IN3 for MS-Windows Release Notes Version 1.7 May 6, 1993 Audio Gain: Some audio boards do not support manual adjustment of the audio record gain. Some of these boards may support audio "mixers" with limited adjustment capability. Follow the manufacturer's instructions concerning audio gain and adjustment. It may be necessary to be more selective about microphone selection and placement for these boards. Command Keystrokes: In entering "keystrokes" into a voice command, control characters are case sensitive. Entering a "{Cntrl}b" results in a "b" with the control key depressed. Uppercase characters are expressed as shifted characters. Entering a "{Cntrl}B" results in a "b" with BOTH the control and shift keys depressed. Some applications will take different actions for these two cases. There are three options under special keys for entering an "Enter". The "Enter" selection chooses the keypress for the "Enter" key adjacent to the standard keys. The "Num Enter" selection chooses the keypress for the "Enter" key on the numeric key pad. The "Return" selection enters the code for an ascii "Carriage Return". This is equivalent to a "{Cntrl}m". Use the "Return" selection to perform a carriage return in a DOS command shell window and with DOS applications. The "Enter" and "Num Enter" are used with windows applications where appropriate. Class Identifiers: Class identifiers are defined when an application registers one or more "window classes". Class identifiers are used by the "class" command in command mode for locating windows to be raised or opened. To determine the class name of a window click on the "Window Class" button in the "New Command" or "Update Command" dialogue windows. The cursor will then change to cross-hairs. Move the cross-hairs to the title bar or icon of the desired window. Clicking any mouse button will then enter the class name of the window into the keystroke line. See the IN3 on-line help entry on "Window Class Names" for more information. Audio Device Drivers: Some device drivers and audio subsystems provided by various manufactures do not permit opening the audio wave input device immediately after closing the audio wave output device without yielding the processor between. IN3 has been enhanced to work with these drivers by avoiding the conditions which cause these drivers to fail. Some audio device drivers introduce an inordinate amount of time when switching directly from input mode (record) to output mode (playback). This can introduce an unacceptable delay associated with the microphone "beep" as the microphone is switched on and off. To work with these audio drivers, the audio beeps may be disabled from the menu selection "options->beeps->microphone". IN3 has also been enhanced to work with those audio device drivers which are prone to lose interrupts and cease to function when playing back short audio buffers. Audio Device Access Contention: Most audio device drivers do not permit "sharing" the audio device. Also, due to hardware limitations on most boards, the audio input (record) and audio output (playback) are mutually exclusive. The standard access arbitration convention to such exclusive devices normally follows an "acquire and hold" methodology. An application acquires (opens) the audio device and holds it while in use. Other applications requesting service from the device get an error on the open indicating that the resource is already allocated. IN3 now utilizes a "yield on demand" convention for arbitrating access contention for the audio devices. When another application requests service from either the audio input or audio output device, which would fail because of device allocation, IN3 voluntarily surrenders the audio device. This occurs transparent to the other application, requiring no specialized protocol or knowledge on the part of the other application. When the other application is finished with the audio device and returns the resource to the system, IN3 then reacquires the audio device for it's own use once again. This has the effect of permitting any arbitrary system module or application unrestricted access to the audio input (wave-in) and audio output (wave-out) devices while maintaining the operation of the speech recognition subsystem. When the audio input is allocated to another application, the recognition subsystem is in a stand-by mode and recognition is disabled. For boards and device drivers enforcing mutual exclusion of audio input and audio output, this also applies when the audio output is allocated to another application. When the audio input is not enabled for IN3 to utilize, the microphone disappears from the lips on the icon. If the system uses the audio board to "beep" or if another application requests the audio device for playing sounds or recording messages, the microphone disappears and recognition is disabled until the audio device becomes available for IN3 once again. Microphone Connections Microphone connections vary among audio boards. Check the board manufacturer's documentation. Listed below is some information on popular boards. SoundBlaster - Dynamic and electret (self-powered) microphones with 2 or 3 conductor plugs work. Microsoft Sound - Dynamic mikes don't work. This board uses a special condenser microphone which is powered by the jack. Condenser mikes work well if they are wired properly. Compaq Business Audio - Same as Microsoft Sound. MediaVision - The PAS board has mono mike input. A 3 conductor plug will not work. If you are using a mike with a 3 conductor plug like the Audio-Technica PRO 8 (supplied with IN CUBE PRO), use an adapter. Radio Shack Cat. No. 274-368. Logitech Soundman - Same as MediaVision PAS. Release Notes - Availability: The release notes, in "Write" format, are installed with the sample lexicons as the file "release.wri". An ascii text version is installed as the file, "release.txt". The release notes are also now available within the on-line help system. Copyright 1993 Command Corp. Inc.