Hi Philip,
Because I'm paralysed from the shoulders down I can't use a physical keyboard, so I have no choice when it comes to using and trusting voice-activated software. These days there is
only one worthwhile option and that is Dragon Naturally Speaking. After using Dragon for almost 20 years I can't understand why so many people still use physical keyboards. I can dictate at 100 words a minute and 99% accuracy, many times faster than I was
able to type.
A surprising number of Australian bird names are already programmed into the software's vocabulary files. The rest I program and train the program to understand myself, it's a little
bit laborious but there isn't an alternative available.
For a detailed discussion about how the software works and which computer systems and microphones work best with it, I think we had better see if people are interested before we continue
to discuss it on "canberrabirds" where this is very much off topic.
From: Philip Veerman [
Sent: Sunday, 26 April 2020 8:50 PM
To: 'Sean Fitzgerald' <>
Subject: RE: [canberrabirds] Justice Hope Park
Hi Sean,
Thanks for answering and I would never have guessed at that as an explanation. So I have learned something strange. I suppose it is nice that there is someone else
to blame. It is hard for me to comprehend the mechanics of that process or why someone would trust such a system on things they send out. How would an American software system know Australian bird names like
Willie and what would they do with a spoken Gerygone? If you did the same message again, would it come out the same? Maybe the apostrophe use
and misuse is mostly random, as it appears to be. How does it know to put commas in the right place? The “feeding/looking”
and new paragraphs would be fairly sophisticated things for a computer to do, just from voice activated software.
Philip
From: Sean Fitzgerald
Sent: Saturday, 25 April, 2020 7:32 PM
To: 'Philip Veerman'
Subject: RE: [canberrabirds] Justice Hope Park
The answer my dear Philip is simple. It is all IT based, out of necessity I use Dragon NaturallySpeaking voice activated software and I wholeheartedly blame the Americans :-)
I do admit to being lazy about correcting it, time was of the essence as there were birds to watch…
Cheers, Sean
Sean Fitzgerald
From: Philip Veerman
Sent: Saturday, 25 April 2020 12:40 PM
To: 'Sean Fitzgerald' <>
Subject: RE: [canberrabirds] Justice Hope Park
Hello Sean,
Good message. Sorry to pick you up but I feel so sorry for the Magpie-larks, Willie Wagtails and Eastern Rosellas in your message, that you lumber them with an
errant apostrophe. Sorry but it is so strange to me how that happens. I can’t understand that and your message is such a curious example. The only crime they did was being plural. However and I wonder why these others are correct but: “Magpies, weeks, crickets,
photographs, birds, Noisy Miners, eggs and hatchlings” are all grammatically correct in the plural, without you giving them the errant apostrophe.
As for your question, quite possibly but Kestrels are not known to be a nest predator, nor, except for rarely, a danger to any birds. More relevant that Magpie-larks,
like most black and white birds, are very good defenders of their nests.
Philip
From: Sean Fitzgerald
Sent: Saturday, 25 April, 2020 12:21 PM
To: 'Julie Clark'; 'Terry Munro'; 'Christine'
Cc: 'COG Chatline'
Subject: RE: [canberrabirds] Justice Hope Park
Hi Julie,
I've also come across a Magpie lark pair nesting in a willow tree out near Tidbinbilla nature reserve. It seemed to me that there were 3 Magpie lark's involved in feeding/looking after the nest.
Interestingly over the last few weeks there's been an Australian Kestrel using the same tree to forage for crickets from. We've been taking photographs of birds in this tree on a regular basis and then suddenly
the Kestrel disappeared.
Mostly the other birds, Magpie lark's, Willie Wagtail's, Magpies, Eastern Rosella's and occasionally Noisy Miners were mostly leaving the Kestrel alone, is that because they didn't see it as a threat?
Do you think that the Kestrel was moved on by the Magpie lark's because their eggs hatched and its threat, to the hatchlings, status changed?
Cheers, Sean
Sean Fitzgerald
E: m("bigpond.com","sean.fitz");">
P: (02) 6223-2082
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