Category: tech

Back in 1999, I was excited by the advances in voice recognition products for the PC. Products like Naturally Speaking and ViaVoice seemed to finally offer a way to throw away the keyboard and deal with the computer in a more human fashion.

I had visions of walking into a room and saying, “Computer, play some music, please.” And it would respond, “Certainly, Stephen. Would you like to make a selection?”

I blame Star Trek for this illusion. My first impression of computers came from episodes where Kirk and Spock would ask the computer to solve complex scientific problems. The conversation would go something like this:

Spock: Computer, is it possible to break the warp ten barrier?

Computer: [click click whir] INSUFFICIENT DATA.

Kirk: Hmm. [thoughtful pause] Theorize.

Computer: [whirrrrr click click click whirrrrr] IT IS THEORETICALLY POSSIBLE.

Kirk: Describe procedure.

Computer: [click click click whirrrrr] INSUFFICIENT DATA.

Spock: Captain, I do not believe this will work.

Kirk: Shh! Computer, theorize…

Okay, I guess it wasn’t exactly like that, but those episodes made me want to have a verbal exchange with my computer too. I wanted to accomplish tasks just by asking the computer to do it for me. I wanted to say “theorize” to make the computer perform the impossible. So I rushed out to the local software store and bought a copy of IBM ViaVoice.

Reality, of course, failed to live up to my expectations.

Even after hours of “training”, most of my commands were answered with “I don’t understand your command.” The dictation feature was similarly disappointing. Several days into the fiasco, I was fuming. I decided to write an e-mail to IBM customer service to express my complete and utter disgust with their product. So I started the dictation software and began:

Dear IBM:

I have recently purchased the ViaVoice. And I’m becoming very conscious of the fact that everything nice say is not being dictated correctly.

I’m very disappointed in the software and fully intend to return of 4 full refund. The accuracy, if it can be called the, is beautiful. For example, the last sentence contains the word beautiful. It should have instead of said the proposal. I have no idea where this program is finding these words but it is nothing like Wednesday, or what I and say.

You have no idea how frustrating it can be to speak to the dictation device and not have that dictate what he’s a. I notice that not one single sentence has been correct. If this is intended to be a time saving device that falls across the short of the mark. 0 Fokker!!

Thus ended my experiment with voice recognition.

For lack of anything better to blog about, I’ll post my first test shots from my new camera. I’m still baffled by all of these buttons, knobs, and levers, so bear with me. This is a learning experience.

There’s a dead mouse on my desk. In typical Windows fashion, my computer went all wonky as soon as I needed it most and as soon as there was no support staff. Saturday morning, I sat down to my computer, and the mouse was dead.

I’m almost ashamed to admit that I couldn’t figure out what was wrong with it. Windows claims that the registry is corrupt, but I’ve stopped trusting Windows a long time ago. Tried deleting it from the Hardware Manager, then re-adding it, but to no avail.

When was the last time you used a computer without touching the mouse? It takes a lot of patience. It’s Monday morning now, and I’m waiting for the IS guy to drop by my cubicle. In the meantime, I’m enjoying a moment of mouseless blogging.

I suppose I shouldn’t complain. After all, I happily used mouseless computers for years before mice became de rigeur for PCs.

Hmm. There’s a Mac in the corner. Do I dare…?

Warning: techy stuff ahead. Non-geeks may get glazed look and fall asleep.

For months now, bandwidth thieves have been “borrowing” images from my site for use on their own site or bulletin boards. Today I decided to do something about it. I installed an .htaccess file in my images directory.

As you may know, you can use an .htaccess file to block people from using images that are hosted on your server. You can also use it to replace images with another image of your choice. Some people have suggested using a naughty image for this, so that the thief’s site would then become littered with nekkid people. But I’m not that mean. Also, my hosting service provider wisely prohibits pornographic images on this server.

Instead, I made a simple animated GIF that alternates between solid yellow and solid magenta. Anyone stealing my images will now have a site full of irritating flashing squares. Hmm. Maybe I should reduce the rate of the flashing — I don’t want to induce seizures.

Here’s a sample from the Google cache, just to give you a taste.