re: advanced help needed with the jaws dictionary manager

  • From: Joseph Lee <joseph.lee22590@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: jfw@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Thu, 01 Feb 2007 08:39:44 -0800

Nicol,
So see what's going on: If you add the words to the default dictionary file, it will only process up to a certain number of entries. For your first question, there is no definite answer, but my suggestion is try using other Dictionary file that corresponds to the program you are using. Secondly, you can use this feature to eliminate excessive entries: There is a setting in Configuration Manager that allows you to have dates spoken as words. Go to Configuration Manager and press CTRL plus Shift plus D. Go to Menubar and select Set Options, then select Text Processing Press TAB until you see "Numeric Date Processing". Press down arrow to select "Some Translation" and press ENTER right there. Press CTRL plus S to save the file and press Alt Fbled to close Config Manager. Now the next time JAWS encounters a date, it will correctly read the date for you. In order to do this effectively, you'll need to remove entries that contains date.
Cheers,
Joseph

----- Original Message -----
From: "nicol" <nicoljacobus@xxxxxxxxxxxx
To: <jfw@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date sent: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 18:02:36 +0200
Subject: advanced help needed with the jaws
dictionary manager

Hi all
I have a query with the jaws dictionary
manager.  Any help is highly
appreciated. Please read my post carefully
as I have to explain a lot for
you to understand exactly what I need.
I know the basics of the jaws dictionary
manager: how to add entries, how to
edit entries, how to delete entries.
For those of you that never used the
dictionary manager: it's a utility with
which you can set JFW to pronounce a word
differently than how it is written
on the screen. Sometimes, depending on the
synthesizer you are using, jaws
pronounces the word wind as wined. So you
can then use the dictionary
manager to set jaws to pronounce it as wind
by typing it as wind.
The same as with names you want jaws to
pronounce differently.
Ok/ so I know all the basics of the
dictionary manager.  I have read the jaws
help file covering the dictionary manager
several times in its entirety but
it doesn't answer my question at all.
I will have to explain this a lot but
basically my problem boils down to the
fact that I need to store thousands of
entries in a dictionary file.
For those of you who doesn't know: when you
add entries to the jaws
dictionary all entries is saved in a file
with a .jdf extension.
Like scripts are saved in a .jss file,
dictionary entries are stored in a
..jdf file. The problem with jaws is that
it will only accept 1000 entries
in one file. I have a dictionary file with
1000 entries already and the file
is only 221 kb in size, so there should be
another reason why jaws only
accept 1000 entries. Say for instance the
file contained 1000 entries and it
was as big as my hard drive, in other words a
file of 40 gigs, then I would
understand why it can only contain 1000
entries.  But the fact that it   can
only contain 1000 entries has nothing to do
with how big the file is.
Well you can actually add endless entries but
jaws will only process the
first 1000 entries. IN other words, it will
only look at  the first 1000
entries and pronounce the word on screen
according to that entry.  It will
ignore dictionary entry number 1001 in the
list.  If dictionary entry 1001
is the word wind, it will still say wined
although you have added an entry
to say wind. This I know for sure because
when I used jaws 5 at work, the
moment the dictionary file contains 1000
entries, jaws warned me if I
attempt to add another entry. It warned me
that it will only process the
first 1000 entries. But with jaws 7 it
doesn't warn me, but I have noticed
that if there is more than 1000 entries,
jaws 7 will also only process the
first 1000 entries.
Can anyone first of all tell me: why can
the  dictionary only contain
1000 entries? What's the reason behind it?
Now here is why I need to add so many entries
to one dictionary file.
I work in a call centre. An outbound call
centre.  My work is to phone
clients and do a customer satisfaction survey
with them.
Here is how it works. I receive service
requests created by inbound call
centre agents. I receive them in html form.
All the service requests are
loaded into a pool which displays them as
html documents.  Let me explain
this further. People working in the
inbound call centre receives calls.
They have to answer phone calls placed by
clients.  They have to write the
details of each call. Each bunch of details
they capture during each call
is called a service request. The agent would
with each call capture the date
of the call, the client's tax and/or ID
number, his  contact details and a
description what the query is about. I'm
working in the call centre of South
Africa's tax organization , sars, South
African revenue services.  So I have
to phone taxpayers based on service requests
created by agents.
We are still looking for someone that can
script jaws to be compatible with
Seibel, the program used in the inbound call
centre.  So until we have found
help to script jaws to work with Siebel, our
employer has given us this
survey job. It happens that many agents make
typing mistakes in their
service requests. These mistakes make it
sometimes difficult for me to
understand what the service request is about.
And sometimes it just
unmotivates me to do my work.
It's plain irritating to hear the word
assessment as asesszment or the word
process as proxxcess. And also I prefer jaws
to pronounce a date as 1
November instead of 1/11/2006.
If I speak to a client and he refers to dates
I have to check on my screen
if the same dates appear in the service
request as the dates he is referring
to and if jaws pronounces the date as digits
rather than words, I get
confused and I'm inclined to swop the digits
in my mind and in return give
the client an   incorrect date.
Whereas if I hear jaws pronounce the date as
words I can immediately give
the client the correct date.
If the client tells me for example:
His tax return is submitted on 8  September
And on the service request it is written
The return has been submitted on 2006/09/08
Then I confuse it with 9 august instead of 8
September, and then I will give
the client the wrong information.
So this is the main 2 issues, typos and dates
pronounced as digits.
So this is why I want to add more than 1000
entries to the dictionary so
that jaws will pronounce all dates as words
and typos as correct words.  Take
the word assessment. The agent wrote
assessssmente.
So I then go ahead and add this word in the
dictionary.
In the actual word field I write:
assessmente.
Or rather, I copy the typo from the html
document  and in the replacement
field I write how I want jaws to pronounce
the word, how it is suppose to be
written. I want to be motivated with each
service request I read.  It have to
be a perfect piece of request, and typos just
unmotivates me.
Just To add entries to the dictionary
continually won't interfere with the
target I have to reach but the moment I have
to delete entries to add
others, then it affects my working speed.
Because now I have to arrow down thousands of
times to get to an entry that
was used by jaws long ago and that takes
time.
Then I tried something else:
The entries that I think will no longer be
used frequently I mark in a
Microsoft word document. Say for instance I
click the submit  button on my
survey page and the word assessmente was in
that service request, then I
will remove that word from the dictionary as
the survey was submitted, that
word will not necessarily be used frequently
because agents makes different
kinds of typos.
So what I did: each time I encountered a typo
or date I copy it to a word
document. And before I submit that survey I
check in my word document if
there is any words added to the dictionary
in that service request  that is
also in my  Word document.
But since that was also very time consuming,
I came to the ultimate idea.
There should be a way to switch between
dictionary files.  When I'm in any
application jaws will open the dictionary
file associated with that
application and use its entries.
So what I did: if the current dictionary file
contains 1000 entries, I went
to: explore my jaws settings under the
programs menu.
Then I made an extra folder. I cut the
current dictionary file, internet
explorer 5--6.jdf to that folder and then
when I did this and I open the
dictionary manager from within internet
explorer or windows explorer, since
it uses the same dictionary file, jaws finds
no dictionary file so it
creates a new dictionary file with 5 entries
which is there by default like
when you install jaws.
And if I have then added 1000 entries to the
second dictionary file and I
want to use the first file's entries again I
go into the enu folder through
the programs menu.
What I then do: I cut the current file which
is called internet explorer
5-6.jdf. I cut it to that extra folder I
created,
But since there is already a file called
internet explorer 5-6.jdf in that
folder, I first rename this one to another
name and then cut it.
So now I take the first one that was there
and I copy it to the main enu
folder and rename it internet explorer
5-6.Its not necessary to type the
extention when renaming a file.
But this is also slightly time consuming.
I want to know is there a quick way so that I
can switch between dictionary
files quickly? I've tried creating a script
that will go into the programs
menu, into the enu folder and copy and rename
the files accordingly so that
I use entries from another dictionary file or
start adding entries to a
blank dictionary file but it didn't work. AS
I said, having to hear dates
pronounced as digits and a lot of typos
unmotivates me in my work.
So I desperately need help.
Please ask me more questions should his post
confuse anyone.
Yours in looking for help.

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