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February 2010

Microsoft Vista Speech Recognition Review

Many people own a copy of Windows Vista or Windows 7, but many people don’t know that it comes with a hands free dictate from speech to text software built in. To activate it just go to your control panel and then go through the options under the Speech Recognition button. After about an hour of setting up the software going through the tutorials and then training the software I was eager to see what this free piece of software could deliver. I told the software to ‘Start listening’ and then I ordered it to ‘Open wordpad’ and then I started dictating. Below is the result I got:
I am trying to get used to the Microsoft dictation software that comes free with windows vista. Even though I have taken the training on three separate occasions, I am having difficulty with dictating this document. I had to continuously correct myself on a continual basis because the dictation software keeps getting me muddled up. I think the main problem is that when we dictate our documents we speak very differently to how we would speak normally. We are supposed to speak in a newscaster fashion and this may not come naturally to most people even a trained presenter like myself. I have found many instances where I’ve had to correct words of context in a sentence such as the word to and two. I started this document at 11.10 AM and it is now 11.30 AM and I am finding that I’m getting used to this newscaster fashion of speaking although it is not as fluent as a program you have to pay for such as Dragon naturallyspeaking. I do like the fact that you don’t have to pay for the program if you already have windows vista although I’m starting to feel like you get what you pay for. It is now 11.35 AM to give you an idea of my progress. I have found it increasingly annoying that the computer will go and select something that I have already dictated as it gets confused with my commands with my dictation. I have to admit that the program is learning quite quickly the things that I’m saying at a relatively quick pace. Since taking the tutorial and three advanced voice recognition stages, I have launched wordpad and started typing this article without once lifting my finger to move the mouse or keyboard. There aren’t too many words in this article so far yet it is already 11.45 AM and I certainly don’t have 99.97% accuracy rate, for the amount of words that have been written I would say it’s closer to a 30 per cent accuracy rate but it is definitely going up. Read More »Microsoft Vista Speech Recognition Review

Planning your hair style for the wedding

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So you’ve decided to get married, the place for the wedding is booked, the place for the party is booked, the date is confirmed, the guests are getting their invitations, the dress has been picked, what else?…… YOUR HAIR!
OK, so you probably were already thinking about your hair even before you went window shopping for a wedding dress at every boutique and dress sale going where there were hoards of tiaras and veils to tempt you into splashing out a few more hundred quid (dollars or other local currency). It’s important that before you opt for that once in a lifetime diamond tiara or the coarse net curtain that droops over your face to find a wedding hair stylist to sort out your hair on your head. My recommendation is to go for a wedding hair specialist who does wedding hair styles day in day out and can travel for your big day. Read More »Planning your hair style for the wedding

Buildings and Landmarks viewable from Vertigo Bar in Tower 42

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Click here to view video with commentary
The above video view is from Vertigo Bar which is on the 42nd floor of Tower 42, formerly known as the Natwest Tower. The address of Tower 42 (if you are trying to find it) is 25 Old Broad Street, London, EC2N 1HQ.
Below are the views from the video above. At each time code I will mention the landmarks & buildings from left to right and then top to bottom (top left, middle left then bottom left and so on).
(mm:ss)
00:05 Exchange House, Exchange Square, Broadgate Venus, London Liverpool Street Station, Bishopsgate Arcade, RBS building, 1 Bishops Square, Spitalfields Market Gazebo, Spitalfields Market, Heron Tower, Denning PointRead More »Buildings and Landmarks viewable from Vertigo Bar in Tower 42