Assistive technology to showcase typing demos
Think typing is a pain in the ASDF?
The Assistive Technology Learning Center will be hosting a series of demonstrations next week for people interested in learning about the latest version of a computer program that allows users to type documents and navigate programs simply by talking to the computer.
The program, Dragon Naturally Speaking 9.0, has useful applications for people with disabilities who are unable to type or cannot do so quickly. But Jacob Miller, the assistive technology coordinator, said the software can be beneficial to anyone.
Though he already considered himself to be a decent typist, Miller said when he began using the program, he improved his speed by more than 430 percent. He said the program is about 99 percent accurate and can spell “chrysanthemum” and other difficult words.
“It detects contexts too, which is pretty impressive,” Miller said, citing the example on the program tutorial that correctly distinguishes homophones in the sentence “This bear has a bare bottom.”
“You’re not just typing, you can actually navigate,” Miller said. “You can open and close files, windows. It’s very impressive. I think people need to see it to believe it.”
Brandon Ervin, a freshman majoring in range management, said he just started using the program last week, and it has been easy to learn.
“It’s fairly simple,” Ervin said.
Ervin said the accuracy is good, and the program can be used for a variety of things, not just typing documents.
“Say if you’re doing a math equation, it will put the points in for you,” Ervin said.
Ervin said he has a traumatic brain injury and is not a good typer. He said using the program at the ATLC is convenient and has sped up his homework output.
“It’s going to help a lot,” Ervin said.
Gordon Richins, the consumer liason for the Center for Persons with Disabilities, said he has been using Dragon Naturally Speaking since version 5.0. He said the software has improved with every generation.
Richins, who has quadriplegia, said he uses the program at both home and work. He said faster typing isn’t the only advantage.
“It spells better than I do,” Richins said. “It also inserts commas and periods, so it speeds up sentence structure.”
Miller said the program can be trained to understand accents, slang and other unusual speech patterns, but the newest version doesn’t usually need training. He said the program is becoming more widely used, and the state of Iowa now requires high school students to learn how to use it.
In the future, Miller said the program may be used to help deaf students during class lectures. He said the program could be trained to a professor’s voice in order to produce a transcript of what the professor is saying on a student’s laptop.
“They could see it in real time,” Miller said. “It wasn’t originally designed for that, but we could use it for that.”
Miller said after the demonstrations next week, interested students can buy the Preferred Edition, which normally costs $199.99, for less than $100. There is no obligation to buy the software, and the demonstration sessions are free.
Miller emphasized that the training sessions are not just for people with disabilities.
“We want everybody who wants to come to come,” Miller said. “We’re hoping that people will get excited about it and their proficiency will improve.”
There will be five sessions on April 9 and five on April 13 in Room 154 of the Merrill-Cazier Library. The sessions will run both days from 10:30-11:20 a.m., 11:30 a.m. to 12:20 p.m., 12:30-1:20 p.m., 1:30-2:20 p.m. and 2:30-3:20 p.m.
-jenbeasley@cc.usu.edu