And for the rest of her life she was dependent on a wheelchair operated by a tongue-touch keypad, a respirator that delivered 13 breaths a minute and ultimately a voice-activated computer to write.

There will be an exception for video on a hands-free or voice-activated device or an application requiring the push of no more than a single button to activate or terminate it.

“The elderly need help and these pets can be better than regular pets because they can be voice-activated and call 911 if there is an emergency. Those are life-saving abilities that can literally help people,” he said.

For instance, the proposal said voice-activated commands for apps would be available in Indian languages in BYD electric cars built in India and that all data from the vehicles would be housed in India, one of the people said.

Some Dearborn students, who had already built and programmed robots in school, said they appreciated learning how to code a different technology: voice-activated helpbots.