Very Computer

Any comments would be appreciated.

Thanks.

--
Andrew Joseph

Quote:>There's a chance I'll be purchasing a new laptop soon, and I was thinking
of
>getting a system fast enough to run Dragon Systems Naturally Speaking
Preferred
>for writing (or perhaps I should say "speaking") fiction.

PS: adding names and any other custom words is easy and doesn't
necessarily require reading them in by voice -- NS will scan text
files -- but anyway the programs' vocabulary is so large
most of what you want will be there.

I find many _authors'_ names are there already, and the
program learns how I say the others by scanning.

I suspect my "factual" writing is not that different from
your "fiction", in that sense.

Quote:> if Dragon Systems Naturally Speaking Preferred can handle things like dialogue
> contained in quotations? Can I insert quotation marks with a voice command
> while writing (speaking), or do I have to go back and add (type) them? Can
> Dragon's NS deal with new paragraph tabs and the like?

Ideally I think you would use one of them with WordPerfect 8 or
Word 97, as the built-in support is best for those programs
and you can do more with them, by voice, than with the
voice programs' own text editor.  

I find that for this kind of writing it makes sense to train
the programs not in the recommended way, reading the supplied
passages straight through, and pausing only at commas,
but pausing where you feel like pausing.  NaturallySpeaking,
anyway, will then get used to your pausing to think (!),
though it will still "prefer" extremely rapid and genuinely
continuous speech.
-- I don't seem to pay a price in recognition quality by doing this,
but I may: it seems worth taking a slight hit so I can compose
straight into the software.

But if you are new to voice software you might be better off
keeping to the recommendations.  

See also http://idt.net/~edrose19/page7.html and Susan Fulton's
page at www.out-loud.com.  Both sites are run and maintained
by a user.  Susan Fulton's has a chart comparing programs.

This post is also an "ad" for the user groups listed there!

Judy Evans
Department of Politics