FOR a long time speech-recognition software was poor, confirming the saying that computers find it difficult to do things humans do easily, and vice-versa. But lately it has got much better: most modern smartphones now have a host of voice-activated features which actually work. Not only can programs such as Google Now or the iPhone's Siri handle restricted tasks like finding a restaurant or dialling a phone number; smartphones are also getting much better at free-form speech recognition, such as taking dictated text-messages or e-mails. How did computers get so much better at understanding speech?
