[nflug] Software lets programmers code hands-free - New Scientist article

[Joe]

Got this on another list.  Thought it might be of general interest.

Joe

Something was going to happen sometime I suppose. Not quite xvoice
though...

http://www.newscientisttech.com/article/dn9066


Software lets programmers code hands-free
       * 17:58 26 April 2006
       * NewScientist.com news service
       * Duncan Graham-Rowe


A new speech recognition tool promises to let programmers write clean
code without ever having to lay a finger on their keyboard.

The tool, called VoiceCode, has been developed to help programmers with
repetitive strain injury (RSI). This is a common affliction for people
who spend a lot of time using a keyboard or mouse and causes pain in
muscles, tendons and nerves in a sufferer's arms and back. Some
estimates suggest 22% of all US computer programmers, or 100,000 people,
suffer from the condition.

Standard speech recognition software can be used to control a computer
but is usually of little help to programmers, says Alain Désilets of the
National Research Council of Canada in Ottawa, one of the creators of
VoiceCode. This is because each symbol and function and every syntactic
peculiarity must be carefully spelled out.

VoiceCode lets a programmer dictate code in a more natural way, Désilets
says, rapidly translating their utterances into awkward programming
syntax. For example, in order to write "if (currRecNum < maxOffSet)" a
VoiceCode user only needs to say: "if current record number is less than
max offset then". Traditional voice-recognition programs could require
nearly 50 individual words to be dictated.


Chat not quit
VoiceCode currently works with the programming language Python but could
be adapted to support others, Désilets claims. Although not as fast as
using a regular mouse and keyboard, he believes it should help many
programmers with RSI get back to work.

"Often people just quit," says Quintijn Hoogenboom, a programmer from
the Netherlands who develops specialised speech recognition software.

Hoogenboom notes that other speech recognition programs let users create
their own shortcuts but believes VoiceCode is unique in its ability to
automatically recognise spoken syntax and turn it into correct code.

Désilets began working on VoiceCode when he himself developed RSI a
decade ago. He now wants to release the software so that other
programmers can evaluate it. But he admits that it needs to be easier to
install. "It typically takes the better part of a day to get all the
pieces installed and working properly," he says. "For someone who has
trouble typing, that may seem insurmountable."

Désilets presented the project at the annual Computer and Human
Interaction (CHI2006) conference in Montreal on Monday. The work was
carried out with David Fox from Harvard University and Stuart Norton
from the University of California, Berkeley.



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