possibly in the long term. Barriers will be lowered for those wishing to
offer a lower priced customized access solution for the blind. In the short
term, it is an unrefined product that will be brought to its full potential
after many end user and developer experiences.
in the short term, screen readers and the audible Vista will be similar to
GSM cell phones in which a third party app like Talx or mobile Speak can be
installed compared to CDMA cell phones with some speech output and much
voice recognition to issue commands. Who really enjoys sitting on a train
with nearly every seat filled and occasionally erupting with shouts of
doctor, home, or names of various persons? A funny but awkward reality with
such interfaces.
On the other hand, voice portals like Tell Me are easier to navigate than
large websites like yahoo, MSN, and those of large brokerages. I'm still
getting comfortable though to barking at my telephone for a weather forecast
or a stock quote.
Kelly
----- Original Message -----
From: "George Cassell" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, February 20, 2006 8:08 PM
Subject: [VICUG-L] Does this mean we no longer need Jaws or Window Eyes?
> MSDN (Microsoft Developer Network) Blog
> Monday, February 20, 2006
>
> Vista's Speech Capabilities
>
> By SYSK 63
>
> The next version of OS (Vista) will have state-of-the-art speech
> technology
> built right in. WinFX will have a powerful API for enabling your users to
> speak to your apps and your apps to speak to your users.
>
> At the last PDC (2005), Phillip Schmid, Robert Brown and Steve Chang gave
> a
> great talk "Ten Amazing Ways to Speech-Enable Your Application", available
> at
>
> http://microsoft.sitestream.com/PDC05/PRS/PRSL03_files/Default.htm.
>
> Below are some key points from the talk.
>
> Vista will ship with 8 language speech recognizers
>
> Vista shell is speech enabled, i.e. you can drive it without using a mouse
> or keyboard. If you can see it on the screen, you can say it! Anything
> you
> can do with a keyboard or mouse, you can say it!
>
> Dictation is built into OS, i.e. any application that has a text field can
> take in dictation. Yes, no code needed -- your application is
> automatically
> dictation enabled!
>
> System.Speech API is now part of WinFX. Why use it? To add more speech
> enabled functionality than "what you see - you can say". E.g. you can
> speech enable deeply nested menus...
>
> Speech Synthesizer Example:
> using System.Speech.Synthesis;
>
> SpeechSynthesizer synthesizer = new SpeechSynthesizer();
>
> // To speak
> synthesizer.SpeakText("Your sentence goes here");
>
> // To send the output of synthesizer to .wav file
> synthesizer.SetOutputToWaveFile("YOUR FILE PATH HERE");name
> synthesizer.SpeakText("Your sentence goes here");
>
> To customize speach recognition, do the following:
> // 1. Create SpeechRecognizer instance (normally, once per application)
> using System.Speech.Recognition;
>
> SpeechRecognizer speechRecognizer = new SpeechRecognizer();
>
> // 2. Create Grammar instance
> Grammer phoneGrammer = new Grammar("YOUR GRAMMAR FILE HERE");
>
> The grammar file is an xml file with words the speech recognizer should
> understand, and their mapped actions; e.g. in a provisioning application,
> you might have the following commands:
>
> <rule id=PhoneCommands" scope="public">
> <one-of>
> <item> purchase new phone
> <tag>synthisizerAction="PurchaseNewPhone"</tag> </item>
> <item> reuse existing phone
> <tag>synthisizerAction="ReusePhone"</tag> </item>
> </one-of>
> </rule>
>
> // 3. Load grammar into recognizer
> recognizer.LoadGrammar(phoneGrammer); // note: there can be many grammars
> loaded at the same time
>
> // 4. Subscribe to SpeechRecognized event
> phoneGrammer.SpeechRecognized += new
> EventHandler<RecognitionEventArgs>(PhoneGrammer_SpeechRecognized);
>
> void PhoneGrammer_SpeechRecognized(object sender, RecognitionEventArgs e)
> {
> switch((string) e.Result.Semantics["synthesizerAction"].Value)
> {
> case "PurchaseNewPhone":
> // TODO: Show new phone purchase form
> break;
> case "ReusePhone":
> // TODO: Show existing phone re-purposing form
> break;
> }
> }
>
>
> Now, how does Microsoft Speech Server relate to Vista's speech
> functionality?
> Microsoft Speech Server is about speech enabling your applications from
> the
> phone.
>
> First, let's set the stage. For those who are not familiar with this
> technology, Microsoft Speech Server acts as a digital data-to-voice
> translator:
>
> - It interprets voice commands/data from a user and digitizes it
> - It offers digitized information as XML to a web application for
> manipulation
> - It takes digital information from a web application and
> 'vocalizes'/'reads' it to a user.
>
> The possibilities range from sales support (e.g. you can search for
> customer
> phone numbers/addresses over the phone with your voice), to getting vocal
> directions from MapPoint to your customer's location read to you while on
> the road, to commerce sites allowing you to check on the order status of
> an
> online purchase, get an ETA, and even to change the destination shipping
> address, to being able to record a message for a person and have it sent
> via
> email attachment via Exchange. Not to mention unprecedented support for
> developers to create friendly web applications for more easy access to the
> visually impaired.
>
> The future version of Speech Server will use the same API, as one exposed
> in
> Vista, for extending the reach of your .NET applications to the telephone.
>
> The SDK is available now, and can be used with VS 2005!
>
> Published Wednesday, February 15, 2006 7:00 AM by irenak
>
> http://blogs.msdn.com/irenak/archive/2006/02/15/532530.aspx
>
>
> VICUG-L is the Visually Impaired Computer User Group List.
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>
VICUG-L is the Visually Impaired Computer User Group List.
To join or leave the list, send a message to
[log in to unmask] In the body of the message, simply type
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