Speech to Text

Are we ready for no keyboarding? Not quite. But we are much closer than in the past. Access to speech recognition software is much cheaper than a few years ago. I use Dragon Dictation on my iPhone on a regular basis. When on my laptop, sometimes I go to Speech Recognizer in Chrome. Both are free apps from the App Store and the Chrome Web Store respectively.

Here is an example:

Produced with Speech to Text:

preteens ladies and gentlemen we are testing speech recognizer chrome extension in the food chain first the sun gives energy plants, the plans are eaten by an hour before, your before he buys a carnivore. And corn markets consumed by decomposers after it dies.

Edited from the above:

Greetings, ladies and gentlemen,

We are testing the Speech Recognizer chrome extension

In the food chain, first the sun gives energy to plants, the plants are eaten by an herbivore, the herbivore is eaten by a carnivore. A carnivore is consumed by decomposers after it dies.

Now you might be thinking: Wow, that really made a mess of the speech. Is that because it is free? No, not because it is free. It is because speech to text conversion is tricky business. People's voices are unique while machines and computers don't do well with unique cases. However, it is getting better all the time.

I actually thought it did a pretty good job, but I've been using speech to text heavily for the last year or so. It helps if you do not read the voice recognition attempt for the written meaning of the words but for meaning you intended. Thus

"the plants are eaten by an herbivore"

becomes

"the plans are eaten by an hour before"

This is where the keyboard comes in. You have to be able to edit the product of the speech recognition software.

It is actually funny to read it with the new meaning which is often meaningless. They have made some funny youtube videos about this! When using voice recognition I should expect that after I finish dictating I will have to go through and edit the words to obtain my intended meaning. It just saves on some typing time.

link to Speech Recognizer app

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/aomjekmpappghadlogpigifkghlmebjk?hl=en-GB