From Nuance

Dragon 201 Webinar

Erica Hill — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 20:42:00 GMT

Did you hear about our Dragon 201 Webinar last week? Kristen Wylie led a terrific training focused on how to make Dragon even easier to use. Some of the topics that were covered during this session included the following:

- Advanced formatting: Word Properties and auto-formatting
- Creating and modifying custom commands
- Common Excel commands
- Working within “non-standard” applications using the Dictation Box
- Using Dragon with a digital voice recorder

If you missed it, don't despair! The replay is now available online here:

https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/824324945

Check it out!

Dragon in the car?

Erica Hill — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 15:28:00 GMT

Cool news from our Automotive team today! Take a look at Rebecca's post below...

Power of Dragon is Coming Soon to a Car near You – Announcing Nuance Voice Control Automotive

Today we had a very exciting announcement from our automotive business that we thought would be appropriate to share with our Dragon Mobile Apps users – we’re bringing the power of Dragon to the car! Today we unveiled Nuance Voice Control Automotive, an innovative platform that is designed for auto manufacturers to bring voice-enabled connected services to drivers around the world – and it’s based on the same core speech recognition technology that you take advantage of in Dragon NaturallySpeaking, Dragon Dictation and Dragon Search. So what can you do with Nuance Voice Control Automotive? Lots of amazing tasks, including:

SMS text messaging and email capabilities, allowing drivers to simply speak and send messages while keeping their hands on the wheel and eyes on the road;
Interaction with social networks such as Twitter and Facebook;
News, weather and traffic updates and the latest sports scores and stock prices;
Movie theatre locations, film listings and times;
Dining options in current area or point of destination; and,
Price comparisons for hotels, fuel, etc.

We’re a mobile society, and more and more we find ourselves connected at all times. But it’s important to ensure a safer route to staying connected behind the wheel – that’s where speech technology becomes so valuable and why we’ve worked to bring this innovative platform to auto manufacturers. We expect the first cars with Nuance Voice Control Automotive to start shipping next year – so stay tuned!

REBECCA PAQUETTE, Corporate Communications Manager, Mobile

Dragon Tip - Making Corrections

Erica Hill — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 16:12:00 GMT

No one is perfect – not even Dragon. In the same way that we might not hear a word correctly when speaking with someone, Dragon also can misrecognize words from time to time. (Have you noticed, though, that Dragon *never* misspells a word?) When a misrecognition happens, the best thing that you can do is to correct it. This way, Dragon will learn that it made a mistake, and will be less likely to make the same mistake again. How cool is that?!

When you make a correction, it can be tempting to simply use the keyboard to delete the text and type in the correct word or phrase. Similarly, the “Scratch that” command makes it fast and easy to delete the transcription of the previous utterance, or string of dictated text. However, this might actually be keeping you from achieving even higher levels of accuracy with Dragon. Why? Because simply deleting the text doesn’t allow Dragon to “learn” from the misrecognition. Instead of simply deleting or “scratching” text that is incorrectly transcribed by Dragon, a better choice is to select the misrecognized text (manually or by voice) and perform the correction (again, either manually or by voice) so that Dragon can learn from the error.

Another cool thing to note is that correction with Dragon can be performed in different ways, and at different times, giving you the option to make your corrections in the way that is most efficient and intuitive for you:

You can make a correction immediately after a misrecognition, or you can wait until you’ve finished your paragraph, or your idea, or even your whole document, before correcting Dragon’s errors.
You can perform Correction entirely by voice, entirely by mouse, entirely by keyboard (by default, the Correction hotkey is the numeric minus), or in a combination.
Dragon can present you with its list of alternative recognitions in two ways: the Correction menu (by default), and the Spell dialog box (where you can spell and type)
Dragon has a “Double-click to Correct” option: if enabled, when you double-click a word, Dragon’s correction interface comes up for that word.
A third-party can perform Correction for you – particularly useful for very busy/heavy Dragon users, very young people who use Dragon, or folks with health issues.
If your edition of Dragon supports it, you can defer Correction: when you close your document, let Dragon save the associated audio file (same filename as the document but with extension .DRA)

You can make a correction in Dragon with a simple, direct voice command. You simply say “Correct XYZ,” where XYZ is the misrecognized word/phrase on the screen. A list of alternative transcriptions will be presented to you in a Correction menu and you can choose the correct option either manually (down arrow, or mouse) or by voice. If the desired transcription is not among the menu choices, say “Spell That”, which opens the Spell dialog.

You can also have your command go directly to the Spell box: to set this, open the Correction tab of the Options dialog, and check the box marked “’Correct’ Commands Bring Up Spell Dialog.” With this option set, saying “Correct XYZ” opens the Spell dialog box. You can then indicate the word or phrase you intended; there are many ways to do so, including spelling out characters or selecting a choice from the list.

Note:
1. If no Spell Box choice is quite correct but one is close, you can quickly modify it: click it once or say “Select” and its number (for instance “Select 5”), which brings it to the top line, where you can edit it by hand or by voice.
2. In the top line, you can dictate commands (such as “Move Left 2 Words” and “All Caps That”) as well as characters, but not words.
3. If you choose to spell out in the Spell box, here are a few quick tips:

To spell a capital letter, just say “Cap” followed by the letter
You can use alternate pronunciations to spell letters: “Alpha,” “Letter Alpha,” “Letter A”…
To insert a space, say "Spacebar"

Here are some additional correction tips to keep in mind:

Tip #1 – When you give the “Correct XYZ” command, be sure to use the word(s) that have actually been transcribed, not the words you had intended.

Tip #2 – If several consecutive words are incorrect, correct them together. For instance, if ‘B40’ were recognized as ‘Before tea’ you would say “Correct before tea.”

Tip #3 – You can have Playback occur automatically when you perform a Correction. On the Correction tab of the Options dialog, check Automatic Playback on Correction. This is particularly helpful as you first learn to use Dragon, as it lets you verify that the audio was clear (if in fact you hadn’t spoken clearly, or you changed your mind, just cancel out of the Spell box and re--dictate the word(s)). You may want to turn it off after you’ve had enough practice.

For more detailed information about the various correction techniques available in Dragon, please have a look at the Correction sections of our recently-updated User Workbook (which includes new content). Note – this link will open a PDF document in a new window.

Dragon hits CES!

Erica Hill — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 20:13:00 GMT

We're here at CES and it's hopping! A quick note below from the team...

It’s a New Year and what better way to kick it off than with the world’s most amazing consumer electronics event, CES! The Dragon team is all packed and ready to head out West, where we’ll be showing off Dragon Dictation and Dragon Search at the Pepcom and ShowStoppers events Wednesday and Thursday evening. We’ll be alongside Dragon NaturallySpeaking, where press and analysts will be able to see how Dragon’s amazing capabilities are leveraged on the PC as well as the iPhone. We’ll also be showing off a few other goodies in our Mobile speech portfolio, so if you’re attending the event – please stop by to check it out.

I’m looking forward to how Dragon can make navigating the madness of Vegas and CES a lot easier. For instance, you’ll likely have your hands full with all those fun CES chotchkies – so texting colleagues or typing in walking directions to the Bellagio might be tough….but you can simply use your voice to easily enter search queries or shoot off a quick text message. You can even easily update your Twitter or Facebook status: “Just scored tickets for Barry Manilow!” (you know you secretly love Barry Manilow…), and quickly look up the lyrics to Copa Cabana so you can sing along.

In all seriousness – there is a lot that Dragon can do to help make your trip easier and productive. Planning on blogging from the show? Why not just use Dragon Dictation? You can take notes as you walk from meeting to meetings, and quickly get blog posts and updates pulled together as the news happens. If you do plan to use Dragon at the show – let us know! We’d love to hear about how it’s made your 2010 CES experience even more amazing.

We’ll be Tweeting from the show all week – follow us @DragonTweets and @NuanceMobile to keep up with us!

For those of you attending, safe travels to Sin City!

Rebecca Paquette
Corporate Communications Manager, Mobile

Search Just Got Smarter: Announcing Dragon Search for the Apple App Store!

Peter Mahoney — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 04:14:00 GMT

People often ask me about Voice Search on Google or Bing. I honestly think they’re cool and mark some great innovation in our industry. But I continue to hear people say they want to use voice to search iTunes for music. Or some say they want to search on Twitter because it’s up to the second information. And still others want to search Wikipedia where they can get detailed descriptions and insights. So – why not make that possible? We did. Today, we launched Dragon Search on the Apple App Store – an intuitive voice-enabled search application that transforms the way you’ll search for mobile content on the iPhone.

With Dragon Search, simply speak a search query – anything you want any way you want – and in seconds the Dragon Search Carousel displays results from a variety of sources like Google, iTunes, Twitter, Wikipedia, or YouTube. Bing and Yahoo are optional. For instance, you can say “Waking Up in Vegas by Katy Perry,” and Dragon Search will grab general search results for the song, bring up conversations about Katy Perry on Twitter, the video on YouTube, and the option to download the song on iTunes. With Dragon Search, you can cut through search engine clutter to immediately deliver the content you want, when you want it.

My wife and I took my 6-year old daughter to Mary Poppins last weekend. She loved the show. At home a few days later, I said “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” to Dragon Search on my iPhone. In just seconds, we had the YouTube video from the Broadway production in full audio / visual. For a 6-year old, it was magic. Then we bought the Mary Poppins album from iTunes.

Dragon Search is the ultimate complementary app to Dragon Dictation – so download it today at http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/dragon-search/id341452950?mt=8. It’s free for a limited time on the U.S. App Store. And as always – let us know what you think about the application – we love your feedback and comments.

Michael Thompson, Senior Vice President & General Manager, Nuance Mobile

You Speak – Dragon Listens…

Peter Mahoney — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 15:49:00 GMT

Good morning iPhoners! I’d like to share the following important Dragon Dictation update with you from Scott Taylor…I know that a lot of you have asked about this issue, and we appreciate your feedback and patience….

Since the launch of Dragon Dictation last week, the response has been overwhelmingly positive. However, there have been concerns about uploading contact names to our servers – a feature we’ve implemented to ensure the names you speak the most are accurately recognized and spelled in any messages you dictate. While we’ve addressed those concerns last week (http://blog.dragonmobileapps.com/2009/12/what-dragon-dictation-for-iphone-does.html) – we do want to ensure we’re meeting the needs of our customers. Many of you have requested that the uploading contact names be made optional…and we’ve now added that feature.

Dragon Dictation will now feature a privacy setting that will allow you to choose whether or not to upload your contact names. Dragon Dictation does work best when you upload your contact names to the server to improve the recognition of names in your dictations, and users can rest assured that this data is safe and is used only to improve recognition accuracy…nothing more.

David Pogue from the New York Times discusses this issue in more detail in his article: http://blog.dragonmobileapps.com/2009/12/new-york-times-article-by-david-pogue.html

For those users who would prefer that their contact names not be uploaded, we now give you the choice at time of download. And if you want to take advantage of the increased accuracy experienced in uploading contact names, you can always change the setting later in the application settings tool. If at any time you change the setting to NOT load your contact names, any contact names that were previously uploaded will be deleted from the server.

The new application version can be downloaded here: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/dragon-dictation/id341446764?mt=8

For more information, check the support site: http://www.dragonmobileapps.com/supportdictation.html

Scott Taylor

Vice President, Marketing & Solutions, Nuance Mobile

***UPDATE****

Update issue with new version 1.1.0

IMPORTANT NOTE: While many of you have been able to download the new version (1.1.0) of the application from the App Store that will provide you with the option of uploading contact names to our servers for increased accuracy, many of you are only able to download only the old version (1.0.1). We are working with Apple to resolve this issue, and we thank you for your patience and continued interest in our application. We will inform you as soon as the issue is resolved.

Dragon for Students and Educators

kwylie — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 15:45:00 GMT

Last month I had the opportunity to demonstrate Dragon NaturallySpeaking on QVC, the home shopping channel that broadcasts live on TV 24 hours a day. My airtime wasn't until 1 AM, so I had plenty of time before the show started to meet with other QVC guests who were struggling to stay awake at that hour.

One guest, who was on-site to demonstrate a cool new version of the Rubik's cube, was particularly interested as I practiced my demonstration. "I wish I had something like Dragon when I was in school!" she commented as my dictated words appeared on the screen. We started talking, and I learned that she was dyslexic and struggled throughout her school experience.

After speaking with her, I made a mental note to comment on air about the benefits of Dragon for students with certain learning disabilities. Unfortunately, I was so nervous about being on live TV that I forgot just about everything I planned to say on air. So I never had the chance to tell the QVC audience (and you would be surprised how many people are watching -- even at 1 AM!) about the benefits of Dragon for students. Luckily we have this blog, so I can share my comments here instead!

More and more middle and secondary schools are adopting speech recognition technology as part of their business education curriculum. This training is intended to help students boost productivity, prepare for tomorrow’s workforce, and prevent increasingly common repetitive stress injuries.

I provide details about the use of Dragon by students every month during one of the webinars that I present to Dragon customers and prospects. A replay of a webinar I gave about using Dragon to improve core reading and writing skills (particularly for ESL students) is available at https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/341865153.

But this month, I added a new education webinar to my repertoire. This webinar focused not on the STUDENT’S use of Dragon, but on the benefits of Dragon for TEACHERS and administrators. Increasingly, schools and universities are beginning to leverage Dragon to improve their own productivity. During this webinar I illustrated how Dragon can be used to give more detailed feedback to student assignments in less time and speed the creation of lesson plans, research projects and other documents. In case you didn't catch the webinar live, a replay is available at https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/956075912.

Call costs: self-service vs. agent-assisted. You do the math.

Donald Davis — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 05:01:00 GMT

Did you know that today the cross–industry average cost of a call fully completed through self–service is $.50 or less, compared to an agent assisted transaction which averages $5.50 per call. And in many industries, the cost of an agent handled call is significantly above this level, further magnifying the savings which can be recognized by automation done right. You do the math. If you want to learn more about the ROI of self-service for your industry, drop us a line at consultingteam...(read more)

Frequently asked questions about Dragon Dictation for the iPhone

Peter Mahoney — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 17:55:00 GMT

Here are some frequently asked questions on Dragon Dictation with our response. We will keep you updated as the situation changes and have more information to share with you.

Is there an option to opt out contact names upload on the servers?
We hear your requests for an opt-out on contact name uploads and we're working on a version update to include this feature. The new version will be submitted to approval very soon.

When will Dragon Dictation be available for iPod Touch?
We are working on Dragon Dictation for iPod Touch; we will provide update on availability soon.

When will the app be available in other iTunes store, besides US?
Dragon Dictation is currently only available in the U.S. We are developing regional roll out plans, and will keep you posted.

Is Dragon Dictation supported on other platforms such a Windows Mobile, Android, Blackberry?
We are continuously evaluating other platforms. We will keep you updated once our software is available on new platforms.

For detailed discussion on how Privacy is handled by Dragon Dictation, Nuance, please visit the blog posting: http://blog.dragonmobileapps.com/2009/12/what-dragon-dictation-for-iphone-does.html

Cloud computing – the secret weapon that enables massively scalable speech applications

Nuance Expert TIPS — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 16:11:00 GMT

Cloud computing is beginning to penetrate many industries, including CRM and in particular the interactive voice response (IVR) market. Forrester Research has said that cloud computing is one of the top 15 technology trends to watch in 2010, especially for IVR speech applications, because it saves enterprises money, frees up limited resources and allows companies to benefit from the latest and greatest IVR technology on someone else's dime. In a cloud computing model, the entire IVR and speech...(read more)

What Dragon Dictation for the iPhone Does (and Doesn't Do) with Your Contacts

Peter Mahoney — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 21:48:00 GMT

Some people have expressed concern about what the new Dragon Dictation for the iPhone application does with your contact information. As you may have experienced already, Dragon Dictation for the iPhone goes through your contact list on your iPhone and uploads the names to our server. We do this for a pretty simple reason: we found that people are often dictating names from their address book and expect the names to be recognized. We take this information and create an anonymous user profile for your device that understands what names are likely to dictate into a document. It's important to note that we only upload the names, not the e-mail addresses, phone numbers or any other personally identifying information from your contacts.

Even though there is no personally identifying information, we still treat all of this information with the highest privacy standards. All of our servers are located in the United States and meet the most stringent privacy and security standards. We conform to these high standards because we use the same data centers for other areas of our business where we are required to store personal information.

All of this is spelled out in our license agreement that comes with the Dragon Dictation for the iPhone application. Since most people only see that license agreement briefly when they are installing the software (and they usually can't wait to start using their software, so they don't spend 30 minutes reading a complex legal document...), we provided a link to that agreement here: http://www.nuance.com/company/privacy/.

So the bottom line is that nothing scary is happening with your data and we only use a little bit of information from your phone to help make the dictation accuracy as high as possible. If you have any questions, comments or concerns, feel free to post them here.

Dragon for the iPhone is here! (And it's free... for now)

Peter Mahoney — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 02:44:00 GMT

I'm thrilled to announce that we have launched the Dragon Dictation app for the iPhone on the Apple App Store. I have received more requests than I can count for this product, and there have been quite a few rumors floating around over the past couple months about the potential of Dragon coming to the iPhone.

Based on that, many people will not be surprised that we are launching this product -- but I think just about everyone will be surprised with the introductory price. Free. That's right, for a limited time, you can download this application onto your iPhone for free. And don't worry, it won't stop working after some limited period of time. It's a full working version of the application that you can continue to use even after we start charging for it in the future.

So what can this great application do? With Dragon for your PC, you can use your voice to create text three times faster than you can type. On your iPhone, typing is a little bit trickier -- so we think you'll be able to create text on your iPhone at least five times faster with your voice.

We've created an innovative application that allows you to dictate and correct text in a special editor and then transfer it directly to an e-mail, text message or the clipboard so you can put it in any other application on the iPhone that supports the clipboard. That means that you can use Dragon with all your favorite iPhone applications (as long as they support the clipboard...).

We've got even more exciting news coming up on apps for the iPhone in the near future -- so make sure you stay tuned to our blog or our Facebook page for important updates.

For more detail on the application along with a link to the App Store, please visit: http://www.Dragonmobileapps.com

Don't forget to tell us what you think about the application on Facebook or by providing feedback directly in the App Store. We love hearing from you!

Peter

Network World doesn't like our radio ads, what do you think?

Peter Mahoney — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 16:04:00 GMT

I was surprised to see an article from Network World yesterday criticizing our radio ads. Paul McNamara, a News Editor for Network World wrote a piece that analyzed our radio ads. While Paul is certainly entitled to his opinion about our creative talents, he did make some points that I disagreed with. I was thrilled that he took the time to comment on our ads - I guess that means that people are hearing them ;-) It also gave me an opportunity to clear up some misconceptions about speech recognition along the way.

The biggest issue I had with his response was the view that Dragon was for adults, not for students. I have been amazed by the impact that Dragon has on some of our younger users and I spend a lot of time telling parents and educators how Dragon can help many students.

We did these series of ads because we wanted to share with consumers some of the exciting ways that our customers use Dragon. We tried to do it in an entertaining way while making our point. I'd love to hear what other people think. Are the ads lame? Are they effective? Do you have any other good ideas for ads that we should be playing?

Here is the link to Paul's article: http://www.networkworld.com/columnists/2009/120309-net-buzz.html

And here is my response: http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/48767

You can listen to the ads here: http://community.nuance.com/blogs/dragon/archive/2009/11/23/dragon-naturallyspeaking-holiday-radio-campaign.aspx

Tell us what you think by commenting here or on our Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/dragonnaturallyspeaking

Thanks and Happy Holidays!

Peter

Tips for effective PDF document review: Part 2

Chris Messina — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 13:37:00 GMT

So you've mastered the art of tact when it comes to composing comments and annotations for PDF documents you and your colleagues are reviewing.

Here are five advanced techniques for stepping up your PDF-commenting game.

Be brief. The more you write in comments, the less likely your idea's going to be considered. Period. Edit them down. To the bare bones.
(Except when explanation's needed). The exception to #5 is when you've got a good reason or anecdote. This also gives you an opportunity to be kind—"Gosh, I love the red here, but executive director John Doe shot down red last time, remember?"
Offer help. Sometimes, document reviews are stressful not because they point out alleged shortcomings in the author's ideas or writing style, but because making the required changes will take time or energy the author simply doesn't have to give. Statements such as "Seems like X is going on, can I do anything to help clarify or somehow make this easier?" Just remember, they might say yes. Be ready to back up your words with action when using this tip.
Review before sending. Read over what you've written. Correct grammar or spelling errors so you're not written off as hurried or ignorant. Flesh out half-finished thoughts, root out needlessly emotional words that might distract from your points, and in general, think about how the recipient might interpret your words, regardless of what you actually meant.
Follow up with a phone call. For sensitive documents containing thorny changes—or when an author/owner might be overwhelmed with the level of comments and edits—pick up the phone to clarify or sympathize. Email and electronic document reviews are fast and convenient, but they make us forget that there are actual people involved in the transaction and it's not just data flowing over wires. Use your people skills when those pangs of common sense say they're needed.

Bonus tip: In general, it's not good strategy to apologize or make any emotional statement in the context of PDF reviews. However, in some situations where conflict might be either breaking out or there's potential for conflict, you can pass along a little note in the PDF's accompanying email to the effect of "If I came on a little too strong here, it wasn't intentional. We're all on the same team, and our goal is all the same: To get this done and [insert your group's objective here: make goal for the quarter, look good for the CEO, etc.]" If you can pull all of this off, you're not only becoming a better PDF commenter; you're flashing leadership skills that likely will get noticed by the higher-ups.

Tips for effective PDF document review: Part 1

Chris Messina — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 13:33:00 GMT

You've read about "working in the cloud," where your documents, email and the rest of your work doesn't exist on a desktop or laptop's hard drive anymore. One just logs in from anywhere, on any machine, and gets working.

If you're doing PDF reviews for work, you're not just reading about the cloud, you're working in it, too.

Office colleagues pass drafts of reports, business plans, sales campaigns, marketing material, and a host of other routine business documents among themselves, often bouncing them from locations in several different cities during the course of a shift.

Like other modes of electronic communication such as email and Internet message-board posting, however, giving feedback in a PDF can present pitfalls; since you're not face-to-face, there's no opportunity to read the other person's reactions and "tune up" your words based on their response.

Putting a little care in your approach to PDF commenting can make your peers more likely to take your ideas seriously and also help sidestep the conflicts your peers will inadvertently cause by moving a little too fast—type first, ask questions later—when their turn to review comes up.

Here are our first five secrets to becoming a better commenter:

Remember, it's a meeting. You're alone at your desk or laptop, but pretend you're in a roomful of colleagues—because that is what's happening here, and this document might circulate with your comments to every corner (and office location) in the company. It's a meeting "in the cloud." Don't say anything in a PDF you wouldn't say out loud with your boss and the rest of the team members in the room.
Drop the emotion. When you're face-to-face chatting with a colleague in a cubicle or at a meeting, your words might be stronger than your facial expressions. Your face indicates that you're making a joke, exaggerating for effect, or being sarcastic—and we all get the picture. In a PDF comment or annotation, however, your words are all you've got. Sharp adjectives, descriptions, even long sentences in general can make an argument read way more emotional than you'd planned. Scrub it out. While this should go without saying, don't forget that PDFs are not a stage for engaging in gossip, arguments, or petty politics.
Use passive voice. While it's not good to use passive voice in general writing, it's perfect for getting people to read your comments more objectively. Turn "Why did you pick red for this?" or "Red stinks here, can't you tell!" to "Is red really needed here?" The easiest way to accomplish this is to take out all instances of "you" and "I" in comments, and rewrite. Sometimes it's possible to make the customers or higher-ups the target of negativity that would otherwise have been focused on the recipient: "Will [customers, the CEO, client, whomever] go for red?" Also, in some cases it's clear the author misstated something, but straight-out correction can seem like an insult. Worse yet, your way of correcting an obvious problem might change the meaning to something the author hadn't intended. So phrasing it as "This needs something, not sure what. Did you mean 'to' instead of 'too'?" makes you sound less like a schoolteacher and more like a colleague playing on the same team.
Suggest alternate ideas. "Is red really needed here? Might blue work better?" Giving someone something to react to gets the creativity flowing and doesn't put them on the spot for making a bad choice in the first place—and being forced to come up with a suitable alternate under duress.
Pose questions. "Red stinks here!" derails the review. "Just wondering, do we really want to go with red, and why?" keeps it on track. Who knows, after reading an explanation, you might be swayed to red, too!

NEXT: Five more tips to help make you the best PDF reviewer in the office, and get your ideas heard!

Make PDF part of your 'Green IT' program

Chris Messina — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 13:31:00 GMT

While it's nice to save the planet—many businesses and people aspire to this commendable goal—the bottom line typically falls higher on the priority list, especially in down economic times.

That's why "Green Information Technology (IT)" initiatives not only need to satisfy our souls and make us take responsibility for our ecological footprint, they also need to satisfy the chief financial officer. Here's the argument he or she will take to heart: Saving a dollar equals $20 of revenue, if your business works on a 5% profit margin—such as the average hospital.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's 16-year-old Energy Star program is where many businesses start their green initiatives. Clark Reed, one of the program's directors, said in an Oct. 1 teleconference that Americans purchased about 550 million Energy Star qualified products last year and more then 2.5 billion since 2000. That includes the computers, monitors, servers and peripherals used in offices.

"The rating means that consumers are guaranteed 25%-50% savings over non-qualified products," Reed said.

But energy savings is just one way to cut costs and do less harm to the environment. Saving paper is another biggie. How big? According to ecology.com, paper use is up 400% over the last 40 years, and 35% of trees cut internationally end up as paper.

One way to cut down on deforestation is to purchase paper made in part with recycled waste. A cheaper, simpler way is to skip paper altogether and integrate PDF documents more fully in your office workflow. If you can use PDFs for more processes between two physical office locations, you're saving the paper and, on top of that, envelopes, postage, and delivery time, too. Get customers to use more PDFs, and all of a sudden a dollar here and there adds up to real money, especially taking into account the revenue model outlined above.

So where do you start widening the use of PDF in your office? Below are some ideas; while you might already be doing some, think about which others can be used.

PDF forms: Porting a paper process such as ordering or human-resources paperwork to PDF not only saves paper, but if you or an IT colleague can plug it into a database, it saves much time formerly devoted to re-keying information in handwritten fields.
Marketing materials/instructions. Think about every catalog, owner's manual, and other documents piling up around your home and office. Why not make your company's docs into PDFs, only printed by customers who actually need paper copies?
Contracts, purchase orders, and other business docs. Let's face it, most people can figure out how to put a digital signature on a document, which the U.S. government now recognizes as legal.
Archiving legacy documents. Just because a regulator or company policy forces you to keep a document or filing around for a certain period doesn't mean you have to spend all that rent and/or upkeep on a warehouse. Some, if not all, records can be retained as PDFs. Using the internationally recognized PDF/A standard helps minimize disk space.
Do document reviews with PDF. Stop the madness of passing paper copies of a document under development, where everyone marks up a draft. That not only takes time, it kills trees and unnecessarily wastes hard-earned revenues on office supplies. Try passing around a PDF, letting stakeholders comment and annotate, instead.

Remember, you don't have to roll out one of these ideas all at once—try a small pilot project, and refine the process until it's straightforward and simple for even the worker who takes a little longer to catch on to new ways of working. Soon, you'll be doing your part to save the environment without having to sail on a Greenpeace ship. The bean counters will love you, too.

For more information on Green IT solutions from Nuance, click here.

Picking the right PDF security settings

Chris Messina — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 13:27:00 GMT

PDF's become the electronic document standard around the world for business, education, and government. That may seem like an obvious, straightforward statement, but it took many years for software makers to standardize how they secure and authenticate electronic documents from online spies, thieves, and forgers the same way signatures, date stamps, and locked doors protect paper documents.

Thankfully, it's simple and straightforward to secure a PDF today. One kind of security involves password protection, which you might choose for documents containing sensitive, business-critical content, such as human-resources files, financial reports, or product prototypes. That and paid content that you don't want passed around for free.

Other documents—examples might include contracts, legal filings, purchase proposals/agreements—might not need to be limited in audience, yet they require tamper-proof digital signatures to prove they came from you, on a particular date.

Still others might contain information in the metadata or comments/annotations that should be scrubbed before emailing or posting on a web site for download because they reveal personal or proprietary data. Imagine a company's stockholders reading an annual report containing all the internal comments made along the way from first draft to final. This security feature ensures the final, polished edition is the one that makes its way out on to the web.

Yet, there is such a thing as too much security. Passwords add a layer of inconvenience for a document's users. When they're lost, a PDF's rendered useless. So think carefully about which security settings to use on your PDF by answering the following questions about its audience, and how you're planning to use the document:

1) Can anyone view this document? If not, use a password.

2) Do legal, regulatory, or internal corporate rules require proof of date or a signature? If so, use a digital signature.

3) Is this the final edition of a formal public document, or even an internal document that was given a confidential look-over by someone whose identity shouldn't be revealed? Scrub the metadata, comments, and annotation before releasing to the public, emailing to colleagues, or regulatory-mandated archiving.

Other more powerful tools include redaction (blacking out text or pictures) and Bates stamping, additional security features specific to the legal field. On top of that, some PDF authoring tools offer security settings include disabling printing, searching, and editing. These allow recipients to view a document but otherwise limit their circulation.

Several recent versions of PDF authoring tools conform to AES-256, the 256-bit encryption standard adopted by the U.S. government. It's the only public encryption algorithm approved by the National Security Agency for top-secret content, which means it's proven extremely difficult to hack.

The ironic part of this powerful security tool is that it's only as secure as its creator. When inventing a password, make your PDF more secure by following these tips:

1) Use a new password for each document.

2) Mix letters and numbers—and throw in punctuation if you'd like.

3) Make it as long as possible.

4) Don't make it an easily guessed—therefore weak—password.

5) Manage the distribution (who has access) to it.

And finally, think acronyms. An example using all of the above might be t10ar5p0rt. (This 1s 0ur Annual R5p0rt, period) for drafts of your annual report getting passed around the office in an email review. While that might seem simple for you to remember, it could take years—or centuries—for a hacker to break into the PDF with a brute-force attack, which involves software guessing different combinations of letters and numbers until it happens upon the right one.

By that time, chances are your next annual report will have been published, and the document's contents will be irrelevant, anyway. The point is, when it comes to PDF security, choose just the level you need, no more, no less.

For more information on document security solutions from Nuance, click here.

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A freelance writer based in Nashua, NH, Don Fluckinger first reported on Acrobat for Desktop Publishers Journal in 1994. From 2000–2009, he covered the entire PDF software universe as a reporter for Ziff-Davis's PDFzone.com, a site under the eWeek umbrella.

A day in the life of a PDF launch

Chris Messina — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 13:22:00 GMT

Happy Independence Day! We’re just 3 days from launching PDF Converter Professional 6 and the team is VERY excited. We have done a good deal of research for this product in regards to how you use PDF Converter Professional. For those of you that participated in our surveys, and gave us feedback on what you felt is important in a PDF solution, I think you’ll see we were listening. We’ve added a bunch of new tools designed to help you work faster, and we’ve made PDF Converter Professional smarter so it can provide shortcuts and suggestions to help you do your job.

Some insight into our launch: At this point the product is done. The final step was the product going through a rigorous quality assurance process (where the team holds its collective breath). To no one’s surprise, but still a great relief, PDF Converter Professional 6 passed with flying colors. These last few days are spent getting all of the marketing material finalized. This time out we have a great guided tour that takes you through some of the key new additions to the product. We also have a feature guide that walks through what makes PDF Converter Professional, better PDF for business. We’ve crossed all of our T’s and dotted all of our I’s, and now we wait patiently, okay not so patiently, to unveil our work to you. Know this, we were listening before and we’re listening now. If you like what we’ve delivered, let us know. If you spot some room for improvement, let us know that too. We welcome your ideas on improving the product.

One last note, to the users who took the time to answer our surveys and to those who took the time to beta test our latest effort and truly put PDF Converter Professional through it’s paces, we thank you. This product is for you, we hope you enjoy it and that it truly delivers better PDF for your business.

Kind Regards,

The Nuance PDF team.

Why you should brand your IVR even though your customers don't call that often

Rebecca — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 19:16:00 GMT

As a practitioner of Nuance's Voice Identity Program (VIP), I've written about extending corporate brands to the IVR, given webcasts on the topic, and do honestly believe it's a good practice. That's why I'm often surprised by resistance to the notion. However, I recently received a pointed question that might explain that resistance - and that might resonate with some of you skeptics out there. Q: Why does an overall brand image matter when most of our customers are not repeat...(read more)

Dragon NaturallySpeaking Holiday Radio Campaign

mgeremia — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 03:58:00 GMT

Hi Dragon Fans, if you live in Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, Seattle or San Francisco, keep your ears perked up for Dragon on the Radio. We have just launched a 5 market radio campaign promoting Dragon for the holidays.

Take a listen and let us know what you think!

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Author Lisa Steadman Dishes on Dragon

Erica Hill — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 19:57:00 GMT

A few years ago, we had the pleasure of meeting Lisa Steadman, best-selling author and relationship coach extraordinaire. Did you know that Lisa has used Dragon NaturallySpeaking to write all of her books? Lisa sat down recently during a break from her busy schedule to tell us why she started talking to Dragon and how it has helped her to become a better writer and speaker. Check out her video here.

Lisa raises an interesting point about "writing through your hands." Many of us are used to conveying our thoughts through our fingers to the keyboard, or to pen and paper. The process of dictating is indeed a significant change in how we create content. It forces us to think ahead a bit more to formulate our thoughts before putting pen to paper...er...voice to microphone. All that said, we've heard from many novelists, bloggers, screenwriters and others who say that using Dragon has actually improved their writing, either by helping them to assemble their thoughts or, in the case of a screenwriter for example, helping them to develop more natural dialogue.

Have a look at Lisa's video and let us know what you think. Has Dragon changed how you create content?

Jon Morrow Video – Speech Recognition for Bloggers

Erica Hill — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 17:16:00 GMT

Jump over to Problogger to check out Jon Morrow's terrific video about speech recognition. This is a great overview that covers everything from sound cards to microphones to PC set-up to software. Jon includes a great demo of Dragon as well!

"Speech recognition technology has come a long way in the last few years – in this in depth, informative and inspiring video which Jon Morrow (Associate Editor of Copyblogger and Co-founder of Partnering Profits) shares his first hand insights into speech recognition for bloggers."

Happy viewing!

Cool Series from GearDiary: Look Ma, No Hands...

Erica Hill — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 15:33:00 GMT

An interesting new series has kicked off over at GearDiary focused on the state of voice recognition technology today. Writer Dan Cohen has started his series with an in-depth look at Dragon NaturallySpeaking. He's even included some great videos that take us through the process of getting started with Dragon.

Hop on over to GearDiary and take a look!

Alex Shines Through!

mgeremia — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 03:45:00 GMT

I'd like to share a story that was submitted to us from a proud parent:

"For our 12 year old son, school was a nightmare. His Aspergers made the work tedious, his dyslexia was frustrating, and his dysgraphia made handwriting extremely difficult and exhausting. According to him, it was torture every day until he met the Dragon. It took a bit of practice and he was frustrated when the dragon didn't understand him. He even was heard reprimanding the dragon for making mistakes! Soon, however, he and the Dragon became fast friends. Sometimes they would play too much and Alex enjoyed tricking the Dragon with sound effects. It's now almost 4 years later and Alex and the Dragon are still friends. Alex has been able to write wonderfully imaginative stories with the help of the Dragon, as well as, complete other academic projects in high school. Now, he and the Dragon talk often which allows his ideas to be communicated more effectively so that the true Alex shines through. Thank you Dragon!"

Are you using Dragon to overcome a learning disability? What about someone you know? Let us know! These stories are great to share, and can really help others who might be struggling alone with learning disabilities.

When touchtone automation isn’t good enough

Jeff Foley — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:33:00 GMT

Today thousands of contact centers are saving even more money by increasing call automation and they continue to keep their customers happy. What's their secret? They have designed their automation system around their customers' needs. Overwhelmingly consumers prefer an easy to use speech interface for phone self-service. Surprisingly, many contact center managers haven't even considered taking advantage of speech technology. Some lack understanding of just how much a great speech solution...(read more)