In SL New England we have an older resident who is having trouble... serious trouble... with typing, but she's still very anxious to participate in community life. A mutual friend told me that she thought she'd heard notice of a Voice > Chat tool that one could use in SL. Since I'd never heard of that, I queried the SL Tech Forum. The only reply I've gotten is the suggestion that I try Dragon Naturally Speaking, which the respondent thought worked with SL.
Dragon Naturally Speaking has been around a very long time, but it never occurred to me to try it. It was developed by IBM, but is now a separate company. I checked into it, and found that I could get a copy on Amazon for about US$53. Feeling that I myself might want to use it (I'm not getting any younger... and typing is always a chore!), I figured I'd get a copy, and if it worked well, recommend it to my friend in New England.
Well, I've just installed it and tried it out. Had a nice chat with Rosie via IM, using MOSTLY it. I think Rosie can testify... for someone who JUST that hour got it installed and was trying to learn it, it worked VERY well! So I thought that I'd bring it up here for any one in the community is finding typing a real chore, especially in meetings, and would love to be able to just talk!
If you're interested, here's how it works. You set it all up first... you have to give it a little training to get to know your voice. But once its set up, you launch it, and it shows as a little red button at the top of your screen. You click the button to turn the mic on (button goes green) and click again to turn it off.
So then you go into SL (I use Firestorm) and open a chat box or an IM box. Be sure your cursor is there... ready to type. Be sure the button is green (the mic is on). Then just talk. Dragon realizes that you're in an unsupported application, and it pops open a Dictation Box, where your words get typed out. When you finish your sentence, you click a Transfer button at the bottom of the Box. The text goes into the SL Chat box, and the Dictation Box disappears. Then you just hit Enter to transmit the sentence.
1) Talk
2) Transfer
3) Enter
Feels like one click too many, but I guess since Firestorm is "Unsupported", that's what you get. Regardless, talking with Rosie, I was able to gab on and on in a way I never could with typing.
Just a suggestion for those of you who may feel a bit isolated cause your typing skills aren't that great... or people who just ARE TIRED of so much typing!
Sudane.............................
