10.0

“Adapt to writing style” – and a caution for multilingual users

Dragon will then offer to start adapting its Vocabulary, presenting a screen entitled “Adapt to your writing

style”. Feel free to skip this simplified customization, which analyzes the texts in your My Documents folder as

well as your sent e-mails; as soon as your profile is created, you can use the powerful, targeted customization

tools described in the following lessons.

IMPORTANT: If some of your documents and emails are in a foreign language or in a radically different

style (think Chaucer or Shakespeare), adapting to these “foreign” texts could actually lower the accuracy, so

do skip this automatic step. The Accuracy Center will let you indicate the specific documents

you want Dragon

to adapt from.

The Speed vs. Accuracy slider and Natural Language Commands

When you start using Dragon 10, the program may present you with a special message if it determined that

your computer’s characteristics wouldn’t allow optimal performance. It will inform you that it has adjusted the

defaults for two of its settings:

• the Speed versus Accuracy slider, and

• Natural Language Commands for Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Corel WordPerfect. (The

lesson “Controlling your Desktop and Applications

” covers these large sets of flexible commands.)

If desired, you can easily reverse these changes through Dragon’s Options dialog: you can enable or disable the

Natural Language Commands for any of these four applications individually, and you can experiment with

various settings of the slider, depending on whether speed of response is more important in your situation. The

Help provides more details, and its Performance Assistant offers many suggestions for optimizing Dragon’s

speed on your computer.

Having given the information needed to create your User profile, you could now start dictating. Before you do,

though, we strongly recommend that you begin personalizing the Vocabulary, since this plays a crucial role

in accuracy and efficiency—this workbook will walk you through easy steps to do just that.

Key points about creating a User profile

9 Each person who wants to dictate with Dragon first needs to create his or her own User profile; this is a

short process, guided through a series of screens called the New User Wizard.

9 Be sure to choose the appropriate dictation source in the first screen of the New User Wizard. The

online Help contains details on special sources like recorders and USB, wireless, or array microphones.

9 You can “enroll” an additional dictation source for an existing profile (for instance, to be able to

dictate into a recorder or an array microphone sometimes). Your various dictation sources will benefit

from the same Vocabulary customizations (special words and phrases, pronunciations, spellings, etc.).

9 When reading the acoustic training text, speak clearly but naturally, using the same volume, pitch and

pace you’ll use day-to-day. Try to read exactly what is prompted as if you were dictating it. Use the

Pause button if you need to clear your throat or speak to someone… When its microphone is on, Dragon

listens to every sound coming from the microphone’s listening side!

9 “Adapt to Writing Style” is an optional step: Dragon adapts its vocabulary to text it finds in your My

Documents folder as well as sent e-mails. (It is meant to introduce the importance of vocabulary

customization.) For best efficiency, skip it; this workbook will present you Dragon’s more targeted and

powerful tools.