January 2002 NGTVoice

Welcome to a new and exciting year! This first 2002 edition of the NGTVoice addresses the latest NaturallySpeaking version 6.0 software and some other issues as well.

CSUN Conference on Technology and Persons with Disabilities
Microsoft Word-Detect & Repair
Pentium 4 2.2 GHz processor
Dragon NaturallySpeaking Version 6.0

CSUN Conference

Next Generation Technologies, Inc. will be conducting a full day workshop on March eighteenth the CSUN conference on Technology and Persons with Disabilities. Individuals from around the world attend this conference, held annually in Los Angeles, Ca. In addition to the full day workshop we will hold an informational session on Wednesday March twentieth.

MS Word Detect & Repair

Since the release of the Office 2000 suite Microsoft Word has had a significant repair utility (as do the other Office components) included that can fix many common problems that occur with Word. This utility is called Detect and Repair and is located on the Help menu in Word. It may require you to have the Office CD available. If you're finding aberrant Word behavior (most often tied to a corrupted file) using detect and repair can restore the health of the application without you're needing advanced technical knowledge.

New Intel 2.2 GHz processor

Intel recently introduce the new Pentium 4 2.2 GHz processor. Based on Intel Netburst microarchitecture, the new P4 uses Intel's .13-micron technology. We're currently building the latest NGT VoicePro desktop machines with this new processor in an 845 chipset supporting 266 or 133 RAM.

Dragon NaturallySpeaking version 6.0

Upgrading to DNS 6.0

Dragon NaturallySpeaking will not allow users to be able to continue using Version 5 with full functionality after installing Version 6. After installing the upgrade if you then start Version 5 and open Word (or other Office applications) the Word application may crash.

Once you've installed DNS 6 we recommend that you leave version 5 installed and remove the shortcut from the desktop. If you remove version 5 and note any aberrant behaviors with Dragon NaturallySpeaking version 6.0 you should reinsert the DNS 6 upgrade CD and run the repair/modify utility. Of course, if you purchased your upgrade from us NGT, Inc. is here to help you if you should run into any difficulties with your upgrade process.

Using DNS 6 in the Special Ed. Environment

Keyboard Adaptation

I've twice mentioned that the new DNS 6 uses keyboard adaptation to modify the underlying language model. This means that a student can dictate a document and a teacher can highlight text, and keyboard in edits. DNS 6 contains a new proprietary algorithm that learns from this type of editing. This can significantly reduce the effort necessary from the student while improving their results.

Playback Utility

When using the Play That Back command function to listen to the .wav file Dragon highlights each word as it's played. This visual feedback can provide additional language support and learning opportunities for students with learning disabilities when they want to review their work.

RealSpeech

The new RealSpeech text to speech (TTS) utility is probably the most human sounding text to speech engine in the world. Coupled with the playback functions available students have auditory access to materials that can help them use DNS in new and exciting ways.

New DNS Utilities

The Tools menu now contains submenu called the Accuracy Center. With a host of utilities this will help users generate the most accurate voice files ever. Of particular note is the Acoustic Optimizer, which accesses stored data from the correction process and then uses this data at a deep level. You can also add contact names directly from your email package--a feature that I really like.

How about being able to spell words into the document window? There's a new command that allows you to do just this. Simply say Spell and when the spell window opens spell the word(s) you want. Not only will this allow one to spell words to the text window, but also this will add new words directly into the dictionary--yeah!

Finally, try the new command Start Vocabulary Editor.

We wish you a healthy and prosperous 2002!

Ed. Rosenthal, and the entire NGT team

Page Last Updated: Sunday, June 01, 2008

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