Hello everyone (again),
some more information for you on this topic, and some direct answers to
your questions Mark.
Cheers,
Dave ;-)
>>> Annabel Gregory Friday, 22 November 2002 >>>
Hi All,
This is an interesting topic, and a question that has come up quite
often - voice seems like the natural and intuitive way to interact with
technology, however I don't think technology has quite caught up with
what we want yet. However, on a positive note, we are experimenting with
a new email program which almost meets the criteria in the original
email - that is a simple way to send a message using voice.
Web Trek Connect software (from Ablelink) is an email program that can
be set up with a photo based address book - you just click on the
picture of the person you want to send to. The program then prompts you
to record a voice message which is automatically compressed and sent as
an attachment. Incoming email can be read out loud by a speech
synthesiser. A person with dementia may still need some assistance to
start the computer and ensure it is connected to the net etc, but it
might meed the need described more than currently available voice
recognition technology. This program was designed for people with an
intellectual disability, but I think its application can be a lot wider
than this. More information is available on our website at:
http://regencyrehab.cca.org.au/catalog/gp_698.htm
To answer some of the questions about voice recognition for ECU, we
have a number of people who have purchased the Sicare Light and we are
getting generally positive feedback.
- how frequent are the spurious activations from extraneous noise?
does putting them in sleep mode help?
There are issues with extraneous noise accidentally activating the
system, so it is worth sending it to sleep when you aren't actively
controlling things. Sometimes extraneous noise will wake the device up
again but the chances are less.
- what types and what proportion of people find these devices
acceptable and what are their reasons for accepting/rejecting them?
Our biggest customer group is people who have had a spinal injury.
Subjectively, I think the reasons for accepting them are that the device
is simple to use, looks quite good and meets some needs for ECU around
the home. I haven't followed up all our users to see how many devices
are in active use further down the track, though this would be an
interesting exercise.
- do these devices work for people with speech problems (I'm
specifically interested in severe dysarthria)and what level of
recognition is possible?
I haven't had anyone with a severe problem try the Sicare Light yet. I
have had some success with trials with people who have relatively low
volume and poor projection and clarity. However in a noisier
environment they are more likely to have problems.
I'm looking forward to any other comments on this topic.
Regards
Annabel Gregory
Annabel Gregory
Computer Access Specialist
Regency Park Rehabilitation Engineering
Days Rd, Regency Park
PO Box 2438, Regency Park SA 5942
Phone: 08 8243 8288
Freecall: 1800 243 246
Fax: 08 8243 8337
Email: [log in to unmask]
Web: http://regencyrehab.cca.org.au
>>> [log in to unmask] 22/11/2002 8:13:56 am >>>
Hello everyone,
I thought you might be interested in the following discussion that is
happening on a UK based AT listserv that I am subscribed to. It might
even begin similar discussions on this list. If you have any comments,
I
can forward them back to the UK list for further discussion. The
emails
appear in reverse order, with the original one at the very bottom
(sorry
for the length of this email).
Cheers,
Dave ;-)
>>> [log in to unmask] Thursday, 21 November 2002 >>>
Dear All
I'm glad Barry has started this line of discussion. I would be very
interested if people could share their experience of speech
recognition
environmental control systems, specifically:
- how frequent are the spurious activations from extraneous noise?
does putting them in sleep mode help?
- what level of recognition are people getting from these devices in
'real' situations?
- what types and what proportion of people find these devices
acceptable and what are their reasons for accepting/rejecting them?
- do these devices work for people with speech problems (I'm
specifically interested in severe dysarthria)and what level of
recognition is possible?
has anyone done any rigorous testing of these devices?
I'd be grateful for your views/experience
Mark
p.s. you may be interested in a research project we are running on
speech recognition and dysarthria on
http://www.dcs.shef.ac.uk/~pdg/stardust/
Professor Mark Hawley
Barnsley District General Hospital NHS Trust
Gawber Road
Barnsley S75 2EP
Tel: +44 (0) 1226 777726
Secretary: +44 (0) 1226 730000 ext 2689
Fax: +44 (0) 1226 208159
email: [log in to unmask]
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