Dictating

Stenowise runs in the background and waits for your key. You press it, you speak, you let go, and the text is where your cursor was. In any program, with nothing to set up first.

The key

Ctrl + Space is the default. You can change it in the settings if it clashes with something else.

There are two ways to use it, and you switch between them in the settings:

• Hold. You hold the key while you speak and let go when you are done. This is the default and the faster way for short sentences.
• Toggle. You press once to start and once to stop. Better for long dictations, where your finger would otherwise fall asleep.

Next to it there is Ctrl + Shift + Space. That key dictates with the cleanup even when you have switched the cleanup off. What the cleanup is for is under Voice Styles.

Where the text goes

Where you would be typing. Stenowise inserts the text at the cursor, in Word just as in a chat window or in the address bar of your browser.

You can also set it so the text only goes to the clipboard and is not inserted. That is the right choice if you work in a program that does not cope with automatic pasting.

The small window at the edge of the screen

While you speak, a small window appears. It shows that Stenowise is listening, and it shows your microphone's input level. If nothing moves there while you speak, Stenowise cannot hear you. What to do then is under When nothing arrives.

After you let go, the same window shows that work is going on. How long that takes depends on how much Stenowise is meant to step in.

Cancelling

If you notice mid-sentence that this is not what you wanted to say, press Esc. The recording is dropped, nothing is recognised and nothing is inserted.

The history

Every dictation is in the history, with its time and its text. From there you can copy it again or have it recognised again, in case something went wrong the first time.

The history can be switched off. Then nothing is stored and you see nothing either. How long entries are kept is set in the same place.