[comp.sys.amiga] VoRecOne really works!

scot@amigash.UUCP (Scot L. Harris) (12/01/89)

[I wonder if the line eater ever gets indigestion?]

	Several weeks ago I called Impulse to order the SV upgrade for 
Turbo Silver and was given the chance to get VoRecOne at a pretty good
price.  VoRecOne is a voice recognition system for the Amiga.  So now,
you Amiga can not only talk to you but it can listen to you and perform
actions based on what you say!  

	I have not seen mention of this little device on the net so
figured I would give you my initial impressions after about 3 days
of playing with it.  

	The hardware itself consists of a small blue box connected to
the joy stick port and a microphone.  The disk provided contains an editor
program and a player type program called recone.  With the editor program
you create what I guess is called a voice script, a list of words and
actions to be performed when those words are activated.  The script language
that comes with VoRecOne appears to be fairly comprehensive, although I have
not tried some of the more advanced features yet.  (one feature of interest
to some is the REXX command that allows you to send commands to other
programs that have AREXX interfaces)

	Once you have your voice script typed in you then train the system
to recognize your voice for each word.  This is a fairly quick operation
where the system displays each word you are to train and you speak into
the mic.  The system requests each word twice, sometimes more, and then
moves on to the next word.  You can go back later and retrain particular
words if they don't work well.  

	After saving your work you can then use the test mode to check
out the script and make sure it does what you want.  When you say a word
in test mode a requester pops up telling you what the system thinks you
said.  You can then ignore it or let it perform the actions in the script
designated for that word.  

	There is a use mode in the editor to allow further testing I assume.
In normal operation you would use the recon program which is a player
type program.  Recon has a small window associated with it which can
display the words currently available if you want.  It also allows you to
disable/enable VoRecOne.  

	The hit rate on it appears to be pretty good.  I would estimate that it
gets the correct word about 75  to 90% of the time.  I expect this will
improve as I get use to using it.  


	The number of words that can be taught appears to be unlimited.
There are commands that allow loading of new word lists on the fly.

	IMHO this is a pretty slick little device!


--
          _                                                                
    ///  /_\      Scot L. Harris !hoptoad!peora!{tarpit,rtmvax}!amigash!scot 
  \XX/  /   \ M I G A   2872 Stallion Dr., Orlando, FL 32822  (407)273-1759 
[VoRecOne by Impulse.  Now my Amiga hears me, but does it really listen to me?]

root@ccave.UUCP (Juergen Hermann) (12/05/89)

In article <2184.AA2184@amigash> scot@amigash.UUCP (Scot L. Harris) writes:
>figured I would give you my initial impressions after about 3 days
>of playing with it.

Your report was very interesting, and I have a few questions:

Could you please inform us of your impressions when you played with it
for more than 3 days? :-)  If you're as enthusiastic after 3 weeks, I
might consider to buy it.

And please post the full address of the company that produces this thing.
And prices, if you have them.

>	The hit rate on it appears to be pretty good.  I would estimate that it
>gets the correct word about 75  to 90% of the time.  I expect this will

Is this the rate (75 to 90%) for not recognizing a word at all, or the
rate for getting a wrong word from the list, or both? How often does it
misinterpret words when the list of words is *long*.

--
   //  Juergen Hermann		root@ccave.smurf.ira.uka.de
 \X/   75 Karlsruhe 1, FRG	Fido: 2:241/2.1212@FidoNet