Dragon is renowned for being a productivity-enhancing software, able to get you flying when it comes to drafting documents, editing articles, writing books or responding to emails. Using a microphone as your primary work input frees up your hands so that you can easily refer to hard copies of documents, text books or shift papers around on your desk. Operating hands-free has many benefits from being able to create documents away from your computer on a digital recorder or smartphone to not being hunched over a keyboard. Besides kicking your feet up, the obvious benefits relating to repetitive strain injuries or carpal tunnel syndrome, it opens up a whole new realm of possibilities for users with disabilities.
We’ve had users who switched over to using Dragon after sustaining an arm injury as a way of bridging their recovery time with as little setback as possible. Not only does this enable them to carry on without having to one-finger type, a benefit to the organisation in terms of continuity, many of these users actually keep using Dragon after they make a full recovery. Being forced to rely on the speech recognition software, they lean heavily into using it as their primary if not only input. The frustration of clicking away on the keyboard with one hand becomes a breeze as they activate their voice in transcribing documentation and emails.
Yet, Dragon’s much more that! It’s a great option for people who have full use of their hands, maximising their productivity and making them more independent, but it can be a huge win for people who can’t type with their hands. There are many applications with a speech recognition facility but there are few that can be as all-encompassing as Dragon. The product is amazingly accurate out of the box, which makes it much easier to adopt straightaway but it’s also highly customisable.
While being able to use a mouse does make life much easier, the software can create a number of time-saving macro commands to carry out several tasks. This is useful to anyone for getting several things done with the issue of a voice command, but can be an absolute game-changer for users who need to build a custom command rich environment. You can use mouse motion commands, but the real power of Dragon is in its ability to navigate your PC by voice.
Switching between windows, opening and closing applications, landing the cursor anywhere in your document, accessing menus… all of this becomes so much easier when you can let your voice do the work. Whether you’re able-bodied or not, Dragon can be the missing puzzle piece to your work situation.