If you haven't noticed by now, I am an advocate of talking to your computer. I regularly use the dictation software and have been more and more using the voice search capabilities. I am also using headset and microphone for participating in GoToMeetings and Skype.
If you are going to be talking to your computer regularly, invest in a decent microphone. I initially tried to use a cheap microphone, and had poor results. It was discouraging and led me to initially shy away from this use. However, due to my specific need to be able to talk to my computer for conference calls, I knew I had to make it work.
Investing in a decent microphone made all the difference. Dictation recognition skyrocketed, calls were much clearer, and voice search better understood what I was saying. I'm not saying you need to drop $100.00 on a microphone/headset, but don't buy a $5.00 microphone and expect great results.
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Tuesday, January 7, 2014
Monday, January 6, 2014
GOOGLE VOICE SEARCH ON THE DESKTOP
I've been using Google Now and Google's voice search on my phone for quite some time. However, I've never really used it much on the desktop. Since I've been dictating more using either Dragon Dictate or Windows Speech Recognition, I find that I have my headset on more often than not while I'm at my desk. Thus, it is much simpler for me to actually use Google's voice search on the desktop when I'm using Chrome as my browser.
There are a number of ways to start a Google Voice search. All of them require that you be on a Google search page. Since I'm always using Chrome, I usually just have to open a new tab which takes me to a page with a Google search bar on it.
From there, you can click on the microphone on the right side of the search bar and then speak your Google search.
There are a number of ways to start a Google Voice search. All of them require that you be on a Google search page. Since I'm always using Chrome, I usually just have to open a new tab which takes me to a page with a Google search bar on it.
From there, you can click on the microphone on the right side of the search bar and then speak your Google search.
I prefer just to use the keyboard shortcut in chrome to start a voice search: ctrl+shift+period. This automatically starts the search.
Lastly, Google has released an extension called Google Voice Search Hotword (Beta). It is supposed to allow you to just say "Ok, Google" like you do on your phone and open the voice search. However, I have not been able to get it to work on my computer, so I am unable to weigh in on how well it actually works.
Using your voice to control the computer is not yet for everyone, but it is starting to come along. Features like Google Voice Search are likely the beginning phases of this technology.
Friday, January 3, 2014
MY REVIEW OF THE JAWBONE JAMBOX
For the last few weeks, I've been using the Jawbone Jambox, and I think it is worth talking about here.
If you're not familiar with it, the Jambox is a relatively small Bluetooth speaker at less than 6 inches in length and 2" inches in depth and weighing less than a pound. Yet, I've found the sound quality that comes out of it to be clear and rich, containing decent sound at both the high and low ends. I regularly have been using it to play both audio-books as well as streaming music from Spotify and have been happy on both counts.
It has a 3.5 mm stereo jack that you can use to plug in your phone if you like or any other audio output device. However, I have found that using the Bluetooth capabilities to be wonderful. I've been able to walk throughout both my house and the office and still maintain connectivity with the Jambox.
And I think the best part has been the battery life. It boasts one the website a 15 hour battery life. But I've used it for 8 hours straight and it said that it still has 3/4 battery life left.
As far as down sides I've found is that the total overall volume could be louder. And the volume is fairly directional, so that I've found that you really want to have it pointing directly at you. Yet these downsides are not deal breakers by any means. The biggest downside could be the price, which seems a bit steep for a speaker this size.
Now, for the reason for bringing this up on this blog. Where I practice, I find myself in relatively small domestic relations court rooms on a somewhat regular basis. Rooms where the sound output of the Jambox would be sufficiently loud to be heard throughout the court room. I often have situations where I want to play a voice message left on my client's phone or the audio from a video they took on their phone. The Jambox would be an ideal way to play these things directly from my client's phone for the court and have better sound quality than the phone's speakers.
Over all, I've been exceptionally happy with the Jambox, and I think others who like to use their phone to play audio will find it's ease of use and quality make this a useful device for some offices.
If you're not familiar with it, the Jambox is a relatively small Bluetooth speaker at less than 6 inches in length and 2" inches in depth and weighing less than a pound. Yet, I've found the sound quality that comes out of it to be clear and rich, containing decent sound at both the high and low ends. I regularly have been using it to play both audio-books as well as streaming music from Spotify and have been happy on both counts.
It has a 3.5 mm stereo jack that you can use to plug in your phone if you like or any other audio output device. However, I have found that using the Bluetooth capabilities to be wonderful. I've been able to walk throughout both my house and the office and still maintain connectivity with the Jambox.
And I think the best part has been the battery life. It boasts one the website a 15 hour battery life. But I've used it for 8 hours straight and it said that it still has 3/4 battery life left.
As far as down sides I've found is that the total overall volume could be louder. And the volume is fairly directional, so that I've found that you really want to have it pointing directly at you. Yet these downsides are not deal breakers by any means. The biggest downside could be the price, which seems a bit steep for a speaker this size.
Now, for the reason for bringing this up on this blog. Where I practice, I find myself in relatively small domestic relations court rooms on a somewhat regular basis. Rooms where the sound output of the Jambox would be sufficiently loud to be heard throughout the court room. I often have situations where I want to play a voice message left on my client's phone or the audio from a video they took on their phone. The Jambox would be an ideal way to play these things directly from my client's phone for the court and have better sound quality than the phone's speakers.
Over all, I've been exceptionally happy with the Jambox, and I think others who like to use their phone to play audio will find it's ease of use and quality make this a useful device for some offices.
Tuesday, December 31, 2013
EVER WISH YOU COULD UN-SEND AN EMAIL? A RULE CAN HELP WITH THAT
We've all done it before. You hit the send button on an email and instantly realized you sent it to the wrong person, or you misspelled something, or you forgot to attach the attachment. Perhaps worst of all, you sent the email out of feelings of frustration or anger and realized too late that sending it wasn't such a good idea.
Once the send button is pressed, it is difficult to impossible to get it back from the receiver. However, you can set up Outlook to not instantly send your emails once you hit the send button. I have mine set to delay sending the email by one minute. It might not seem like a lot, but it is enough time for you to double check your email if you want before it is actually sent out. In an average week, I probably change three of four emails after I have initially hit the send button because of this.
To delay sending emails like this, you need to create a rule. Open Outlook and click on the File tab in the ribbon. Then, choose "Manage Rules & Alerts" in the Info area. In the window that pops up, click on "New Rule" near the top, which will open a new window.
Now, we are going to create a rule that applies to every email sent, so click on "Apply rule on messages I send" and choose next.
In the next window you can narrow down the application of the rule to only certain situations if you like. However, I prefer to have it delay all of my emails, so you can just click next. A pop up will remind you that your new rule will apply to all emails, which is what you want.
In the next window, check the box next to "defer delivery by a number of minutes". Then, in the lower window, click on the link "a number of minutes" and tell it how many minutes you want things delayed by. I chose one, but you can choose however many you like.
In the next window, you can choose situations in which you don't want to delay sending an email. There may be some situations where this makes sense for, but for me, I like having an across the board rule, so I just clicked next. In the last window, give the rule a name and make sure the box next to "Turn on this rule" is checked. Then hit finish.
From now on, when you hit the send button on an email, it will sit in your outbox for the number of minutes you set out in the rule before it is actually sent. Thus, giving you time to either edit the email, add the attachment you forgot, or to decide not to send it after all.
So, even if you have hit the send button, you now have a chance to un-send that ill formed email.
Once the send button is pressed, it is difficult to impossible to get it back from the receiver. However, you can set up Outlook to not instantly send your emails once you hit the send button. I have mine set to delay sending the email by one minute. It might not seem like a lot, but it is enough time for you to double check your email if you want before it is actually sent out. In an average week, I probably change three of four emails after I have initially hit the send button because of this.
To delay sending emails like this, you need to create a rule. Open Outlook and click on the File tab in the ribbon. Then, choose "Manage Rules & Alerts" in the Info area. In the window that pops up, click on "New Rule" near the top, which will open a new window.
Now, we are going to create a rule that applies to every email sent, so click on "Apply rule on messages I send" and choose next.
In the next window you can narrow down the application of the rule to only certain situations if you like. However, I prefer to have it delay all of my emails, so you can just click next. A pop up will remind you that your new rule will apply to all emails, which is what you want.
In the next window, check the box next to "defer delivery by a number of minutes". Then, in the lower window, click on the link "a number of minutes" and tell it how many minutes you want things delayed by. I chose one, but you can choose however many you like.
In the next window, you can choose situations in which you don't want to delay sending an email. There may be some situations where this makes sense for, but for me, I like having an across the board rule, so I just clicked next. In the last window, give the rule a name and make sure the box next to "Turn on this rule" is checked. Then hit finish.
From now on, when you hit the send button on an email, it will sit in your outbox for the number of minutes you set out in the rule before it is actually sent. Thus, giving you time to either edit the email, add the attachment you forgot, or to decide not to send it after all.
So, even if you have hit the send button, you now have a chance to un-send that ill formed email.
Friday, December 27, 2013
ONE WAY TO HANDLE EMAILS WHEN CLOSING A FILE
At the end of a case, I often will have several emails between myself and either opposing counsel or my client. As I receive and send emails, I always move those emails into the client's folder in my email inbox so that they are all kept together. But when it comes time to close a case, I don't like having to keep that client's email folder in my inbox. If I did that, my inbox folder list would be too large to easily navigate.
I am left with a few options. I could print out a copy of all of those emails and put with the physical folder. This keeps true to the notion that we should treat email like letters. But, the wanton destruction of trees and the waste of physical space is more than I care for.
Since we have both Adobe Pro XI and Outlook 2010, I've been using the option of converting an entire email folder and its contents into a PDF portfolio. As long as you have Adobe Pro loaded, you should be able to right click on the email folder, and at the bottom of the pop-up menu, you will have an option called Convert "<folder name>" to Adobe PDF.
Click on this and tell it where you want the new PDF portfolio saved. It will then convert all of your emails to PDF documents and store them as a PDF portfolio. This allows you to still easily navigate all of your emails in PDF format. During the conversion process, everything is made word searchable, so you can still search through those emails. Additionally, it brings all of the attachments with it, so you can double click on an attachment and it will open. It still has the look and feel of reading your emails in Outlook, but they are now PDF documents ready for long term storage.
By converting everything in this manner, you will be able to keep an electronic copy of your emails in your now former clients electronic folder and not clogging up your email inbox.
I am left with a few options. I could print out a copy of all of those emails and put with the physical folder. This keeps true to the notion that we should treat email like letters. But, the wanton destruction of trees and the waste of physical space is more than I care for.
Since we have both Adobe Pro XI and Outlook 2010, I've been using the option of converting an entire email folder and its contents into a PDF portfolio. As long as you have Adobe Pro loaded, you should be able to right click on the email folder, and at the bottom of the pop-up menu, you will have an option called Convert "<folder name>" to Adobe PDF.
Click on this and tell it where you want the new PDF portfolio saved. It will then convert all of your emails to PDF documents and store them as a PDF portfolio. This allows you to still easily navigate all of your emails in PDF format. During the conversion process, everything is made word searchable, so you can still search through those emails. Additionally, it brings all of the attachments with it, so you can double click on an attachment and it will open. It still has the look and feel of reading your emails in Outlook, but they are now PDF documents ready for long term storage.
By converting everything in this manner, you will be able to keep an electronic copy of your emails in your now former clients electronic folder and not clogging up your email inbox.
Thursday, December 26, 2013
CREATING RULES IN OUTLOOK
Due to the holidays, I was out of the office for a bit, but I'm back now and anxious to get back to blogging.
A number of attorneys and firms use Microsoft Outlook as their email client. One of the features of Outlook is the ability to create a "rule" that tells Outlook what to do with your email when it arrives.
As an example, I am signed up to receive email from a number of different listservs, one of which is the Ohio Bar Association Daily Report. As you can guess, most are devoted to technology issues. All email from the listserv comes from the same address, regardless of who sends it. It would be helpful if all of those emails would automatically be put in the folder in which I keep those emails. I can then read them when I have time and they aren't clogging my inbox.
There are a number of ways to create rules, but for this post, we're going to assume you have no experience creating rules. Start by opening an email from the sender you want the rule to apply to. For our example, I would open one of the Ohio Bar Association Daily Reports. In the Message tab of the email's ribbon, there is the "move" group. And within it is a button called "Rules".
Click on Rules and choose "Always Move Messages From: <email address>". Note that <email address> will be filled in with the email address of the sender of the email you had opened. This will cause a new window to pop-up. In the new window, highlight the folder you want Outlook to put all new emails from this sender in. If you don't already have such a folder, you can create one by highlighting where you want the folder to be and clicking new.
When you choose OK, it will run the rule on your entire inbox, moving any email in your inbox from that address to the folder you chose. Then, when you receive new emails in the future, it will automatically move them to your folder, automatically sorting your email for you.
Friday, December 20, 2013
OPEN WORD DOCUMENTS WITHOUT RUNNING STARTUP MACROS
In our office, I have been creating a number of MS Word templates that run macros or other code as soon as they are opened. It could be code that the macro automatically adds our letterhead to the document or that it pulls up a user form that gets information from the place in the document.
People prefer to access these templates in different ways; they sometimes open the template and other times they add a new document based on the template. I have found that it is sometimes easier to code around people's preferences than to try to get them to change their preferences. As a result, I have the templates set up to run the code regardless of how they access the document.
The up side to this is that the end users have the code run regardless of how they enter the document. The down side is that it could make it harder to edit the template when changes need made. In fact, I thought I had created uneditable templates because no matter how the template was opened, it always created a new document and would not give me a chance to change the template. This, naturally, led to frantic Google searching.
The point of this story is to point out that you can open a template or other document without running any macros or code that are otherwise supposed to run at start. To do so, hold down the shift key while the document opens, and none of those codes will run.
Just hoping to help out others who may have a similar problem.
People prefer to access these templates in different ways; they sometimes open the template and other times they add a new document based on the template. I have found that it is sometimes easier to code around people's preferences than to try to get them to change their preferences. As a result, I have the templates set up to run the code regardless of how they access the document.
The up side to this is that the end users have the code run regardless of how they enter the document. The down side is that it could make it harder to edit the template when changes need made. In fact, I thought I had created uneditable templates because no matter how the template was opened, it always created a new document and would not give me a chance to change the template. This, naturally, led to frantic Google searching.
The point of this story is to point out that you can open a template or other document without running any macros or code that are otherwise supposed to run at start. To do so, hold down the shift key while the document opens, and none of those codes will run.
Just hoping to help out others who may have a similar problem.
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