With macOS Sierra, Apple has finally brought its well-known personal assistant, Siri, to the Mac. Siri for Mac differs from iOS' version of Siri in several ways, taking advantage of the larger real estate of a Mac's display and the Finder file system. Users can also easily transfer or pin Siri's search results to the Notification Center or documents they're working on. To help you get started with Siri for Mac, we've put together a guide outlining what it's capable of. Activating Siri There are three ways to activate Siri in Sierra. Two of the methods are visually obvious while the third is not.
The Dock icon sitting in between the Finder and Launchpad logos. The Menu Bar toggle in between the Spotlight search and Notification Center icons. The keyboard command. Hold the Command and Space buttons for approximately two seconds.
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Siri can be enabled two ways. While you're installing macOS Sierra, there'll be a prompt asking you whether you'd like to enable Siri. Additionally, Siri can be enabled and disabled in the Siri section of System Preferences. There are several other options for Siri in System Preferences, including language, voice, voice feedback, mic input and customized keyboard shortcuts. What Siri for Mac Can Do Siri for Mac can do most of the same things Siri for iOS can do. It can give you sports scores or tell you about the weather. Schedule an event on your calendar, remind you what you need to get done today or find movie times.
Here's a full list of the things that carry over to the Mac. Launching and searching for apps. FaceTime and Messages.
Sports scores, team schedules, league standings, and player and team information. Photo search. Maps and navigation.
Twitter and Facebook posting, plus Twitter search. Movie information, showtimes, movie theater locations, movie reviews and award trivia. Apple Music, radio and music identification. iTunes, iBooks and Podcasts. Reminders, calendar stocks, weather, contacts, clock, Find My Friends, email and notes. Web search and Q&A, like unit measurements, facts and figures, and simple math. Settings / System Preferences Siri has two new abilities that are built specifically to take advantage of the Mac:.
Finder. About this Mac Siri's Mac-Specific Abilities Unlike Siri for iOS, Siri for Mac's dialogue box only takes up a portion of the screen. This allowed Apple to build Siri to be better utilized for multitasking. For example, Siri can be used to send a message to a friend while you're writing an email or working on a document. It can also find restaurant reservations for you while you're in the middle of a conversation with a friend. Because Siri is built for multitasking on a Mac, some of its results are more interactive, allowing you to combine them with other apps. These are some of the things you can do with Siri's results in macOS Sierra.
Pin photo results or sports team schedules to the Notification Center by clicking the + icon. Drag files from Siri's Finder search to the desktop.
Drag and drop search results from photo searches into emails, messages, documents and the desktop. Drag and drop map locations into emails, messages and documents. Siri's Settings category is referred to as System Preferences to better match macOS' verbiage, but Siri can also do some things on a Mac that it can't do on an iPhone. These are new settings abilities Siri has gained:.
Putting your computer to sleep. Changing your desktop wallpaper. Changing your display settings. Finally, there are some specific hardware requests that Siri can fulfill. In addition to asking Siri to turn up your volume or turn off your Bluetooth, Siri can tell you about your Mac. How fast your Mac is. How much memory your Mac has.
What your Mac's serial number is. How much free space your Mac's hard drive has.
How much iCloud storage you have. What version of macOS you're running.
All of Siri's Mac abilities can be used at any time. Siri will pause any audio or video you might have been playing when you activated it. This includes audio and video in your web browser, like SoundCloud tracks or YouTube videos. Siri's dialogue box will also stay on your screen no matter where you are, whether on the desktop or in a full-screen app.
It'll also stay in place as you navigate to different spaces. Siri can be deactivated by clicking the small 'x' in the top right corner of its dialogue box. I played around with Siri last night.
For some reason I cannot get her to launch applications. I have tried saying both 'open' and 'launch' with the name of the application, but every time she says 'cannot find an application with that name, do you wish to search for it in the app store?'
This is true for all apps, Apple's and third party apps. Has anyone else experienced this? Article Link: How to Use Siri in macOS Sierra ('I have the same problem, she tells me I don't have the app of that name and I should search the App Store!
Other than set appointments and uselessly read out the Nikkei performance she seems incapable of anything useful. She won't search anything, can't find a file and is basically useless - she cannot interpret as well as the iPhone and won't place a FaceTime call, because I don't have the app according to her! Flawed is an understatement - useless is more like it.
Siri on the Mac goes even deeper into your software than it does on iPhone and iPad. It can search for files, check your system settings, and understands contextual language, so you can ask one question and follow it up with a related one right after. How to enable Siri on the Mac When you first set up your Mac or update it to a new version of macOS, you will be asked if you want to use Siri on the Mac. If you didn't enable it at that time, you can do so manually at any time from System Preferences. Click on the Apple icon in the upper left corner of your screen.
Select System Preferences from the drop-down menu. Select Siri (it is in the fourth section down). Tick the box on the left side of the window to Talk to Siri. Select a language. Select a Siri Voice. If you don't want Siri to speak, turn off Voice Feedback. Select the Mic input from the internal one or an external accessory.
How to enable 'Type to Siri' on the Mac. In macOS High Sierra and later, you can type your search query to Siri instead of having to ask it out loud. So if you're in a meeting and trying to find that spreadsheet your boss just asked you for, you can ask Siri to find it for you without having to interrupt what's being said. How to use a keyboard shortcut to activate Siri You can click on Siri in your app Dock or the Menu bar at the top of the screen.
But if you prefer keyboard shortcuts, you're in luck — Siri likes them, too. Click on the Apple icon in the upper left corner of your screen. Select System Preferences from the drop-down menu. Select Siri (it is in the fourth section down). Under Keyboard Shortcut, select a keyboard shortcut to use.
By default, you hold down Command-Space, but you can also select from Option-Space, Function-Space, or you can customize it with the key combination you prefer. When you have a keyboard shortcut assigned, you can simply press and hold the two assigned keys until Siri pops up. How to pin Siri results to Notification Center All of your Siri search results can be pinned right into Notification Center. This can be very helpful if you are keeping track of documents for work — or you simply want to add pictures of Oscar Isaac to your Today view. Click on the Siri icon in the Menu bar or Dock, or use your keyboard shortcut to activate Siri.
Tell Siri to find you a file, document, or perform a web search. When the search results appear in Siri's window, click the Plus (+) button next to the search results. The Siri search results will be pinned to the Today view of your Notification Center. To remove it, hover over the search section in Notification Center and click on the X.
Here are some things that Siri can do on the Mac Siri can search for files. Siri has access to the files and documents on your computer. You can search for files based on date, and even narrow the search in a second query.
'Find files I worked on last week.' .
'Just the ones from Saturday.' . 'Just Pages documents.' You can also search for emails, contact information, calendar events, directions, Notes, and more.
'Do I have any new emails?' .
'What's on my schedule today?' . 'How do I get to the Apple Store?' . 'Find X name Note.' . ' What is my mom's address?'
(If you ask for contact information for a relationship, Siri will ask who that person is, by name.) Siri can tell you more about your Mac. Did you know Siri is a sports fan?
Ask it which team will win the next big game. You can ask Siri for the schedule of upcoming games, the current standings of a league, the team roster of tomorrow's match, and player stats. Siri knows about football, baseball, basketball, hockey, soccer, and, as of macOS 10.2.4, cricket.
Here's what Siri knows about sports:. Soccer: Italian Seria A, English Premier League, Dutch Eredivisie, Major League Soccer, French Ligue 1, Spanish La Liga, and German Bundesliga. Baseball: Major League Baseball. Football: NCAA Football, NFL. Basketball: NCAA Basketball, NBA, WNBA. Hockey: NHL.
Cricket: IPL and ICC For each of those sports, Siri can provide:. Scores. Standings. Schedules.
Team Rosters. Player stats If you want to know about a sports team, game, or league, just say, 'When do the West Indies play next?' Or 'Who won the A's game last night?' Siri will jam out to your tunes with you. Siri has access to Apple Music and your music library. If you want to hear a specific song or album, or just want to relax to any genre of music, Siri can help. 'Play me some tunes.'
. 'Play the top 10 songs of 1962.'
. 'Play metal songs from the 80s.' Thanks to Shazam integration, Siri can also tell you what song is playing so you don't have to open iTunes to find out. Because Siri has access to your system settings, it can adjust the volume, pause, skip, and replay songs.
As of macOS High Sierra, when you're using Apple Music, Siri learns your style and can create custom playlists based on what you like. For example, it can create the perfect playlist for your weekend backyard BBQ or workout. It also answers music trivia like identifying members of a band, or what was the first album an artist put out.
With support from Safari, Maps, and Find My Friends, Siri on the Mac can actually plan your evening for you. Ask about movies playing nearby, including their current rating; find out if there are any restaurants where you can book a table; and with Find My Friends enabled, you can even find out if your crew is putting one back at the local pub. 'What movies are playing tonight.'
When you click on a movie, you will be directed to Fandango on the web. 'Is 'Sully' any good?' You'll get a Rotten Tomatoes rating and a link to watch the trailer on movietrailers.apple.com. 'Find reservations for dinner tonight at seven.' Siri can't book the reservation, but when you select a restaurant, you will see the Maps info card and can call or visit the website to make reservations.
Set Smart Reminders with Siri. You don't have to get specific when asking Siri to set reminders for you: Since the Reminders app works with dates, times, and locations, you can get notified in a number of ways.
'Remind me to take out the garbage when I get home.' . 'Remind me to finish typing my resume tomorrow.'
. 'Remind me to walk the dog every morning at 7:00 AM.' Siri also has an uncanny ability to recognize the app you're using thanks to its machine learning algorithms and can set reminders based on what you are doing currently.
'Remind me to look at this tonight.' . 'Remind me to respond to this email after lunch.' Siri can control your HomeKit accessories. With the arrival of macOS Mojave and the Home app for macOS, Siri on the Mac has gained the ability to control your HomeKit scenes and accessories, just like it can on your iPhone or iPad. This includes everything from lights to thermostats.
'Turn off the lights in my bedroom.' . 'Set the temperature to 72 degrees.' . 'Set my Goodnight scene.' Ask Siri anything Siri has a wealth of knowledge built into its ever-increasing intelligence.
It knows a lot about sports, music, geography, astronomy, and more. If Siri doesn't know the answer outright, it can find more information for you with a quick search of the web. You can ask Siri anything — and the more you ask, the more Apple will (anonymously) learn about what users need from Siri. Have a question about Siri on the Mac? Let us know in the comments. Updated November 2018: Added information about controlling HomeKit accessories. Removed section about posting on social media, as that is no longer available in Siri for Mac.