Speech to Text. Useful to Genealogy and Family History Research!



SpeechloggerHow many times do you wish there was another method to transcribe to text a recording you had of a relative or be able to dictate some documents so they were in digital text form? Using the online software ‘Speechlogger‘ you can now do that very easily. It works with Chrome Browsers.

This is a speech recognition (which goes from spoken word to digital text) on your computer or smart phone or tablet. It is unique in that it is auto-punctuation, auto-save, timestamps, in-text editing capability, transcription of audio files, export options (to text and captions) and more. There is no user registration needed, plus it’s completely free!

speechlogger-female wordsIt is a way to preserve information on a printed document by you just reading that information so it is made into text and then it can be saved to your computer, a Google Cloud account, a phone, a tablet, etc. IF they use a Chrome Browser. It is another method besides scanning to save family artifacts. Saves you from typing it all out!!

Of course, one of the best applications is to have a vocal recording of an interview from a relative transcribed into text. The translation portion helps with any recordings done in another language.

It is as simple as clicking on the microphone on the site and begin speaking. If a question mark is needed just click on that ‘?’ symbol on the screen. It will be in front of you as you speak. If the Speechlogger can’t quite figure out which phrase or word you are saying, it makes that word in red so you can verify it. It does not have to be just paragraphs that are spoken, if you have a list of items, such as an inventory of family artifacts, you can call off each item and have a digital text ready document. Excellent if you want a vintage newspaper article in digital text. Once finished, just press the ‘Enter’ key to finalize that session.

speech-logger--aYou can title the digital version, it dates it and then saves it. Just place your mouse arrow over the icons on the top right to locate the export selection choices (such as TEXT or MS Word Document). Or you can ‘select all’ (button in top left with a box ‘ALL’ of the digital text box) of the digital text and do a ‘copy / paste’ to transfer it to a new document. That works very well. If you want to also print the completed dictation out, there is the button for that also.

The site has YouTube videos that demonstrate how to further make use of this program. You may need to practice and play around with it to learn what it can do. It generally recognizes the voice right away. To start a new page of dictation press the icon of a page which says ‘New Session’ when you place the mouse cursor over it.

Keep this site ‘Speechlogger‘ on your bookmark list or even on your computer Desktop, you may be using it quite frequently.  Reminder, you need Google Chrome.

Related FamilyTree.com genealogy blogs:

Transcribe Old Documents

Interview Relatives

Smithsonian – Help with Transcribing

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