Got a tip for us? Share it...
• • RSS

'Dragon Search' Comes to the iPhone

Friday December 18, 2009 7:56 am PST by Eric Slivka

Dragon Search [App Store, Free], the follow-up to the highly-publicized Dragon Dictation iPhone application released last week, has appeared in the App Store. Dragon Search utilizes voice recognition technology to allow users to search by voice numerous sources, including Google, Yahoo!, or Bing (depending on the user's search engine preferences), YouTube, Twitter, iTunes, and Wikipedia.


Nuance Communications, the company behind the Dragon applications, has also become more proactive about privacy issues in the wake of concerns from users over Dragon Dictation's automatic uploading of their contacts' names to the company's servers. While the goal of the tactic was to enable more accurate transcription of those names, a number of users have been concerned about privacy issues, from the security of the company's servers to possible misuse of the information.

In response, Nuance earlier this week issued an updated version of Dragon Dictation that makes uploading of contacts optional and allows users to delete the information if it had been automatically uploaded by the original version of the application. In the case of Dragon Search, Nuance makes clear in the application's App Store description that no personal information is uploaded or stored, although spoken search queries are stored by the company for assistance in improving its technology.
[ 14 comments ]

Top Rated Comments

(View all)

Avatar
tryppy
Posted: 32 months ago
not seeing this in the Canadian store. Not really surprised though. :rolleyes:
Rating: 0 Positives / 0 Negatives
Avatar
str1f3
Posted: 32 months ago
Seriously, they couldn't just add this to the Dictation app already?

I wonder about the relevance of this app since the Google Mobile App already has voice search.
Rating: 0 Positives / 0 Negatives
Avatar
GoldenPRGuy
Posted: 32 months ago
Not sure if anyone else has experienced this issue, but for the last several days my Application app has been showing there is an update to a new version which lets you pull back contacts from the Dragon server. No matter how many times I try to update the app stays at the original version and continues to show as new in my apps to update. Thoughts?
Rating: 0 Positives / 0 Negatives
Avatar
vigorblade
Posted: 32 months ago

Not sure if anyone else has experienced this issue, but for the last several days my Application app has been showing there is an update to a new version which lets you pull back contacts from the Dragon server. No matter how many times I try to update the app stays at the original version and continues to show as new in my apps to update. Thoughts?


I had the same issue when trying to update it through itunes, but I tried deleting the original app I had, directly from the iphone and re-downloading directly through the iphone and finally I had the updated version. The next time I sinc'd with itunes the updated version of the app was transferred from my iphone to my itunes. Hopefully it works for you. Good Luck !

-Vigorblade
Rating: 0 Positives / 0 Negatives
Avatar
TraceyS/FL
Posted: 32 months ago
Would be nice if it worked on the Touch with a Mic. My Dad could use it/them for medical reasons....
Rating: 0 Positives / 0 Negatives
Avatar
MadeTheSwitch
Posted: 32 months ago
Needs a different icon. Too similar to the dictation app. In fact, it should specifically have the word SEARCH on it.

A lot of these companies need to go take an icon 101 class. Some of this stuff is so basic, yet they still make icons that don't even resemble their products or what they do. DUMB!!!!
Rating: 0 Positives / 0 Negatives
Avatar
deenybird
Posted: 32 months ago
These dragon apps are really great, but I'm wondering how their search app will improve over googles. This should have been bundled with their dictation app as well
Rating: 0 Positives / 0 Negatives
Avatar
iphones4evry1
Posted: 32 months ago

I wonder about the relevance of this app since the Google Mobile App already has voice search.


I'm thinking the same thing. When you search Google, Wikipedia results come up in the search results; so Google really searches both Google and Wikipedia.

The only advantage I can think of is that perhaps the Dragon voice dictation/recognition software is better than Goolge's. Maybe not. I don't know which is better.

Does anyone know what this app has that Google App does not already have?
Rating: 0 Positives / 0 Negatives
Avatar
Darth.Titan
Posted: 32 months ago

Does anyone know what this app has that Google App does not already have?


It's simple. The Google App searches Google. Dragon Search lets you view results from Google, Wikipedia, Twitter, YouTube, and the iTunes Store individually. It also looks like it would be a simple matter to add other searches via updates.

Pretty sweet for a free app.
Rating: 0 Positives / 0 Negatives
Avatar
stepchild
Posted: 32 months ago

It's simple. The Google App searches Google. Dragon Search lets you view results from Google, Wikipedia, Twitter, YouTube, and the iTunes Store individually. It also looks like it would be a simple matter to add other searches via updates.

Pretty sweet for a free app.


Agreed, I just hope it stays free.
Rating: 0 Positives / 0 Negatives

[ Read All Comments ]