Dictation Into the XpressPad
Applet
Little Bugs Add Up
The dictation applet sometimes launches itself under the voice
status bar, obscuring applet menu options such as File and Edit.
Status bar messages are obscured on a 640 by 480 monitor screen.
The dictation engine frequently interprets breathing as words,
despite a wizard intended to minimize that effect. It would sometimes
delete necessary spaces following a phrase, especially at the
end of a paragraph. It also has trouble keeping track of capitalization
when inserting new text into an old document.The "capitalize that"
command failed on any word beginning with the letter "f."
Correcting errors in L&H is more difficult than in Dragon for
two reasons: first, the correction window provides fewer suggested
alternatives than Dragon's, and second, unlike in Dragon, the
cursor does not return to the last position prior to correction.
The fewer the number of suggested alternatives, the more likely
you will have to type the correction rather than simply select
it from the list by mouse or voice. And when the cursor does not
return to the last place you were, more muscle
events are required to reposition it.
The word correction sequence puts out an unexplained bell sound
upon completion that the microphone picks up, causing the status
bar to say "sound not recognized"—a curious bit of useless programming.
No Voice Playback, But Very Effective Undo and Flexible Commands
The applet does not have a way to play back your dictated voice,
which makes fixing some misrecognitions perplexing if you don't
remember exactly what you said. However, the applet has the most
effective, multiple-level undo command of all the products we
reviewed. This facility lets you easily debug and back out of
consecutive misrecognitions once you discern an error. The VoiceXpress
corrections command structure is the most flexible of all the
products. Rather than memorize a special set of commands from
a pre-defined list, almost anything you say that makes sense as
a correction command will work.
Although the status bar briefly shows the last command processed,
there is otherwise no history list to help in debugging consecutive
misrecognitions in either the XpressPad applet other applications.
More: Introduction
More: Ongoing Training
Process...
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Performance...
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