You don’t need to have an R2-D2 unit in the back to talk to your vehicle. You even need to whip out your cell phone either, because Nuance Communications has officially unveiled Dragon Drive, a voice-based system that some are calling Siri for cars. I’m sure Apple appreciates the connection.

While there are already voice-based systems in cars, like Ford Sync by Microsoft, they can only do “local” things like change the song or adjust climate control. With Dragon Drive, the voice commands can extend to Nuance’s cloud-based language servers via 3G or 4G. This is not unlike the voice searches that you’d conduct on your smartphone of choice. Just like Siri, Dragon Drive can intepret context and intent, searching for information as needed. You just speak naturally, rather than having to follow a set voiced formula.

To be fair, you’re not getting “full” Siri functionality here. At least not yet, since Nuance is starting with just an SMS service via Dragon Drive. As adoption continues and grows, Nuance will layer on additional functions and features, like adapted versions of Dragon Dictation and DragonGo search. They could conceivably use Dragon Drive to look up real-time weather or traffic, or even find “recommended” songs that are similar to your existing playlist.

Is there another car that comes to mind when it comes to speaking naturally to your automobile? Nuance thinks so. EVP and GM Mike Thompason says, “We are already making KITT in many ways.”

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The tech world is anxiously awaiting the arrival of Apple’s next generation iPad as well as the next version of their mobile OS, iOS 5.1. So far there hasn’t been any confirmation about the release date or the features of both the products. But it appears like some folks have gained access to a pre-GM version of iOS 5.1, screenshots of which have revealed upcoming features.

As you can see in the above image, iOS 5.1 may arrive with a new lockscreen camera slider. This will allow you to launch the camera app directly from the lockscreen with a vertical sliding action on the new icon. That’s certainly something that will be really useful for taking snaps quickly and easily.

Just in case you are wondering, you have to double press the home button for summoning up the camera button in current versions.  There were rumors flying around earlier that suggested Siri will be supporting Japanese iPhone 4S owners in the future. The above screenshot of Siri’s settings is evidence on the matter.  As you already know, Nuance is the driving force behind Siri and it’s worth noting that Nuance’s Dragon Dictation already supports Japanese. So a Japanese Siri is certainly not far away.

Rumors suggest that Apple will most likely release iOS 5.1 alongside iPad 3 on March 7th. But make sure you stay tuned to this space for updates.

The post iOS 5.1 Screenshots Reveal New Features appeared first on Mobile Magazine.