Siri is coming to the Mac with OS X 10.12 update

Rumor has it that later this year Apple might finally bring Siri to Mac OS X, as of the upcoming 10.12 update. Siri’s integration into the Mac ecosystem has been in the works for quite some time, with Apple expected to extent its virtual assistant beyond the realm of iOS, since last year, when Microsoft took the lead by making Cortana an integral, and almost necessary component of Microsoft Windows 10.

While some details have leaked, including a number of concept images depicting Siri within the Mac OS X menu bar, more accurate information is expected to be unveiled at this year’s upcoming World Wide Developer Conference, in San Francisco.

Apple and Google have been pioneering the technology behind virtual assistants and voice-controlled devices, with a heavy focus on mobile computing, especially smartphones. With that said, using voice commands in desktop environments is becoming a trend among owners of Windows 10 PCs. Using voice in a desktop environment is extremely useful, in situations when we may want to open an app that we don’t use very often, for which there might not be a desktop icon available.

There are all sorts of tasks for using voice makes sense in Mac OS X, as much as it does on Windows 10, such as creating and sending a new email, searching the web, or, as mentioned earlier, opening applications instead of looking for them in a list or a menu.

What we can expect from Siri on the Mac, is most likely a similar set of features as on iOS, which means deeper integration with Continuity and iOS.

This desktop version of Siri could also be capable of reporting notifications from iOS devices, similarly to what Windows 10 users will be able to do, after this Summer’s Anniversary Update, and similar to what Windows 10 Insiders have already been experimenting with, since the latest Preview Build.

In spite of Siri being ported to the Mac, those who have been theorizing a convergence between iOS and Mac, will once again be disappointed, as Tim Cook has made it very clear, on numerous occasions, that Mac OS X and iOS will stay separate, in the face of the latest rumors of Google looking to allow Android apps to run in Chrome OS.