Siri may soon talk to a Mac near you

By Michelle Maltais

March 30, 2012 12 AM PT

Siri may be talking to more devices in the near future, according to a patent Apple filed.

The patent application suggests that Apple may be looking at connecting and controlling devices via Siri on the iPhone.

In the filing, Apple wrote:”Portable electronic devices, such as digital media players, personal digital assistants, mobile phones, and so on, typically rely on small buttons and screens for user input. Such controls may be built into the device or part of a touch-screen interface, but are typically very small and can be cumbersome to manipulate.... What is needed is an electronic device that includes a voice user interface for executing voice or oral commands from a user, but where voice recognition is performed by a remote device communicatively coupled to the electronic device, rather than the electronic device itself.”

Among the possibilities the filing seems to describe is an iPhone controlling a digital media player, like Apple TV, with voice commands, as well as a Macbook or Mac desktop serving as Siri’s conduit to control other devices. This could be an answer to the question on many Mac forums of when the voice-control feature would come to Macs.

If the figures filed with the patent are any indication, iPhone owners could eventually use their Siri-enabled device to control a third-party digital camera.

Siri currently is available on only the iPhone 4S.

Apple patents universal remote -- no programming necessary

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