Views of a Patzer!

When I first bought my computer (back in my first year of college), I installed and tried out all the things I could get. My 56Kbps modem, though trusty, couldn't get me all the things I wanted (like the complete OS/2 3.0, which I got with the first PCQuest CD back in 1995 :)). Luckily, I had a subscription for PCQuest, which delivered a CD full of goodies every month. One of the hot things at that time was voice recognition. IBM Via Voice & Dragon naturally speaking were two of the voice recognition software I tried out. Both, unfortunately, didn't have the technology developed/implemented to that extend where typing can safely be forgotten! It took me a long time to learn to dictate; Ya, it might sound funny, but try speaking like "This is a text UNDO test UNDO test PERIOD. SELECT TEST. BOLD.", your mom will think you have finally gone nuts!

It seems the hardware/software has finally evolved to make this experience enjoyable (I "enjoyed" my encounters too, but thats more fun, this time it is serious business). Check out this post by John Udell.

Click here to see the SWF video of Udell trying his hand (voice!?) at dictating, with the latest Dragon Naturally speaking 8.0.