A video has surfaced showing that BlackBerry is working on a personal assistant for the next evolution of its operating system. The so-called Intelligent Assistant will be a new alternative to Siri and Google Now , the two current options that will soon also see the arrival of Microsoft's offering, which appears to be called Cortana.
It seems clear that the next step in consumer computing is virtual personal assistants. The PC and later the mobile phone have always evolved in the direction of adjusting more and more to the circumstances and biography of the user. Setting up defaults and accounts on our devices was just a first step. Then Siri explored the option of putting a humanized interface to which we could give orders with voice and that would also respond with voice to the necessary information. Google Now went a step further and in addition to those voice commands and spoken responses, it gave us information on cards that was ahead of our requests.
BlackBerry's alternative appears to be at the same stage as Siri. We haven't been able to see it in action since the N4BB leak shows an early build of the new BB10.3. However, we can confirm that a search interface with voice input has been created.
The current level of demand is quite high. The Google and Apple systems allow us to do many of our own actions by voice such as managing the calendar, sending messages and emails, using alarms, reminders, calls and, of course, searching for information.
Google is breaking new ground with Android Wear , as features related to the sensors in wearables , as well as some smart home applications, will come into play and be integrated into Google Now. Meanwhile, Cortana seems poised to become a comprehensive interface for Microsoft's operating systems, helping us personalize our environment.
Ultimately, again BlackBerry will hit hard competition as others have come before and have done a good job.
The rest of the changes that the update to BB10.3 will bring are very interesting, mainly affecting the interface. You can keep an eye on them in the following video.