Android Wishlist: Smart Context

G1 is literally a death threat in the car, with its lack of voice dialing capabilities.

On the other hand, it is also a privacy threat, being used without the screen lock pattern.

Whereas it is barely possible to get away with placing a call with the screen unlocked (Menu-Menu-Home-Direct Dial, if it is configured, and Menu-Menu-Call-get-lost-and-die, if it's not), it is even more difficult if there is a lock pattern.

A good start in the right direction could be, for example, automatic unlock to the home screen upon connecting with a specified Bluetooth device.

Still, this doesn't make it safe enough, just reduces the threat. I do wish someone's got enough time and money to come up with the docking station.

Or, for Pete's sake, fix the voice dialer...

Android G1: Bluetooth is not that useful, either

In the process of comparing headsets, I've swapped H700 and H710 between phones and decided to test the voice quality via Bluetooth on G1.

I knew that voice dialer could be better, but the result was unexpected nevertheless.

Turns out, there are just two things you can do using just the buttons on your Bluetooth headset:

• Take the call
• Redial

Having used to have an extensive set of voice commands, this comes as a major disappointment.

G1 is unfit for hands-free operation. If you drive a lot, and have to initiate calls, you may want to think twice before buying it.

Android G1 RC29 is here

Voice dialer still sucks. Totally unusable - checked by three people. Not a sinlge time in 10 minutes of trying did it get a single name (or number, for that matter) right.

G1 Voice Dialing Sucks

Don't know what to blame it for - on G1 hardware, or on Android software, but the voice dialer on G1 deeply and profoundly sucks.

Out of existing address book, it can recognize 1 (one) name.

It would've been tolerable if it could recognize digits, but no, it can't recognize them either. Repeatedly.

I would've blamed that on the fact that I speak with an accent, if not for the fact that a stone age old PEBL had just slight problems with it, and BlackBerry Curve didn't have any at all.

I wonder if voice recognition actually runs locally on the phone, or remotely with your voice input channeled to a Google server - just like Picasa 3 does with face recognition. Also wonder if the algorithm is fixed, or self-learning - it gives me way too may choices when it fails.

Verdict: unusable in current state. If you're using voice dialing a lot, make sure it works for you before you buy the phone.

Update: I'm not the one whose voice it doesn't recognize. Native speakers have just as much luck as I do.

Update: RC29 didn't help much.