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Speech recognition technology was originally designed as a tool to ease the often heavy paper work loads in professions such as medicine or law. However, a new technological push towards assisting those with disabilities is upon us. People suffering from a variety of disabilities can benefit from such software, including muscular dystrophy, spinal cord injury, or cerebral palsy. Half the world's population either has a disability or is helping people with disabilities, so you can imagine the possible target audience.
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Speech recognition programs are immediate, fast, and accurate. Speech technology is still in its infancy stage. However, the possibilities are endless and the need for such technology is growing by the day.
Many voice recognition software programs have two modes of operation: dictate mode and command mode. Spelling is almost always correct, drawing from dictionaries of over 200,000 words. Technology is pushing towards the day when the user can wear just one headset and do all the work needed, hands-free. However, it is often necessary to access command mode to make changes in a document, or navigate the computer. You can imagine how bulky and awkward this would be. Dictate mode is the usual method people use when speaking into the microphone. Most programs offer multiple choices for unrecognized words, allowing the user to correctly select the desired word. Command mode allows the user to adjust the document, such as capitalization, insertting a tab, or initializing spell check. h recognition applications not only allows one to transform the spoken word into text, but also allows the user to command nearly every program in the computer; surfing the web and navigating the windows desktop and folder trees are some examples.
Many users also need to wear two separate headsets: one for the voice recognition microphone, and a second for a gyroscope used to control the mouse via head movements.
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