Voice Command Cheat Sheet

I've lived with my Treo 700w phone for almost two weeks now, and despite having to do a hard reset yesterday, I'm loving it.  I've quit carrying my Pocket PC, and even gave it away a few days ago, so you know I'm serious about this new device.

Right now I'm in an airport using my phone as a high-speed modem.  Despite what Verizon says, it can be done, you just need a little piece of software called pdaNet.  I'm connected with a USB cable, but I expect the software will evolve to do the trick over Bluetooth.

Last week I mentioned that a lot of speech recognition applications suffer from a lack of documentation and "cheat sheets".  Piyush Dogra from Microsoft forwarded this cheat sheet to me the very next day.  Eric Badger, one of the developers of the product created it and has given me permission to share it.  Thank you Eric!  This is one of coolest pieces of software I've seen in a long time.  As you point out "Knowing what to say makes all the difference when using Voice Command."  As of today I have 829 contacts in Outlook, and Voice Command never misses when I say a person's name.

I also find myself saying "What's my next appointment" because it is just easier than opening the schedule and scrolling around the screen.  Speech recognition really shines when you have deep trees of information that you need to directly access.  It's a long story, but even though my phone came with Voice Command, I ended up buying a copy at the local computer store.  The retail product does come with very good documentation that should get you going.  If you have Voice Command or a Windows Mobile phone, you've got to give it a chance.  Learn a few commands and you will wonder how you got by without it.

Here's Eric's Cheat Sheet - Enjoy!

Terry

Voice Command Cheat Sheet for Treo 700w

Knowing what you can say makes all the difference when using Voice Command.

===== CALLING A CONTACT =====

Commands:

Call <contact>
Call <contact> at home
Call <contact> at work
Call <contact> on mobile
Call <contact> on cell
Call <contact> on cellular
Call <contact> at home two
Call <contact> at work two
Call <contact> at car
Call <contact> on radio
Call <contact> on pager
Call <contact> at assistant

To confirm that you want to make the call after Voice Command responds:

You can say "Yes" or "Correct" to call.
You can say "No" or "Incorrect" to try again.

If Voice Command asks you which location, you can:

Repeat one of the locations that Voice Command offers to call.
Say "No" to try again.


Related commands:

You can say "Call back" to call back the last call that you received.
You can say "Redial" to call back the last call that you made.


Examples:

Call Karen Archer on cell
Call Frank Miller
Call City Light and Power
Call Barbara Sparrow Home


Notes:

Voice Command indexes by the Contact's first and last name if it exists. If you have a nickname entered, you can use that

too. Voice Command will only let you call by company name if there is no first or last name.

You must prefix contact calling with the "call" keyword. If you use "dial", it won't work!

===== DIALING A NUMBER ======

Commands:

Dial <7-digit number>
Dial <10-digit number>
Dial <1+10-digits>
Dial <N-1-1>

Examples:

Dial 555-0200
Dial 800-555-1212
Dial 1-800-555-1212
Dial 411

You must prefix digit dialing with the "dial" keyword. If you use "call", it won't work!

===== CHECKING CALENDAR =====

Commands:

What are my appointments today?
What are my appointments tomorrow?
What's my next appointment?


===== START MENU =====

Commands:

Start <program>


Example:

Start Solitare
Start Messaging
Start Internet Explorer
Start Pictures and Video

Notes:

Voice Command will index any file that is in or inside of \windows\program files
You have to say the file name exactly as it is written. It may be helpful to rename shortcuts.
Also, you can put links to web pages here and go straight to a saved web page this way.


===== MEDIA =====

Commands:

Play music
Play media
Play artist
Play album
Play genre


Play <artist name>
Play <album name>
Play <genre name>
Play <everything>

Play
Pause
Stop
Next
Previous (track)
Shuffle on
Shuffle off
What song is this?
What track is this?


Examples:

Play The Beatles
Play The White Album
Play Rock
Play Everything


Notes:

You cannot play individual tracks using voice
Voice Command will index the media based on the metadata. You can use a metadata editor to groom the fields.