Voice Recognition for Log?

[SwellGuy]

The good ASR (automatic speech recognition) engines are mainly in the cloud: siri, alexa, etc, all just know how to hear their wakeup word locally. This activates the cloud connection where audio is streamed and the speech recognition happens. So maybe really good speech recognition doesn't fit in a box.

On the other hand, these systems also do the much harder work of natural language processing to deduce your intention from the words you spoke, and from out there in the cloud they can reach in and touch any number of other cloud connected services (to get the weather you are asking it for, or to turn the lights on and off by talking to your cloud connected iot robot house), so theres plenty of good reason for them to be in the cloud. So maybe just the speech to text part could fit in a box. And obviously thats all you need for simple dictation.

Although, why isn’t that the standard practice, then...

[B23iL23]

What you're looking for is a Dictation app, and not a voice engine like Siri or Google. Something like the old Dragon app - the issue you will have is that a lot of the time you will have no internet connection (so no Siri etc) and so all the language files will have to be stored locally.

[tarian]

Originally Posted by B23iL23

What you're looking for is a Dictation app, and not a voice engine like Siri or Google. Something like the old Dragon app - the issue you will have is that a lot of the time you will have no internet connection (so no Siri etc) and so all the language files will have to be stored locally.

Yes this is what I was thinking when I read this thread

A good dictaphone and the software to upload it onto files on your computer that you can then chronological and put into relevant . files
Used to do this for all my University lectures , would take them home and upload then and file them ,, then I could go back anytime and find them
Most Dictaphones will have software to upload and then you can have a back up filing system that automatically saves a back up.
I know there is an extra step in this i,e you will talk then have to upload but if dictaphone is permanently connected to computer it should only be a click away
Might try this for myself . my hand writing is terrible never mind on a pitching boat

[Montanan]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Siri is awful, and I bet there has been great progress with voice recognition since then.
. . .

I don't find Siri to be awful. I recall a couple of years ago traveling to Miami Beach to attend our private company's Board of Directors meeting at our lead investor's private satellite office, which was located in a office building directly across the hallway from the Elite Modeling agency. It was the last day for trading football players [a.k.a. in the USA, soccer players] in Europe's premier leagues and our lead investor / director was distracted and busy reviewing and executing last minute trades of the major football team he owned so he asked if the rest of us might go to lunch as the time period for ending player trading would be concluded in Europe by the end of our lunch break in America. He suggested a nice restaurant a few blocks away. As we exited the office building onto the sidewalk we weren't sure which way to turn to go to the restaurant so our CEO took out his Apple phone and asked Siri for directions to where the restaurant was. He asked Siri just as two incredibly beautiful young ladies were walking by and were headed to enter the office building [to go to the Elite Modeling agency no doubt], one of the ladies overheard my CEO's question to Siri and stopped and provide directions and then she entered the building. I recall telling my CEO after the ladies had entered the building: Wow, so that's what Siri looks like!

Of course, one can change Siri to be any number of voices.

It remains a very strong motivation for me to consider changing over from my Samsung Android smartphone to an Apple phone just so I could have exchange of communications with Siri. Saying "Okay, Google" just doesn't conjure up the same image to me.

[Montanan]

Dictaphones recorded to wax continues to work fine.

[tarian]

Originally Posted by Montanan

Dictaphones recorded to wax continues to work fine.

Thats my Dictaphone you get your own (a very good resemblance of me as well , so you owe me money for my Picture as well)

[Montanan]

Originally Posted by tarian

Thats my Dictaphone you get your own (a very good resemblance of me as well , so you owe me money for my Picture as well)

Ah then, Mr. Edison ye be going on 172 years young and still enjoying the cruising lifestyle, good on you.

Or perhaps are you Alexander Graham Bell who would say, Ahoy ahoy, when answering his telephone? Bell originally suggested 'ahoy-hoy' be adopted as the standard greeting when answering a telephone, before 'hello' (suggested by Thomas Edison) became common. Reference photo of AGB:

[hellosailor]

If you don't want to spend a hundred bucks on Nuance (Dragon Dictate) or have an OS and computer with enough hp to natively do voice response (I know Win7 and up have it, not quite up to StarFleet standards) there must be cheaper ways.

But it still requires lots of CPU, and the ability to speak "Tom Brokaw the air traffic controller with no accent" language.

I notice that when I say the word "the" VR systems have no trouble with it. I pronounce it "thee". Nope, humans mishear it as "vee" all the time. If I say "thuh" as is "duh" then they figure out it is "the". Go figure.

On top of that, there's still the problem that although digital signatures have been legally accepted by federal law since the Carter days (something to finally think Jimmy for?) no one really knows it. Banks, brokers, you give 'em a digitally signed email or digital form, PDF, they say "No, you have to sign it and fax or mail it to me."

The only industry that has any concept of digital signatures is real estate. Apparently "But I need those papers, signed, NOW" is enough to motivate them to understand these things. Or at least, recognize them. For the average poor slob, simply GETTING a digital signature or certificate, and then figuring out how to use it, takes a lot of time or money or both. And then, no one still knows how to use it.

You try telling the Royal Navy or the USCG or your insurer "No, really, those members mean it is real and unaltered." Eh, like teaching a pig to play the piano, as Mr. Twain said.

Easy enough to do a voice log, just choose the transcription software of your choice. Authentication? Ah, that will be an expensive computer forensics challenge, when or if the log ever needs to be admitted into evidence. No matter HOW you do it, because you'll be breaking new ground on that.

[Macblaze]

And there is no hope for the Scots...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAz_UvnUeuU

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by hellosailor

If you don't want to spend a hundred bucks on Nuance (Dragon Dictate) or have an OS and computer with enough hp to natively do voice response (I know Win7 and up have it, not quite up to StarFleet standards) there must be cheaper ways.

But it still requires lots of CPU, and the ability to speak "Tom Brokaw the air traffic controller with no accent" language.

I notice that when I say the word "the" VR systems have no trouble with it. I pronounce it "thee". Nope, humans mishear it as "vee" all the time. If I say "thuh" as is "duh" then they figure out it is "the". Go figure.

On top of that, there's still the problem that although digital signatures have been legally accepted by federal law since the Carter days (something to finally think Jimmy for?) no one really knows it. Banks, brokers, you give 'em a digitally signed email or digital form, PDF, they say "No, you have to sign it and fax or mail it to me."

The only industry that has any concept of digital signatures is real estate. Apparently "But I need those papers, signed, NOW" is enough to motivate them to understand these things. Or at least, recognize them. For the average poor slob, simply GETTING a digital signature or certificate, and then figuring out how to use it, takes a lot of time or money or both. And then, no one still knows how to use it.

You try telling the Royal Navy or the USCG or your insurer "No, really, those members mean it is real and unaltered." Eh, like teaching a pig to play the piano, as Mr. Twain said.

Easy enough to do a voice log, just choose the transcription software of your choice. Authentication? Ah, that will be an expensive computer forensics challenge, when or if the log ever needs to be admitted into evidence. No matter HOW you do it, because you'll be breaking new ground on that.

I'm sure I'm not the only person keeping an electronic log. Email is used every day in courts, so really -- there is no special difficulty with using electronic documents as evidence, if its required. It's no more complicated than proving the authenticity of a physical signature, even if no special care has been taken like using digital signatures.



As to how the world has gone -- I haven't worked in the U.S. in a few decades, so I can't say whether we're lagging so far behind the times as you seem to indicate, but over here in Northern Europe, the business world is almost completely paperless already. Other than the odd document that needs to be signed in front of a notary. I borrowed €10 million for one project last month, and not a single piece of paper was involved. Truly, no trees were harmed! Even the title to the real estate involved is electronic. I don't think I've signed a paper contract of any kind in years, and I don't even have a filing cabinet in my office. Most contracts aren't even digitally signed -- just a scan of a signature in a PDF, using Adobe Fill & Sign -- widely practiced here, and legally valid. We have damned good servers, though, with a complex system of backup and archiving.



So electronic log -- speaking as a lawyer -- no problem.






As to dictation -- is Dragon still the state of the art? My boat computer runs Win 10 but has a pretty light CPU. This might be a decent excuse to upgrade if that turns out not to be enough power.

[MikeDofFreo]

In my view the computer technology has only just caught up with Dragon. I now use it with a PC with i7 CPU and 16Gbs RAM. The results are great and I love it.

[Shala]

captains log: seadate 2019....boldy going where no tech has gone before

[jmschmidt]

I think he is talking about voice recognition software that change the spoken words into electronic printed words. The electronic text can then be stored indefinitely and/or be printed on to a logbook format.

[requiem]

Originally Posted by hellosailor

On top of that, there's still the problem that although digital signatures have been legally accepted by federal law since the Carter days (something to finally think Jimmy for?) no one really knows it. Banks, brokers, you give 'em a digitally signed email or digital form, PDF, they say "No, you have to sign it and fax or mail it to me."

The only industry that has any concept of digital signatures is real estate. Apparently "But I need those papers, signed, NOW" is enough to motivate them to understand these things. Or at least, recognize them. For the average poor slob, simply GETTING a digital signature or certificate, and then figuring out how to use it, takes a lot of time or money or both. And then, no one still knows how to use it.

Electronic, or at least "electric" signatures have been considered valid in the US since before the War of Southern Aggression. I believe the first time the topic had mention at the Supreme Court level was back in 1867. In biotech we use them all the time. Europe is interesting, as the situation is not as simple as in the US. I feel they've taken a more, perhaps, ceremonial view, with different tiers and that leads to more uncertainty. In the long term, especially with electronic IDs, that may put them ahead of the US, just as with chip-and-pin technology.

Now digital signatures are more interesting; far more useful and portable, but getting people to understand them is like, well, I believe you had a suitable simile. If you're really concerned about demonstrating the integrity of your logs, just use a digital timestamping service. By the time something reaches the courts, demonstrating the integrity of your logs is likely the least of your concerns, and suspect manageable without much trouble.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by requiem

. . . If you're really concerned about demonstrating the integrity of your logs, just use a digital timestamping service.

A really simple way to do this is just email them to yourself. Email leaves a forensic trail which the courts have vast experience with. That's what I do.



A better what would be to have an archiving authority. Might be a cool commercial project.

Originally Posted by requiem

By the time something reaches the courts, demonstrating the integrity of your logs is likely the least of your concerns, and suspect manageable without much trouble.

For sure. It's bread and butter of the courts, to figure out whether documents, whether paper or electronic, are fake or tampered with. It's not a big deal, and you will surely have, as you say, much bigger problems.


You might also keep the audio files of your dictation if you're really paranoid. It's actually easier to authenticate these kinds of records, than a hand written log.