Hey Facebook wake phrase from Facebook to interact with its Oculus:
Along with technology advancement, People are showing interest in voice assistant Hands-free tech. Like people are very familiar with using commands like “OK Google” and “Hey Siri” for their voice assistants. Similarly now Facebook also brings a “Hey Facebook wake phrase for the voice assistant to interact with its products hands-free.
Today Facebook’s new vocal command has officially rolled out, Where Facebook introduced “Hey Facebook” as an opt-in wake phrase for the Oculus Quest 2. Also plans to make it available for all Quest devices in the future. Facebook’s goal is to make voice commands a truly hands-free experience. Thus making it easy to take screenshots, cast, and more.
However, The Oculus Quest 2 already has a set of voice commands that can be triggered by some physical control from users. But with this new wake phrase, Facebook allows for complete hands-free control. Facebook announces that this wake phrase is an optional feature. Initially, it will be disabled by default so users have explicitly needed to toggle that switch if they want to experience this hands-free voice assistant.
However, The Verge informed that this new wake phrase Facebook can also be used with Facebook’s Portal devices. In the place of the “Hey Portal” wake phrase. Which allows you to ask questions or perform a task like starting a video call.
Here are the details of Facebook introducing the “Hey Facebook” wake phrase
Starting today the new opt-in experimental “Hey Facebook” wake phrase will be rolling out to Oculus Quest 2. This will be a gradual rollout, But if you want to experience you can enable it via Experimental features settings. Once you enable this, You can give commands hands-free like Hey Facebook take a picture. And Hey, Facebook show me who’s online, or Hey Facebook, open supernatural, etc. You can give any voice commands to get started. Always be aware that your Quest will not respond to this new wake phrase if its microphone is off, or when the headset is asleep or powered down.
Also, note that this new “Hey Facebook Wake phrase is an opt-in feature. And as usual, you can still use Voice commands without this wake phrase. By simply using the existing button in the Home menu or By double-pressing the Oculus controller button. Also, Facebook informs that opting in for this new feature isn’t a permanent experience. If you want you can easily turn off this New wake phrase “Hey Facebook” similar to how you activated it, you can also disable it from the same Experimental Feature Panel.
Along with this new wake phrase
You will always have control over whether your voice commands are stored and potentially used in the future to make the feature better. You can always effortlessly check your voice commands activity, you can view and delete at any time as you wish. Also, you can turn off Voice storage from your settings. Without interrupting your voice command feature.
With the “Hey Facebook” Wake phrase Facebook will help you do more with Quest. It helps you to get into your favorite games faster or capture events at the same time being immersed at the moment. Facebook in its Oculus blog informs that ” Controllers, Hands and voice we’re committed to helping you to experience most out of your headset, and that begins with providing you with options”
Hey Facebook Wake phrase also works as an alternative to “Hey Portal”
As informed by Verge, This new Facebook also works for Facebook Portal Displays. As an alternative to the “Hey Portal” command, it is also listed on the Facebook Portal support page.
“Hey Facebook” and “Hey Portal” are wake phrases that will let you use your portal hands-free. It will help you in making requests or ask questions using your voice hands-free. So, now you can select whether you want to use “Hey Portal” or “Hey Facebook” wake phrase to activate a response to your voice commands. If you’re already using one try saying “Hey Facebook” or “Hey Portal” when you want to start a video call with your portal, check for which command it will respond to.
Portal voice commands will get activated when the portal detects the wake phrases “Hey Portal” or “Hey Facebook” based on which wake phrase you select. If Portal’s microphone is off it will not be able to listen to any wake words. And if Portal hears any wake phrase, then a visual indicator will appear on the bottom of the screen. Then Portal will begin recording and transcribing your voice interaction. This recording and transcription will sent out to Facebook servers in real-time to respond to your request.
Other details
With all this in mind, it seems like a natural improvement for the portal devices and Oculus headset. But it would have been much better if Facebook introduced the “Hey Oculus” instead of new wake phrase for Oculus Quest 2 headsets.
However, The reason behind introducing the Hey Facebook wake phrase is to let you do things with your voice instead of interrupting the VR action often. We have to see how users will respond to these new changes.
Face informed that support for the wake phrases is gradually rolling out. so if you can’t enable access to this Hey Facebook feature then don’t worry you might get this update later this week
Conclusion
Facebook has announced that now Oculus Quest users can utter the “Hey Facebook” wake phrase to interact with its devices hands-free. However, Facebook didn’t inform anything about the wake phrase being supported for the Portal Displays, This was first noted by the Verge. Means Portal device users can also use the new wake phrase as an alternative to the “Hey Portal” wake phrase.
