Voice Commands is a more limited app than Voice Actions, although it does some of the things that Voice Actions does, like making phone calls. Voice Commands is as easy as talking. Press the Home key twice, and a friendly female voice instructs you to “Say a command,” and the screen displays “Say a command” as well.
Note
You can launch Voice Commands no matter what app you’re using by pressing the Home key twice. You don’t need to be on the Home screen in order to launch it. You can also launch Voice Commands by tapping its icon in the Application Tray.
At this point, tell the Droid 2 what to do—“Call Carmen Jones,” for example. The Droid 2 asks you to confirm the action; for example, “Did you say, ‘call Jamie Jones’?” Say yes or no, or tap Yes or No at the bottom of the screen. If you answer No, the Droid 2 says (and displays onscreen) “Command not recognized. Try again?” If you want to give it another try, say or tap Yes, and repeat what you said. Say or tap No, and, after a brief warning screen, you exit the Voice Commands app.
If the Droid 2 recognizes what you wanted it to do, at this point, your wish is its command. If you’re making a call, for example, it repeats the phone number to you, show it onscreen, and then make the call. If you tell it to run an app, it tells you and shows you what app it’s about to open, and then opens it.
Note
If you’re making a phone call, speak the phone number to call if the person isn’t in your Contacts list.
Life, though, is rarely so simple. Right out of the box, Voice Commands isn’t a great listener, and it doesn’t always understand what you say. It does a good job of recognizing the task you want it to perform, such as making a phone call or opening an app, but it isn’t nearly as good at recognizing names—or it may be confused when several names in your Contacts are similar. If it can’t completely understand you, it pops up a list of possible choices, for example, a set of names. Say or tap the name you want to call. Although, as a practical matter, if Voice Commands didn’t understand you the first time, it probably won’t understand you the second time, either. At this point, tapping is probably better than speaking.
If you’re a glutton for punishment, or have plenty of time to spare, don’t do anything, and the Droid 2 reads you each of the choices onscreen in turn. After each choice, say no if it’s wrong; say yes when you get to the right choice. If none are the right choice, start all over again.
Note
The Droid 2’s voice-synthesis capabilities are a lot like most voice synthesis capabilities—that is to say, fairly rotten. It does a good job of pronouncing words it already knows, and often a very bad job of pronouncing words it doesn’t know. It’s particularly bad at pronouncing names. So when controlling the Droid 2 with your voice, you’ll often have to look at the screen, because you may not understand what it’s asking you.
If you’ve asked the Droid 2 to make a phone call or send a text message, email, or so on to a contact and the contact has multiple phone numbers or email addresses, a list of them appears onscreen. Tap the number or address you want to use. The next time you take that action for that contact, the Droid 2 won’t bother with asking which phone number or address to use—it’ll use that one.