Alexa facts for kids
Alexa most often refers to Amazon Alexa, a smart computer program that listens to your voice and helps you with many tasks. It's like having a helpful assistant inside a smart speaker or other device. The name "Alexa" can also refer to other things, like a company that used to study websites.
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Amazon Alexa: Your Smart Voice Assistant
Amazon Alexa is a special computer program that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to understand what you say. It's often called a "virtual assistant" because it can help you with many things just by listening to your voice commands. You can find Alexa in devices like Amazon Echo speakers and other smart gadgets.
How Does Alexa Understand You?
Alexa works by listening for a "wake word," usually "Alexa." When it hears this word, it starts listening to your command. Your voice command is then sent to Amazon's cloud servers. In the cloud, powerful computers use something called "natural language processing" to figure out what you mean. This technology helps Alexa understand everyday speech, not just specific commands. Once it understands, it sends the answer or action back to your device.
What Can Alexa Do?
Alexa can do many cool things to help you and make life easier:
- Play Music: You can ask Alexa to play your favorite songs, artists, or even specific genres.
- Answer Questions: Need to know the weather, a fact, or how to spell a word? Just ask Alexa!
- Set Alarms and Timers: It's great for waking up or timing your homework.
- Control Smart Home Devices: If you have smart lights or thermostats, Alexa can turn them on or off with your voice.
- Tell Jokes and Stories: Alexa can be fun too, with jokes and even interactive stories.
- Get News and Sports Updates: Stay informed by asking for the latest headlines or scores.
Where Can You Find Alexa?
You'll mostly find Alexa built into Amazon's own devices, like:
- Amazon Echo Speakers: These are popular smart speakers that come in different sizes, like the Echo Dot.
- Echo Show Devices: These have screens, so Alexa can show you things like video calls, recipes, or song lyrics.
- Other Smart Devices: Alexa is also built into some headphones, smart TVs, and even cars.
Another Meaning: Alexa Internet
"Alexa" also used to be the name of a company called Alexa Internet. This company was a part of Amazon.com. Its main job was to collect information about how people used websites. It would track things like how many people visited a website and how long they stayed there. This information was used to create rankings of the most popular websites. However, Alexa Internet stopped its services in 2022.
See also
In Spanish: Alexa para niños
