User manual NUANCE DRAGON NATURALLYSPEAKING PROFESSIONAL 4

Dragon NaturallySpeaking USER'S GUIDE ® August 1999. Version 4.0. Professional edition. This publication may not include some last-minute technical changes and/or revisions to the program. Changes are periodically made to the information described here. Future editions of this manual will incorporate these changes. For last-minute changes that are not incorporated in this edition, refer to the Readme file included in your program. Dragon Systems® may have patents or pending patent applications covering subject matter in this document. The furnishing of this document does not give you any license to these patents. The software is subject to one or more of these U.S. patents: 4,783,803; 4,803,729; 4,805,218; 4,805,219; 4,829,576; 4,829,578; 4,837,831; 4,866,778; 4,903,305; 4,914,703; 5,027,406; 5,202,952; 5,428,707; 5,526,463; 5,680,511; 5,715,367; 5,754,972; 5,765,132; 5,794,189; 5,799,279; 5,809,453; 5,818,423; 5,822,730; 5,850,627; 5,903,864; 5,909,666; 5,915,236; 5,920,836; 5,920,837. © Copyright 1999 Dragon Systems, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this manual or software may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval systems, without the express written consent of Dragon Systems, Inc. Many of the designations used by manufacturers and sellers to distinguish their products are claimed as trademarks. Where those designations appear in this book, and where Dragon Systems is aware of the trademark, the first occurrence of the designation is printed with a trademark (TM) or registered trademark (®) symbol. Dragon Systems, the Dragon Systems logo, and NaturallySpeaking are registered trademarks and MouseGrid, NaturallyMobile, NaturalWeb, NaturalWord, Select-and-Say, Vocabulary Builder, and Vocabulary Editor are trademarks of Dragon Systems, Inc. Adobe and Acrobat are registered trademarks of Adobe Systems Incorporated. Corel and WordPerfect are registered trademarks of Corel Corporation. The Dragon Systems, Inc., Text-to-Speech utility uses the Elan Text-to-Speech engine, which is licensed from Elan Informatique. Lotus and Lotus Notes are registered trademarks of Lotus Development Corporation. Microsoft, Windows, and Windows NT are registered trademarks and Outlook is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. Netscape and Netscape Navigator are registered trademarks of Netscape Communications Corporation in the United States and other countries. Voice It and the Voice It logo are registered trademarks and Voice It Link is a trademark of Voice It Worldwide, Inc. Yahoo! is a registered trademark of Yahoo! Inc. Dave Barry in Cyberspace, © Copyright 1996 by Dave Barry. Published by Crown Publishers. 2001: A Space Odyssey, © Copyright 1968 by Arthur C. Clarke. Published by New American Library. 3001: The Final Odyssey, © Copyright 1997 by Arthur C. Clarke. Published by HarperCollins Publishers. Dogbert's Top Secret Management Handbook, © Copyright 1996 by United Feature Syndicate, Inc. Published by HarperBusiness, a division of HarperCollins Publishers. Success Is a Journey: 7 Steps to Achieving Success in the Business of Life, © Copyright 1999 by Jeffrey J. Mayer. Published by McGraw Hill. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, © Copyright 1964 by Roald Dahl. Published by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. and Penguin Books. Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator, © Copyright 1972 by Roald Dahl. Published by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. and Penguin Books. To Be a Man, © Copyright 1997 by Eugene and Miranda Pool. Ghost Brother, © Copyright 1990 by C.S. Adler. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. The Captain of Battery Park, © Copyright 1978 by Eugene Pool. Published by Addison-Wesley. 03-403-40-01 Contents About This Guide CHAPTER 1 1 Introducing Dragon NaturallySpeaking 3 What should I expect from Dragon NaturallySpeaking? 4 Do I still need my mouse and keyboard? 5 Using Dragon NaturallySpeaking Successfully 7 How Dragon NaturallySpeaking works 7 Seven habits for success with Dragon NaturallySpeaking 9 Positioning your microphone correctly 9 Speaking properly to the computer 10 Speak naturally and continuously, but pronounce each word clearly 11 Avoid leaving out words and making extra sounds (like "um") 11 Speak at your normal pace--don't slow down 11 Speak in phrases, rather than one word at a time 12 Speak at your normal volume--don't whisper or speak too loudly 12 Correcting recognition mistakes 13 Correcting mistakes 13 Editing in the Correction dialog box 17 Playing back your dictation while you correct 19 Adding words to the Dragon NaturallySpeaking vocabulary 21 About the vocabulary 22 Adding words when correcting mistakes 24 Adding words in Vocabulary Editor 24 Using Find New Words 26 Running Vocabulary Builder 29 Preparing documents 30 Adding words from a list 31 Running Vocabulary Builder 32 Adding words found in documents 35 CHAPTER 2 Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide iii Contents Training Dragon NaturallySpeaking to recognize problem words 38 Training words after making corrections 38 Training words when using Find New Words or Vocabulary Builder 40 Training words from Vocabulary Editor 40 Training words from the Tools menu 41 Training a voice command 41 Running General Training again 43 Creating specialized vocabularies 44 Creating vocabularies 45 Opening vocabularies 46 Renaming vocabularies 46 Deleting vocabularies 46 Importing and exporting vocabularies 47 CHAPTER 3 More About Dictating 49 Preventing vocal strain 49 Dictating names of people, places, and events 50 Dictating abbreviations and acronyms 51 Dictating hyphenated words 52 Including hyphens as you dictate 52 Adding hyphens later 52 Removing hyphens 53 Preventing hyphens 53 Dictating compound words 53 Compounding words as you dictate 54 Compounding words later 54 Dictating words that end with 's 55 Including 's as you dictate 55 Adding 's later 55 Dictating e-mail and Web addresses 56 Dictating special characters 57 Dictating common special characters 57 Dictating uncommon special characters 57 Dictating foreign words 60 Dictating numbers 61 Numerals and Zip codes 61 Dates 63 Times of day 63 Telephone numbers 64 Currency and coin 64 Fractions 65 Roman numerals 65 Creating dictation shorthands 66 iv Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide Contents CHAPTER 4 Editing a Document by Voice 69 Moving around in a document 70 Going to the top or bottom of a page 70 Going to the beginning or end of a line 70 Placing the cursor before or after a specific word 70 Moving up or down a paragraph 71 Moving up or down a line 72 Moving right or left a word 72 Moving right or left a character 73 Selecting text 73 Select-and-Say 73 Selecting the same text again 74 Unselecting words 74 Selecting a range of words 75 Selecting your whole document 75 Selecting an entire paragraph or line 76 Selecting a word or character 76 Copying, cutting, and pasting text 77 Capitalizing text 77 Capitalizing the first letter of the next word you dictate 77 Capitalizing consecutive words 78 Dictating the next word in all capital letters 78 Dictating consecutive words in all capital letters 79 Dictating the next word in all lowercase letters 79 Dictating consecutive words in all lowercase letters 79 Capitalizing (or uncapitalizing) text already in your document Formatting text 80 Adding (or removing) bold, italics, and underlining 80 Changing the font as you dictate 80 Changing the font later 82 Aligning text 82 Deleting text 83 Deleting the last words you dictated 83 Backing up as you dictate 83 Deleting specific words 84 Deleting the next or previous paragraph 84 Deleting the next or previous word or character 84 Using text-to-speech 85 80 Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide v Contents CHAPTER 5 Controlling Your Computer by Voice 87 Starting programs 88 Starting a program from the Start menu 88 Starting a program from the Windows desktop 89 Opening documents and folders 89 Opening documents and folders from the Start menu 89 Opening documents and folders from the Windows desktop 90 Switching between open windows 90 Copying text to other programs 91 Opening and closing menus 91 Selecting buttons, tabs, and options 93 Selecting icons on the desktop 93 Resizing and closing windows 94 Scrolling in windows and list boxes 95 Controlling Internet Explorer 96 Going to favorite Web pages 97 Entering a Web address in the Address bar 98 Going back or forward to the previous Web page 98 Following links (words, buttons, and images) 99 Scrolling in a Web page 100 Selecting check boxes and other options 101 Entering text in a text box 102 Troubleshooting 103 Pressing keyboard keys 103 Pressing letters 104 Capitalizing a letter 105 Pressing numbers 105 Pressing key combinations 105 Pressing function and numeric keypad keys 106 Pressing other keys 106 Moving the mouse pointer and clicking the mouse 107 Moving the mouse pointer with MouseGrid 107 Moving the pointer with the "Mouse" command 109 Clicking the mouse 109 Marking and dragging objects 110 vi Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide Contents CHAPTER 6 Creating New Users and Managing Users 111 Creating a new user 112 Opening a user 112 Renaming a user 113 Backing up a user 113 Restoring a backup copy of a user 114 Deleting a user 115 Creating Your Own Dragon NaturallySpeaking Commands 117 About commands 118 Creating and editing commands 118 Specifying where a command will be active 119 Naming a command 119 Specifying what a command will do 120 Example: Creating a command "Type E-Mail Signature" 120 Using Dragon NaturallyMobile 125 137 CHAPTER 7 APPENDIX A APPENDIX B INDEX Dragon NaturallySpeaking Commands List 167 Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide vii About This Guide W elcome to Dragon NaturallySpeaking®, the world's most widely acclaimed speech-recognition product. Dragon NaturallySpeaking lets you talk to your computer instead of typing. It also lets you use your voice to control your computer in other ways. This guide provides detailed information that will help you get the most out of using the program. It also explains how to ensure that Dragon NaturallySpeaking will recognize your speech accurately. Before using this guide, we recommend that you read the Dragon NaturallySpeaking Quick Start booklet and view the online Quick Tour. This guide covers multiple editions of Dragon NaturallySpeaking. Where information applies to certain editions only, this is clearly noted. Conventions used in this guide This user's guide contains many examples of words and phrases you can say when using Dragon NaturallySpeaking. These examples usually appear in italics with quotation marks, for instance: "Scratch That." Some procedures also include sample text for you to dictate. Sample text appears in a different typeface, with punctuation in square brackets. For example: When talking to a computer [comma] try to say every word clearly without trailing off at the end of a sentence [period] Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide 1 About This Guide Comments? If you have comments about this user's guide or any part of the Dragon NaturallySpeaking documentation, we hope you'll let us know what you think. You can e-mail comments to: doccomments@dragonsys.com. Thank you! 2 Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide CHAPTER 1 Introducing Dragon NaturallySpeaking D ragon NaturallySpeaking lets you talk to your computer instead of typing. As you talk, your words are transcribed onto your screen and into your documents or e-mail messages. Talking to a computer while it types what you say is called dictating. You can dictate into Microsoft® Word, Corel® WordPerfect®, e-mail programs, personal information organizers, and virtually any other program in which you normally type. Dragon NaturallySpeaking is good for: s s Composing letters, memos, and e-mail messages. Just think about what you want to say, and then say it into the microphone. Writing a report, article, or story. Brainstorm out loud and capture your thoughts on screen. Then edit your work by voice or mouse and keyboard. "Typing up" notes from a meeting. When you get back to your desk, simply read your notes into the microphone. s You can also use simple voice commands to revise and format text, move around your document, and control your computer. Learn the basics in your Dragon NaturallySpeaking Quick Start booklet. Dragon NaturallySpeaking isn't just for typing, however. You can also use your voice to start programs, open menus, and click buttons. If you use Internet Explorer to browse the Web, you can use Dragon NaturallySpeaking to follow links and go to favorite sites by voice. You can learn how in Chapter 5, "Controlling Your Computer by Voice." Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide 3 CHAPTER 1 Introducing Dragon NaturallySpeaking If you share your computer with family members, friends, or colleagues, they can also use Dragon NaturallySpeaking. Simply create a new set of "user speech files" for each person who wants to talk to the computer. Find out how in Chapter 6, "Creating New Users and Managing Users." After you become comfortable talking to your computer, you may want to take the convenience of dictating a step further by using a portable recorder with Dragon NaturallySpeaking. This option is available if you have Dragon NaturallySpeaking Preferred or Professional. We recommend that you buy the Dragon NaturallyMobileTM recorder (a handheld digital recorder offered by Dragon Systems) but you can also use a recorder you already own. For more information, see Appendix A, "Using Dragon NaturallyMobile." If you have Dragon NaturallySpeaking Professional, you can expand the power of using speech by creating your own voice commands. Find out how in Chapter 7, "Creating Your Own Dragon NaturallySpeaking Commands" (Professional edition only). The Professional edition also lets you create and customize additional vocabularies for dictating in different subject areas. For more information, see "Creating specialized vocabularies" on page 44. What should I expect from Dragon NaturallySpeaking? One reason to use Dragon NaturallySpeaking is to do your writing more quickly. Another is to reduce the stress associated with keyboarding. Or maybe you just like the idea of being able to lean back in your chair, put your feet up on the desk, and still get work done. Dragon NaturallySpeaking is good for all these reasons, but making it work well requires some effort from you. Dragon NaturallySpeaking actually learns about your voice and pronunciation as you use it. When you use words the program doesn't know, it will make mistakes, and you'll have to stop and correct them. It may take a while before you feel comfortable and productive using Dragon NaturallySpeaking. You can find out more about how to make 4 Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide CHAPTER 1 Introducing Dragon NaturallySpeaking the program work well by reading Chapter 2, "Using Dragon NaturallySpeaking Successfully." Do I still need my mouse and keyboard? Although you can use Dragon NaturallySpeaking to do almost everything on your computer by voice, some things are still easier to do by mouse or keyboard. If using a mouse and keyboard is an option for you, try experimenting with using your voice and using your hands for different tasks, to see what works best. If using a mouse and keyboard is not an option, read Chapter 5, "Controlling Your Computer by Voice." Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide 5 CHAPTER 2 Using Dragon NaturallySpeaking Successfully I f you followed the exercises in your Dragon NaturallySpeaking Quick Start booklet, by now you've had a chance to try dictating with Dragon NaturallySpeaking. So, are you ready to throw away your keyboard? Probably not. Chances are there are more mistakes in your document than you'd like to see. Why does the program make mistakes, and what can be done so it makes them less often? This chapter provides some background information to help you understand how Dragon NaturallySpeaking works. It then reveals the "Seven habits for success with Dragon NaturallySpeaking," a list of tips and procedures you can follow to make the program recognize your speech accurately. How Dragon NaturallySpeaking works When you talk into the microphone, Dragon NaturallySpeaking doesn't hear words or phrases. The computer hears your speech as a continuous stream of sounds. From this stream, Dragon NaturallySpeaking picks out common sound patterns, known as phonemes. To match these sound patterns to words, Dragon NaturallySpeaking relies on two large sources of data: acoustical data and language data. Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide 7 CHAPTER 2 Using Dragon NaturallySpeaking Successfully Dragon NaturallySpeaking uses acoustical data about the sound patterns that make up different words to choose the words that most closely match what it heard. Since no two people sound exactly alike, Dragon NaturallySpeaking does a much better job of matching sounds to words when it knows something about your pronunciation. When you first trained the program, you provided acoustical data on top of what Dragon NaturallySpeaking already knows about the sounds of English. Sometimes it's not possible for Dragon NaturallySpeaking to choose the correct word based on sound alone. Consider these two phrases: "pizza delivery boy" and "Pete's a delivery boy." When spoken, they sound exactly alike. How would Dragon NaturallySpeaking know which to choose? When it's not clear from sound alone what was said, Dragon NaturallySpeaking uses language data about the frequency with which words in English appear alone and in combination with others to determine which words were most likely spoken. The phrase "pizza delivery boy" is more common than "Pete's a delivery boy," so the program would favor this phrase over the other. Since people write differently, it helps if Dragon NaturallySpeaking knows something about the frequency with which you use different words. When you run Vocabulary BuilderTM, or make corrections in the Correction dialog box, you're providing the program with language data about how often you use different words. Knowing that Dragon NaturallySpeaking uses acoustical data and language data to recognize your speech can help you know what to do to make the program work better. 8 Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide CHAPTER 2 Using Dragon NaturallySpeaking Successfully Seven habits for success with Dragon NaturallySpeaking The rest of this chapter describes seven habits you can adopt to make Dragon NaturallySpeaking work well for you. If you make the techniques and procedures in this chapter a habit, and continue to use Dragon NaturallySpeaking regularly, you should be able to make the program recognize your speech accurately 95­98 percent of the time. Seven habits for success with Dragon NaturallySpeaking s s s s s s s Position your microphone correctly Speak properly to the computer Correct recognition mistakes Add words to the Dragon NaturallySpeaking vocabulary Run Vocabulary Builder Train Dragon NaturallySpeaking to recognize problem words Run General Training again If you have Dragon NaturallySpeaking Professional, you can also create specialized vocabularies to enhance recognition accuracy. See "Creating specialized vocabularies" on page 44. Positioning your microphone correctly You've already heard a lot about the importance of your microphone position. If you followed the instructions on the screen when you first started Dragon NaturallySpeaking, your microphone is probably in about the right position. But you should continue to think about your microphone and check its position frequently to make sure it hasn't moved out of place. Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide 9 CHAPTER 2 Using Dragon NaturallySpeaking Successfully If you find that Dragon NaturallySpeaking is making too many mistakes, experiment with moving the microphone a little closer to or farther from your mouth. If extra words, such as "and" and "the," are often inserted into your document, Dragon NaturallySpeaking may be interpreting the sound of your breath as speech. Try moving the microphone slightly to the side, so it's not directly in front of your mouth. Keep in mind that it's easy for the microphone to move slightly out of the best position. You might not notice if this happens, because Dragon NaturallySpeaking may still get most of your words right. But if the microphone is even slightly out of place, the program may no longer be able to tell the difference between similar-sounding words, such as "our" and "are," and will begin making subtle mistakes. Make it a habit to check your microphone position regularly. If accuracy ever seems lower than normal, always start by checking your microphone. TIP You can double-check your microphone position at any time by running the Audio Setup Wizard. (On the Dragon NaturallySpeaking Tools menu, click Audio Setup Wizard.) Make sure your audio quality is reported to be "Acceptable." Speaking properly to the computer At times the computer will type something that sounds like what you said but isn't quite right. People sometimes misunderstand each other in the same way. But the computer is not a person, so it won't help to: YELL talk slowly or. say. only. one. word. at. a. time. This section provides some guidelines for talking to a computer. 10 Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide CHAPTER 2 Using Dragon NaturallySpeaking Successfully Speak naturally and continuously, but pronounce each word clearly When you talk to another person, you can mumble and run your words together and still be understood most of the time. For example, if you say, "Didja eat?," a person will probably understand that you're asking, "Did you eat?" But Dragon NaturallySpeaking has trouble interpreting mumbled or slurred speech. The computer recognizes speech most accurately when it can hear each word distinctly. To understand what it means to speak both clearly and naturally, listen to the way newscasters read the news. If you copy this style when you use Dragon NaturallySpeaking, you should see an improvement in how well the program recognizes what you say. Make it a habit to say each word clearly when you talk to the computer. Avoid leaving out words and making extra sounds (like "um") In conversation with another person, it's okay if you leave out a word here and there. People are good at filling in the blanks in a sentence. Unfortunately, the computer is not very good at this. If you leave out words, Dragon NaturallySpeaking also leaves them out. Another thing people do well is ignore all those "ums" and "you knows" that show up in conversation. But the computer has no way of knowing which words are unimportant, so it simply transcribes everything you say. Make it a habit to avoid leaving out words or making extra sounds. It may help to compose your thoughts before you speak. Speak at your normal pace--don't slow down When another person is having trouble understanding you, speaking more slowly usually helps. So it's not surprising that people often slow down and begin sounding out each syllable when Dragon NaturallySpeaking makes mistakes. It doesn't help to speak at an unnatural pace when you're talking to a computer, however. This is because the program listens for predictable Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide 11 CHAPTER 2 Using Dragon NaturallySpeaking Successfully sound patterns when matching sounds to words. If you speak in syllables, Dragon NaturallySpeaking is likely to transcribe each syllable as a separate word. Make it a habit to speak at your normal pace, so Dragon NaturallySpeaking can learn your normal pronunciation. Speak in phrases, rather than one word at a time Along with the tendency to speak slowly, people often begin saying just one or two words at a time when Dragon NaturallySpeaking makes mistakes. Surprisingly, speaking in very short phrases or individual words can actually lessen accuracy. This is because Dragon NaturallySpeaking uses the context of a phrase to help it decide what you said. Consider the following phrase: "Dear Mr. Jones." If you were to dictate this phrase one word at a time ("dear" "mister" "jones"), Dragon NaturallySpeaking might type "Deer" or "Gear," instead of "Dear." But if you were to dictate the whole phrase ("dear mister jones"), the program can use context to determine that the word you want is most likely "Dear." Make it a habit to dictate in phrases, so Dragon NaturallySpeaking can use context to help determine what you said. It may help to compose your thoughts before you speak. Speak at your normal volume--don't whisper or speak too loudly When you first started Dragon NaturallySpeaking and read the training text aloud, the program adapted to the pitch and volume of your voice, along with learning your pronunciation. For this reason, you should continue to speak at a normal volume (or slightly louder if this helps). If you shout or whisper, Dragon NaturallySpeaking won't understand you as well. Make it a habit to speak at your normal volume, since Dragon NaturallySpeaking has adjusted to this volume. 12 Dragon NaturallySpeaking User's Guide