Apple’s HomePod was announced at the 2017 WWDC. The speaker has gotten a lot of critiques for its lack of features, absence of color options, and worst yet, Siri. It seems to closely resemble Amazon’s Echo series with it’s cylindrical shape and big round disc on top.
proposal
I propose the renaming of the product to something more suitable. The speaker has received a lot of critique because it’s not very smart (it doesn’t know what you want, it just tries its best), isn’t multi-room capable, can’t be linked with other speakers without
Apple’s latest addition to its smart speakers is the HomePod, a wireless speaker for the home with Siri built in. Unfortunately it appears that when you set up HomePod your iPhone or iPad will name it ‘Home’ [1] [2].
name change
In iOS 11 when setting up a new device, one of the options is to rename the device. When you do this, iOS will ask for a new name and then suggest that you choose from one of your devices [3]. This is not what we want as we wish to rename HomePod after it has already been named ‘Home’.
Unable to change name
Since HomePod can be activated by saying ‘Hey Siri, turn off the lights’ we can’t activate it by name in this form. It is possible to say ‘Turn off the bedroom light’ and have it turn off a specific HomeKit device such as a lamp so it would be possible to say ‘Hey Siri, turn on the kitchen light’. Doing so will only activate that one device and not another device in the same room that has a different name.
about homekid devices
HomeKit devices can be grouped together under ‘scenes’ which control multiple HomeKit devices at once. A scene could have one light on and the other off, or both lights dimmed to 50%. Scenes are activated by saying ‘Hey Siri, activate <scene>’.
From what I have found, Siri won’t let you change the name of your devices, even after they’ve been named. This only seems to be able to be done by renaming the device in iTunes on a computer, but it does allow for different names to be set up depending on which iCloud account is being used [4] [5] [6].
If iTunes renaming is to be used, it will require more than one iCloud account since the same device would have two names depending on which iCloud account you are using. It also requires that iTunes be installed on a computer and connected with your device using a USB cable. This limits the utility of the solution as most people don’t want to use iTunes.
Apple has actually recommended the renaming of devices before although it was for file sharing between apps. Apps installed on iOS can access files in other apps but they need to get permission first [7]. This is what Apple needs done, not true device renaming. It’s also not required that any app gets permission to access files in other apps.
‘Hey Siri, rename HomePod’. This would be a simple way of renaming the speaker without requiring that it already have a name. It is unlikely for this command to interfere with any other commands as Siri listens only when the user says Hey Siri so could simply ask if they are sure before completing the action.
how to change homepod name after set up
HomePod has been pitched as a competitor to Amazon Echo and Google Home, but it falls short in a lot of ways. For one, Siri is pretty weak at this time compared to what’s on the market. The speaker itself isn’t too impressive either since Apple didn’t have enough time to improve upon the audio quality from the first generation model. It’s priced at $350 which isn’t a bad price for what you’re getting, but it may be hard to justify the cost over similar products from third-party manufacturers.
conclusion
Apple has only announced two colors of HomePod so far: white and space gray. It’s unlikely that other colors will be announced at WWDC 2017. In iOS 11 when setting up a new device, one of the options is to rename the device. When you do this, iOS will ask for a new name and then suggest that you choose from one of your devices [3]. T
