Nuance ScanSoft MacSpeech Dictate User Manual

User Manual

MacSpeech Dictate™

License Agreement

5. U.S. Gove rnment Restricte d Rights

The SOFT WARE PROD UCT is provide d with Restri cted Right s. Use, duplication or disclosure by or to the United States Government is subject to restrictions as set for th in subpar agraph (c)(1)(ii) of the Rig hts in Technica l Data and Computer Sof tware clause at DFARS 252.2 27-7013 and/or subparagraphs (c)(1) and (2) of the Commercial Computer Software - Restr icted Rights at 48 CFR

52.22 7-19, as applicable. Manufacturer is MacSpeech, Inc. in Salem, New Ha mpshire, U SA.

IMPORTANT - READ CAREFULLY : Before installing this software carefully read the following terms and condit ions. This S oftwa re End-User License A greement (“License Agreeme nt”) is a bin ding agreeme nt between you (either an individual or a single entity), the e nd-user, and MacSp eech, Inc. (“MacSpeec h”) r egarding use of the soft ware accompanying this Agreement, which includes computer soft ware (“SOFT WARE”) and accompanying documentation and may include “online” or electronic documentation and a license key (together “SOF TWARE PRODUCT”). By in stalling, copying or otherwise using the SOFTWARE PRODUCT, by clickin g on “yes”, you agree to be bound by the terms of this L icense Agreement. If you do not agree with the terms of this Lic ense Agre ement, cl ick on “no”, and t he instal lation pr ocess wi ll not cont inue.

1. Grant of License

If you are an individual, this Licens e Agreement grants you (“ Recipient”) a non -exclusive and non-transfer able r ight to use one copy of the SOFT WARE PRODUCT in the manner d escrib ed in thi s License Agre ement. If you a re an entity, this Lice nse Agreement g rants yo u (“Re cipient ”) the right to designate o ne individual within Recipient’s o rganization to have the sol e ri ght o n a non- exclusive and non -trans ferable basis to use one copy of the SOFTWARE PRODUCT in the manner described in this Lic ense Agreement.

2. Use Limitations

(a) Single Mac hine

Recipi ent may use the license d copy of the SOFTWA RE on a single computer. The SOFT WARE is in “u se” o n a computer when it is lo aded into tempora ry memory (i.e. RAM) or installed into permanent memor y (e.g. hard dis k, CD- ROM or othe r storage device) of that computer. Use on a “single computer” permits you to transfer the SOFT WARE from one computer to another comp uter provided the SOFTWARE is i n use on only one computer at a time.

(b) Copies Permitte d

Recipi ent may make one copy of the SOFTWARE solely for backup or archival purposes provided that Recipient reproduces all copyright , confidenti ality and other pro prietary notices that ar e on the original copy of the SOFT WARE. Recipient may not copy the printed materials accom panying the SOF TWARE.

Recipi ent may not r ent, leas e, sell or otherwise trans fer the SO FTWAR E, whether on the media, if any, or otherwise, nor any copies of the SOFT WARE, or any of the ac companying docum entation. Recipi ent may not disclo se, make availa ble, or otherwise redistribute all or any part of the SOFT WARE PROD UCT or any cop ies there of to third parties. In addition, Recipient may not use the SOFTWARE or any part th ereof, in any for m, in software or other product that i s or will be distri buted to a thi rd part y.

(d) Limitat ions on Rever se Engineering/ M odific ations

Unless applic able law prohibits enforceme nt of this provision, Recipie nt shall not decompile, disass emble, reverse engineer, or create derivative works of the SOFTWARE PRODUCT or of any part of the SO FTWAR E PRODUCT. Re cipient may not alter or modify the SOFT WARE PRODUC T or any part thereof.

3. Copyr ight Limitations

(a) Ownership

The SOFTWARE PRODUCT is licensed, not sold to Recipient, for use only under the term s of this L icense Agreeme nt, and MacSp eech reserves all r ights not expressly gr anted to Recipi ent. Recipi ent owns the media, if any, on whi ch the SOF TWARE PRODUCT is recorded. M acSpee ch or its suppli ers owns the SOF TWARE and all copyright and other intellectual rights in the SOFT WARE PRODUCT (including but not limi ted to images, “applets”, photographs , animations, video, audio, music and text inc orporated into the SOFT WARE PRODUCT), the accompanying printed materials , and any copies of the SO FTWAR E. Under the ter ms of this License Agreeme nt Recipi ent receive s only a limited right to use the SO FTWAR E PRODUCT under all terms set forth by Mac Speech, Inc., which are subject to change. The SOFTWARE PRO DUCT is prote cted by United States copyri ght laws and internatio nal copyright treatie s, as we ll as by other intellectual proper ty laws and treaties. Therefo re, Recipient mus t treat the SOF TWARE PRODUCT like any other copyrighted materia l and not transfer or distribute the SOFT WARE PROD UCT to others.

(b) No Copie s

Except as expressly permitted under “Use Limitati ons” above, Rec ipient may not c opy the SOFT WARE PRODUCT or acc ompanyin g writte n materials.

4. Term

This License Agreement is effec tive until ter minated. Recipient may terminate thi s License Agreement at any time by destroying t he SOF TWARE PRODUCT and all copies the reof including any doc umentation. T his Li cense Agreement will ter minate immediately without notice from MacSp eech if Recipi ent fails to c omply with any provision of th is Agreement. In such event, Recipi ent must dest roy the SOFTWARE PRODUCT and all of its component pa rts, and delete, remove, or oth erwise destroy all cop ies of the SOFT WARE PRODUCT t hat are in Recipie nt’s possession or control including installed SO FTWAR E. All provisions of this License Agreement relating to disclaimers of warranties, limitation of liability, remedies or damages, and all of MacSp eech’s prop rietar y rights s hall sur vive termination.

6. Expo rt Restr ictions

The SOFTWAR E PRODUCT, inc luding technic al data, is subjec t to U.S. export control laws, including the U.S. Ex port Administ ration Act and its as sociate d regul ations, and may be subject to expor t or import regulatio ns in other countries. Recipient agrees to comply strictly with all such regulations and ackn owledge s that Recipient has the responsibi lity to obtain licen ses to export , re-export or import t he SOFT WARE PRODUCT.

7. Limited Warra nty

With the exclusion of any other warranty, MacSpeech solely warrants for a period of six ty (60) days from the date of delivery to Recipient (the “Warr anty Pe riod”) that any media on which the SOFT WARE i s furnished, will b e free from defects in materials and workmanship under normal use. Recipient ’s sole and exc lusive remedy and the entire liability of MacSpeech and its suppli ers hereunder will be, at Mac Speech’s option, rep air or replacement of the media, if repor ted (or, upon request, returned) to M acSpee ch or its designee w ithin the Warranty Period. T his warranty does not apply if such defective media is the result from accident, abuse, or misa pplicat ion. Any replac ement will be warranted for the remainder of the original Warrant y Period or thirty (30) days, whichever is longe r.

THE SOFTWARE AND ANY RELATED DOCUMENTATION IS PROV IDED “AS IS” WITHOUT WARRANTY OF AN Y KIND. EXCEPT AS EX PRESSLY SET FORTH ABOVE, NO OTHER WARRANTIES, EITH ER EXPRESS OR IMPLI ED CONDITIO NS, REPRESENTATIONS AND WARRANTIES, ARE MADE WITH RESPECT TO THE SOFTWA RE PRODUCT INCLUDING BUT N OT LIMI TED TO THE I MPLIED WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOS E, OR NON- INFRIN GEMENT, AND MACSPEECH AND ITS SUPPLIERS EXPRESSLY DISCLAIM ALL OTHER WARR ANTIES NOT STATED HEREIN, EXCEPT TO THE EXTENT THAT SUCH DIS CLAIMERS ARE HE LD TO BE LEGALLY INVALI D. RECIPIENT ASSUM ES THE RISK AS TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE SOFTWARE. SOME STATES D O NOT PERMIT THE EXCLUSION OF IMPLI ED WARR ANTIES, SO THE ABOVE EXCLUSION MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU. THIS WARRANT Y GIVES YOU SPECIFIC LEGAL RIGHTS A ND YOU M AY HAVE OTHER RIGHTS WHICH VARY FROM STATE TO STATE. IT SHOULD BE UND ERSTOOD BY RECIPIEN T THAT SPEECH RECOGNITION IS INHERENTLY A STATISTICA L PROCESS AND THAT RECOGNITION ERRORS ARE INHERENT IN THE PROCESS OF SPEECH RECOGNITION.

8. Disc laimer

TO THE MA XIMUM E XTENT PERMITT ED BY APPLICA BLE LAW, IN NO EV ENT SHALL MACSPEECH OR ITS SUPPLIERS OR THE OWNERS OF TH E RIG HTS IN THE SOFT WARE PRODUC T BE LIABLE FOR ANY IN DIRECT, INCI DENTAL, CO NSEQUEN TIAL, SPECIAL, PUNITI VE, OR OTHER DAMAGES WHATSOE VER, IN CONNECTION WITH OR ARISI NG OUT OF THE USE OR INA BILIT Y TO USE TH E SOFTWARE P RODUCT (INCLUDING, W ITHOUT LIMITATION, DAMAG ES FOR LOSS OF BUSINESS REVENUE, PROFITS, USE, DATA OR OTHER ECONOMIC ADVANTAGE), HOWEVER IT ARISES, WHETHER FOR BREACH OR IN TORT, EVEN IF MACSPEECH HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILIT Y OF SUCH DAMAGES. IN NO EVENT SHALL MACSPEECH’ OR ITS SUPPLIERS’ LIABILITY TO RECIPIENT HEREUN DER, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGEN CE) OR OTHERWISE, EXCEED TH E PRICE ACTUAL LY PAID BY RECIPIEN T FOR THE SOFT WARE PRODUCT. THE FOREGOING LIMITATIONS S HALL APPLY EVEN IF THE ABOV E-STATED WARRANTY FAILS OF ITS ESSENTIA L PURPO SE. BECAUSE SOME STATES AND JURISDICT IONS DO NOT ALLOW TH E EXCLUSION OR LI MITATION OF LIABILIT Y, THE ABOVE LIMITATION MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU.

9. Speci al Provisi ons

This License Agreem ent shall be governed by and interprete d under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusett s, United St ates of Amer ica, wit hout regar d to conflicts of law provisions. By acceptin g this Lic ense Agreement, Recipient agrees to be subjec t to juris diction in Massachusett s, and to commence any action arising under or relating to this Licen se Agreement in the appropriate State or Fe deral Court in Mas sachusetts.

BY CONTINUING WITH THE INSTALLATION OF THE SOFT WARE RECI PIENT

ACKNOW LEDGES THAT RECIPIENT H AS READ AND UND ERSTOOD TH IS LICENS E

AGREEM ENT AND TH AT RECIPIENT AG REES TO BE BOU ND BY ITS TERMS. RECIPI ENT

FURTHER AGREES THAT THIS LICENS E AGREEME NT IS THE CO MPLETE A ND

EXCLUSIVE STATEMENT OF TH E AGREEMENT BETWEEN RECIPIENT AND M ACSPEECH ,

AND SUPERSEDES A NY PROPOSAL OR PRIOR AGREEM ENT, ORAL O R WRITTEN,

AND AN Y OTHER COM MUNIC ATIONS REL ATING TO THE SUBJECT MATTER OF THIS

SOFT WARE END -USER LICENSE AG REEMENT.

Dictate is a trademark of Mac Speech, Inc.

2 MacSpeech DictateLicense Agreement

Credits

MacSpeech Engineering:

Jeff Ganyard

Chris Hardy

Paul Herzog

Eric Hon-Anderson

Jim Kelley

Fernando Lins

Robert Stuller

Andrew Taylor

Colin Taylor

Chad Weider

Jonathan Wight

…and the rest of MacSpeech:

Sheila Ganyard

Stephane Gauthier

Jay Gonzales

T. Patrick Henebry

Carla Hernandez

Sara Jennings

Donald MacCormick

Dominique Maltais

Craig Nesbitt

Nathan Nesbitt

Anne Schwing

Michael Schwing

Brenda Shiepe

Jack Simonton

Carly Taylor

Special Thanks To:

Apple Inc. for the wonderful Mac OS X.

Nuance Communications, Inc. for their phenomenal speech engine.

Naomi Pearce and Ed Prasek for all their help introducing MacSpeech Dictate to the world.

And of course, thanks to everyone who has ever been involved with MacSpeech. MacSpeech Dictate certainly wouldn’t be here without all your hard work and support!

Credit Given Where Credit Is Due:

The above are registered trademarks of Nuance Communications, Inc. and are used here under license.

AquaticPrime Framework

BDAlias

This user manual was partially written using MacSpeech Dictate.

For updates to this document, please see http://www.macspeech.com/support_center

CTGradient

Some rights reserved: <http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.5/>

Log4Cocoa

Shortcut Recorder

Contributor details at <http://wafflesoftware.net/shortcut/contributors/>.

3 MacSpeech DictateCredits

MacSpeech® Dictate License Agreement 2

Credits 3

Chapter 1: Introduction 5

Chapter 2: Installation 9

Chapter 3: Getting Started 10

Chapter 4: Training 14

Chapter 5: Dictation 20

Chapter 6: Controlling Your Mac 32

Chapter 7: Reference 38

Index 47

4 MacSpeech DictateTable of Contents

Chapter 1: Introduion

What Is MacSpeech Dictate?

MacSpeech Dictate is a new way to interact with your Mac. Instead of typing your input, and clicking your mouse for commands, now you can dictate your input and speak your commands.

When you dictate words and phrases, what you say will appear on the screen, in virtually any Macintosh application. The technology that enables this amazing feat translates speech to text and characters almost anywhere you would normally type.

MacSpeech Dictate can be used as a “third hand” to control your Mac without using the mouse or keyboard. Speaking to your computer is faster and can help you accomplish tasks more easily than constantly moving your hands from keyboard to mouse.

MacSpeech Dictate is speaker dependent speech recognition software. This means that in order to recognize your speech so accurately, MacSpeech Dictate will be trained to recognize your unique speech patterns.

Fortunately, MacSpeech Dictate is a quick learner. Initial training can happen in a few short sessions, and the program continues to learn as you go. Training data is stored in a profile along with other things such as the type of microphone you are using. MacSpeech Dictate can handle multiple profiles, so others in your family or workgroup can use it, too (on the same computer).

Will MacSpeech Dictate Replace My Mouse And Keyboard?

Speech is a useful addition to the way you work with your computer, but it isn’t a replacement. Some tasks will still be efficiently performed using your mouse or keyboard. While using MacSpeech Dictate, you will discover what combination of speech, mouse, and keyboard use is appropriate for your tasks.

Who Is MacSpeech, Inc.?

MacSpeech, Inc. people are passionate about the Macintosh and experienced creators of speech recognition technology. MacSpeech’s founder and senior engineers were key members of the teams that produced some of the first and some of the best speech recognition products for Macintosh, including Voice Navigator, PowerSecretary and iListen.

Being Mac-only means not having hands and creativity tied by a requirement to maintain a common code-base across computer platforms. As a uniquely Macintosh-based company, MacSpeech, Inc. can take advantage of all the Macintosh has to offer.

MacSpeech Dictate System

Who Should Use MacSpeech Dictate?

MacSpeech Dictate works well for many different people. For a busy Mac user, MacSpeech Dictate can speed up work when creating documents such as memos, reports, and e-mails, or surfing the web and chatting.

Creative Professionals will love MacSpeech Dictate’s ability to control the Mac interface, effectively allowing them to use their voice as a “third hand.” MacSpeech Dictate can help overcome mobility problems that make using a keyboard difficult or impossible to use. Finally, those who have little or no typing skills will benefit from MacSpeech Dictate’s ability to free them from the “hunt and peck” method of typing.

No matter what type of user you are, you need to spend a little time teaching MacSpeech Dictate the unique qualities of your voice so the program can understand you better. As you use MacSpeech Dictate it learns how your voice sounds, your vocabulary and how you pronounce things. The more you use the program, the better it will become at recognizing

your speech.

5 MacSpeech DictateChapter 1 — Introduction

Requirements

MacSpeech Dictate has the following minimum system requirements:

• MacOSXversion10.5.2orgreater(“Leopard”)

or Mac OS X version 10.4.11 or greater (“Tiger”)

• 1GB(ormore)RAM.

• Intelprocessor-basedMac.

• 2GBoffreeharddrivespace.

• AMacSpeech-certiedUSBnoise-canceling

microphone.

Speech recognition takes a lot of horsepower. In order to decipher what you are saying, your Mac needs to perform thousands of calculations every second. Slow machines just can’t keep up with the demand. So if you ever needed a reason for buying that new top-of-the line computer with loads of RAM, now you have one.

Microphones

MacSpeech Dictate supports microphones which connect to the Macintosh through the USB port, either directly or through a USB adapter.

Although today’s Macintosh computers appear to have a port for sound input, this only works with devices that provide a LINE IN signal, which is different from the signal produced by a microphone. For this reason, you should use a high quality, noise-canceling USB microphone with MacSpeech Dictate.

Tip

For best results, use a MacSpeech-certified microphone. The iSight and the internal microphone built into some Macintosh computers are not supported because these do not have the necessary directional and noise-canceling properties that are required to obtain the best speech recognition accuracy.

may be small, but it packs a surprising amount of information, as shown in Figure 1-1.

Figure 1-1

If you already have a noise-canceling microphone that is not MacSpeech-certified, don’t panic; it may work. Dictate’s Microphone Setup assistant can adjust the audio input level of most microphones to work with your system.

If you use a microphone that is not MacSpeech-certified and are getting accuracy below 95%, it is a good indication the microphone you are using is not compatible with MacSpeech Dictate.

If you received your microphone from MacSpeech along with MacSpeech Dictate, it is certified to work with the software. For information on microphones, please see the MacSpeech Web site at:

http://www.macspeech.com/microphones

MacSpeech Dictate’s User Interface

By design, MacSpeech Dictate has a user interface that tries to stay out of the way. The small Status window provides control over the program’s main actions. The Recognition window indicates what Dictate heard you say, and enables the Phrase Training feature. The Available Commands window shows which commands are available at a specific point in time.

The MacSpeech Dictate Status Window

The Status window is MacSpeech Dictate’s main interface. This window floats on top of all the other windows on your screen, so it is always available to you. The Status window

The microphone button indicates your microphone’s status, and controls whether it is on, off, or asleep:

• When the microphone is on, the button will

show a green circle behind a microphone. The command Microphone Off or clicking the button will turn the microphone off. The command Go To Sleep will make it asleep.

• When the microphone is off, the button will

show a red octagon in front of the microphone. Click the button to turn the microphone on.

• Whenasleep,thebuttonwillshowapurpleoval.

The commands Wake Up or Turn Microphone On, or clicking the button will turn the micro-

phone on.

Sound Input Level

The sound input level displays the strength of the audio input. In general, this should be green with a little bit of black space at the top when you are speaking.

Command Status Indicators

The command status indicators display the status of certain commands. The top light is for capitalization commands (All Caps/Caps/No Caps), the middle light for spacing commands (NoSpace), and the bottom light for numeral commands (Numeral/Roman Numeral).

MacSpeech Dictate Button

When pressed, the MacSpeech Dictate button will bring the application to the front, just like clicking the MacSpeech Dictate icon in the Mac OS X Dock.

6 MacSpeech DictateChapter 1 — Introduction

Speech Mode Indicator

The speech mode indicator text in the top right of the status window tells you MacSpeech Dictate’s current mode. It will say either “Dictation”, “Command”, “Spelling” or “Asleep.”

Each time you do this will activate the Phrase Training fea- ture which helps Dictate continually learn more about your speech.

Recognition Window Button

The recognition window button (picture of branching arrows) is highlighted when there is a dictated phrase with multiple recognition options available in the Recognition window.

Current Profile

The current profile text in the bottom right of the status window is the name of the currently active user profile.

The Recognized Text Indicator

As you speak, the words as MacSpeech Dictate recognizes them appear below the Status window in white, shadowed text. Whether this text appears is determined by whether the

Show “Recognized Text” preference is checked in General Preferences. The default is for the text to appear.

The Recognition Window

The Available Commands Window

The Available Commands window (Figure 1-3) provides a list of commands that are available to be spoken. This list varies depending on what is happening on the screen. You will see different lists of available commands in this window as the context changes.

Typing a word or phrase in the Search field in this window will limit the display to only the commands containing that word or phrase.

The Recognition window (Figure 1-2) shows Dictate’s recognition of the words you dictated. This window will appear dynamically during dictation depending on how the Recognition Preferences are set. It includes a list of close alternatives to choose from in case the program doesn’t recognize your most recent word or phrase.

Figure 1-2

You can pick one of these options by saying “Choose <x>” or “Pick <x>,” where <x> is the number of most accurate option.

Figure 1-3

User Modes

The specific things you can do using speech vary widely, but they boil down to two main things: entering text and controlling your Macintosh. In order to accomplish these tasks, MacSpeech Dictate provides you with the following operating modes:

Dictation Mode

You will probably use Dictation Mode the most. In Dictation Mode, MacSpeech Dictate types what you say into a text

area in the active window. That text area can be in a word processing document, a text field in a dialog box, or even text that renames icons in the Finder.

All commands available in Command Mode are also available in Dictation Mode. In order to execute a command in Dictation Mode pause briefly before and after saying the command. For Example:

This is a sentence that has been dictated PERIOD

[pause] Select All [pause] Copy Selection

The above sequence will type the dictated sentence, then select the whole document and copy it to the clipboard.

7 MacSpeech DictateChapter 1 — Introduction

Command Mode

Command Mode is used when you only want to control your Mac by voice. In Command Mode, anything not recognized as a command will be ignored. The advantage of using Command Mode is that the commands will be more easily recognized and will be less likely to be confused as something you want dictated instead.

In Command Mode, you can click buttons, control windows, launch applications, and use speech instead of pressing keys on the keyboard or using the mouse. Many commands in MacSpeech Dictate are written in AppleScript, the scripting language built into Mac OS X. Commands can be global, meaning they work everywhere, or application specific, which means they only work within a particular application.

Spelling Mode

Spelling Mode allows you to spell a word that is not part of the regular MacSpeech Dictate vocabulary. For example, you might use this to correctly dictate names and other proper nouns, proprietary terms, words in other languages, or acronyms.

Figure 1-4

Sleep Mode

Sleep mode is a special mode where the microphone stays on, but ignores everything except a command to resume listening. You say Go to Sleep to put MacSpeech Dictate into sleep mode, and Turn Microphone On or Wake Up to return it to the last mode used before putting it to sleep.

Switching Between User Modes

There are several ways to switch between the user modes:

Speech

Say Command Mode, Dictation Mode, Spelling Mode or Go to Sleep.

You can also switch modes by bringing MacSpeech Dictate to the front and selecting the desired mode from MacSpeech Dictate’s Speech menu.

Hot Keys

You can turn the microphone on or off and cycle between user modes with customized keyboard shortcuts. To change your Hot Key preferences, select Preferences from the Dictate menu and click the Shortcuts icon in the toolbar (figure 1-4). Any key can be used for a hot key, provided you use at least one modifier (Command, Control, Option, etc.).

8 MacSpeech Dictate

Chapter 2: Inallation

Insert the CD titled “Application Disc”. A window like the one in Figure 2-1 should appear. If it does not, double-click the CD image on your desktop. Drag the MacSpeech Dictate icon shown over to the picture of your Applications folder. This will copy MacSpeech Dictate and its documentation to the Applications folder.

Figure 2-1

Launch MacSpeech Dictate by opening your Applications folder, then double-clicking on the MacSpeech Dictate icon.

Click the Register button to fill out the required information in the Registration window (Figure 2-2). MacSpeech respects your privacy, and will not share your information with anyone else.

Data DVD

During the initial installation, set-up and training, MacSpeech Dictate will ask for the Data DVD (in most versions titled “MacSpeech English Data Disc”). This comes with the product, and is a separate disc from the Application CD. Please have the DVD handy for when the program requests it.

Your Reiration Code

Registration Codes have 16 characters broken into 4 groups of 4 characters each by dashes. Here is an example:

1A23-4B5C-678D-901E

This code should be on a sticker, on the sleeve for the MacSpeech Dictate Program CD. After entering your Registration Code you will receive a license file back from MacSpeech’s servers.

Removing MacSpeech Dictate

To remove MacSpeech Dictate, follow these steps:

1) Open the Applications folder on your hard drive.

2) Delete the MacSpeech Dictate application, and close the Applications folder.

Figure 2-2

Click the Register Now button to begin using the program. (Registration requires an Internet connection.) A dialog box will appear to confirm your registration has been accepted.

3) Open the Library folder inside your Home folder.

4) Open the folder called Application Support.

5) Look for a folder called MacSpeech; if it exists delete it.

6) Close the Application Support folder and open the Preferences folder inside the Library folder.

7) Find the file called com.macspeech.dictate.plist and if it exists, delete it.

8) You can delete profiles by searching for files on your harddrive with the extension .dictationprofile.

Troubleshooting Installation Problems

If you have problems with installation, please visit the MacSpeech support web site at:

http://www.macspeech.com/support_center

9 MacSpeech DictateChapter 2 — Installation

Chapter 3:

Gettin Started

The first step is to get MacSpeech Dictate used to your voice. You begin by setting up your microphone, and creating your first Profile. MacSpeech Dictate requires you Enable access for assistive devices in the Mac OS X Universal Access in your System Preferences. If this option is not turned on you will see the following panel:

Figure 3-1

Enable access for assistive devices is on, you may close the Universal Access System Preferences window and click the Continue button. MacSpeech Dictate will not allow you to proceed until Enable access for assistive devices is on.

If the Universal Access setting is correct, you will see the Connecting a Microphone to your Macintosh panel (Figure 3-3). If you have not registered yet, you will also see a panel asking you to register or select your license key.

If you see this panel, click the icon labelled Show Universal Access Settings. This will bring up the window shown in Figure 3-2.

Figure 3-2

Make sure the check box at the bottom for Enable access for assistive devices is checked. (Don’t turn on VoiceOver at

the top of the window by mistake unless you want your Mac to talk back to you for every thing it does). Onc e yo u h ave verif i e d

Figure 3-3

The Connecting a Microphone panel gives you information about connecting your microphone. Follow the directions for connecting your microphone.

IMPORTANT

You must use a USB connection for your microphone. It is fine to use a USB adapter. However, MacSpeech Dictate does not support non-USB input connections, such as a Mac’s internal microphone, direct analog microphone jacks, built-in Bluetooth, FireWire, etc.

Positioning the microphone is very important. The microphone should not be directly in front of your mouth, because direct noise from your breath sounds can affect accuracy.

For most people, the microphone should be one or two fingertips from the corner of your mouth and off to the side a bit.

You will be able to test and adjust the connection and positioning during the next steps of Getting Started. For now, make sure the correct side of the microphone (sometimes

10 MacSpeech DictateChapter 3 — Getting Started

marked with a dot or the word “Talk”) is pointing towards your mouth. When the microphone is connected and positioned, click OK to close the Connecting a Microphone panel.

Creating a Profile

Now it is time to create a profile that will let MacSpeech Dictate learn about your voice and your microphone. You will see a blank Profiles Window (Figure 3-4).

Figure 3-4

TIP:

The “Microphone” pull-down menu may list something like “AK5370,” “C-Media USB Headset” or “VXI 7.0.2.” That’s OK. That is the firmware designation for the USB adapter. (Your Mac has no way to otherwise identify an analog microphone.)

Select the language model that best suits you from the Language pull-down menu. MacSpeech Dictate supports language models including US English, UK (British) English, US Teen, Australian English, Indian English, and Southeast Asian (Singaporean) English.

If you use a high-quality, noise-cancelling microphone such as one from MacSpeech, select Standard Acoustics. If you are using an Array microphone, click on the Advanced but ton and then select “Array” from the pop-down menu next to the word “Acoustics.”

When you have verified your choices, click the Create button. After a short wait your profile is created. The first Microphone Setup panel (Figure 3-6) appears.

To create a profile, click the “+” button. This will let you enter a profile name, and select microphone type and language for the profile (see Figure 3-5).

Figure 3-5

Select the type of microphone you are using from the Microphone pull-down menu.

Figure 3-6

The Microphone Setup Volume Adjustment steps will ask you to read a short bit of text out loud while MacSpeech Dictate sets the audio levels for your microphone. Click the microphone icon with the red octagon on it, to enable the microphone. This icon will turn into a green light, and the window will display a box with text to read (Figure 3-7).

11 MacSpeech DictateChapter 3 — Getting Started

Figure 3-7

Read the text in this panel at a normal conversational volume and pace. You should read until the text box disappears and the panel changes. You will see the volume meter bar fill, and the gain indicator slide as you read. If nothing happens after reading the text, simply start reading the text again from the beginning.

If the volume meter bar remains empty, or the text doesn’t disappear after you read it three (3) times, you probably have a sound input problem. See the Troubleshooting Sound Input section at the end of this chapter for more information.

resonances from the bones in our head. Recordings lack these extra resonances, so they sound different than we expect. (If you don’t hear anything during the playback, check to make sure your volume is not muted.)

Listen for static, excess noise, a hum, or any other odd sound. If you hear any these of things, check your microphone’s connections. If the connections seem OK, the microphone may be faulty.

To hear the voice sample again, click the Play button. MacSpeech Dictate is very good at determining the quality of the sound input, but if you hear anything unusual, consider re-sampling your voice. To re-sample your voice, click the left arrow to go to the previous panel.

When you are satisfied with your voice sample, press the Voice Training button to proceed to Voice Training.

TIP:

Microphone Setup can be used at any time, for example, to adjust for room noise or microphone positioning. Run this procedure by selecting Microphone Setup from the Tools menu.

Checking the Manual Gain Setting b o x w i l l a l l o w y o u t o b y p a s s automatic volume adjustment and set the gain manually.

The Finished recording panel (Figure 3-8) plays back some of what was recorded so you can check the sound quality.

Figure 3-8

Chances are, you will think your voice sounds funny. That’s normal; when we speak, we hear our voices with additional

12 MacSpeech DictateChapter 3 — Getting Started

Troubleshooting Sound Input

If MacSpeech Dictate doesn’t respond to your voice or doesn’t seem to be working at all, check your sound input. The problem can either be with the hardware (your microphone or computer) or with software (the Macintosh sound input settings).

Checking Your Microphone

Make sure the USB adapter is plugged into an open USB port on your Macintosh. You may want to unplug it and plug it back in to make sure, then try the following:

1). Quit MacSpeech Dictate if it is running.

2). Open your System Preferences and click on the Sound icon.

3). Click on the Input tab and make sure your headset is highlighted in the input source list.

4). Click on the Show All icon in the upper left hand corner of the System Preferences window, then click the Speech icon.

5). Click the Speech Recognition Pane, then highlight the Listening sub-pane in the middle of the window.

6). Select your headset from the pop-down menu labeled “Microphone” towards the bottom of the screen. Sometimes your headset may be indi-

catedbythermwaredesignatorofyourUSB

pod. This might say something like “AK5370.”

7). Click on the “Calibrate” button. In the next window, say a few words and note if the signal meter moves when you speak. If it does, everything should be working correctly. Quit System Preferences and re-launch MacSpeech Dictate. Follow the on-screen instructions or the instructions in the User’s Guide to set up your microphone.

If you are not getting sound, you may have a defective microphone. Examine it to make sure there is no mute switch set to off (some headsets include mute switches). Unplug the microphone from your USB adapter and unplug the adapter from your computer.

Re-plug everything and then restart your computer. If possible, try the headset in a different Macintosh to rule out any problems with your computer.

13 MacSpeech DictateChapter 3 — Getting Started

Chapter 4: Trainin

This chapter covers two methods of training MacSpeech Dictate to recognize your voice, Voice Training and Vocabulary Training. Along the way, we will share some insight into how MacSpeech Dictate works, as well as tips for better recognition. We will also explain how to manage multiple profiles.

Voice Training and Vocabulary Training are not performed during normal use of MacSpeech Dictate for dictation. However, a third method, Phrase Training, allows you to train the program through the Recognition window during everyday use. Since it’s part of the standard dictation process, the Phrase Training feature will be covered in Chapter 5 (“Dictation”).

Why Do I Need To Train MacSpeech Dictate?

MacSpeech Dictate is speaker dependent, which means it needs to be trained to get the best accuracy. You do this by reading one or more training stories so it can adapt to your unique vocal characteristics.

Luckily, training MacSpeech Dictate is as simple as reading aloud and only takes a few minutes. The Voice Training part of the program will guide you through the process.

tend to pepper your speech with lots of “ums,” “uhs,” “likes,” and “you knows” MacSpeech Dictate will dutifully type what it thinks you said.

Voice Training

Once you have set up your microphone and created a profile, MacSpeech Dictate automatically starts Voice Training (Figure 4-1) so you can begin personalizing your profile. You can re-enter training at any time by choosing Voice Training from the Tools menu.

Speaking Properly To MacSpeech Dictate

It is important to relax and speak in a normal conversational tone. There’s no need to shout or project your voice. In fact, doing so can be counterproductive and lead to poor accuracy. It can also lead to vocal fatigue and voice strain. So relax!

It is also important to speak at a normal pace. MacSpeech Dictate is a continuous speech recognition product, so it relies on the context of words within phrases to obtain its accuracy. If you insert… unnatural… pauses… between… words, accuracy will actually decrease. (This is also why you shouldn’t look at the screen while you are dictating. Waiting for MacSpeech Dictate to catch up with you will result in these unnatural pauses.)

Try to speak clearly. When you talk to people, they can fill in the words you leave out, and they can compensate for words you mispronounce or slur. Computers can’t do that.

One last thing: just as MacSpeech Dictate cannot insert words you don’t say, it also cannot eliminate words or phrases you say, but do not want in your documents. For example, if you

Figure 4-1

Click the microphone icon and read the text box on the panel. The text you read turns green as it is recognized. Note that you need to say punctuation, such as COMMA and PERIOD (US only) or FULL STOP (all dialects). These commands are spelled out and capitalized to help you here.

TIP:

After reading the first training story, MacSpeech Dictate will become familiar with your reading voice, which may be different from your dictation voice. For an idea of how accurate MacSpeech Dictate is at this point, try reading it something out of a magazine or newspaper.

This will be mentioned a couple of times, but it bears repeating: You need to talk fairly slowly when first starting Voice Training, but remember to read the text smoothly and naturally.

14 MacSpeech DictateChapter 4 — Training

The text you read turns green as it is recognized (Figure 4-2).

After a bit of processing (Figure 4-3), MacSpeech Dictate will indicate when you are at the end of the training section.

Figure 4-2

MacSpeech Dictate automatically moves to the next panel as you read. If you make a mistake, don’t worry; if MacSpeech Dictate doesn’t understand you, the text will turn red (Figure 4-2).

If the text turns red, pause for a moment, then continue reading starting at the text that is not green. If the program stops on a particular word, try saying just the one word, or with only a couple of words following it. If this doesn’t help, click the Skip Word button to continue training.

TIP:

If you get a lot of red text, read fewer words, then pause until the text turns green. Gradually increase the number of words you read before pausing as long as the text continues to turn green.

Figure 4-3

Adapting your voice samples is a time-consuming process. Be patient; your computer just needs a little time. When adaptation is complete, MacSpeech Dictate will let you know.

TIP:

It could take a few minutes for MacSpeech Dictate to analyze your voice. Sometimes it can take about as long as it took you to read the stories.

Just be patient. Do not Force Quit. Doing so may corrupt your profile and make it unusable.

As you complete each panel, the progress bar indicates where you are in the story, and how far it is to the end. Keep reading until you finish the “Welcome” story.

15 MacSpeech DictateChapter 4 — Training

Vocabulary Training

MacSpeech Dictate will learn more about your voice as you use it for dictation. The process of Phrase Training through the Recognition window (see Chapter 5) will help the program pick up your speech patterns. But you also can have MacSpeech Dictate concentrate on learning your communication style and new words by analyzing existing text.

One way to do this is to use the Vocabulary Training menu item to “feed” the program text documents. Another method is to use the spoken command Train Vocabulary from Selection for text highlighted in any application. You can also cut and paste this text into Dictate’s Note Pad and choose the Train Vocabulary from Selection... from the Tools menu.

TIP:

The Vocabulary Training methods improve accuracy by helping MacSpeech Dictate learn about the way you put words together. For this reason, it is preferred that you use text that is written by you, not someone else.

Figure 4-4

2. You should now see the Include/Exclude panel (Figure 4-5). Determine which words here you don’t want MacSpeech Dictate to learn. For example, there might be proper names that are not a usual part of your writing, abbreviations or parts of URLs. For any word you do not want to add, highlight it in the left column, then click the “Exclude” button.

Here’s how to use these features to have MacSpeech Dictate learn new vocabulary from text in documents:

1. You select the text containing new words you want the program to learn. You can do this by one of these methods:

Choose Vocabulary Training from the Tools

menu. Read the introduction screen, then click the right arrow button. A screen will appear (Figure 4-4)

tospecifyles.ClicktheAdd... button, and choose plaintext or Rich Text(.rtf) les to use. Clickthe

right arrow button.

Within any application, highlight the text you want

Dictate to learn, then speak the command “Train Vocabulary From Selection”.

Paste text into Dictate’s Note Pad, then choose

Train Vocabulary From Selection from the Tools

menu.

Figure 4-5

3. To move a word you excluded back to the Included list, highlight it in the right column and then click the “Include” button. When you are

satisedwithyourchoices,clicktherightarrowto haveMacSpeechDictateprocessyourlesinto itsvocabulary(gure4-6).

16 MacSpeech DictateChapter 4 — Training

Figure 4-6

4. When nished, MacSpeech Dictate will display a screen

informing you the words have been added to your vocabulary, asshowningure4-7.Click the“Close” button or the red close window button to dismiss this window.

To review: For most people the microphone should be one to

two fingertips from the corner of the mouth. It should be out

of the breath stream from your mouth or from your nostrils.

An easy way to tell if the microphone is in your breath stream

is to place a finger over it and see if you can feel anything

when you exhale normally. Once you have the microphone

positioned properly, make sure it is placed there every time

you dictate.

Don’t Over-enunciate!

Train MacSpeech Dictate with your normal, clear speaking

voice. It is ok to enunciate a little more than normal. However,

if you read the training text with extra enunciation, like a radio

announcer, MacSpeech Dictate will think you speak that way

all the time.

You don’t want to over-enunciate, but you do want to speak

clearly. You should not sound stilted or weird; ideally, you

Figure 4-7

Improving Accuracy

There are a variety of things you can do to improve accuracy.

Proper Microphone Position Is Important!

Improper microphone position is the first thing you should check when accuracy declines. Make sure the microphone is pointed towards your mouth, but is not directly in front of it. Many microphones are noise-canceling, which discard sounds picked up away from your mouth. In many cases, a user having problems with accuracy will discover the microphone has been turned around and the noise-canceling side is facing towards the mouth. No wonder accuracy is suffering!

should still sound like you — just speaking a bit more distinctly

then you normally might when talking with a friend. Those

experienced with older speech recognition software tend to

develop a style that is a bit more precise than their usual

speaking voices. They find when they are tired, or if they slack

off a bit, their accuracy declines.

Think Before You Speak

Remember, you are developing a new skill when dictating. If

you think before you speak, what you say will come out more

clearly.

Read More Stories

Choose Voice Training from the Tools menu to read another

story. You will see the Choose Story window, as in Figure

4-8.

17 MacSpeech DictateChapter 4 — Training

Figure 4-8

The stories you have already read are indicated with a MacSpeech Dictate icon to the left of its name. Select an untrained story by clicking its name, click the right arrow button, then read on.

A Note For Users Of Backup Utilities

To use an automated backup program, such as Apple’s Backup, Time Machine, or Retrospect from Dantz Development, allow it to back up the folder where you save profiles for MacSpeech Dictate.

Adding Profiles

To create a new profile, follow these steps:

1. Choose “Proles”fromtheToolsmenutoopenthe

Proleswindow,asshowningure4-9.

When you have finished reading, click the Finish Training button. Adaptation of your speech profile will take a while to complete.

Working With Profiles

Your profiles — your personalized voice files — are the most important part of MacSpeech Dictate. You have invested your time and effort into building them. So knowing how to back up and restore these valuable files is important.

Saving Your Profiles

You can have as many profiles as you have room on your hard drive space. You may want different profiles for various reasons -- such as if you use multiple microphones, or if your voice characteristics change between morning and evening. Each profile takes around 25 MB of space. Your profiles can be stored anywhere on your hard drive. You choose the location. It is recommended that you keep these all in one place, in the Documents folder on your hard drive.

Backing Up A Profile

It is important for you to back up your profiles for MacSpeech Dictate, just as you would back up any important documents.

In case you need to find them, the profiles are named using the format <Profile_Name.dictationprofile>.

You can back up your profiles just like any other files -- by burning a copy of the folder where you keep these files to a CD, dragging them to an external drive, using Apple’s Time Machine, etc.

Figure 4-9

2. Click the PlusSign(+)tocreateanewprole. Typeinthenameforthenewprole.

3. Follow the procedure in Chapter 3 to complete

creatingthenewprole.

Switching Profiles

If more than one person is using MacSpeech Dictate on your computer, each person will need to have his or her own profile.

1. Choose “Proles”fromthe“Tools”menutoopen

theProleswindow,asshowningure4-9.

2.Highlighttheproleyouwanttouseandclickthe

“Make Active” button.

3.MacSpeechDictatewillloadtheprole.

Deleting Profiles

To delete a profile, follow these steps:

1.Choose“Proles”fromtheToolsmenutoopenthe Proleswindow,asshowningure4-9.

2.Highlighttheproleyouwanttodelete.

3. Click the Minus Sign (-).

4.Click“OK”toconrmdeletingtheprole.

If you have only one profile, MacSpeech Dictate will not allow it to be deleted as a safety precaution. In this case, you

18 MacSpeech DictateChapter 4 — Training

need to create a second profile before deleting the first one. The program will also not delete an active profile. To delete an active profile you must first switch to (or create) another profile.

Troubleshooting Training

Most problems with achieving an acceptable level of accuracy with MacSpeech Dictate can usually be traced to improper setup. Below are a few tips that will help achieve the best results.

1. Make sure your microphone is properly connected and System Preferences are properly set (see “Troubleshooting Sound Input” at the end of Chapter 3 for more information).

2. Restart your computer, then launch MacSpeech Dictate.

3. Once MacSpeech Dictate has initialized, select

“Proles…”fromthe“Tools”menu,thenclickthe “+”buttonintheProleswindow.

4.Followtheproceduresforcreatingaprole.

5. Read some sample text. Make sure it is text without a lot of proper names or technical terms that MacSpeech Dictate is unlikely to know.

At this point, MacSpeech Dictate knows how you read aloud, but your dictation style may be different. Reading some sample text will give you a good idea for how accurate your profile is at this point. We recommend you read approximately 300 words to get a good sampling.

6. Gauge your accuracy percentage by dividing the number of errors by the number of words, then subtract the result from one. For example, if you read 300 words and there are 9 errors, your error rate would be .03, so your accuracy would be .97

or 97%.

7. If your accuracy is below 95%, read another story then repeat steps 5 & 6.

You should get better than 95% accuracy after the first story.

8. Once your accuracy is above 95%, stop reading training stories.

9.OnceMacSpeechDictatehasnishedprocessing

the training stories choose Vocabulary Training from the Tools menu in MacSpeech Dictate to analyze previously created documents typical of those you intend to dictate. Doing so will make a noticeable difference in MacSpeech Dictate’s performance.

You should now be able to use MacSpeech Dictate without too much fine-tuning.

19 MacSpeech DictateChapter 4 — Training

Chapter 5: Diation

This chapter covers using MacSpeech Dictate for dictation. We will explore how to dictate words and phrases, as well as special cases such as punctuation, numbers, and capitalization. This chapter also covers using the Recognition window to review your dictation, correct your text and enable Phrase Training to improve your profile’s accuracy. We will also discuss basic options and advanced considerations for editing your dictation.

Introducing Dictation

Dictation will likely be the task that you use MacSpeech Dictate for most often, so it deserves a basic definition for starters. Dictation is simply the process in which you speak, then MacSpeech Dictate recognizes your words and phrases, and outputs those words as text. There are also a set of “dictation commands” that can be used to navigate and edit the text that has been dictated.

Speak where you would type

You can dictate into almost any application that supports text input. Most word processors and text document applications (e.g. Mail, TextEdit) allow you to dictate a large amount of text in a document instead of typing it. It is usually straightforward to navigate and edit this dictated text by voice. MacSpeech Dictate keeps track of the text you dictated, and follows your voice commands to position the cursor and select text.

However, there is one main guideline to keep in mind...

Speak, or type...but not together

You will get the best results by following this guideline: Use your voice, or use your keyboard and mouse, but not both together.

edit text, it is primarily the application itself that is aware of what you are doing.

If you are dictating text at the same time as editing by mouse and keyboard, you may eventually experience odd results in the text. On the ot h er hand, i f you use onl y your vo ic e to select and edit misrecognized words that you have just dictated, it is much less likely MacSpeech Dictate will lose its place. Your dictated text will remain in sync with the rest of your document. Also, correcting dictated text by voice will train your speech profile toward maximum accuracy.

So, the following guideline is worth repeating: Use your voice, or use your keyboard and mouse, but not both together.

The Built-in Note Pad

MacSpeech Dictate includes a built-in word processor called Note Pad, which is designed for creating and editing text through dictation. In fact, you should only use your voice to add text while in Note Pad. Regular typing will not produce a normal result (try it out!). This helps provide a consistent result by not mixing dictating and typing.

You can still copy text from Note Pad, so text dictated there can be moved to other applications. You also can use common editing a n d for m at t i n g c o m m a nds like cut, copy, and sel e c t a l l. These commands are in the Edit and Format menus for Note Pad.

When you are first starting out with MacSpeech Dictate, try out the Note Pad. You may also find it handy for practicing or testing dictation commands off to the side of other applications for word processing.

Another good saying to remember this rule by is:

If You’re Talking, Talk. If You’re Typing, Type.

Here is a more detailed explanation:

Modern word processors and other applications are designed to do more than just accept the input of text. They keep track of changes, manage text markup and custom formatting, help outline your thoughts, etc. In order to do this, these applications keep track of text in their own ways.

Most applications also support custom commands for controlling navigation, editing and other features. When you use the mouse and keyboard to control these commands and

20 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

Using Dictation Mode

When off, the microphone button in the Status window has a red stop sign on top of it, as in Figure 5-1. (If the Status window is not visible, select Show Status Window from the Window menu.)

Figure 5-1

To dictate text, you may follow these steps:

1. Switch to the application into which you want to dictate, or use MacSpeech Dictate’s Note Pad (see Figure 5-2).

2. If necessary, create a new document, or open an existing document to which you will add text.

Figure 5-2

3. Click the microphone button in the Status window, or press a keyboard shortcut that corresponds to the Microphone On/Off. The microphone button will change from a red stop sign to a microphone

withagreencirclebehindit,asingure5-3.

Handling Misrecognized words

No matter how good MacSpeech Dictate is — or how carefully you speak — there will be words recognized as something you didn’t intend. When that happens, there are some special commands available to assist.

Scratch That or Forget That

Scratch That and Forget That perform the same action. They delete the last utterance, which is what you said from the last time you paused, or to the left of where you insert the cursor in dictated text.

Scratch Word or Forget Word

If Scratch That or Forget That deletes too much, try using Scratch Word or Forget Word instead. This will erase only

the last word you spoke, or to the left of where you insert the cursor in dictated text.

These commands can be spoken repeatedly to delete several recently dictated phrases.

IMPORTANT: The commands Scratch That, Forget That, Scratch Word, and Forget Word are NOT the equivalent of the Undo menu command (Cmd-Z) in many Mac OS X applications. The Scratch/Forget commands will delete the last phrase dictated, or the text to the left of where you insert the cursor by voice, even if it was a correction of a previously dictated word.

Figure 5-3

4. Speak into your microphone. There will be a short delay while MacSpeech Dictate interprets your speech, after which text will appear in the document window.

5. Whenyounishdictating,turnyourmicrophone

off by speaking the command Microphone Off, or Go to Sleep. You may also use your mouse to click the microphone button in the Status window.

Dictation Sessions

If you are dictating into the active text area of an application, and you open a second document in that application or another application, MacSpeech Dictate starts a new dictation session for the new window. This allows MacSpeech Dictate to keep track of words and punctuation for each window.

TIP:

If Scratch That or Forget That deletes to o much, s ay Scratch Word or Forget Word instead to delete only

the last word you spoke, or the last dictated word to the left of where you inser ted the cursor using spoken commands.

Editing Your Document

There are some special rules for editing and navigating your documents when using MacSpeech Dictate. You can use the Scratch That, Forget That, Scratch Word and Forget Word commands we already told you about, but there are many other commands at your disposal.

Moving Around Documents By Voice

Just because you can’t use the keyboard or mouse before you are finished editing doesn’t mean you can’t get around. In fact, once you get used to how to do it, you may prefer moving around by voice in documents.

21 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

TIP:

If you are navigating a document by voice, you can use either of the commands Go to End or Move to End of Document to return to the end of where you left off dictating.

Here is a list of useful commands for editing and navigating while in dictating:

Dictation Commands

What You Say What Happens

Capitalize the Word[s] “text” [through/to “text”]

Delete the Word[s] “text” [through/to “text”]

Go to Beginning

Go to End or Move to End of Document

Insert After the Word[s] “text” [through/to “text”]

Insert Before the Word[s] “text” [through/to “text”]

Lowercase the Word[s] “text” [through/to “text”]

Move Backward [1-99] Words

Move Forward [1-99] Words

Move to Beginning of Document

Move to End of Document

New Line Presses the Return key once.

New Paragraph Presses the Return key twice.

No Space <word>

Select the Word[s] “text” [through/to “text”]

Scratch That / Forget That

Scratch Word / Forget Word

Select All Selects all text.

Train the Word[s] “text” [through/to “text”]

Uppercase the Word[s] “text” [through/to “text”]

Capitalizes the instance of the word or phrase spoken that is closest to the insertion point.

Deletes the instance of the word or phrase spoken that is closest to the insertion point.

Goes to the Beginning of the current document.

Goes to the end of the current dictation session.

Moves the insertion point to just after the word or phrase you said.

Moves the insertion point to just before the word or phrase you said.

Makes all characters lowercase in the instance of the word or phrase spoken that is closest to the insertion point.

Moves cursor back 1 to 99 words (Punctuation marks count as words)

Moves cursor forward 1 to 99 words. (Punctuation marks count as words)

Moves cursor to the beginning of the current document.

Moves cursor to the End of the current dictation session.

Types next word without a space before it.

Selects the instance of the word or phrase spoken that is closest to the insertion point.

Deletes the last phrase you said, or to the left of where you insert the cursor.

Deletes the last word you said, or to the left of where you insert the cursor.

Selects,correctsthespeciedwords intext,andtrainsthemintoproleas speciedwordsarere-dictated.

Makes all characters uppercase in the instance of the word or phrase spoken that is closest to the insertion point.

Using “Delete the Word[s]”

When you say Delete the Word[s] followed by a word or phrase, MacSpeech Dictate finds the occurrence of what was said closest to the insertion point and deletes it. If there are multiple instances of the same word in the document, you can insure you delete the correct instance by using another command first. Use Select the Word[s], Insert Before the Word[s] or Insert After the Word[s] to select or move the insertion point next to the word you want to delete.

Note: This command replaces the “Do Delete” commands in earlier versions of Dictate.

Using “Select the Word[s]”

Say Select the Word followed by a word or phrase to find the closest occurrence of that word or phrase to the insertion point. You can say Select the Word[s] “text” through/to “text” to select a range of words. For example, suppose you dictated the following…

“I am teaching my Mac to recognize speech

PERIOD” (US only)

…but MacSpeech Dictate types…

I am teaching my Mac to wreck a nice beach.

You would say…

“Select The Words WRECK through BEACH”

[pause] “recognize speech”

Select the correct instance of a word or phrase by saying enough words to insure there is only one instance of the phrase in the document, then use the Select

the Word[s] command again to zero in on your selection. You can also use Insert Before the Word[s] or Insert After the Word[s] to move the insertion point next to the word or phrase you want to select.

If you would also like to submit the selected text for Phrase Training, to improve Dictate’s accuracy, use the command “Train the Word[s]” instead.

Note: This command replaces the “Do Select” commands in earlier versions of Dictate.

Using “Insert Before The Word[s]” and “Insert After The Word[s]”

You can say Insert Before the Word followed by a word or phrase to move the insertion point before that word or phrase. Likewise, you can say Insert After the Word to move the insertion point after the word or phrase.

You can also say Insert Before the Words

“text”

through/

to “text” or Insert After the Words “text” through/to

22 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

“text” to move the insertion point before or after a range of words. This can be very helpful as it allows you to zero in on exactly where you want the insertion point to go, especially when there are multiple occurrences of a word or phrase in a document.

For example, suppose you just dictated the following:

“Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid

of their country.”

If you want to add “and women” after “men,” say the following:

“Insert After the Words good men”

[pause] “and women”

After inserting the new text you could move the insertion point back to the end of the document by saying either Go to End or Move to End of Document.

Note: This replaces the “Do Insert” commands in earlier versions of Dictate.

The Recognition Window

Despite MacSpeech Dictate’s excellent accuracy, the software will sometimes recognize a word or phrase differently than you spoke. The Recognition window (Figure 5-4a) indicates how your speech is recognized, and lets you train Dictate as you go along dictating. This is called Phrase Training, and is designed to further improve the program’s understanding of your speech. The options in the Recognition window can be used for correcting misrecognized text in your document.

The Transparency slider lets you set whether you want the Recognition window to be transparent, or opaque.

Dictate, Correct and Edit

Here’s how to use Recognition window during dictation. The process can be broken down to three steps: Dictate, Correct and Edit.

Phrase Training Commands

What You Say What Happens

Choose “1” (or “2”, etc.)

Pick “1” (or “2”, etc.)

Edit “1” (or “2”, etc.)

Cancel Edit

Press Play

Hide Recognition Window Closes the Recognition window.

Show Recognition Window

Dictate

Make sure you are in Dictation mode. Decide if the text you just dictated is correct. You can look at the document where you were dictating, or in the Recognized Text feedback field (below the Status window). These should show your most recently dictated word or phrase.

Choosesthespecieditem#inthe

Recognition window as the spoken and recognized phrase.

Corrects the selected text with the word or phrase that is item 1 (or 2, etc.) in the Recognition window.

Allows you to edit item 1 (or 2, etc.) in the Recognition Window.

Cancels all edits and restores all items in the Recognition window.

Plays audio of most recent word or phrase dictated.

Opens the Recognition window.

Figure 5-4a

In the Recognition window, you can play back the audio of your last spoken word or phrase by clicking on the Play button or saying the command Press Play.

23 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

If the text you dictated was recognized correctly, you don’t need to do anything with the Recognition Window. Just keep on dictating.

If incorrect, continue with the process of using the Recognition window. Based on the word or phrase Dictate thought you said, the Recognition Window will present you with options that are close to what you dictated (see Figure 5-4 again).

Correct the Recognition / Correct the Text

You can correct MacSpeech Dictate’s recognition of the text, as well as the text itself in your document by saying the command Choose <x> or Pick <x>. The <x> represents the corresponding item number from the Recognition Window item list. For example, say “Choose 4” or “Pick 4” to choose item number 4 in the Recognition window as the correctly recognized text.

If none of the options are correct, and MacSpeech Dictate doesn’t recognize a word or phrase, use the Recognition

window to train your profile to better recognize what was said. This is called Phrase Training and it is the best way to improve your accuracy. Depending upon how unique a new word or phrase is, it may take more than one effort.

What about Editing the Text?

Using Cut, Copy, Paste, Undo/Redo

It is recommended that you do not try to mix dictation and typing at the same time. To help you remember this, there is the saying, “If you are talking, talk. If you are typing, type.”

TIP:

After you have worked with MacSpeech Dictate awhile, the Recognition Window may often list only a few choices, or it may even be blank as it correctly recognizes your speech.

Edit the Recognition

If none of the items in the Recognition window corrects what you dictated, you can Edit one of those items. Speak the command Edit <x>, where <x> is the corresponding item number from the Recognition Window item list. For example, say ““Edit 3” to use item number 3 to establish the correctly recognized word or phrase (Figure 5-4b).

However, the reality is that every document, whether typed or dictated, will probably require some text editing. Again, if you are going to do this using the mouse and keyboard, it is recommended that you do this after you have completed dictation for a specified section of text.

For more details on using your voice to control common editing commands (Cut, Copy, Paste, Undo/Redo) within an application, please see “Dictation Advanced Topics” at the end of this chapter.

Tips for using the Recognition window

Here are some tips for using the Recognition window and Phrase Training features more effectively:

• Use

• Ifthereareotherwordsorphrasesinthedocu-

Train The Word[s] as you dictate in order to correct misrecognized text, and train your profile for better accuracy.

ment to correct, use commands such as Select The Word[s] or Train the Word[s] to highlight the text in the document. Then work with the Recognition window to select or edit the text.

Figure 5-4b

Now, you can dictate the correct text, or use Spelling or type in the correct words. The command Cancel Edit cancels any changes you made and restores its original contents. When you are done editing, you can say “Choose <x>” or “Pick <x>” to select that item from the list and also change your document.

From our previous example, let’s say that you attempted to add the words “and women”, but the Recogni tion window gave you the choices listed in Figure 5-4a. Now you would say, for example, “Edit 3” and then dictate (or type) “and women” instead of “and one”. Finally, you would say “Choose 3” to select the edited item and place the edits in your document.

•

The commands Scratch That and Forget That do NOT work when editing items in the Recognition window. Instead, you can use the commands Scratch Word and Forget Word.

•

The Edit <x> command in the Recognition window is for changing word recognition, not formatting. After applying the command Choose <x> for an edited item from the Recognition window, you may still see the item’s format changed to fit the context (e.g. capitalization, numerals).

Sleep Mode

If you are interrupted while using MacSpeech Dictate, the program can be put to sleep. In sleep mode the microphone is still active, but it will only respond to commands intended to wake it up.

Sleep mode is useful for short interruptions such as phone calls or taking a break. Sleep mode is activated by saying Go To Sleep. To wake up MacSpeech Dictate and return to the mode you were last in, use the command

24 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

Wake Up or Turn Microphone On. When MacSpeech Dictate is asleep, the Status window will look like Figure 5-5:

Figure 5-5

If you will be away from the computer for an extended period of time, use the Microphone Off command instead. This ensures MacSpeech Dictate can’t accidentally interpret room noise or speech from a conversation as a Wake Up command.

Dictating Special Kinds of Words

As you learned while training MacSpeech Dictate, it is necessary to speak punctuation so it can accurately tell where sentences begin and end, among other things. There is an extensive list of things you can say. The following tables provide a guide to the different things you can say that produce text beyond just words on the page.

How does MacSpeech Dictate know the difference between punctuation and a real word? Consider the following sentences:

Wayne scored the winning goal in the third period

PERIOD (US Only)

The train came to a full stop FULL STOP (all

dialects)

Capitalization Commands

What You Say What Happens

Caps On

Caps Off

Cap <word> Capitalizes the next word spoken.

All Caps <word> Types the next word spoken in CAPS.

All Caps On Makes every word CAPS.

All Caps Off Returns capitalization to normal.

No Caps <word> Makes the next word spoken lower case.

No Caps On

No Caps Off Returns capitalization to normal.

Capitalize the Word[s] “text” [through/to “text”]

Turnsoncapitalizingtherstletterof

every word.

Turnsoffcapitalizingtherstletterof

every word.

Makes the following text lowercase until turned off.

Capitalizestheidentiedwordorphrase

spoken that is closest to the insertion point.

Cap is singular, Other Caps are not

Note that there are several similar commands here, but each has a different function. The command “Cap <word>” capitalizes only the next word spoken. Please notice that this command doesn’t have the letter “s” on the end. The command Cap <letter> is the only capitalization command that works in Spelling Mode.

The commands “Cap <word>” and “No Caps <word>” are expiring commands. When the command is spoken, it will cause the Caps/AllCaps/NoCaps indicator light to turn orange (Figure 5-6) until the <word> part of the command is completed.

MacSpeech Dictate does not use simply word recognition, but rather an analysis known as continuous speech recognition. The program analyzes complete phrases as you speak — taking a close look at what is said both before and after the current word or phrase. Only then does it decide what was dictated.

Because of this, MacSpeech Dictate has many special terms that produce a variety of effects or symbols. Let’s take a look at them.

Capitalization

MacSpeech Dictate does some capitalization formatting for you. It will automatically capitalize the first word in a document, the first word in a sentence, and proper names that are already in its vocabulary. Otherwise, it uses the following capitalization commands:

25 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

Figure 5-6

Caps/AllCaps/NoCaps

The top indicator light in the Status Window lights up green when the you have turned on one of these commands:

Ca ps On - Capitalizes the first letter of almost every word dictated, until you say “C aps Off ”. For example, if you say, “This is the title of the book” it will be dictated as “This Is The Title of the Book”. The top indicator light in the Status Window will turn green and show the text “Abc” (Figure 5-7).

Note: Not all words are capitalized, such as “the”, “of”, etc.

Compound words and No Space commands

The No Space commands are useful when you want to type words without spaces in between them:

Figure 5-7

AllCaps On - Capitalizes every letter of the words dictated, until you say “All Caps Off”. For example, if you say, “This is the title of the book” it will be dictated as “THIS IS THE TITLE OF THE BOOK”. The top indicator light in the Status Window will turn green and show the text “ABC” (Figure 5-8).

Figure 5-8

NoCaps O n - Turns of f capitalization of the first letter of every word dictated, until you say “NoCaps Off”. For example, if you say, “This is the title of the book due out in January” it will be dictated as “this is the title of the book due out in january”. The top indicator light in the Status Window will turn green and show the text “abc” (Figure 5-9).

“No Space” Commands

What You Say What Happens

No Space On

No Space Off Turns the No Space mode off

No Space <word>

Turns the No Space mode on, so there is no space between words.

Types the next word without a space in front of it.

For compound words you could say No Space On before you say the compound word, and then say No Spac e O f f af te r you finish speaking the word. For example, to have MacSpeech Dictate type “AppleTV” you would say the following:

“NO SPACE ON Apple TV NO SPACE OFF”

The middle indicator light in the Status Window lights up green when the No Space On command is activated (Figure 5-10).

Figure 5-9

When you turn any of these commands off (with the C aps Off, or AllCaps Off, or NoCa ps Of f commands), then MacSpeech Dictate resumes automatic capitalization and the indicator light in the Status Window will be gray.

Hyphenated and compound words

The behavior for dashes and hyphens is slightly different depending on what you are dictating. For most things, MacSpeech Dictate puts a space before and after a dash. If you dictate a US phone number, however, MacSpeech Dictate will correctly type it without the spaces before and after the dash.

To make a hyphenated word, you would need to say “hyphen” where you want the hyphen to appear, as follows:

“free HYPHEN wheeling”

Figure 5-10

You can also say No Space <word> to type the next word without putting a space in front of it. Using the same example, you would say:

“Apple NO SPACE TV”

The middle indicator light in the Status window lights up orange when you say “No Space” and stays lit until you say the <word> portion of the command (Figure 5-11).

Figure 5-11

Punctuation

There are a variety of things you can say to have MacSpeech Dictate type punctuation and symbols. The following table lists the various things you can say, and what MacSpeech Dictate will type:

26 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

Punctuation Examples

What You Say

Ampersand &

Apostrophe ‘

Apostrophe ess ‘s

Asterisk *

At Sign @

Back Slash \

Back Quote / Backtick ‘

Caret ^

Cents Sign ¢

Close Angle Bracket >

Close Brace }

Close Bracket (US Only) Close Square Bracket (All Dialects)

Close Euro Quote »

Close Parenthesis (All Dialects) Close Bracket (Non-US Dialects)

Close Quote ” (close curly quote)

Close Single Quote ’

Colon :

Comma ,

Dash <space> -- <space>

Degree Sign °

Dollar Sign $

Dot .

Ellipsis …

Em Dash <space> --- <space>

En Dash <space> -- <space>

Equals Sign =

Euro Sign €

Exclamation Mark (All Dialects) Exclamation Point (US Only)

Forward Slash /

Full Stop (all dialects) .

Greater Than Sign >

Hash Sign (Non-US dialects) #

Hyphen <word>-<word>

Left Angle Bracket <

Less Than Sign <

Minus Sign -

New Line <one carriage return>

New Paragraph <two carriage returns>

Number Sign (US Only) #

Open Angle Bracket <

Open Brace {

What Happens

]

)

What You Say

Open Bracket (US Only) Open Square Bracket (All Dialects)

Open Euro Quote «

Open Parenthesis (All Dialects) Open Bracket (Non-US Dialects)

Open Quote “ (open curly quote)

Open Single Quote ‘ (open single quote)

Percent Sign %

Period (US only) .

Plus Sign +

Point .

Pound Sign (US Only) #

Pound Sign (non-US Dialects) Pound Sterling Sign (US Only)

Question Mark ?

Registered Sign ®

Right Angle Bracket >

Section Sign §

Semi Colon ;

Sharp Sign (Non-US Dialects) #

Slash /

Space Bar <the space character>

Tab Key <the tab character>

Tilde ~

Trademark Sign ™

Underscore _

Vertical Bar |

Chat /

Instant Messaging

What Happens

[

(

In addition to being able to dictate directly to chat windows, MacSpeech Dictate has some special commands you can use when dictating an instant message in programs such as iChat, AIM, MSN Messenger, and many others:

Commands Helpful in Chat Programs

What You Say What Happens

Send Message Sends the current message.

Smiley Face :-)

Frowny Face :-(

Winky Face ;-)

Numerals / Numbers

When you say a number, MacSpeech Dictate will either type out the words or the number, depending on the context in which the number was used. If you want to force the program

27 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

to type a number instead of typing the words for the number, say Numeral before saying the number.

MacSpeech Dictate has the ability to properly format numbers as they are spoken. Here are some examples:

Number Examples

What You Say What Happens

One or Numeral One 1

Five or Numeral Five 5

Seventeen 17

Forty Two 42

One Hundred Seventy Nine 179

Five Thousand Four Hundred and Twenty Three

Five COMMA Four Twenty Three 5,423

Twelve Thousand Five Hundred and Thirty Seven

One Hundred and Forty Two Thousand and Fifteen

Thirty Five POINT Two Three 35.23

Zero POINT Zero Three (All Dialects) Naught POINT Naught Three (Non-US Dialects)

Forty-Three POINT Twenty Eight PERCENT SIGN

Oh Two Four Six Zero 02460

Oh Two Four Six Zero HYPHEN One Four Five Eight

Two and Three Fourths 2 3/4

Eleven Over Thirty Two 11/32

Eleven Thirty Seconds 11/32

Ninety Nine Dollars and Fifty Five Cents $99.55

Forty Five Euros and Thirty Five Cents €45.35

Pound Sterling Sign One Hundred and Twenty POINT Thirty Five

5423

12,537

142,015

0.03

43.28%

02460-1458

£120.35

Fractions

You can dictate common fractions the way you would normally say them. To dictate 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, 1/5, 1/6, 1/7, 1/8, 1/9, 1/10, and 1/16 or a multiple of these fractions, just say the fraction normally. If the fraction is typed out as text (“one half” instead of “1/2”) try saying NUMERAL before the fraction.

If the denominator (the bottom number) is greater than 10, enter the fraction by saying slash or over between the two numbers.

Fraction Examples

What You Say What Happens

One Half 1/2

One Fourth or One Quarter 1/4

Fifteen Sixteenths or Fifteen Over Sixteen 15/16

Fraction Examples

What You Say What Happens

Three and Seven Eights or Three and Seven Over Eight

Nine SLASH Twelve or Nine Over Twelve 9/12

Five SPACE BAR Three SLASH Fifty Six 5 3/56

One Thirty Over Seventy 130/70

3 7/8

Roman Numerals

Roman Numerals are dictated by saying Roman Numeral and the number. For large numbers, say the number in smaller combinations, as shown in the last example below.

Roman Numeral Examples

What You Say What Happens

Roman Numeral One I

Roman Numeral Four IV

Roman Numeral Five V

Roman Numeral Ten X

Roman Numeral Fifty L

Roman Numeral One Hundred C

Roman Numeral Five Hundred D

Roman Numeral One Thousand M

Roman Numeral Twenty Four XXIV

Roman Numeral Thirty One XXXI

Roman Numeral One Thousand [pause] Roman Numeral Nine Hundred [pause] Roman Numeral Ninety [pause] Roman Numeral Seven

MCMXCVII

US ZIP Codes

Five-digit US ZIP Codes are dictated the same as any group of numbers. When dictating nine-digit ZIP Codes, you must say the hyphen.

US Zip Code Examples

What You Say What Happens

oh one oh oh ve 01005

Five Three Four Zero Three 53403

Nine Four Seven Oh Four HYPHEN One One Five Oh

94704-1150

UK and Canadian Postal Codes

You can dictate UK postcodes by saying Postcode followed by the letters and numbers that make up the postcode. For Canadian postal codes, say Postal Code followed by the characters that make up the postal code. Spacing and formatting will happen automatically.

28 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

UK and Canadian Postal Code Examples

What You Say What Happens

Postcode N G Three Two H X NG3 2HX

Postcode E Ten Seven B D E10 7BD

Postcode E C Two Y Four L K EC2Y 4LK

Postal Code K One A Zero M Five K1A 0M5

Postal Code X Oh A Oh H Oh X0A 0H0

US Telephone Number Examples

What You Say What Happens

One Eight Hundred Five Five Five One Two One Two

OPEN PARENTHESIS Six Zero Three CLOSE PARENTHESIS Three Five Zero Zero Nine Zero Three

One Two One Two Five Five Five Twelve Twelve

1-800-555-1212

(603) 350-0903

1-212-555-1212

Dates and Times

You can dictate most dates and times the way you would normally say them. Say Oh or Zero to enter 0. In dialects other than US and Canada you can also say Naught.

The US dialect of MacSpeech Dictate automatically types the colon (:) if you say A M or P M when dictating the time. Say O’clock or Colon Zero Zero to enter “:00.”

Non-US dialects automatically type the point (.) if you say A M or P M depending on the regional setting.

Date and Time Examples

What You Say What Happens

Twenty Two January Nineteen Ninety Nine 22 January 1999

April Nine COMMA Two Thousand and One April 9, 2001

Fourteen SLASH Oh Seven SLASH Eighty Five

Three SLASH Eleven SLASH Zero Two 3/11/02

Three SLASH Eleven SLASH Two Thousand and Two

April First April 1

March Twenty Second March 22

The Nineteen Eighties the 1980’s

Eight COLON Thirty

Seven Forty Five A M

Ten Twenty Two P M

Three O’Clock or Three COLON Zero Zero

Five O’Clock PM

14/07/85

3/11/2002

8:30 (US)

8.30 (others)

7:45 AM (US)

7.45 AM (others)

10:22 PM (US)

10.22 PM (others)

3:00 (US)

3.00 (others)

5:00 PM (US)

5.00 PM (others)

Telephone Numbers

MacSpeech Dictate will format phone numbers for you. For the US version, just say the number as you normally would, pausing between groups of numbers.

US Telephone Number Examples

What You Say What Happens

Three Five Zero Zero Nine Zero Three 350-0903

Six Oh Three Three Five Oh Oh Nine Oh Three

603-350-0903

When dictating a phone number for outside the US you will need to say all the punctuation (hyphens, spaces, and parenthesis).

Non-US Telphone Number Examples

What You Say What Happens

OPEN PARENTHESIS Oh One Six Two Eight CLOSE PARENTHESIS EIght Nine Four One Five Oh

Oh Two Seven SPACE BAR Six Two Nine SPACE BAR Eight Nine Four Four

Six One HYPHEN Seven HYPHEN Four Six Nine Five HYPHEN Two Zero Five Five

OPEN PARENTHESIS Six Five CLOSE PARENTHESIS Two Seven Seven Eight Five Nine Zero

(01628) 894150

027 629 8944

61-7-4695-2055

(65) 2778590

Spelling Mode

Spelling Mode allows you to spell one letter or numeral at a time, or speak punctuation marks. In Spelling Mode, Dictate recognizes what you say as letters or numerals (e.g. “c”, or “1”) rather than as words (e.g. “see”, or “won”). To launch Spelling Mode, say the command Spelling Mode, or select Spelling from the Speech menu item, or toggle through modes with a designated hot key.

Spelling Mode Commands Examples

What You Say What Happens

a b c abc

1 2 3 EXCLAMATION POINT 123!

a SPACEBAR b SPACEBAR c a b c

a b CAP c abC

a b c SCRATCH THAT ab

a b c MOVE BACKWARD 1 CHARACTER d abdc

A limited number of commands are available in Spelling Mode. These include “Cap <letter>”, “Spacebar”, and “Move Backward/Forward [1-99] Character[s]”. Also, the commands Scratch That, Scratch Word, Forget That, and Forget Word will work and can be used to delete the last letter spoken.

29 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

These commands do NOT work in Spelling Mode: Caps

On/Off, AllCaps On/Off, NoCaps On/Off, New Line, New Paragraph.

Accuracy Issues

If your recognition accuracy suddenly deteriorates, first take a look at the signal strength meter in the Feedback window. When you speak, it should be about 80% to 90% green.

Tips for Spelling Mode:

• Remember thatyou are notin Dictationmode. So, don’t

try to speak full words. Spelling mode is mainly for printing individual characters. You may need to jump back and forth between Spelling and Dictation mode, but this can be done quickly with voice commands.

•Inspellingmode,thecommandsMove Backward/Forward [1-99] Character[s] only work for characters that have been

spelled.

•WhenenteringSpellingmode,youwillusuallywanttostart

with the command Spacebar, in order to start with a leading space. Otherwise MacSpeech Dictate will add the letters and numerals you speak directly on to the end of the last word you dictated before entering Spelling mode.

For example, you would dictate the following

“This is a test of how to speak SPELLING MODE <pause> SPACEBAR <pause> abc PERIOD”

The result is:

This is a test of how to speak abc.

If you did not say SPACEBAR you would get:

This is a test of how to speakabc.

If there is too little or too much green in the meter, there is a good chance your voice is not being input properly for good recognition. This can happen if the noise level in the environment in which you are using MacSpeech Dictate changes from what it was when you first set up your profile.

Don’t panic. All you need to do is select S e t U p M y M i c r o p h o n e from the Tools menu in MacSpeech Dictate to re-calibrate your microphone, which takes only a few seconds.

If Dictation Doesn’t Appear In Your Document...

Make sure you are using the same microphone that was connected when you set up the current profile. Microphones are profile-specific. To use a different microphone, you need create a new profile.

For more information on troubleshooting, please see the MacSpeech Support web site at:

<http://www.macspeech.com/support_center>

Speaking Tips -- For Your Voice

Dictation may help alleviate RSI (Repetitive Strain Injury), because it eases the burden on your arms and hands. But speech recognition has its own potential problem, which is vocal strain. Overuse of your voice can cause hoarseness and a sore throat. With a bit of preparation, however, you can easily avoid vocal strain.

Troubleshooting Dictation

Using MacSpeech Dictate for dictation is fairly straight forward — you speak, and the text appears at the location of the insertion point, in any document. Occasionally, however, you may experience reduced accuracy or other problems. There is usually an easy solution to these issues.

Extra Words

If “extra” words such as “the,” “to,” “of,” “oh,” and “a,” appear in your document — sometimes when you aren’t even speaking — this usually means the microphone is too close to your mouth. MacSpeech Dictate is capturing the sound of your breath, and attempting to convert this sound into words.

For best results, make sure the microphone is one to two fingertips away from the corner of your mouth. (If you are softspoken, you might have to have it as c lose as a thumb’s width. If you have a loud voice, maybe a bit further.) When properly positioned, you should be able to drink from a normal-sized glass without touching the microphone or spilling the liquid.

30 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

Keep Drinking

We’re talking about keeping your vocal cords lubricated. Speaking for long periods will dry out your throat, so keep something drinkable nearby. While it is true that some liquid is better than no liquid, it is also true that some liquids are better than others. Plain water is best, and, because cold makes your throat muscles tighten up, water at room temperature is preferred. Caffeine promotes dehydration, so avoid it.

Find The (Vocal) Middle Ground

It is as much of a mistake to speak too quietly as it is to speak too loudly while dictating. Either extreme can lead to vocal strain. Try to keep a conversational speaking tone, as though you’re speaking to a person who is about an arm’s length away.

Mind Your Posture

Sit up straight. It helps to have an adjustable chair with support for good posture. This helps your voice because there

is a free flow of air. When slumped in your chair, you work harder to speak.

Don’t forget to breathe

It is easy to get into the bad habit of squeezing or blasting out a phrase at a time, with insufficient breath to power your voice. Try breathing from your diaphragm, not the upper chest or throat.

Relax

If you are sitting tense and too rigid in your chair, chances are your voice and vocal cords will be tense too. Make a conscious effort to keep your shoulders and facial muscles loose.

Take Breaks

Overdoing it seems to be a common trait in almost all computer related injuries. Dictating too long without a break is a great way to get a sore throat or end up feeling hoarse. Try not to dictate more than about 45 minutes without taking a short break.

Get Professional Help

This last tip is not for everyone, but if you expect to do a lot of dictation, consider taking a couple of hours of training from a speech teacher. In a short time, a good vocal coach can give you useful tips and exercises that will help protect your voice.

Dictation Advanced Topics

Text Editing & the Purge Cache command

As mentioned at the beginning of this chapter, using a combination of voice dictation and keyboard/mouse in other applications can lead to strange behavior with your text.

If you combine dictation and typing to edit a document, MacSpeech Dictate cannot always keep track of the typed contents the same way it keeps track of dictated contents. The dictated contents are tracked in Dictate’s cache (pronounced “cash”).

In addition, changes made to a document through the common text editing commands (Cut, Copy, Paste, Undo/Redo) are tracked by the active application, not MacSpeech Dictate...

even if those commands are initiated by voice commands through Dictate.

T h is m ea n s y o u c a n st i ll t r y t o us e th e s e t ex t e di t in g co m m an d s in a dictated document. However, if you want to attempt this “mixed editing”, you will need to do editing in small batches, and use a special command (Purge Cache) to commit edits to the document each time edits are completed.

Text Editing Commands

What You Say What Happens

Cache Document

Copy Selection Copies the selected text.

Cut Selection Cuts the selected text.

Paste From Clipboard Pastes text from clipboard.

Purge Cache

Redo Last Action

Undo Last Action

Select All Selects all text.

Prepares pasted text from other applications for editing by dictation in Note Pad.

Commits dictated text to an existing document.

Tells active application to perform most recent action again.

Tells active application to undo most recent action. Equal to Cmd-Z keyboard shortcut in many applications.

The P ur ge Ca ch e command makes MacSpeech Dictate forget about any dictated content in the document, so it considers all the contents simply as typed text. After using Purge Cache, the program will treat the document as though nothing has been dictated. MacSpeech Dictate will then better handle inserting new dictation into the existing text.

To make changes to an existing document, use the selection commands and dictation to make a set of changes. Use the Purge Cache command to purge the extra information that MacSpeech Dictate stores about each dictation. Then you may move on to the next set of changes.

Another use of this command is during navigation of a window that has multiple fields, such as an email client, a database, or a spreadsheet. After finishing dictating in a field, using the Purge Cache command at the beginning of the next field will ensure that prior dictation does not affect the contents of the new field.

Cache Document Command

If you paste text from another application into MacSpeech Dictate’s Note Pad, you can use the Cache Document command to prepare that text for editing through dictation.

The Cache Document command only works with documents in MacSpeech Dictate’s Note Pad. In addition, when you use the Purge Cache command in Note Pad it automatically performs a Cache Document command, so that Note Pad will always know the contents of its own window.

Please check the MacSpeech Support web site for updates on more advanced technical details for using these commands.

31 MacSpeech DictateChapter 5 — Dictation

Chapter 6: Controllin Your Mac

In this chapter, we will look at some ways MacSpeech Dictate can control a Macintosh. It can open files or applications, type keyboard commands, and press buttons.

MacSpeech Dictate is not likely to replace your keyboard and mouse completely. Think of MacSpeech Dictate as a “third hand” to click a button without raising your hands from the keyboard, or to open a file without digging through folders. As you work with it, you will figure out what tasks are right for you to accomplish by voice, keyboard, and/or mouse.

Using Command Mode

Command mode is used when you want to have MacSpeech Dictate focus only on executing commands. While all commands are also available in Dictation mode, dictation commands are ignored when you are in Command mode. This makes it easier for MacSpeech Dictate to understand the commands.

The available commands can be seen in the Available Commands window (Figure 6-2). The list will change depending on what you are doing, and which application you are using Dictate to control. MacSpeech Dictate tracks which application is active, and automatically loads any commands it has available for this application.

Figure 6-1

Here are some tips for using Command mode:

• Makesureyousee“Command”inthe

MacSpeech Dictate Status window before you begin speaking the command.

• Don’tpauseinthemiddleofsayingacommand. If you say “Close <pause> Window” instead of “Close Window,” MacSpeech Dictate may not understand what you want it to do.

• Toseewhichcommandsareavailable,keep

the Available Commands window open. You can open this window by saying “Show Available Commands Window”. Hover your cursor over a command to see a brief description of what it does.

Switching To Command Mode

To switch to Command mode, do one of the following:

• Say“CommandMode”

• Select“Command”fromMacSpeechDictate’s

Speech menu

• Pressthekeyboardshortcutforswitching

modes.

You can tell MacSpeech Dictate is in Command Mode because “Command” appears in the Status window, as in Figure 6-1.

Figure 6-2

Launching Applications

MacSpeech Dictate already knows the names of applications on your hard drive and allows you to open any of them by voice. Here’s how:

Say “Open [application name].”

Make sure in your Preferences for MacSpeech Dictate that the box is checked for Generate Application Launch Commands. You will find this under Command in the Preferences (in the Dictate menu). Then when you install or update applications, MacSpeech Dictate can learn how to open them by voice as well.

NOTE: You can’t launch MacSpeech Dictate by voice, because it has to be running before it can interpret your speech. If you

32 MacSpeech DictateChapter 6 — Controlling Your Mac

want the program to launch when you start your Macintosh,

do one of the following:

- Control-click or hold down the mouse button on the

MacSpeech Dictate icon in the Dock. Select “Open

at Login” from the menu.

- Drag the MacSpeech Dictate icon into the Login

Items section of the Accounts panel in System

Preferences.

Controlling Buttons

MacSpeech Dictate can operate most buttons that appear in

dialog boxes regardless of the mode it is in. You can verbally

press a button by saying:

“Press [button name]”

Figure 6-3

By default, all commands are set as “Active” when you start MacSpeech Dictate. A particular command can be deactivated by clearing the check mark in the Active column next to the set.

For example, if a dialog box appears on the screen asking if

you want to save a document, the choices are usually “Don’t

Save,” “Cancel,” and “Save.” You can press these buttons us-

ing your voice by saying Press Don’t Save, Press Cancel,

or Press Save.

MacSpeech Dictate only knows about buttons that were

programmed in accordance with Apple’s programming

guidelines. If you try to press a button by voice and it doesn’t

respond, it is probably because the program you are using

has not told Mac OS X about its buttons.

Managing Commands and Command

Sets

MacSpeech Dictate manages a number of different files

that have commands, words, and text macros. These files

are known as command sets. Some of these sets contain

commands that work everywhere on your Mac; these are

global commands. Others are only active while in a particular

application, and are called application-specific commands.

To access these commands, choose Commands… from the

Tools menu. The Command List window opens, as shown in

Figure 6-3.

Global Commands

MacSpeech Dictate’s Global commands are available in any application, whenever the microphone is active.

Dictation Commands

MacSpeech Dictate’s Dictation commands are available when MacSpeech Dictate is in Dictation Mode. These are general commands for positioning the insertion point, controlling capitalization, and deleting the last spoken word or phrase.

Types of Commands

There are several types of commands in MacSpeech Dictate:

• AppleScript: This allows an AppleScript to be executed when you speak its name. MacSpeech Dictate has a built-in script editor for editing and testing scripts.

• TextMacro:Atextmacrotypesapredenedblock

of text when you speak its name. The text can be a whole form letter or just an address; in fact it can be any amount of text.

• Keyboard Shortcut: This is a type of command using AppleScript, that executes keystroke combinations, and deserves special mention. You will recognize these by their names and functions equivalent to keyboard commands such as Copy (Cmd-C), Select All (Cmd-A), Undo (Cmd-Z), etc. But you can also create or modify your own commands that perform other keystroke combinations.

• Application: These are commands that open a specicapplication.Youwouldonlyneedtouse

33 MacSpeech DictateChapter 6 — Controlling Your Mac

this if there is an application on your hard drive stored outside the Applications folder that you would like to open by voice.

• Bookmark: A Bookmark command opens a web page when it is spoken.

• File or Folder: A File or Folder command will open a File or Folder when it is spoken.

• Menu Item: Chooses an item from the designated application’s various menus.

• Shell Script: You use this to run Shell Scripts by voice. Shell Scripts are scripts created to run in Mac OS X’s Terminal application.

• AutomatorWorkow:Thiscommandwillrunthe referencedAutomatorWorkowwhenitsnameis

spoken.

Creating and Modifying Commands

Most commands are written in AppleScript, Apple’s system-wide scripting language. An AppleScript tutorial is beyond the scope of this manual. You can learn more about how to write AppleScript from Apple’s web site, at

http://www.apple.com/applescript/

All the commands built-in to MacSpeech Dictate are open source, which means their source code is available for you to view, or copy and modify. Commands can be Automatically or Manually Created. When you create or modify a command, MacSpeech Dictate automatically saves it for you, and it appears in the Command list for the Command set in which it was created.

Creating Commands Automatically

To create an Automatic command, follow these steps:

Figure 6-4

5. Drag an existing AppleScriptle,bookmark, textortextclipping,leorfolder,orAutomator Workowintotheeditingareaforthenew

command.

When creating a bookmark command, you can

dragtheaddressfromtheaddresseldinmost

browsers directly into the Automatic area of MacSpeech Dictate’s command window.

6. A suggested name will be entered in the Command Name Field. Leave it as is or enter a new name.

TIP:

If you are creating your own commands, you will need to give them unique names that are speakable. Command names should be two or more words and composed of words only -- i.e. do not use abbreviations, numerals or punctuation.

Turn off MacSpeech Dictate’s microphone.

1. Switch to MacSpeech Dictate by clicking the MacSpeech Dictate icon in the Status window, or using the Dock.

2. Choose “Commands…” from the Tools menu. The Commands window opens (Figure 6-3). Individual command sets are listed in the left sidebar. For this example, we will create a new global command in the Global command set.

3. In the Commands window, select the command set into which you want the command to be stored from the “Context” menu.

4. Click the Plus Sign, or select “New Command” from the File menu. A new command is created and is ready to be edited, as shown in Figure 6-4.

34 MacSpeech DictateChapter 6 — Controlling Your Mac

Creating Commands Manually

You can also create a command manually. Use this method when you don’t have pre-existing content that will work with MacSpeech Dictate’s ability to automatically create a command.

To create a command manually, follow these steps:

1. Switch to MacSpeech Dictate by clicking the MacSpeech Dictate icon in the Status window, or using the Dock. Turn off the microphone.

3. In the Commands window, select the command set into which you want the command to be stored from the “Context” menu.

4. Click the Plus Sign, or select “New Command” from the File menu. A new command is created and is ready to be edited, as shown in Figure 6-4.

5. Select the type of command you want to add from the “Type” pop-down menu, as shown in Figure 6-5.

6. Edit the command so it does what you want when its name is spoken.

AppleScript

Anything that can be written as an AppleScript can be made into a voice command. MacSpeech Dictate includes a full AppleScript Script Editor. Enter the code for the AppleScript into the Source field. Press the Compile button to verify the script will compile, and the Stop or Run buttons to stop or run the script.

To see the result of running a script, click the Result button.

Keyboard Shortcut

Any keystroke combination can be recorded as a Keyboard Shortcut command. After you create and name a new com-

mand, select the Type as “AppleScript”. Click on the gray button titled “Click to record shortcut” at the bottom of the window. Then type in the keystroke combination.

Application

Application commands are for opening applications that can

be seen by your computer. By default, MacSpeech Dictate already knows how to open all the applications in your Application folder. You would only need to create this type of command if you wanted to open an application that is outside your Applications folder, such as on an external hard drive or network server.

Bookmark

The quickest way to create a Bookmark command is to simply drag a URL to the Automatic area of the Command window, as discussed earlier in this chapter. If you want to manually create a Bookmark command simply type the web address, including the “http://” into the URL field, t h e n g i ve the command a name and description.

Figure 6-5

Types of Commands - More Details

The Command window will look slightly different depending on what type of command you are creating. This section will provide additional information to assist you in creating different types of commands. Refer to Figure 6-5 for an illustration of how to select the different types of commands in the Command window.

35 MacSpeech DictateChapter 6 — Controlling Your Mac

File or Folder

A File or Folder command allows you to use your voice to open any file or folder you could normally open in the Finder. As with Bookmarks, the quickest way to create a command of this type is to simply drag a file or folder’s icon into the Automatic area of a new Command window and name the command.

If you want to manually create a File or Folder comm a nd, t ype the path to the item, or click the Browse button and navigate to it, then give the command a name and description.

Menu Item

A Menu Item command allows you to use your voice to choose an item from the menu of an application, as though you were selecting that menu item with the mouse or keyboard shortcut. After you create and name a new command, select the Type as “Menu Item”. To manually create a Menu

Item command, type the path to the item in the “Menu Path” field (such as “Finder->View->Keep Arranged By->Name”).

Shell Script

A Shell Script is a text file that contains a sequence of commands for your computer to execute. In Mac OS X, shell scripts are most commonly created with Apple’s Terminal program, which you will find inside the Utilities folder on your hard drive. If you save a Shell Script from within Terminal, you can drag it into the Automatic area of a new Command and name it to easily create the command.

To manually create a Shell Script command, select Shell Script from the Type pop-down menu and write the shell script directly into the Source field of the Command window, then choose a name for your command.

Text Macro

Text Macros put whatever is in the Tex t area of t h e Command window at the insertion point whenever the command’s name is spoken. They can have an unlimited amount of text in them.

6. Enter text in the “Text” area that is to be typed when the name of the command is spoken (you

canalsopasteordictateintothiseld).

7. Enter a name for the new command in the

“Command”eld.

8.Optionally,entertextintothe“Description”eld

(this is for informational purposes only and will not be typed out).

Your command will automatically be saved.

That’s all there is to it. Whenever you say the name you gave that command, it will insert the text you put in the Tex t area for that command at the insertion point of the active application.

Automator Workflows

Mac OS X comes with some examples of Automator Workflows. Let’s try making one speakable. We’re going to make the Copy Unread Mail to iPod Notes workflow speakable.

1. Launch MacSpeech Dictate if it is not already running and turn on its microphone.

2. Say “Open Automator”

Text Macros work almost like any other command — you speak the command name to invoke the macro. Instead of executing an action, however, a Text Macro enters pre-defined text at the insertion point in the active document. Like with dictation, MacSpeech Dictate doesn’t care where the insertion point is. It can be in a word processing document, a cell in a spreadsheet, using the text tool of a graphics program, or even the name of a file in the Finder.

Text Macros are great for form letters, email signatures, starting a letter – just about anything you need to type frequently.

Creating Your Own Text Macros

Creating text macros is similar to creating other commands. Here’s how:

1. Switch to the MacSpeech Dictate application by clicking the MacSpeech Dictate icon in the Status window Dock. Turn off MacSpeech Dictate’s microphone.

2. Select “Commands…” from MacSpeech Dictate’s Tools menu.

3. Click the Plus Sign or select “New Command…” from the File menu to create a new command.

4. Select “Global” from the “Context” menu to store the command in the Global command set. You can also store Text Macros in application-specic command sets. Doing so will mean the command will only be available when that application is active.

5. Select “Text Macro” from the Type pop-down menu.

3. With your mouse, select “Open Examples Folder” from Automator’s Help menu. This will open a Finder window with the Automator Examples in it.

4. Say “Microphone Off.”

5. Switch to MacSpeech Dictate by clicking it’s icon in either the Status window or the Dock.

6. Select ”Commands…” from the Tools menu.

7. Click the Plus Sign to open a new Command window, or select “New Command…” from the File menu.

8. Make sure “Globals” is selected from the Context pop-down menu in the Command window (unless you want the macro to only execute when a particular application is active. If so, then put it in that Application’s command set).

9a. At this point, you simply drag the Automator

Workowiconnamed“CopyUnreadMailtoiPod

Notes” to the automatic area in the Command window, name the command, and (optionally) provide a description and you are done.

If you want to manually create the command, do the following instead of step 9a:

9b.Select“AutomatorWorkow”fromtheTypemenu

in the Command window.

10. Click the Browse button and navigate to the ex-

ampleworkow.Itislocatedatthefollowingpath:

<HARD DRIVE>/Library/Application Support/

Apple/Automator/Workows

36 MacSpeech DictateChapter 6 — Controlling Your Mac

Duplicating Commands

To duplicate a command, do the following:

1. In the side bar, click the command set to which the command you want duplicated belongs.

2. Highlight the command you want to duplicate in the command list.

3. Press the button that looks like two documents on top of each other.

4. The command you highlighted in step 4 is duplicated with the name “<command name> copy.”

Modifying Commands

To modify a command, do the following:

1. In the side bar, click the command set to which the

commandyouwantmodiedbelongs.

2. Highlight the command you want to modify in the command list.

3. Makeanymodicationsyouwouldlike.

MacSpeech Dictate will automatically save the

modiedcommandforyou.

Window”. This will display a list of commands that can be spoken at that time. If the command you are trying to execute is in the list, double-click its name. If you don’t see the command in the Available Commands window, then it is not available to be spoken.

Deleting Commands

To delete a command, do the following:

1. In the side bar, click the command set to which the command you want deleted belongs.

2. Highlight the command you want to delete in the command list.

3. Press the minus button.

Troubleshooting Commands

There are several things to check if a command does not execute after it is spoken. First, make sure you are pausing briefly both before and after you say the command. This will help MacSpeech Dictate recognize what you said as a command.

If you have problems getting a command to be recognized while in Dictation mode, try switching to Command mode. This will limit the vocabulary MacSpeech Dictate understands to only those words that are in the command names, making them easier to recognize.

To insure you are in command mode, make sure the microphone is turned on and say Command mode or select Command from the Speech menu. When in Command mode, the word Command will appear in the Status window.

If a command still fails to execute, make sure you are saying the right thing. To do this, make sure MacSpeech Dictate’s microphone is turned on and say “Show Available Commands

37 MacSpeech DictateChapter 6 — Controlling Your Mac

Chapter 7: Reference

This chapter provides a quick reference to menus and windows.

Getting Technical Support

Via the World Wide Web

MacSpeech’s web site provides access to technical support resources 24 hours a day. Go to

http:/www.macspeech.com/support_center

for answers to many questions. This is where you should go first for help.

Via E-mail

You can also contact MacSpeech Support via email to dictatesupport@macspeech.com, or by selecting Send Email To Tech Support from the Help menu when MacSpeech Dictate is the active application.

Dictate Menu

Startup Mode

This controls the state MacSpeech Dictate is in when it is launched. You can have it start up with the Microphone off (Idle - Mic Off), in Dictation mode, in Command mode, or Sleep.

Figure 7-1

About MacSpeech Dictate

Displays the About window. Click anywhere to dismiss it.

Preferences... (Cmd-comma)

Opens the Preferenc es window, which has four panes. Switch between panes by clicking the icons in the toolbar at the top of the window. Closing the Preferences window saves any changes.

The Preferences panes are General, Recognition, Command, and Shortcuts. Here is detail on each:

1. General

General Preferences (Figure 7-2a) is where you fine-tune MacSpeech Dictate’s performance and behavior. It has four sections, Startup Mode, Startup Actions, Feedback, and Recognition.

Figure 7-2a

Startup Actions

These options control what happens when MacSpeech Dictate is launched. Check Show Startup Wind ow to see the star tup window when MacSpeech Dictate launches. This is useful if you have are multiple profiles. Check Open a New Note Pad

Window if you prefer dictating into MacSpeech Dictate’s Note Pad. If you prefer dictating into other applications leave this

unchecked.

Feedback

These options control whether or not to show the Status window at startup, and if you want to see the recognized text printed on the screen. When the Show “Recognized Text” Feedback option is on, whatever you say will appear in white shadowed text below the Status window whenever the Status window is visible.

Chapter 7 — Reference

38 MacSpeech Dictate

Recognition

Moving the slider towards Faster makes text appear more quickly, but may sacrifice accuracy. Moving the slider towards More Accurate makes the program try harder to understand you, which could slow it down. By default, the slider is set to balance the two factors. Feel free to experiment to see what setting works best for you.

2. Recognition Preferences

Recognition Preferences (Figure 7-2b) allows you to adjust how the Recognition Window is shown and/or hidden.

Figure 7-2b

Enable Command Grouping will group commands, rather than show them as one big alphabetical list. This option has two sub-options: Show Global Commands at Top and Show

all Global Commands in One Group.

Global Commands at Top

When checked, this option forces all the Global commands to appear at the top of the Available Commands window.

Show all Global Commands in One Group

This option puts all the Global commands in one group, leaving application-specific commands in their separate groups.

Command Generation at Startup

Turn on Generate Application Launch Commands to allow each application in the Applications folder on your hard drive to be opened by voice. With this option on you can say Open followed by the name of an application to open it by voice. For example, “Open iChat”, or “Open Safari”.

Show Recognition Window When Dictating will show the Recognition Window after each word or phrase that you dictate. Close Recognition Window After Each Choice will hide the Recognition Window after an item is selected for the list.

3. Command Preferences

Command Preferences allow you to adjust the ways commands are handled. This window has two sections, Available Commands Window and Command Generation at Startup (Figure 7-3).

Available Commands Window

Checking Hide at Startup will hide this window when MacSpeech Dictate starts up.

The Generate Email Commands option generates commands that can address an email to a person in your Address Book.

4. Shortcuts Preferences

This pane (Figure 7-4) allows you to choose what keyboard shortcuts you want to use to toggle the microphone on or off, cycle through the speech modes, and show the Recognition window.

The defaults are Command-F11 to toggle the microphone, Command-F10 to select the speech mode, and Command-F9 to show the Recognition window. You can use any key combination you prefer, provided the combination includes at least one modifier key (Command, Control, or Option). The

Toggle Microphone shortcut turns the mic on and off. The Select Speech Mode shortcut will switch between Dictation

and Command modes. The Show Recognition Window will show and hide the Recognition Window.

Figure 7-3

Chapter 7 — Reference

39 MacSpeech Dictate

Figure 7-4

Dictate Menu (continued)

Visit MacSpeech’s Web Site

Launches your browser and takes you to MacSpeech’s Web site (Internet connection required).

Check for Updates…

Checks for to see if there are any software version updates available for MacSpeech Dictate (Internet connection required).

Services

Provides access to Mac OS X’s Services.

Hide MacSpeech Dictate (Cmd-H)

Hides MacSpeech Dictate

Hide Others (Cmd-Opt-H)

Hides all applications other than MacSpeech Dictate.

Show All

Shows all hidden applications.

Figure 7-6

The Note Pad may provide more control over the text you are dictating compared to many third-party applications. Many commonly-used word processing commands are available for formatting the text in this window. These commands are in the Edit and Format menus, which are described later in this chapter.

Quit MacSpeech Dictate (Cmd-Q)

Quits the MacSpeech Dictate application.

File Menu

Figure 7-5

New Note Pad (Cmd-N)

Choose this to open a new Note Pad window (figure 7- 6). You can dictate directly into a Note Pad window and transfer the text to another document. Multiple Note Pad windows can be open at once.

New Command (Cmd-Shift-N)

This opens a new Command window (Figure 7-7).

Figure 7-7

Open (Cmd-O)

Opens a previously saved Note Pad document.

Close (Cmd-W)

This closes the active window.

Save (Cmd-S)

This allows you to save the current Note Pad window.

Save As… (Cmd-Shift-S)

Saves the current Note Pad document under a different name.

Chapter 7 — Reference

40 MacSpeech Dictate

Command Import

Allows importing sets of commands.

Spelling

Choosing this puts MacSpeech Dictate into Spelling mode.

Command Export

Exports designated sets of commands.

ScriptPak Import…

Imports commands that have been exported from iListen. For more assistance with this, please consult the iListen User Guide.

Edit Menu

Figure 7-8

All these commands are designed to work exactly as they do in other Macintosh applications.

Sleep

Choosing this puts MacSpeech Dictate to Sleep. When in Sleep mode, the microphone will remain on but the program will ignore everything you say until you say Wake Up.

Tools Menu

Figure 7-10

Profiles…

Opens the Profiles window (Figure 7-11), from which you can change to a different profile, as well as add or delete profiles.

Speech Menu

Figure 7-9

The Speech Menu is used to turn the microphone on or off, and to select MacSpeech Dictate’s mode.

Microphone On/Off

Using this menu item toggles the microphone on and off. The menu item changes to Microphone Off when the microphone is on.

Dictation

Choosing this puts MacSpeech Dictate into Dictation mode.

Command

Choosing this puts MacSpeech Dictate into Command mode.

Figure 7-11

Highlight the profile you want to use, then click the Make Active button. If there is only one profile listed, clicking the Make Active button also closes the window.

Commands

The Commands window (Figure 7-12), allows you to manage Global and Application Specific commands.

Chapter 7 — Reference

41 MacSpeech Dictate

Figure 7-12

Microphone Setup…

Use this if accuracy seems to be decreasing. Microphone Setup will help if you change the microphone’s position, if the

noise level in the environment has changed, or adjust your profile if the characteristics of your voice change.

Figure 7-14

Vocabulary Training…

Vocabulary Training allows you to have MacSpeech Dictate analyze documents you have written and discover words you commonly use which are not in MacSpeech Dictate’s extensive vocabulary.

Train Vocabulary from Selection…

This allows you to select text in MacSpeech Dictate’s Note Pad and have MacSpeech Dictate learn new vocabulary from it.

Vocabulary Training and Train Vocabulary from Selection both display a window similar to the one shown in Figure 7-15.

Figure 7-13

Voice Training…

Select Voice Training (Figure 7-14) when you want to read more training stories in order to further improve your accuracy. Stories you have already read are indicated with a MacSpeech Dictate icon next to their name. Select a story from the list in the Voice Training Selection window and then follow the on-screen instructions.

As you read, recognized text will turn green. If something is not recognized, the text will turn red. When that happens,

Figure 7-15

pause briefly, and re-read from the text that is not green.

Chapter 7 — Reference

42 MacSpeech Dictate

Format Menu

Items in the Format Menu change the look of text in a Note Pad document. There are two menu items: Fonts and Text.

Fonts

The items in the Font menu (Figure 7-16) control how text is formatted.

Figure 7-16

Show Fonts (Cmd-T)

This menu item displays the Font palette, as shown in Figure 7-17.

Figure 7-18

Copy Style (Cmd-Opt-C)

This copies the style of the selection.

Paste Style (Cmd-Opt-V)

This applies the style information from the clipboard to the selection.

Text

Figure 7-17

Bold, Italic, Underline (Cmd-B, Cmd-I, Cmd-U)

These menu items format your selection in Bold, Italics, or Underlined, respectively.

Bigger, Smaller (Cmd-Plus Sign, Cmd-Minus Sign)

The menu items increase and decrease the size of the selected text.

Show Colors (Cmd-Shift-C )

This menu item displays the Color Palette (Figure 7-18), which you can use to change the color of the selected text.

Figure 7-19

The menu items in the Text sub-menu allow you to align the selected text left, right, centered, or justified.

Window Menu

Figure 7-20

Minimize (Cmd-M)

Minimizes the active window to the Dock.

Chapter 7 — Reference

43 MacSpeech Dictate

Zoom

Zooms the active window to its full size.

Bring All To Front

Brings all MacSpeech Dictate windows to the front.

Show or Hide Status Window

Shows or hides the Status window.

Show or Hide Available Commands

Shows or hides the Available Commands window.

At the bottom of this menu is a list of all currently open MacSpeech Dictate windows. The active window is indicated by a check mark to the left of its name.

Help Menu

Status Window

The Status window displays information about the microphone, sound input, certain commands, recognition options, and the current profile.

Microphone Off

When the microphone is off, the microphone button will show a red octagon in front of the microphone. This is the default state when MacSpeech Dictate is first launched. (You can change the startup state in Preferences). When off, the signal meter to the right of the microphone button will be empty (black) as in Figure 7-22. Clicking the microphone button will turn the microphone on.

Figure 7-22

Figure 7-21

Enter a word or phrase in this field to search for a particular topic on which you need help.

Welcome

Displays the MacSpeech Dictate Welcome document in a window.

Tips & Tricks

Displays Tips & Tricks for using the currently installed ver- sion of MacSpeech Dictate.

Release Notes

Displays the Release Notes for the currently installed version of MacSpeech Dictate.

Quickstart Guide

Displays the Quickstart Guide for the currently installed version of MacSpeech Dictate.

User Manual

Opens the User Guide for the currently installed version of MacSpeech Dictate.

Microphone On

When the microphone is on, the microphone button will show a green circle behind the microphone. When on, the signal meter to the right of the microphone will be partially filled when you are speaking (Figure 7-23). The command Microphone Off or clicking the button will turn the microphone off. The command Go To Sleep will put the program into Sleep mode.

Figure 7-23

Microphone Asleep (Sleep mode)

In Sleep mode the microphone is on, but any incoming sound is ignored. The microphone button will show a purple oval (Figure 7-24). There may still be activity in the signal meter, but no action will be taken. The commands Wake Up or Turn Microphone On, or clicking the button will turn the microphone on.

Send Email to Tech Support

Prepares a message in your email client to send to MacSpeech Technical Support.

Chapter 7 — Reference

44 MacSpeech Dictate

Figure 7-24

Speech Mode Indicator

The upper right corner of the Status window indicates the current mode for MacSpeech Dictate. This will be either

Command, Dictation, Spelling, or Asleep. Command, Dictation and Spelling modes will be indicated no matter

whether the microphone is on or off. If the program is in Sleep mode, it will indicate Asleep instead of one of the active modes. MacSpeech Dictate returns to the last mode used when awakened from Sleep mode.

Different command sets can be shown or hidden by clicking the triangle next to their name.

The Available Commands window can be re-sized by dragging the grow handle in the lower right corner of the window.

Any command in the list can be activated by double-clicking its name, as well as by speaking it. Option-double-clicking a command name will open it in MacSpeech Dictate’s Command Window for editing.

Current Profile

The lower right corner of the Status window indicates the Profile that is currently loaded into MacSpeech Dictate.

Recognized Text Indicator

As you speak, the words MacSpeech Dictate thinks you said appear below the Status window in white, shadowed text. Whether this text appears or not is determined by how the

Show “Recognized Text” Feedback preference is set in General Preferences. The default is for the text to appear.

Available Commands window

Recognition window

Figure 7-26

The Recognition window, shown in Figure 7-26 for Mac OS X 10.5.x (Leopard), lists the options for recognition of each word or phrase you dictate. You can choose one of the options listed in order to both correct the text, and train Dictate to improve accuracy. The list can be edited if none of the listed items are correctly recognized speech.

Figure 7-25

The Available Commands window, shown in Figure 7-25

For updates to this document, please check:

http://www.macspeech.com/support_center/

for Mac OS X 10.5.x (Leopard), lists the commands available to use at any given time. The list can be scrolled if necessary, and will change according to what application is active.

Chapter 7 — Reference

45 MacSpeech Dictate

Notes:

Chapter 7 — Reference

46 MacSpeech Dictate

Index

About MacSpeech Dictate 38 About MacSpeech Dictate menu 38 accuracy 6, 10, 14, 16, 17, 19, 23, 30, 39, 42

percentage, how to gauge 19

Recognition slider 38 adapter, microphone 10, 11, 13 adapting voice samples 15, 16, 21, 22, 34 AllCaps 26 All Caps commands 25 All Caps Oﬀ 25 All Caps On 25 AllCaps On 26 Ampersand command 27 Apostrophe command 27 Apostrophe ess command 27 AppleScript 8, 33, 34 AppleScript commands 35

Source ﬁeld 35 applications

commands to open 34, 35

Hide Others command 40

launching 32

Show All command 40 application speciﬁc commands 33, 36, 39, 41 asleep 7 Asterisk command 27 At Sign command 27 audio input

line in 6

USB 6 audio levels 11 audio level settings 11 Automator Workﬂow commands 36 Available Commands 32, 37, 39, 44, 45

window 32, 45

window preference 39 Available Commands window 32, 45

backing up proﬁles 18

with Apple Backup 18

with Retrospect 18

with Time Machine 18 Back Quote command 27 Back Slash command 27 Backtick 27 Bigger menu 43 Bold menu 43 Bookmark 35 breaks from dictation 31 breath 10, 17, 31

Bring All To Front menu 44 buttons

advances 11 and Apple’s programming guidelines 33 AppleScript Editor

Compile 35 Run 35

Stop 35 Cancel 33 Close 17 controlling 33 Don’t Save 33 Exclude 16 Finish Training 18 Include 16 Make Active 18, 41 Play 12 pressing by voice 32, 33 proﬁles

minus sign 18

plus sign 18 Register Now 9 Save 33 Skip Word 15 Voice Training 12

Cache Document 31 caﬀeine 30 Canadian postal codes 28 Cancel Edit 24 Cap command 25, 26 capitalization 25 Capitalization 25 Capitalize the Word[s] 25 Cap <letter> 25 Caps Oﬀ command 25, 26 Caps On 25 Caps On command 25, 26 Cap <word> 25 Caret command 27 Cents Sign command 27 changing

commands 34 modes 8, 32, 39 proﬁles. See switching proﬁles

Chat commands 27 Check for Updates

menu 40

checking

sound quality 12 your microphone 13

Choose 23

in Correction window 23

choose story window 17, 42 clear speaking voice 17 Close Angle Bracket command 27 Close Brace command 27

INDEX

47 MacSpeech Dictate

Close Bracket command 27 Close Euro Quote command 27 Close menu 40 Close Parenthesis command 27 Close Quote command 27 Close Single Quote command 27 Close Square Bracket command 27 Colon command 27 Comma command 27 command

editor window 40, 42 exporting 41 generation at startup preference 39 list window 33 menu 41 mode 7, 32, 37, 39, 45

startup preference 38

switching to 32 preferences 39 preferences window 39 sets 33, 33–37

creating 34–37

duplicating 37

modifying 37 types. See commands, types window 34–37

commands

application 35 application speciﬁc 8, 33, 36, 39, 41 Automator 34, 36 Available Commands window 32, 37, 39, 44, 45 bookmark 34, 35 capitalization 25 creating 34

automatically 34

manually 35 deleting 37 dictation 33 Do Delete 22, 23 Do Select 22, 23 duplicating 37 ﬁle or folder 35 Forget at 21 global 8, 33, 33–37, 39, 41 Go to Beginning 22, 23 Go to End 22, 23 Go to Sleep 8 Go To Sleep 24 importing 41 Insert After 22, 23 Insert Before 22 keyboard shortcut 33, 35 managing 33 menu 41 menu item 34, 35 microphone 24 Move to Beginning of Document 22 Move to End of Document 22, 23

Numeral 28 punctuation 25–31 Scratch at 21 Scratch Word 21 shell script 34, 36 sleep mode 8, 21 text macros 36 types

Application 33 Automator Workﬂow 34 Bookmark 34 File or Folder 34 Shell Script 34 Text Macro 33

Wake Up 8, 25 Command Status Indicators 6 compound words 26 conﬁguring microphones. See microphones Connecting a Microphone 10 continuous speech recognition 14, 25 Copy 24, 31 Copyright Sign command 27 Copy Selection 31 Copy Style menu 43 creating

commands 34

automatically 34

manually 35 proﬁles 10–13 text macros 36

current proﬁle 7, 30 Cut 24, 31 Cut Selection 31

Dantz Development 18 Dash command 27 Data DVD 9 Dates and Times 29 Degree Sign command 27 Delete the Word[s] 22 deleting commands 37 Dictate menu 38, 40 dictation

commands 33 dates and times 29 doesn’t appear in document 30 extra words 30 menu 41 mode 7, 39, 45

startup preference 38

using commands in 7 sessions 21 special kinds of words 25 Telephone Numbers 29

Dictation Commands 22 Disable at Startup preference 39

INDEX

48 MacSpeech Dictate

Dollar Sign command 27 Dot command 27 drinking water 30 duplicating commands 37

Edit 23, 24 editing text 20 Editing Your Document 21 Edit menu 41 Ellipsis command 27 Em Dash command 27 Enable access for assistive devices 10 Enable Command Grouping preferences 39 En Dash command 27 enunciate 17 Equals Sign command 27 Euro Sign command 27 Exclamation Mark command 27 Exclamation Point command 27 Export

exporting commands 41

Feedback Palette 6 Feedback preference 38 File menu 40 Find the (vocal) middle ground 30 Forget at 21, 24 Forget at command 21 Forget Word 21, 24 Format menu 43 Forward Slash command 27 Fractions 28 Frowny Face command 27 Full Stop command 27

general preferences 7, 45

window 38 Generate Application Launch Commands preference 39 Generate Email Commands preference 39 getting technical support 38

Via E-mail 38

Via the World Wide Web 38 global commands 33, 41 Go to Beginning command 22, 23 Go to End 23 Go to End command 22, 23 Go to Sleep 8, 21 Go to Sleep command 8, 24 Greater an Sign command 27

handling mistakes 21 Hash Sign command 27

Help menu 44

Search ﬁeld 44 Hide Available Commands menu 44 Hide Correction Window 23 Hide MacSpeech Dictate menu 40 Hide Status Window menu 44 hot keys 8 hyphenation

hyphenated words 26

Hyphen command 27

iChat 27 Idle - Mic Oﬀ preference 38 iListen

importing from 41 Import

importing commands 41

importing ScriptPaks 41 Import menu 41 Insert After the Word[s] 22 Insert After e Word[s] 22 Insert Before the Word[s] 22 Insert Before e Word[s] 22 installation 9 Instant Messaging 27 Italic menu 43

Keyboard Shortcut 33, 35

launching applications 32 Left Angle Bracket command 27 Less an Sign command 27 License Agreement 2 Lowercase the Word[s] 22

MacSpeech Dictate Icon 6 Menu Item 34 menus

Dictate 38, 40

About MacSpeech Dictate 38 Check for Updates 40 Hide MacSpeech Dictate 40 Hide Others 40 Preferences 38 Quit MacSpeech Dictate 40 Services 40 Show All 40

Visit MacSpeech’s Web Site 40 Edit 41 File 40

Close 40

Import 41

INDEX

49 MacSpeech Dictate

New Command 40 New Note Pad 40 Open 40 Save 40 Save As 40

Format 43

Font

Bigger 43 Bold 43 Copy Style 43 Paste Style 43 Show Colors 43 Show Fonts 43 Smaller 43 Underline 43

Text

Align Left 43 Align Right 43 Center 43 Justify 43

Speech 41

Command 41 Dictation 41 Microphone On/Oﬀ 41 Sleep 41

Tools

Commands 33, 41 Microphone Setup 41 Proﬁles 18, 41 Train Vocabulary from Selection 41 vocabulary training 19 Vocabulary Training 41 Voice Training 14, 41

Window

Bring All to Front 43 Mimimize 43 Show/Hide Available Commands 43 Show/Hide Status Window 43

Zoom 43 Microphone On/Oﬀ menu 41 microphones 11, 17

array 11 checking 13 conﬁguring 11–13 MacSpeech-certiﬁed 6 positioning 17

USB adapter 10 Microphone button 6 Microphone Setup 42

menu 42

window 42 Minimize menu 43 Minus Sign command 27 modes

Command 32, 39

Dictation 39

Sleep 8

Spelling 29

modifying

commands 37 Move Backward [1-99] Words 22 Move Forward [1-99] Words 22 Move to Beginning of Document command 22 Move to End of Document 23 Move to End of Document command 22, 23 Moving Around Documents By Voice 21 MSN Messenger 27

New Command menu 40 New Line 22 New Line command 27 New Note Pad menu 40 New Paragraph 22 New Paragraph command 27 No Caps 25 NoCaps 26 No Caps commands 25 No Caps Oﬀ 25 No Caps On 25 NoCaps On 26 No Space 22 Note Pad 20, 31, 40, 43 Note Pad window 40 numbers

Canadian Postal Codes 28

Roman Numerals 28

Telephone Numbers 29

UK Postal Codes 28

US ZIP Codes 28 Number Sign command 27 Numeral command 28

Open Angle Bracket command 27 Open Brace command 27 Open Bracket command 27 Open Euro Quote command 27 Open menu 40 Open Parenthesis command 27 Open Quote command 27 Open Single Quote command 27 Open Square Bracket command 27

Paste 24, 31 Paste From Clipboard 31 Paste Style menu 43 Percent Sign command 27 Period command 27 Phrase Training 7, 14, 20, 23, 24 Pick

in correction window 23 Play button 23 Plus Sign command 27

INDEX

50 MacSpeech Dictate

Point command 27 Postal Codes

Canadian 28 UK 28

US ZIP 28 posture 30 Pound Sign command 27 Pound Sterling Sign command 27 PowerSecretary 5 preferences

Available Commands Window 39

Disable at Startup 39

Command

Available Commands Window 39 Command Generation at Startup 39 Enable Command Grouping 39

Show all Global Commands in One Group 39 Show Global Commands at Top 39

Command Generation at Startup 39

Generate Application Launch Commands 39

Generate Email Commands 39 Command Preferences 39 Feedback 38

Recognition Slider

Faster 39

More Accurate 39 Show “Recognized Text” Feedback 38 Show Status Window at Startup 38

General 38

Feedback 38 Recognition 38 Startup Actions 38 Startup Mode 38

Command 38

Dictation 38

Idle - Mic Oﬀ 38

Sleep 38

hot keys 8 Recognition Slider 38 Shortcuts 39

Select Speech Mode 39 Toggle Microphone 39

Show Correction Window 39 Startup Actions 38

Open a New Note Pad Window 38 Show Startup Window 38

Preferences menu 38 Press Don’t Save button 33 Press Play 23 Press Save button 33 proﬁles 45

adding 18 backing up 18 menu 41 standard acoutics 11 switching 18 window 41 working with 18

Punctuation 26 Purge Cache 31

Question Mark command 27 Quit MacSpeech Dictate menu 40

RAM 5 Recognition 24 Recognition preferences 38, 39 Recognition window 7, 20, 23, 24, 39, 45 Recognition Window Button 7 Recognized Text 7, 23 Recognized Text Indicator 7, 45 Recording Quality panel 12 Redo 24, 31 Redo Last Action 31 Registered Sign command 27 registration code 9 registration window 9 relaxing 31 Release Notes document 44 removing MacSpeech Dictate 9 Restoring a Proﬁle 18 Right Angle Bracket command 27 Roman Numerals 28

Save As menu 40 Save menu 40 Scratch at 21, 24 Scratch at command 21 Scratch Word 21, 24 Scratch Word command 21 ScriptPak Import 41 Section Sign command 27 Select All 22, 31 Select the Word[s] 22 Semi Colon command 27 Send Email to Tech Support 44 Send Message 27 Services menu 40 Sharp Sign command 27 Shell Script command 36 Shortcuts preference 39 Show all Global Commands in One Group preference 39 Show All menu 40 Show Available Commands

menu 44

window 37 Show Colors menu 43 Show Correction Window 23, 39 Show Fonts menu 43 Show Global Commands at Top preference 39 Show “Recognized Text” Feedback preference 7, 38, 45 Show Status Window at Startup preference 38

INDEX

51 MacSpeech Dictate

Show Status Window menu 44 signal meter 6 Skip Word 15 Slash command 27 Sleep menu 41 Sleep mode 8, 44, 45

startup preference 38 Smaller menu 43 Smiley Face command 27 Sound Input Level 6 Space Bar command 27 speaker dependent 14 Speech menu 8, 41 Speech Mode Indicator 7, 45 Spelling 7 Spelling mode 29, 30

Tips for 30 Startup Actions preference 38 Startup Mode preference 38 Status window 6, 25, 44

Current Proﬁle 7

“I Heard” Indicator 44

MacSpeech Dictate Icon 6

Microphone Asleep 44

Microphone Oﬀ 44

Microphone On 44

Mode Indicator 44

Proﬁle Indicator 44

signal meter 6

Sleep mode 25

Speech Mode Indicator 7 straining your voice 20 switching between user modes 8 switching proﬁles 18 system requirements 5

types of commands

AppleScript 33 Application 33 Automator Workﬂow 34 Bookmark 34 File or Folder 34 Shell Script 34 Text Macro 33

Typing 20

UK Postal Codes 28 Underline menu 43 Underscore command 27 Undo 24, 31 Undo Last Action 31 Undo menu command 21 Uppercase the Word[s] 22 USB adapter 10, 13 user interface 6

Available Commands window 7

search ﬁeld 7

Status Window 6

Current Proﬁle 7 MacSpeech Dictate Icon 6 signal meter 6 Speech Mode Indicator 7

user modes 7

Command mode 8 Correction 8 Dictation mode 7 Sleep mode 8

switching between 8 using dictation mode 20 US ZIP Codes 28 utilities folder 36

Tab Key command 27 Telephone Numbers 29 Terminal program 36 Text Editing, caution with 31 Text Macro command 36 text macros

creating 36 Text menu 43 Tilde command 27 Tips & Tricks document 44 toggle microphone 21 Tools menu 41 Trademark Sign command 27 training 14 Train the Word[s] 22, 24 Train Vocabulary from Selection 16, 42 Train Vocabulary from Selection menu 42 Transparency slider 23 Troubleshooting 30 Turn Microphone Oﬀ command 25 Turn Microphone On 8, 25

INDEX

52 MacSpeech Dictate

Vertical Bar command 27 Visit MacSpeech’s Web Site menu 40 vocabulary training 15

Include/Exclude window 42

menu 42 Vocabulary Training 16 vocal coach 31 Voice Navigator 5 voice training 14, 42

green text 14, 15

menu 42

red text 15

window 42 Voice Training 14

Wake Up 8 Wake Up command 8, 25

Welcome document 44 Window menu 43 windows

automatic commands 34 available commands 7, 32 command editor 40, 42

type pop-down menu 35 command list 33 command preferences 39 connection 11 create a new proﬁle 10 ﬁnish training 15 general preferences 38 green text 15 microphone setup 42 new proﬁle information 11 Note Pad 40 preferences

shortcuts 8 proﬁles 18, 41 recording quality 12 registration 9 shortcuts preferences 39 show universal access settings 10 startup screen 21 status 6, 20, 21, 23, 24 Universal Access System Preference 10 vocabulary training

documents 16

ﬁnished 17

processing ﬁles 17

unknown words 16 voice training 14, 42

choose story 18 volume adjustment 11

Winky Face command 27 Working with MacSpeech Dictate 20

Zoom menu 44

For updates to this document, please check: http://www.macspeech.com/support_center/

INDEX

53 MacSpeech Dictate

Nuance ScanSoft MacSpeech Dictate User Manual

Specifications and Main Features

Frequently Asked Questions

User Manual

Credits

Table of Contents

Index