MyLink Voice Commands

[athlon770]

Hello everyone, just recently purchased my '18 Bolt Premium, I also own a '17 Volt Premium. We are truly an electric family

Loving the Bolt so far, but only 2 weeks into the ownership I have found a glaring issue. I called OnStar and they transferred me to the Infotainment team where I was given the particular response of "yes, they removed that feature from 2018 and 2019 vehicles".

The feature they are talking about is when you have a phone paired to the vehicle (I have a Android (Note9)) that when you press the Voice Command button on the steering wheel, it no longer gives you the voice commands that we know and "love". All it does is pull up the phone dialer on the main screen.

No activation prompts, nothing. All it pulls up is the phone dialer. I can't even say "call whoever"...there is no prompt!

For instance, in my Volt, I press the voice control button, get a ding, and I say, "call wife cell" and it replies "do you want me to call wife cell?", and I say "yes" and it does it...odd, I know, right? I can do this from any screen. Same for playing music, I press the voice control button, get a ding, and I say, "play Parov Steller" and the radio starts playing the requested group from my USB drive.

The Infotainment team says they removed this functionality...WHY? They can't seriously think it would be safer for me to press the button when I want to make a call, then go over to the screen, search for the person I want to call, find the number I want to call, then tap on the number to call...all while driving...can they? And don't even get me started on finding a group to listen to on the USB connection. How can all that be easier than pressing the button and asking the system to do what needs done?

So, I search the net and find nothing, I search this forum, and nothing. Is this only happening to me and the Infotainment guy just wanted to get me off his phone? Or does no one use the voice command button to make calls?

I have already reset the radio to factory, and cleared all personal settings with no luck. I have no problems in my Volt and fully expect the Bolt to have the same functionality. Am I alone with this issue? Does everyone else's voice commands work?

Looking forward to your replies so I can figure out my next steps.

 

[SeanNelson]

I installed Android Auto on my smart phone (Samsung Galaxy S7) and I plug it into the USB port when I drive. It lets me navigate, make phone calls, receive and send texts all via voice command (although it can be very recalcitrant when you're trying to dictate text messages). You just say "OK Google" and then give some command like "Navigate to... <place>", or "Phone Mary" or "What's the weather forecast for Seattle?".

 

[SparkE]

Sean - do you have a 2018 or 2019 Bolt, or earlier?

 

[SeanNelson]

Sean - do you have a 2018 or 2019 Bolt, or earlier?

It's an autumn-build 2017.

 

[SparkE]

Hello everyone, just recently purchased my '18 Bolt Premium, I also own a '17 Volt Premium. We are truly an electric family

Loving the Bolt so far, but only 2 weeks into the ownership I have found a glaring issue. I called OnStar and they transferred me to the Infotainment team where I was given the particular response of "yes, they removed that feature from 2018 and 2019 vehicles".

The feature they are talking about is when you have a phone paired to the vehicle (I have a Android (Note9)) that when you press the Voice Command button on the steering wheel, it no longer gives you the voice commands that we know and "love". All it does is pull up the phone dialer on the main screen.

No activation prompts, nothing. All it pulls up is the phone dialer. I can't even say "call whoever"...there is no prompt!

For instance, in my Volt, I press the voice control button, get a ding, and I say, "call wife cell" and it replies "do you want me to call wife cell?", and I say "yes" and it does it...odd, I know, right? I can do this from any screen. Same for playing music, I press the voice control button, get a ding, and I say, "play Parov Steller" and the radio starts playing the requested group from my USB drive{...}

Sean - you appear to be in the "2017 case" (see bolded underlined, above).

athlon770 - are you pairing via bluetooth? (I assume so.) Have you tried connecting via a USB cable (with data capabilities - most have that, but some cheapo cables do not) ?? Does connecting to USB solve your problem?

 

[SeanNelson]

Sean - you appear to be in the "2017 case" (see bolded underlined, above).

You don't need OnStar to use Android Auto, as long as you have a data plan for your phone.

 

[SparkE]

I believe he called OnStar during the 3-month-free-trail period to ask "WTF ?!!!? Why doesn't this work like it does in my Volt!!!???" (But I could have misinterpreted.)

 

[SeanNelson]

I believe he called OnStar during the 3-month-free-trail period to ask "WTF ?!!!? Why doesn't this work like it does in my Volt!!!???" (But I could have misinterpreted.)

He did phone OnStar to complain about the voice control button not working. My point was that with Android Auto you don't need to use the voice control button - you just say "OK Google...", wait for the acknowledgement bleep, and then give your command - which can include navigation instructions, requests to play music, initiating phone calls, receiving or sending text messages, and even asking general questions like "What's the wind in Seattle?"

I assume that Apple CarPlay works in a similar fashion.

 

[athlon770]

Hi Sean, Spark...

I do have Android Auto installed and that works, and I found out what I was doing wrong with the long press of the command button...I was not looking at my phone where it was asking how I want to complete the action...Google...Bixby.

So, I have to long press the voice command button to make a phone call which completes through my phone...an 'ok' work around I guess, at least I can now make phone calls without swerving all over the road scrolling through my contacts list.

BUT, I still have no voice access to my songs on my USB stick. Which is still frustrating, especially as the menu commands on the Bolt for the media player, well, lets just say they suck!

What I miss...

I should be able to quick press the Voice Command button on the steering wheel and tell the car "Play Alice in Chains", or "Play Goldfish" as I can do in my 2017 Volt. I still cannot fathom why the programers of the controlling system would remove this, and I hope to God in a future update I do not loose this in my Volt!

 

[SparkE]

athlon770 -

Have you tried plugging the phone in to USB, then simply saying "OK Google" to talk to THE PHONE and then tell the phone what you want? That doesn't work? (i.e., skip the "press button" step, and replace it with saying "OK, google")

 

[athlon770]

athlon770 -

Have you tried plugging the phone in to USB, then simply saying "OK Google" to talk to THE PHONE and then tell the phone what you want? That doesn't work? (i.e., skip the "press button" step, and replace it with saying "OK, google")

The phone is not the problem and would be unaware of the USB drive that I have plugged into the BOLT so asking it to play something from the drive is like asking your garbage can to turn on the TV (Geico commercial reference). A Long press of the voice command (over bluetooth) allows me access to anything Google related (including my initial irritation of not being able to make a phone call), and while being connected by USB using Android Auto does give me access to Pandora, the issue is I have a 32GB USB drive connected to the vehicle which is almost full of songs that I can no longer ask the car to play from. I prefer my music from my USB drive but like to change up what I listen to depending on my mood. One day I will want to listen to Avenged Sevenfold, the next day will be Brother Cane, or Daft Punk, Finger Eleven, Hinder, Korn then back to Parov Stelar or Pendulum. My point is I can no longer just ask my Bolt to play a particular group or even a particular song from my USB drive. I can do this in my 2014 Nissan Juke, I can do this in my 2017 Chevy Volt, but the Infotainment team seem to think that finding a song should now require me to pull to the side of the road, stop the car, open the media player, and drill down 5 levels of menus to find what you want. This is not a step forward, but a horrendus fall backwards.

I guess I can copy all my songs over to my phone, and THEN I can use the voice command to ask Google to play a song from my phone, but I shouldn't need to. This is a 2018 vehicle with a "INFOTAINMENT" system. I should be able to ask it to play something from a connected USB drive and it should be able to do it.

While I appreciate the attempt of a work arround, it would appear that no one else uses a USB thumbdrive to play the music they enjoy in the $40k vehicle they just purchased. My only hope is that the Infotainment team get their hands on this thread and realize how stupid it is that the voice command button has pretty much become usless. How sad to spend so much money on the premium trim and the Bose sound system and be told, "yeah, we removed that feature".

 

[SeanNelson]

Have you tried plugging the phone in to USB, then simply saying "OK Google" to talk to THE PHONE and then tell the phone what you want?

Exactly. With Android Auto there's no need to press the button on the steering wheel at all, and no need to select items from a contact list. You just say "OK Google.... call Fred" and it happens.

 

[athlon770]

Sorry guys, I think your stuck on the "not being able to make a phone call" thing. This has been resolved as stated earlier. When you press and hold the Voice Command button for 3 - 4 seconds (Long Press), it activates a system pass through which is the same as your suggesting with the Android Auto connection. I was originally not looking at my phone which was asking me the question of which app to use when I long press the command button (Google or Bixby), I choose Google. So now when I long press the command button, I get the Google ready ping and I can ask what I want my phone to do just as if I said "OK, Google". But I don't need to connect my phone to my car with a USB cable, it is all done over BT (Bluetooth). Nor do I ever see a reason to connect my phone with a USB cable every time I get in and out of the car. I will use Android Auto by connecting my phone over the USB cable when I need to use Google Maps or feel the need to play music through Pandora.

I do not know if this is your 1st Chevy and you just don't know the way it is supposed to be, but at the completion of the Bluetooth setup between phone and car, I should be able to quick press the Voice Command button and be met with a "ding" (indicating a ready state), and a help menu if I am not quick in saying my next command. The following is a list of commands that the Bolt is now missing...

Chevy MyLink Commands - Phone Commands
TO DIAL = DIAL, CALL
TO REDIAL = REDIAL, REDIAL LAST NUMBER
TO CLEAR AN ACTION = CLEAR
TO CLEAR ALL ACTIONS = CLEAR ALL
TO CALL USING DIGITS = DIGIT DIAL
TO USE NUMBERS 1-9 = ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR, FIVE, SIX, SEVEN, EIGHT, NINE
TO USE THE NUMBER 0 = ZERO, OH
TO USE * AND # = STAR, POUND
TO CALL OR DIAL A NUMBER = CALL OR DIAL (NUMBER)
* TO CALL A SPECIFIC CONTACT = CALL OR DIAL (CONTACT NAME), (CONTACT NAME)
TO PAIR YOUR DEVICE = PAIR, CONNECT, PAIR DEVICE

Chevy MyLink Commands - Tuner Commands
TO TURN TO AM = TUNE AM RADIO, TUNE AM, TUNE TO AM RADIO, TUNE TO AM, AM RADIO, AM
* TO TURN TO FM = TUNE FM RADIO, TUNE FM, TUNE TO FM RADIO, TUNE TO FM, FM RADIO, FM
TO TUNE TO A SPECIFIC AM STATION = TUNE AM (FREQUENCY NUMBER), TUNE TO AM (FREQUENCY NUMBER), AM (FREQUENCY NUMBER)
* TO TUNE TO A SPECIFIC FM STATION = TUNE FM (FREQUENCY NUMBER), TUNE TO FM (FREQUENCY NUMBER), FM (FREQUENCY NUMBER)
TUNE TO XM RADIO = TUNE XM RADIO, TUNE XM, TUNE TO XM RADIO, TUNE TO XM, XM RADIO, XM
TO TUNE TO A SPECIFIC XM STATION = TUNE (XM STATION NAME), TUNE XM (CHANNEL NUMBER)
TO TUNE TO AN INTERNET APPLICATION STATION NAME = TUNE PANDORA, TUNE STITCHER, PANDORA, STITCHER, TUNE TO PANDORA, TUNE TO STITCHER
TO USE THE THUMBS UP BUTTON = THUMBS UP
TO USE THE THUMBS DOWN BUTTON = THUMBS DOWN

Chevy MyLink Commands - Media Commands
TO PLAY YOUR CD = PLAY CD, CD
TO PLAY A DEVICE THROUGH YOUR AUXILIARY INPUT = PLAY FRONT AUX, AUX, PLAY AUX, FRONT AUX
* TO PLAY A DEVICE CONNECTED TO THE USB PORT = PLAY USB, USB
* TO PLAY A DEVICE THROUGH BLUETOOTH AUDIO = PLAY BLUETOOTH AUDIO, BLUETOOTH AUDIO
* TO PLAY A SPECIFIC SONG = (SONG TITLE), (SONG TITLE) BY (ARTIST NAME)
* TO PLAY MUSIC ON A CONNECTED DEVICE BY ARTIST = PLAY (ARTIST NAME)
* TO PLAY MUSIC ON A CONNECTED DEVICE BY ALBUM = PLAY ALBUM (ALBUM NAME), PLAY ALBUM BY (ARTIST NAME)
* TO PLAY A SPECIFIC ALBUM = (ALBUM NAME), (ALBUM NAME) BY (ARTIST NAME)
TO PLAY MUSIC ON A CONNECTED DEVICE BY GENRE = PLAY GENRE (GENRE NAME)
TO PLAY A SPECIFIC GENRE = (GENRE NAME)
TO SHUFFLE YOUR MUSIC ON A CONNECTED DEVICE = SHUFFLE ON
TO TURN OFF SHUFFLE = SHUFFLE OFF

The commands I used all the time I put an * next to. For example, to make a phone call, all you did is press the command button on the steering wheel and after the ready ping speak the words, "call, daddy dave, mobile" and it would call daddy dave on his mobile phone. Simple. This is all done over the BT connection, no need to connect your phone by USB. This is side skirted now by doing a long press on the command button to initiate the pass through to the phone. This is fine and works and is livable to make a phone call. Fantastic! However, the phone does not talk to the stereo system so I can not go through Google to ask my car to tune to a FM station or play a artist / song from my USB thumbdrive.

So, stick with me here, lets say I am listing to a morning show on my FM station in my 2018 Bolt and decide they are being stupid. Because the Infotainment team decided we didn't need these commands, I now have to open the radio screen, click on source, click on USB. With it now playing music from my USB thumbdrive, I now have to go to Menu, select the view order of "Folder, Artist, Song, something else, something else", find the Artist I want to listen to, find the Album from that artist, show all songs, and play! Are you kidding me? All while driving? I think they are BEGGING for a Class Action Suit! Now, in my 2017 Volt, all that can be done by me pressing the command button and saying "play Goldfish" or "play Aliens ate my Buick" to play that album. So simple, even a caveman can do it!

I hope you can start to see my frustration with the Infotainment team and OnStar for making things so much more difficult. There should never be a subtraction of features which promotes safty in the vehicle.

 

[brosenheim]

I just bought a Bolt EV (2020) after trading in my 2014 Volt. I find the necessity of a phone app instead of a built in voice command system bothersome. I have read the reviews of the Android Auto app and it seems to have gone truly downhill after a recent update.

So, let's ask ourselves why a free app is doing what Chevy used to do. Based on the premise that nothing in life is free, something in our use of this app must be valuable enough for 1. Android to make it and update it free of charge, and 2. Chevy to ditch their in car voice recognition system. What could be so valuable? Data!

The true cynics would say that I was going to drive around with my phone, it would be tracking me anyway, but I'm sure there is something in the user agreement that no one read that says that they are selling our data, including whereabouts, driving style, patterns, etc. This bothers me and I will be reluctant to use this feature. I try to minimize the amount of apps that track me, with some obvious inconsistencies for convenience, and this one probably is designed just to do that. What bothers me is who may be interested in buying such data from Google. I can think of my insurance company seeing my sporadic sports mode use and jacking up my (or yours, or everybody's!) premiums, for instance.

Anyway, I'll get of my conspiracy laced soapbox. But I'm bothered by this. Wish there was a way to push back, but I'm not going to ditch a nice EV for lack of voice recognition!

 

[BoltEV]

I've posted my dissatisfaction that both my 17 Bolt EV and 19 Bolt EV do not have built in Navigation (as promised by GM CEO Mary Barra at her Keynote speech at the 2016 CED Convention in Las Vegas), even though my 13 Volt and subsequent Volt models have it too!

Apple CarPlay has become less of a nuisance for me since I purchased the $150 USB "wireless" dongle some months back.