• Dictation Resource Kit (DRK):  This is fantastic if you have a speech application that requires a specialized vocabulary.  For example, say you’re building a product for the medical or legal professions, where there’s a lot of specialized terminology.  You can use this tool to build a language model for your domain that can be used with the speech recognition engine in Windows.  Maybe in a few months I’ll put together a sample and blog about it.
• I’ve been playing a lot with the Bing client on my iPhone, which uses our speech engine in the cloud so you can tell it what you want to search for.  Very *very* cool.  Try it out.  It’s also available on Windows Mobile – actually it was there first, and it’s also excellent.
• TellMe.  This is an astoundingly impressive operation, delivering state-of-the-art IVR phone services (i.e. automated phone applications that work extremely well).  For example, there’s a good chance that when you dial 411 (directory assistance) in the US, it’s a TellMe app that’s answering the phone. 
• The speech macro recorder for Windows is a lot of fun.  Basically, you just fill it with your own custom voice commands so that you can customize the way you control programs with your voice.
• If you’re using speech recognition on Windows and you get a new computer, you don’t need to retrain the new computer to learn your voice.  Just use the profile tool to back-up your profile from your old computer and put it on your new one.

Years ago, when I started this blog, it was to talk about speech APIs, and I'm going to return to those roots, 'coz it's cool, it's fun, it's what I work on, and judging by the page hit stats, at least some of you liked what I wrote about.

BTW, check this out.  Speech is now a top level item in the MSDN Library:

Yep, SAPI, embedded, servers and Tellme documentation, all in one place:

Also, look at the System.Speech.XXXX namespaces for the .Net Framework speech API (e.g. System.Speech.Recognition, etc).

If you’re not sure what some of these technologies are, the microsoft.com/speech site should help (it also has a nice new facelift):

It's awesome to be working on speech again.  Did I mention that?

Cheers,

/Rob

Microsoft announced a round of layoffs on Tuesday, and I was included.  With the economy the way it is, it's understandable that cut-backs need to be made.  I'm no longer working on Response Point.

For now, I'm focusing on figuring out what I'm going to do next, and won't spend much time on this blog.  So, if you find yourself clicking through to this blog, and you have a question you want to ask:

1. There is still a team working on Response Point.  For ongoing help with Response Point, please refer to the main Response Point blog: https://blogs.technet.com/rp, where you can ask questions.  If you have any questions about how these cuts affect the project, here's an initial blurb: https://blogs.technet.com/rp/archive/2009/05/07/next-chapter-for-response-point.aspx.  You can mail John Frederiksen directly if you have specific questions (he's the general manager - johnfre@microsoft.com).
2. If you have questions about speech APIs, speech recognition, or speech synthesis, it's years since I posted on any of that stuff, but I still get a lot of questions about it, and google analytics shows that half the hits I get on this blog are from searches related to speech technology. That's kinda cool :-).  Please mail sapi5@microsoft.com, or check Rob Chambers' blog https://blogs.msdn.com/robch/.  

I'll update this blog when things get clearer for me.

Thanks,

 /Rob

Michael Forester just sent me this helpful note:

> Good article but lacks details on how to perfom some of the tasks 

> which someone new to SBS 2008 and Exchange 2007 would require. I 

> found an easier and more flexible solution which allowed Response 

> Point and an HP MFP Scanner to relay mail to SBS 2008 with one 

> configuration change. See: Allowing app server relay off Exchange 

> 2007 (https://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2006/12/28/432013.aspx).

> 

> Thanks,

> 

> Michael

 Thanks Michael,

 /Rob

Q: (From Bill) We just installed our first response point system and I have a quick question on getting a basic setup configured. The company has a receptionist group setup but if they're on the phone they want the call to be redirected to the autoattendant. I cannot figure out how to do this. Can anyone tell me how to redirect an incoming call to the auto attendant if the receptionists are on the phone

A: (From Phil) You can do this by setting the Call Handling rules for the receptionist. This can be done by logging into the Assistant program as the receptionist or by editing the receptionist user in the Administrator program. From Administrator, do the following:

1) On the Phone System page, right-click on the receptionist user
2) Click Edit User
3) Click the Call Handling tab
4) In the call forwarding section, click "Do the following" and select "Forward call to Automated Receptionist"
5) Click OK

In Assistant, do the following:

1) Clicking Call Handling on the Settings menu
2) In the call forwarding section, click "Do the following" and select "Forward call to Automated Receptionist"
3) Click OK

----- 

I *finally* got onto twitter.  Yes, I'll be upgrading from my abacus and slide rule tomorrow.

I shall now beg for friends: please add @akarob.

(The hardest thing about having such a common name is getting a decent account name whenever i sign up to a new service...)

(Off topic, but speaking of comics, I just finished reading Bone.  Yeah, I’m a bit behind the times.  It’s as good as they say it is.  Get the ones published by Scholastic/Graphix – they’re in color.)

For example:

Don't recognise this screen?  It's part of the Response Point Assistant.  Take a look at this video about using Assistant.  The video's about 7 minutes long, and the voicemail to email bit is around 4:30.

 'nuff said.