“put parentheses around ‘as you know,’” “select ‘the day I flew’ capitalize that,” and so on. You can also use smart commands like “search Google for ‘electric curtains,’” On the other hand, you can speak commands that click links in Safari, enable AppleScript and Automator macros, and so on. (“Thank you so much for writing about my column. My particular favorite is the text macro, where I speak one thing (“buzz off”) and the software types out something entirely different On the other hand, this program-your-own mode has incredible powers.

It’s not like the Windows version, where out of the box, you can speak any menu command. Out of the box, you can say, for example, “open Microsoft Word.” Unfortunately, you have to manually program other menu commands, like Tools->Word Count or whatever. Over time, each correction like that trains the software never to make that kind of mistake again. I just said “Choose 2” to replace the error and continue. I was easily able to correct the errorīy saying, “Correct ‘or I speak”” a list of numbered alternative transcriptions appeared. In this entire column, the software mistranscribed only once (“or I speak” instead of “where I speak”). wired headset, a wireless Bluetooth headset or, in a pinch and with compromised accuracy, the built-in microphone of your laptop.īecause it uses the same underlying recognition technology as NaturallySpeaking 11, the accuracy is uncanny, at least if you speak fairly clearly and don’t have much of an accent. (It probably goes without saying that I dictated this entire column. After 25 years, full-blown, professionalĭictation software has finally come to the Mac.ĭictate ($200 with headset $50 upgrade) runs in the background and translates everything you say into typewritten text into any Mac program. really, everybody would’ve been a lot happier if a Mac dictation app had been available all along - but it’s almost everything it should be. It’s something that many Mac fans have been awaiting for more than a decade. The result, now called Dragon Dictate for the Mac, made its debut last week. Taylor’s team harness all of the company’s enormous dictation-software expertise, Its latest recognition technology, the one that drives NaturallySpeaking 11 for Windows, to the Mac - and to let Mr. Apparently the resurgence of Apple and the Mac was dramatic enough for Nuance to get interested - and it bought Andrew Taylor’s little company. Columnist, David Pogue, keeps you on top of the industry in his free, weekly e-mail newsletter.

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