[Michael Quinlan]

For the last several years I've had a dumb Kenwood stereo in my Ford E250 work van. I can push a button on the front and Google Assistant interacts with me via the attached mic and built-in speakers. Pretty straightforward, very functional.

Now I have a ProMaster with Uconnect (I know, you're sorry). It's dumber than dumb, and knows nothing about interacting with a smartphone. No matter what button I push on my steering wheel, all I can get is a female Steven Hawking to respond. But here I present my workaround, at least for anyone willing to forgo controlling media playback from Uconnect.

I programmed the Android app Tasker to intercept the media buttons when connected to Uconnect. Now I can press the Media button on the radio, the press Previous on the touch screen, and Tasker starts Google Assistant - talking to me through the built-in mic and speakers.

I don't see how Uconnect (or any built-in system like this) will ever be able to compete feature-wise with a smartphone, so are these systems really nothing more than a gimmick to boost sales by appearing to be a feature?

Sent from my SM-G930U using Tapatalk

 

[jeffnology]

Would you be willing to share your tasker program? I bought tasker, but have never really used it. But I just bought a Promaster yesterday and I already hate uConnect.

 

[RDinNHandAZ]

I got the UC3 “free” radio option. It plays music through a USB thumb drive, will random play songs so you may hear the same one three times in an hour (I have 36 hours of songs on the thumb) and won’t connect to my phone at all, no bluetooth. There are no great stations on free radio anymore anyway. I am still probably better off than the UC5 owners!
In answer to the OP’s last question- yes.

 

[jrosser1]

I too just got tasker and would be interested in seeing how you programmed it to interact with the media buttons!