Eurominuteman's Webcasting Blog

Ever Heard of SMIL?

2008-09-14T03:58:00.000-07:00

SMIL (Synchronous Multimedia Integration Language) for Multimedia Subtitling and Language Translation...

Check out what's unfolding here:

http://collaborative-translation.ning.com/group/subtitling/forum/topic/show?id=2237585%3ATopic%3A1605

Audio Transcription Technology

2008-08-23T07:15:00.001-07:00

Audio transcription technology has made a jump in quality, but it is not cheap. The language translator community is getting into this now, and webcasting interfaces with this technology.

Here is a product feature matrix for Dragon 10:
http://www.nuance.com/naturallyspeaking/resources/product-matrix.asp

Dragon 10 Professional
http://www.nuance.com/naturallyspeaking/products/professional.asp

Using Multiple Computer Monitors for Webcasting

2008-07-27T02:52:00.000-07:00

This report describes how a 30 inch screen offers measurable productivity and efficiency gains:
http://www.gizmag.com/go/6972/

Wikipedia also offers some information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-monitor

This article is about how computer monitors work, which includes a video showing how to add a monitor to your laptop:
http://computer.howstuffworks.com/monitor.htm

Lockergnome shows Mac users how his two 30 inch monitor setup works on Mac OS X:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnUSMU63sgs

Once you get the multi-monitor configuration set up, you might like to install the free multi-monitor toolbar (the download link is farther to the bottom):
http://www.mediachance.com/free/multimon.htm

This enhancement is cool too, multi-computers & multi-monitors integrated into one keyboard. I haven't done it yet, but it looks like one of my next research and implementation steps:
http://www.mediachance.com/free/multicomp.htm

I am still awed at the YouTube videos I found showing all types of monitor configurations:

- Adding up to six monitors via USB

- Eight monitor configuration for MS Flight Simulator

Directory for Laptop & Notebook Drivers

2008-07-27T00:57:00.000-07:00

As my 2 desktop computers are down at the moment (blue screen and partition malfunction) and I wasn't keen to service them for the moment, I decided to migrate more into my somewhat unused dual-core XP notebook Samsung R55. In the course of beefing up its configuration, I stumbled across the following URL:

http://www.notebook-drivers.com/

I had been aware that webcasting needs an up-to-date sound card driver for the desktops, but after trying to find an up-to-date graphic driver for the notebook (because of installing the free student version of the 3D mindmapping software Topicscape) at nVidia.com in order to accommodate my motherboard-based GeForce graphic card, I got the information that notebook graphic card drivers are only supplied by the according OEM notebook manufacturer, thus leading to the above Driver Directory for laptops and notebooks.

My driver search (using the Boolean search "Samsung AND R55") yielded a list of notebook drivers covering more than I had expected of. Check the hit list at the bottom of the following:

http://www.notebook-drivers.com/notebook-drivers/s_642_1.shtml

The following types of up-to-date notebook drivers are available:

At first, arranged under Windows 2000, XP, and Vista: Then bluetooth drivers, chipset drivers, Intel/nVidia graphic drivers, LAN/WLAN drivers, MC drivers?, modem drivers, sound drivers, touchpad drivers, wireless drivers, MMC reader drivers, battery and display drivers, easybox drivers?, keyboard drivers, management center drivers, network manager drivers, update plus drivers?, and finally BIOS/Micom drivers.

I have marked the ones in red that I think are relevant to webcasting, the other drivers can be installed at your discretion.

Yet, the directory is still not fully complete. If you use e.g. a Fujitsu notebook, you won't find this variety of types and those drivers for Vista. You will still need to visit the OEM notebook manufacturer's website, which offers those for Vista and in a similar variety of types.

This knowledge step also makes me reiterate back into my desktop configuration in order to check all the driver updates of the non-motherboard hardware components.

Speech Recognition in YouTube > Text Search for Spoken Content in Videos

2008-07-16T09:32:00.000-07:00

Google has added speech recognition capability in some YouTube videos that enables you to search for text spoken in these videos.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/07/in-their-own-words-political-videos.html

Various other tips and services towards "wav-to-text" transcription, video search and administration, and shownote taking are reported within the link list too:

http://www.blinkx.com/
http://trafcom.typepad.com/blog/2007/01/podcasting_secr_1.html
http://www.veotag.com/
http://www.clipblast.com/
http://www.pixsy.com/
http://jott.com/

Streaming - Transcribing - Blogging

http://www.webcastacademy.net/node/2068

I hope to get this process running soon...