Speech Input

I’ve been using speech input for more than three decades after a bout with repetitive strain injuries in my hands.

For a long time I used Dragon Pro Individual along with Utter Command, an add-on I developed that allows you to say command phrases. I also trained people to use speech input efficiently.

More recently I’ve switched to Talon, freely available speech input software that works on the Mac and PC, is more stable than Dragon, and has a great volunteer community behind it. The folks who use it are mostly programmers and it’s optimized for programming.

I’ve written a set of freely-available Utter-Command-style commands that let me write and control my computer using Talon speech. This was a much easier lift than writing Utter Command for Dragon because Talon is a community effort and the people developing Talon also use it. Feel free to contact me for more information.

Here’s a nice take on Human-Machine Grammar and Utter Command from James Stout’s Hands-Free Coding blog. Stout is a key contributor to Talon.

(The original Utter Command is no longer for sale, but you can read about it on the legacy site. It still works, including on Dragon 15/Windows 10. You can request a copy here if you let me know why you’d like to try it, and promise to give me some feedback as you use the program.

Here’s a video showing Utter Command in action. The Utter Command documentation is at the bottom of the UC Knowledge Base page.)

The text and slides from the presentation I gave at AccessU include my thoughts on using speech input: Including Speech Input Users: What’s frustrating, what’s needed – 2018 update (PDF, slides)
AccessU, May 16, 2018

Here’s some more background: