When your hands are wet or you can't grab your phone....the one thing I used Google assistant for, Gemini can't do.
this post was submitted on 14 Mar 2025
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If you still have Google Assistant, it will tell you it can't set an alarm, and then tell you to try setting an alarm using Google Assistant
Gemini works as a general search engine, but it's trash at everything else.
I miss now on tap
Translation: your phone runs fine right now.... Well not anymore! Introducing more Bloatware! Your phone has never crawled like this before.
I don't want that at all. Well I guess I can't use hands free anymore. Thanks google.
Terrible idea. Every time I look at toggling it on just to test, it explicitly lists features that I use as ones which will be disabled by the switch.
I have no idea of the difference other than I feel slightly like a downgrade when I cant do simple things that Inused to be able to. The biggest difference isnlikely to be my privacy and data.
Google on tap was all I needed and they have removed and it readded it multiple times...it is currently the only gemini feature I use. And its not a gemini feature.
Gemini is hardly an uprade to Assistant, though. Gemini can't do any task automation (aka the one thing Google Assistant could do) because it's a LLM that most likely doesn't even 'know' that it's being run on a phone....
They already fucked up assistant so bad that it can't even set timers anymore... )):
Yes. This is why I've disabled it repeatedly when it supplants my assistant.
If they remove automation, well, that was the one thing standing between me and de-googling.
I am sure they are working on automation with Gemini when they replace assistant
I don't know if they can really do that since Gemini is just an LLM at its core. Maybe they could integrate Assistant functionality into Gemini on Android that's then triggered by certain keywords, but at that point why not just keep both Assistant and Gemini?
I find Gemini has better communication and comprehension ability compared with assistant, but can do even less when it comes to controlling the phone. No reminders, no calendar events, no messages, no integration with anything. Just talking.
I would have preferred assistant talk and understand better, instead of a completly gimped alternative that does that and nothing more.
Google assistant was already a good listener, it seems to have gotten worse, but compared to anything else I've tried to do with voice it was & is still the best at understanding, and can be set to be bilingual.
I honestly don't understand this but it's very Google to push the change before the replacement is fully baked. They did that with YouTube Music too.
Exactly, and maybe I'm a outlier, but I have no intention of speaking to my device like it's a human. Ever.
Integrations with the phone's functionality is key. I don't care how clever the brain is, it needs to talk to the rest of the body.
I'm somewhat of a boomer, what sort of things can you do through assistant?
Set or change alarms, add reminders to your calendar, ask about those things, send text messages, start phone calls, have it read out last text messages received.
When I was a truck driver, my wife could test me, and I could just listen to a transcript of what she sent instead of calling her and asking what she typed.
"Hey Google, read my last text"
"Hey Google, send a text to , 'Quit texting me while I'm driving, woman!" Stuff like that. 🤣
I use it to set reminders and alarms. I don't keep the "OK google" stuff on, I just hold the power button for a second or two until the assistant pops up (or at least used to, I haven't done it in a while so I'm not sure if it's stupid gemini now instead), then just say like, "remind me friday at 3pm to call the doctor" and it does it.
Usually quick things in the car when I don't have hands.
- Ask about weather
- Set a reminder
- Reply to a text
Mine does reminders and events now. It can also do Google home stuff.
Well, too bad, i have replaced Google on my phone.
What setup you currently running?
GrapheneOS is the only one that can really sever the Google connection. LineageOS is kind of a halfway point but still relies on an amount of Google to function.
Meh, the GPS SUPL thing might be the only one for me, but i prefer good location. I use Cromite and never used Captive Portals.
https://old.reddit.com/r/degoogle/comments/cldohl/how_to_degoogle_lineageos_in_2019/
Gemini might be good at something, but I'll never know because it is bad at all the things I have ever used the assistant for. If it's good at anything at all, it's something I don't need or want.
Looking forward to 2027 when Google Gemini is replaced by Google Assistant (not to be confused with today's Google Assistant, totally different product).
Seriously, I tried Gemini for a while but it is mostly useless. It can it open my apps, cannot control Home Assistant, cannot send a message to someone.
Yeah, it has a total lack of any of the integrations that made Assistant actually useful.
Even if an LLM offers meaningful improvements on the core conversational elements of Assistant, launching it without all the needed integrations is idiotic and completely hamstrings the functionality.
I swapped to Gemini for a month or two. Kept thinking to myself "maybe I'm not speaking clearly," and other justifications. Turns out it just sucks. Now I just do everything manually. Fuck em.
🤣 Gemini is the worst of all the ais. It can't even do the most basic shit like set reminders.
Google has fallen so hard. They are just pure ad garbage now.
If this is pushed through a silent update then I'll use adb to remove it. I don't need a useless ai assistant hogging precious memory.
I feel bad for for the folks who have their phone gimped overnight and they won't have no clue why. So many people with older phones are going to need to upgrade because of this forced update. Talk about e-waste.
It probably already is. AICore is a service thats been getting snuck on the andoids for a couple of months, ever since AndroidSystemSafety was push on silently, which is effectively like recall and scans all your photos and files in the background.
Thanks for letting know about system safety, I just removed it. Play store said my xperia isn't compatible with AICore so I got lucky with that. Wish I could switch to lineage buty bootloader is locked.
Anything else I should remove?
not remove but there is an apk that acts as safety core so that it doesn't "accidentally" pop back up on your phone after an update.
I got the change and immediately put it back to Google assistant. I don't want AI. I want to tell my phone when to set my alarm clock.
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No fucking thanks! Gemini is garbage.
But Google likes garbage...
I use Google Assistant a lot. I tried the Gemini Assistant on my phone and it was an exercise in frustration.
Me: (after pausing the tv) "Resume TV"
Google: (resumes playback on TV)
Gemini: "TV not recognised. Please say the device name" or even worse... "A resume is essential when you're looking for a job in television. Your resume should blah blah..."
Me: (with phone locked) "set a timer for xxx"
Google: "setting a timer for xxx, starting now"
Gemini: "I'm unable to set timers, please unlock your phone, open xxx and (lengthy step by step instructions)", or "setting a timer for yyy" (completely wrong time).
They activated Gemini at work to auto-complete stuff in emails. I work in IT, and I was not aware of that. I was typing the sentence "we will need some help" and was about to add "in the project blah blah" but Gemini came with its amazing auto-completion and added something like "in the street where they sell sausages".
AI was a mistake, and I didn't use it since that day. Waste of time, waste of everything.
Granted I've a N Irish Belfast accent but Assistant pretty much always got exactly what I said. They've definetly gimped the speech recognition in Gemini I tried show me a picture of a jet and it responded with here's a picture of a unique job title.
There's wrong and there's how the hell.
Google Assistant: Let's build a product around functionality.
Gemini: Let's build functionality around a product.
Any guess which method works better?
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Once again, thank goodness for GrapheneOS.
Seriously considering this for my next phone. I currently have a Pixel, so I'm thinking I'll get another Pixel, try grapheneOS on the one I have to get comfortable with it, before doing it to the new phone.
The switch was much easier than expected.
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Good thing I never used Google Assistant then.
Same here. Really looking forward to not using their new product. How exciting.
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