I used to be able to press the microphone button on my home screen and say “Start 5-minute timer” and it would start the timer.

Now, when I do that, it does a Google search for “Start 5-minute timer”.

How do I get that functionality back?

I don’t want to open an app, and I don’t want to use a number pad or anything to enter the number.

EDIT: Thank you! I went into the Gestures section of Settings, and now I can long-press the power button to get the desired behaviour. This might even be more convenient than tapping the mic icon!

  • Onno (VK6FLAB)@lemmy.radio
    2·
    8 months ago

    Google has been futzing with Google Assistant for a little while now, discontinuing features that they unilaterally decided were “unsafe” or for other random reasons.

    For example for the past few months I can’t turn my A/C off in the middle of the night with a voice command. I can turn it off RIGHT NOW, but not at 3am.

    I did notice that using the command for a timer did bring up the search as you said, but the search page showed a timer counting down.

    I have no sound, so I don’t know if it alerts you at the end of the countdown.

    Google also removed “remind me to XYZ in an hour”.

    It’s all getting very authoritarian.

    • otpOP
      2·
      8 months ago

      I was able to access it by changing it from the mic button to long pressing my power button. Thankfully, I don’t use any of the more advanced features, lol