Digital dictation
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Digital dictation is a method of recording and editing the spoken word in real-time within a digital audio format.
Digital dictation offers several advantages over traditional cassette tape based dictation:
- The user can instantly rewind or fast forward to any point within the dictation file to review or edit.
- The random access ability of digital audio allows to insert audio at any point without overwriting the following text.
- Dictation files can be transmitted electronically, e.g. via WAN, LAN, e-mail or FTP.
- Large dictation files can be shared with multiple typists.
- Digital dictation provides the ability to prioritize work.
The interchange format for digital audio is WAV. However most digital diction systems use a lossy form of audio compression to minimize hard disk space.
A common compressed digital audio format used for BASIC digital dictation is .DSS, which stands for Digital Speech Standard. This compressed digital audio format is used in portable digital recorders such as Olympus (http://www.olympusamerica.com/cpg_section/cpg_voicerecorders.asp?CMP=ILC-homevr), Grundig (http://www.grundig.com/) and Philips (http://www.dictation.philips.com/na/).
A new digital dictation format specially designed for ADVANCED PC based digital dictation is a file format called an .IAF, which stands for Intelligent Audio File. This compressed digital audio format is used by companies such as Quikscribe (http://www.quikscribe.com) and Verdatum (http://www.verdatumsys.com).