I have been having problems when dictating into WordPerfect with the .dra files. I am using WordPerfect X5. Many times while I am dictating in WordPerfect, I will close the file and save it and come back to it at a later time for further dictation. I may do this several times during the day since I am using it for medical notes. If I do not correct the dictation at the time that I dictate I have noticed that if I do several dictations and close and save the file that many times I cannot go back and play back the sound file at all. Many times the only thing that will be saved is the last sound file. In the options setting I have the "save recorded dictation with document "set to always". I do not have anything set in the options file on that data tab under the advanced settings. Is this the mistake that I am making? I notice under the advanced button under the data tab that one of the options is "always preserve wave data". Should I be setting that with a check mark? Any input would be welcomed. I am using Windows 7 ultimate edition with all service packs installed.

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Tony C

When you make your corrections, are you doing so exclusively via the Spell That Correction Dialog Box? If you use Select-&-Say correction or simply retype over your mistakes, this will break the link to the dra connection. In theory, NaturallySpeaking should be able to deal with multiple saves but even if you are doing everything correctly, you may be pushing the envelope a little too far on this feature.

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In the particular case that I am speaking about I made absolutely no corrections to the dictations throughout the day into WordPerfect. At the end of the day when I decided to go back and correct the dictations the only .dra entry was the last dictation. During my usual dictations prior to that I would correct each dictation as I went along and use a combination of both Select & Say and Spell That. In those cases most of the time things work fairly reasonably. This is the first time that I have tried to go through an entire day of dictations without any corrections and then go back and correct them using the playback file for comparison. Am I correct in assuming that if I set the options elective under the data tab and then under the advanced settings tab to "Always preserve wave data" that there should be no change in the behavior then if I were to set the main elective "Save recorded dictation with document" to always? Or am I simply being confused by these two settings in the options menu under the data tab?

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Tony C

Tony,

Lunis makes a good point that you do have to be careful when you're saving your audio and text (dra files) with your document. However, there are a couple of additional considerations:

From the DMPE help:


Disk space reserved for playback:
If you save your dictation in .DRA files, you (or someone else) can reopen the documents at a later time and play back your dictation to clarify misrecognitions. See Correcting dictation later.

By default, Dragon Medical Practice Edition can maintain up to 100 MB of recorded speech on disk. This is enough to store about 90 minutes of dictation. If you dictate for longer than the available space allows, the earliest dictation is removed. You cannot play back the removed dictation or save it with your text.

Your dictation is never stored with your document unless you choose to save it when you save your document.

Always preserve wave data
You can save dictation with your Microsoft Word, Corel WordPerfect, or DragonPad document if you select either "Always" or "Ask me" from the "Save recorded dictation with document" list on the Data tab of the Options dialog box.

If dictation is not available for playback, playback skips to the next section that has dictation available. There will not be any playback for text that was typed or pasted into a document, revised by typing, or moved around in the document. If you want to preserve all your dictation independently of any changes made to the document, select 'Always preserve wave data."

With the above in mind, you need to make the appropriate changes as noted to the Data tab in the DNS Option dialog. However, you need to keep in mind the following:

1.  It is probably a good idea to increase the "Disk-based reserved for playback" from 100 MB to at least 200 and preferably 250 MB. I don't know how long you dictate into a particular document during the course of a day but if you dictate more than 100 min. and the disk space reserved for playback is set to 100 MB, you will exceed that setting. Note the above help explanation and consider that for each minute of dictation, Dragon requires 1.5 MB of disk space. When you exceed that, Dragon will start removing the earliest audio.

2.  You can make corrections by typing over misrecognitions. However, you may want to enable "Use double-click to correct" in the Corrections tab of the DNS Option dialog. When you manually typing corrections, DNS will protect whether or not you are making the correction or making a substitution. If you make substitutions by changing the text such that it does not correspond to the underlying audio, you will lose the audio for that change. Therefore, be very careful how you make corrections. It is most advisable to make corrections by voice versus manually using the keyboard.

3.  Using the "Always preserve wave data" is specifically related to what it is that you're trying to do, as well as to ensuring that you don't lose any of your audio as long as the "Disk space reserved for playback" is set sufficiently high enough.

I suspect that the reason that you're losing portions of your audio is for any or all of the reasons noted above, particularly with regard to the explanations from the Help.

Chuck Runquist
Technical Project Manager
VoiceTeach LLC
Home of VoicePower®: We don't make speech recognition, We make it better!

"Life's Rule #1: Once you pull the pin, Mr. Grenade is no longer your friend."  (Variant of Murphy's Law  -  Edward A. Murphy, Jr)

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It appears to me that you have probably found the answer. It is very possible that I did type corrections in rather than using voice to correct some of them. I have already set the options menu to allot for 500 MB of space for storage of dictations but did not have the "Always preserve wave data" checked in this submenu. In addition, in the options I did not have the "Enable double-click to correct" checked. Thank you so much.

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Tony C

Tony,

Aside from setting up the proper options for saving your audio with your document(s), it's a good idea to periodically save your documents. Another way of ensuring that the associated dra file is properly updated, is to change the option from "Always" to "Ask me" this prompts you every time you save a document. Even though I don't use this option, when I was testing originally I found that being prompted always ensures that the associated dra file is being saved. I think that if you do all this, you'll find that you don't generally lose any audio playback.

All this being said, I have found in the past that you have to be careful and ensure that the dra file is saved and properly updated before you close a document. This is one of the reasons why I always use "Ask me" and then check the dra file.

There is one feature in the Professional versions, including DMPE, that you may not be aware of. That is, you can view the text and execute the playback options of your dra files in DragonPad. If you open DragonPad, click on open, and go to the location where your WordPerfect documents are being saved, you will notice at the bottom right of the Open dialog, there is a drop-down list for file types. If you drop that list you will notice that the last option is Dragon Recorded Document (*.dra). If you select that option, you can see the dra file associated with the document that you're working on. Select that dra file and open it. This is a good way of testing whether or not the file was correctly save and whether or not it contains all of the audio information. This is particularly helpful in pinning down and/or diagnosing problems relative to saving your audio with the text (dra files).

Chuck Runquist
Technical Project Manager
VoiceTeach LLC
Home of VoicePower®: We don't make Dragon NaturallySpeaking, We make it better!

"What you are aware of you are in control of; what you are not aware of is in control of you." - Anthony de Mello

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Thank you so much for the information Chuck about opening .dra files using the notepad.  You raise another interesting point.  Prior to Dragon 11 Medical I always use the notepad to do all of my office notes.  I never could get Dragon to work appropriately in all editions from 3 all the way until the most recent edition to work appropriately with WordPerfect.  With Dragon 11 Medical, however, play back in the notepad seems to be fraught with some problems.  I have noticed that after periods and pauses in speech that playback is inordinately slow and retarded for some reason during those pauses.  After switching to the use of Dragon with WordPerfect, it works perfectly as it always did in the past.  This is the only place that playback does not work appropriately.  As a result, I very seldomly use Notepad anymore for dictation purposes.

Thanks for all your help.

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Tony C

Tony,

There should be no reason why playing back your voice should be any different whether you're using DragonPad, and it is Dragon pad not notepad, and/or Microsoft Word, WordPerfect, yada yada yada.

First, remember that Dragon records your dictation exactly the way that you dictate. So, if you pause after punctuation or if you dictate in short choppy phrases with significant pauses, that's The Way, Dragon will play it back. It doesn't matter what application you're using the playback function with.

Second, if the playback is slow and sounds "retarded", have you checked the playback settings in the Dragon Options dialog | Playback/Text-to-Speech tab? The normal playback speed should be set to 100. Also, remember that there's a difference between "read that" and "playback". The default setting for "read that" is abnormally slow. However, my assumption is that, since you shouldn't be having a problem with playback speed no matter where you're attempting to play back what you said, other than what I've noted in the second paragraph above, but if it's inordinately slow or "retarded" it may be that the speed setting is wrong (i.e., not 100) under the Playback attributes.

Chuck Runquist
Technical Project Manager
VoiceTeach LLC
Home of VoicePower®: We don't make Dragon NaturallySpeaking, We make it better!

"What you are aware of you are in control of; what you are not aware of is in control of you." - Anthony de Mello

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That is exactly the same understanding that I have.  I do not see any reason that the pauses after periods or during speech should be any longer than the short duration that they exist.  I do not have the program set to wave data during pauses.  They certainly are not longer when I play them back in WordPerfect or Word.  For that fact even dictating this note to you the playback is at normal speed when I corrected.  I checked the settings in the options and they are all set to 100%.  The interesting thing is I change the speed setting up playback for Jennifer to slightly faster and noticed that there was an increase in the Dragon Notepad playback compared to what it was before I made that setting.  Maybe I am hallucinating at this point in time.  Actually, this is more of an anecdotal observation than a major concern.  Since I have been using WordPerfect for my dictations this issue does not really affect me at the current time.  The interesting thing is, that I used your technique of playing back the .dra file in the Dragon Notepad to make the comparisons.  I dictated the material in WordPerfect and then played it back in the Dragon Notepad.  Thank you for all of your help.

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Tony C

Tony,

Well, just strange behavior that I've never noticed. Chalk it off to gremlins!!!

Go figure!!!

Chuck Runquist
Technical Project Manager
VoiceTeach LLC
Home of VoicePower®: We don't make Dragon NaturallySpeaking, We make it better!

"About the time we can make the ends meet, somebody moves the ends." Herbert Hoover

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Well, finally I have found the solution to this problem. All of this time I have taken the suggestions and having the program asked me each time I want to save the verbal files. As it turns out many times I would shut off Dragon's microphone prior to saving the file in WordPerfect 5. For some reason when I do that it does not save the verbal file (.dra) file correctly. Instead of appending to the file each time it opens up a new file and only records the dictation since it was opened.  If I leave the microphone running and save the WordPerfect file I can close both programs and come back to it at a later time and append to the (.dra) file. So much for gremlins.

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Tony C