Nobody talks on the phone anymore, but people are talking at their phones. On any platform, check your settings and helper guides to get an understanding of what your app or phone can actually do, as completely misunderstood responses from a speech app can be pretty infuriating. Android phones with Google's Voice Search installed, for example, can make a phone call, compose email, send a text message, get directions, and pull up musical artists-but can't launch applications from vocal commands. This isn't so much an issue on iPhones, but Androids and other phones can have pinhole-style microphones that can get gummed up or partially covered by awkward cases. Intermediate: Stop Slowing Down, But Think Before Speaking You need not talk like a robot to be understood by one, says Vlad Sejnoha, chief technical officer at Nuance, maker of the Dragon speech-to-text software for Windows, Macs, iPhones and iPads.
Dragon's software learns speech styles and tics over time, and you want to aim for a natural speaking flow. Digging around Android forums and elsewhere, I found a good number of tesimonies from speech-to-text enthusiasts who saw better results from simply speaking at a normal clip. Google representative Nadja Blagojevic offered much the same advice for the search giant's voice product in both Android and its Chrome browser: Speak naturally and clearly, but don't strain to enunciate too much or speak slowly. Advanced Dictation: Punctuation and Personalization Another embarrassing thing you can stop doing is holding your phone or desktop microphone directly in front of your mouth. In your Mac's System Preferences, there's a whole range of Speech options, sure; but check in the Input section of the Sound options, and you'll find a check box to Use ambient noise reduction, which Google's Blagojevic recommends for using the Chrome browser's speech function.
The best noise cancellation tools put in cars and hearing aids use multiple microphones to pinpoint the speaker and amplify their Input, but your phone isn't quite as refined an audio tool. Punctuation is no different than words, as Dragon, Google, and most good voice recognition software will train itself to how you say "period," "comma," or even "smiley." Just be sure to actually go back and fix bad Punctuation, as that's often how the software learns. Finally, if you're using an Android phone, be sure that you've enabled Personalized Voice Recognition. It benefits your speech-to-text on Android, in your browser, and, ultimately, your self-driving car.
