During the last WWDC Apple introduced us to its idea of an intelligent speaker, a speaker for the home equipped with Siri that is characterized not only by offering the ing intelligent answers but also by the quality of audio.
Although it was presented in June, it will not reach us until December, and therefore there is still some time to know it in detail. Of course, some things are gradually being revealed.
Developer Steve Troughton-Smith has searched the HomePod firmware a bit (its code name is AudioAccessory1,1) and some surprises have been found. The first? This is an iOS without a screen. The difference is that your presentation scheme is not a SpringBoard but a SoundBoard.
Like other Apple products, it will feature accessibility features and VoiceOver. In this way, people with accessibility problems can use the device without any problem.
In any case, it will be curious to see these options, because the HomePod itself is already all audio, and accessibility functions usually focus on describing by audio the screen of a device.
As we know, at the top of the HomePod we find a surface of touch LEDs. Apple will use it to display the Siri animation and to display basic playback controls. We’ll see if it shows something else because Apple’s main criticism of the Amazon Echo was that it did not have a screen.
Finally, even though the speaker is running the iOS code, it does not appear that third-party applications or extensions will be supported, at least not at the moment.
Perhaps in the second generation, Apple will allow developers to create their own apps for the device by integrating an App Store. Be that as it may, in December we will be in doubt when it goes on sale.
Source | Steve T-S
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