i hope uh
i'm not putting you on the spot but the
if somebody wanted to get one of these
homepods and to just have an iphone but
they don't necessarily have you know
landline problem or any other
in-house wi-fi
is it possible to um
run these speakers without without um
wi-fi can it work off your 4g shared
hotspot or something like that i don't
think it's possible to do that and if
you just have one iphone in the house
okay i think you'll need either a second
if you're going that direction you might
need a second
iphone or one of those my fightings that
you can get i don't even know if they're
still available anymore but one of those
um portable wi-fi systems but i i think
it worked better if you had a proper
wi-fi system yeah yeah i don't imagine
it'd be
um you know
disturbing enough to keep the connection
all the time either you know what i mean
yeah thing like this would need a solid
broadband connection all the time i
reckon
okay
you know i should have something else
another question about mine
because i know you you use different
smart speakers besides apple homepod you
know google and amazon
what kind of like um what proportion of
save up your time using smart speakers
would you say for example your amazon
echo versus your homepod mini versus
google nest like already have particular
features that you'd focus on one so for
example the calls text would you work
well with the apple homepod mini and
then for music you might use another one
or how to work on it i find i use the
homepod mini
um
lately i've been using it for music and
i've also been using it as a an office
speaker because of the calls feature
um
whereas the um echo
i use a lot for some of the other
features like um
it has audio audible on it audible
um
it connects to some some well i've
connected it previously to a lot of the
smart home things in my house
and it connects to a lot of other
different services so
the as i said the
echo is in the game a little bit longer
um and it
seems to have allowed a lot more
external services in but there is a
there might be a few hoops to
jump through for the apple one but you
still can connect to most of the
services and you can also connect siri
shortcuts to it so
um
there's a shortcuts app on your on your
iphone and you can run siri shortcuts
from the homepod mini so
there is ways of doing everything with
the homepod mini there just might be one
or two that helps you to jump through
so
that's
probably
yeah but i think you know
yeah it's a good overview of the homepod
many as well it gives us a good sense of
its strengths and
maybe weaknesses depending on what sort
of ecosystem you're you're a bit
invested in already yeah well defend
yeah that's the thing it only came out
in the summer so if you a lot of people
are already invested in some other
ecosystem so it's a little bit late to
party as such but it it is
possible to connect it so for example i
can i can show an example of um maybe
turning
the heating on
i'll just give that a little demo there
so um hey siri turn up the heat and
downstairs
warming to 24 degrees celsius
okay we're going to be
roasted downstairs
i can also lower the heat and so i can
say hey siri it's a good thing lower the
heating downstairs
celsius yeah well lowering it to the
five degrees i don't think you can we
can we can go that low down there but
thankfully but did you get the idea so
um that's connected to a hive thermostat
and um yeah you can connect it to lots
of other different thermostats um
i hope that you were saying that you can
you can lower the heating as well
because
if you were stuck with only ever
increasingly
you'd be well roasted
yeah you can stop you can boost heat as
well you can stop it um
yeah you if you want to set a schedule
you have to go through the app
yeah other things we can do yeah i
probably i might have um
[Music]
might mention that you can set a
reminder as you can set timers you can
set the calendar event which will sync
with your calendar on your iphone
um
pretty good
yeah very good
yeah it gives us a good overview of the
homepod mini we haven't uh we haven't
really talked about it too much since it
since it came out so it's good to get
that overview and get an idea of the the
main functions and some of the little
differences as well between between that
and the other offerings that are out
there as well so thanks very much for
taking us through that joe and all the
demos went well
you're welcome you're welcome
thank you
always always nice when the demos come
off without the interesting well as
usual thanks
you've always got faith in those
uh live demos
in wi-fi
yeah that's it yeah yeah
meanwhile while i pick myself up off the
ground in relief that it's that it's uh
another live demo has worked we'll uh
move move on to the last little bit of
our show because we're we're nearly at
the end of our show today but we do have
our tech news to cover as well and jp
you were telling us a little bit about
this earlier but uh tell us a bit more
about the
changes with siri that's right two
things i'd like to
so when you release an internet
connection or maybe your your connection
itself is a bit patchy um and of course
all this means that you won't get the
refrain frustrating employee sorry i
can't help you right now if you're um
don't have an internet connection
um just with this feature using siri
offline it's worth highlighting that you
don't need to enable offline siri in ios
15. it's actually on by default
it does work with commands
such as setting and changing timers or
alarms
opening up applications controlling
system settings
like for example dark and light mode
the volume can be controlled with siri
offline uh the flashlight can be turned
on and off
most probably significantly on the show
today with accessibility features like
voiceover can be turned on and off with
siri offline things like airplane mode
as well low power mode and even
bluetooth
things like playing a next or previous
song if you're in the in a music app
in terms of what doesn't work there are
going to be some limitations obviously
um
if you're offline and ask a request that
siri can't help you with you will hear
and can help with that when you're
connected to the internet so these kind
of requests will include uh text and
whatsapp messages uh facetime
phone calls anything that really
requires uh internet connection
um things like you know checking the
weather forecast reminders uh your maybe
more specific apps uh actions and
applications
uh playing music as well and podcasts
and that includes actually downloaded uh
content it won't work
uh with siri um offline uh but it can be
very very helpful uh function for many
people
absolutely yeah that makes sense it does
it really does i've seen some
experiments as well as someone who's
used siri on an iphone which is uh
offline online very very clear that
offline siri is significantly faster in
responding to commands
and that's because the commands are
are processed internally on the phone
a quick one with that jp and you might
not have an answer for this but it's um
just if if you're online yeah and you
ask the same sort of things as
you as it can do offline does it does it
default to the offline mode like by my
honest by default it will give you the
quick answer instead of trying to
collect it's faster that's my
understanding dude it does uh however if
internet connection is required that's
my understanding but maybe then i'll be
into that but
um but yeah as i say it's any iphone
with an a12 chip which i think is the
iphone xs and upwards
most iphones nowadays will be able to
use the siri offline
but yeah it's certainly much faster it's
so it's all all the processing is done
internally on the phone as opposed being
sent to a server processed and then sent
back uh to your phone which you know can
take a bit of time
um so that's that's siri offline
um in terms of the other other thing i
mentioned a moment ago which is um this
was a little kind of a bit of a
limitation there with siri which is we
can't
check our send email since it's really
ios 15.
so that was a really really welcome
feature we saw with offline siri
but a lot of users now uh who people who
upgraded to ios 15 are pointing out that
it's no longer possible to use siri to
check or send emails and that's actually
the case as well with someone who has an
iphone running ios 14.
so other functionality as well that's
been removed includes you can't access
your call history with siri uh such as
missed calls
siri will actually respond to say that i
can't help with that but you can ask me
to open the uh they can ask me to open
up the phone phone app
i mean the other way around this is
using voiceover is to go into your call
history go into your your mail app or
whichever application you're using to to
check and send email well it is i mean a
lot of chat to a lot of people who have
used siri and relied on siri to check
email um
disappointing for people and i suppose
that's the thing is that if you if
you're using
voiceover anyway you're kind of able to
um get by without an assistant without a
virtual assistant or whatever but you've
got that assistant in siri and if it's
suddenly not able to assist you with
something that you might rely on oh
that's it exactly and i'd find a lot of
people and maybe yourselves are the same
and joe maybe maybe
build away in this but maybe series use
in conjunction with voiceover so it's
maybe it's opening up an application uh
which you know
sending email but then maybe to
to complement that with voiceover or
whatever can be helpful
um i know there's been several requests
made to apple support to have this
function restored
and apple has responded by saying that
we are aware of this issue and it's
currently under review so we can hope
that this review will lead to the return
of some missing serial functions yeah
that's kind of unclear almost isn't that
whether whether it's the booger or not
it's almost like it could be deliberate
but it could be like there could be a
part of a kind of a wider
plan for it but um it could also be a
book they could be i know they're trying
to encourage a lot of users to
use the shortcuts app um
app workflows for tasks like sending
copy this is going to be convenient are
we straightforward for every everyone to
use yeah right
it doesn't look like a small step
backwards for siri you know and this is
the 10th
14th this week is the 10th anniversary
of syria and we want them to
get
better and more productive not go
anywhere backwards but um
we pointed out all the good things that
that came from the whole body like you
know so i mean
there's
steps forward and slight step backwards
i wonder does siri go and look for you
know after 10 years you know and a pay
rise off of apple and this is her way of
protesting
she's on a semi strike
yeah yeah let us know if you if you get
that response when you try and send an
email i'm sorry i can't do that i'm on
strike
[Laughter]
yeah very good so that's kind of good to
know anyway even though the um
even though it's it's a bit of an
inconvenience really uh
to have that kind of limitation with
siri we noticed that the kind of pros as
well with offline siri but that that
limitation is a little bit difficult but
it's good to at least know about it it's
out there you know yeah hopefully they
will restore it
yeah your iteration yeah
yeah that's it
very good well thanks for taking us
through our tech news today jp and that
pretty much brings our show to a close
so hopefully you've enjoyed today's show
and just a reminder again of course that
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that through donate.ncbi.i
just before we go just a reminder of
what we're going to be talking about in
future live events we're going to be
talking about amazon show so that's uh
that feature that function
is going to be uh discussed in our next
live event which is going to be
on
october the 26th i think the date is
wrong just on the slideshow there so
october 26th two weeks time
at 2 30. uh we're going to go through
that so we look forward to to that in
two weeks time we're also going to be
talking about the variety of smart
classes now that will be in one of our
future shows we're going to just talk
about some of the the uh
different types of smart glasses that
are out there are they any good what are
they best for and we'll talk about that
in one of our future live events we're
also going to be having evelyn cusack on
to talk about the met iron app as well
and how that can
be be of help
in terms of
accessibility as well so we'll
talk to evelyn cusack about that in one
of our future live events as well if you
want to stay up to date with what's
happening on our live events as well as
plenty more you can subscribe to our
newsletter as well on our website or you
can email us at labs at
if you'd like to do that a lot of things
that we talk about uh even the tech news
today if you want to kind of read a
little bit more about that as well
that's been included in the
the technology newsletter i think that
was last week's
newsletter was it jp i think there was
some information about that
checking and sending an email where she
was featured in last uh last friday
that's it so if you want to read a bit
more about that please do
access the the newsletter you can sign
up for the newsletter there
so all that's left for me to do is to
thank our guests today stephen howell
from microsoft and joe lonergan of
course and uh of course thanks to to
everyone listening in as well i'm from
jp daniel and myself goodbye for now and
we look forward to having you all back
with us soon for another ncbi labs live
event
thank you
you