Last year, HP rolled out Virtual Assistant help with your printing via Cortana and Google Assistant. Starting this week, they have extended the virtual assistant to include Amazon’s Alexa.
That is to say, all Alexa-enabled devices will now be able to pair with HP Printers and follow a number of commands. To pair the printer with the Alexa-enabled devices, you will first need to obtain the printer’s email address, and enable the HP Printer skills on the Alexa device(s). Check the full guide at HP support site, at this link.
Anneliese Olson, head of Home Printing at HP, said: “Integrating voice into the home printer is an undeniably useful application of the technology. For busy families, the virtual assistant ecosystem makes a lot of sense and connecting a printer to it is a natural extension within the smart home.”
Connecting your printer to a digital assistant may look like a silly idea at first, but look at some of the commands below, and just think about scenarios they could help save you time and energy.
HP examples of commands to the Printer via Alexa
Shopping list: “Alexa, ask my printer to print my shopping list.”
To-do list: “Alexa, ask my printer to print my To-do list.”
Crayola coloring pages: “Alexa, ask my printer to print a Crayola coloring page.”
Art therapy coloring pages: “Alexa, ask my printer to print art therapy.”
Sudoku: “Alexa, ask my printer to print Sudoku.”
Word Search: “Alexa, ask my printer to print a word search game.
Bingo: “Alexa, ask my printer to print two Bingo cards.”
Notebook paper: “Alexa, ask my printer to print notebook paper.”
Checklists: “Alexa, ask my printer to print a one-column checklist.”
Calendar: “Alexa, ask my printer to print a calendar.”
HP is clearly moving in line with the trend, as homes and offices of the future will embrace both virtual assistant and IoT, which will be intertwined. Hopefully, more electronics brands will jump on the virtual assistant bandwagon and make devices which you can ask your digital assistant to operate.