Voice recognition Articles on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

Hallooo computarrrr! Siri not yet compatible with Scottish accents

by Chris Rawson (Oct 27th, 2011)

Let's open with a reality check: Siri is still in beta. Apple's new voice recognition service is just getting started, and many of us have found out the hard way that Apple's definition of "beta" is closer to what many other developers would call "alpha." That having been said, The Daily Mail's ...

Android's Andy Rubin is not a fan of Siri

by Kelly Hodgkins (Oct 20th, 2011)

Siri is the talk of the town now that the iPhone 4S is in the hands of over four million customers. There has been a deluge of articles about using Siri, funny phrases it says and even clever hacks that let third-party companies tap into the service. Apple and its fans may be excited by the voice ...

Dragon Go for iPhone gets smarter

by Mel Martin (Sep 29th, 2011)

Dragon Go!, the all-purpose voice recognition search app from Nuance, is getting a significant upgrade today. In fact, it's almost a preview of some of the functionality we suspect will be in iOS5. The free app lets you speak conversationally with your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad. Say things ...

Dragon Dictate 2.5 offers support for Microsoft Word 2011

by Steven Sande (Jul 25th, 2011)

Nuance has announced Dragon Dictate 2.5, a free upgrade to the company's Mac voice control/input app for version 2.0 customers. The new version dramatically improves mouse and keyboard entry in Microsoft Word 2011, among other features. According to Nuance, Word 2011 is the most commonly used app ...

Nuance buys SVOX ahead of iOS 5 release

by Mike Schramm (Jun 16th, 2011)

There's a whole trail of rumors hinting at an upcoming deal between speech recognition company Nuance and Apple. For quite a while now (ever since Apple picked up personal assistant software maker Siri), the scuttlebuzz has claimed that the folks in Cupertino would make a deal with Nuance for ...

Weekend rumor roundup: Apple Retail event, new MacBook Airs, unlocked iPhones, more

by Chris Rawson (Jun 12th, 2011)

Several rumors with varying degrees of credibility came up over the weekend. According to AppleInsider, Twitter user @chronicwire (reportedly a source of past Apple leaks) reports that Apple's retail stores are setting up to launch Apple's annual Back to School promotion on Wednesday. The same ...

Is a Nuance and Apple deal in the works?

by Michael Grothaus (May 7th, 2011)

TechCrunch is reporting that Apple is in the process of some sort of deal with Nuance Communications, one of the leading companies in the field of speech recognition. Many readers may be familiar with Nuance's Dragon NaturallySpeaking software, however the Dragon speech engine is also licensed and ...

Apple looking to hire voice technology, speech recognition specialists

by Kelly Hodgkins (Dec 22nd, 2010)

Apple is looking to hire several voice and speech recognition experts for iOS, according to four new postings on Apple's job board. The new hires would join the iOS Application Framework team and would be working on "speech-related development activities." These multiple listings come hot on the ...

Dragon Dictate for Mac now available

by Mel Martin (Sep 20th, 2010)

That didn't take long. Earlier this year, Nuance Communications took over the MacSpeech product, with the intention of improving what was already a good application. That has now been accomplished, and today Dragon Dictate is available for the Macintosh platform -- a reasonably priced upgrade for ...

Vlingo 2 adds more voice power to iPhone

by Michael Rose (Mar 4th, 2010)

In the burgeoning market for iPhone voice recognition apps, the free Dragon Dictate clearly holds the top spot. In fact, this paragraph was dictated using DragonDictate (with some minor edits after the fact). However, the application doesn't always shine when it comes to getting your text quickly ...

Siri for iPhone is like the proverbial Genie in a bottle

by Mel Martin (Feb 5th, 2010)

We're getting closer and closer to some of the stuff we see it science fiction literature and films. Siri [iTunes link] is a small Silicon Valley startup with a really breakthrough product that for now only works on the iPhone. Here's the deal. You download the free app, start it up, and tell it ...

Hey Canada! Dragon Dictation and Dragon Search now in your app store

by Mel Martin (Jan 13th, 2010)

This will please many of our neighbors to the north. Nuance, the creator of Dragon Dictation [U.S. iTunes link] and Dragon Search [U.S. iTunes link] for the iPhone and iPod touch say the U.S. version of the apps is now available in the Canadian iTunes store. These versions support U.S. English ...

Bada Bing! Microsoft delivers Bing search app

by Mel Martin (Dec 16th, 2009)

Search is really getting interesting these days. Microsoft late last night released Bing [iTunes link] for the iPhone -- a full featured free app offering search, movies, maps, and directions, all with voice control. It's notable that Microsoft is going after iPhone mind-share after Steve Ballmer ...

Uh oh! Google releasing free turn by turn GPS app for Android

by Mel Martin (Oct 28th, 2009)

Just when you thought it was safe to buy a nav app for the iPhone, Google goes and announces a free app for Android, and says it's going to be available for the iPhone if Apple will let it into the App Store. The app, called Google Maps Navigation, will ship with phones running the Android OS 2.0 ...

Let your Mac take dictation

by Mel Martin (May 22nd, 2009)

MacSpeech Dictate has now been upgraded to version 1.5, giving the application more accuracy and a new vocabulary editor. The update also includes a new English profile option, allowing you to indicate if your speech has North American, Southern North American, or a Latino North American accent. The ...