There are two programs on my desktop that I consider to be absolutely indispensable. They save me time each and every day and the fact that they are available only on Windows is probably the primary reason I haven\u2019t moved to Linux. The hit to my productivity would simply be too great if I lost access to them.<\/p>\n
They are Nuance\u2019s Dragon NaturallySpeaking<\/a> and Siber Systems\u2019 AI Roboform<\/a>. Anybody who does what I do for a living should consider investing in them.<\/p>\n Dragon has been around for more than 10 years, and they have been eventful ones. In the late 90s, the company that owned the software at the time was a darling of the Internet bubble, reaching valuations in the billions of dollars. <\/span>Then there was a crash, an accounting scandal and some generally negative publicity about speech recognition software. <\/span>The product faded from view for several years, but Nuance picked it up and has continued to develop it.<\/p>\n Speech recognition companies have long claimed accuracy rates north of 90%. <\/span>I’ve never found this to be true, at least in my case. <\/span>NaturallySpeaking version 8 probably gets about eight out of every 10 words correct out of the box, which isn’t bad. <\/span>With training, you can indeed get accuracy up to the 90 to 95% range. <\/span>Here’s a tip: backup your user files, because if you experience a hard disk crash, all of that training will go to waste.<\/p>\n I find that NaturallySpeaking about doubles my word output, which is important when words are a unit of payment. <\/span>Even though I type 90 wpm, I dictate much faster than that and Dragon reduces eyestrain and the risk of repetitive stress injury. <\/span>For $60 on eBay, it was is a great investment.<\/p>\n Roboform is a password manager\/form filler\/password generator and the only shareware I pay for. <\/span>Most browsers have the ability to save passwords but Roboform does a lot more. <\/span>It can store a rich set of information about a user’s identity and automatically fill forms with that data. <\/span>This is enormously useful if you register on a lot of web sites – and who doesn’t these days? <\/span>With Roboform, registration is a one-click process. <\/span>The software also retains information about multiple credit cards and bank accounts, making it easy to fill in that information with one click.<\/p>\n The password manager organizes passwords in a master list that is easy to navigate. To go to any password-protected website, you click on the toolbar icon and select the account. Roboform takes you to the login page and signs you in. <\/span>I am registered on well over 300 web sites, and it would be simply impossible to keep track of them without this program. <\/span>Another very nice feature is that the Roboform user files can be stored on a server. That means that my current database of passwords is available to me from any computer on my network.<\/p>\n Roboform has some quirks that make it annoying at times. <\/span>The vendor seems to release .updates about every week, and upgrading is an intrusive process. <\/span>Also, Roboform has an annoying tendency to try to save login information as a new account, even when the account is already in the database. <\/span>I dislike the number of dialog boxes it throws at me, but that doesn’t change the fact that this is a very useful productivity tool.<\/p>\n I just wish they had it on Linux. There are two programs on my desktop that I consider to be absolutely indispensable. They save me time each and every day and the fact that they are available only on Windows is probably the primary reason I haven\u2019t moved … Continue reading