Voice recognition software is turning into standard fare with office applicationsuites
Connecting state and local government leaders
Lotus Development Corp.'s SmartSuite Millenium edition adds voice recognition and Web publishing to office applications. A headset and microphone come in the box to use with IBM Corp.'s ViaVoice Gold voice recognition application. Competitor Corel Corp. includes NaturallySpeaking from Dragon Systems Inc. of Newton, Mass., in one edition of its WordPerfect Suite 8. Market leader Microsoft Office does not yet have voice recognition software.
Lotus Development Corp.s SmartSuite Millenium edition adds voice recognition and
Web publishing to office applications.
A headset and microphone come in the box to use with IBM Corp.s ViaVoice Gold
voice recognition application. Competitor Corel Corp. includes NaturallySpeaking from
Dragon Systems Inc. of Newton, Mass., in one edition of its WordPerfect Suite 8. Market
leader Microsoft Office does not yet have voice recognition software.
SmartSuites FastSite lets content managers create and post information on a Web
site without webmaster intervention. It uses Lotus jDoc Java document publishing
format.
SmartSuite Millenium is year 2000-ready. In addition to ViaVoice, it bundles
Lotus
1-2-3 spreadsheet, Approach database manager, SmartCenter suite integrator, mail client
and Word Pro word processor. Also in the package are Microsoft Internet Explorer and
Netscape Navigator Web browsers.
Lotus officials said the applications are file-compatible with Microsoft Office 95 and
97, and backward-compatible with WordPerfect 5.1 and earlier SmartSuite editions. A viewer
is included for incompatible document types.
The suite and Lotus Notes have a common user interface, so SmartSuite users can open a
document saved in a Notes database. They can also query PeopleSoft Inc. and SAP America
Inc. relational database management system applications through Lotus Approach or 1-2-3
and retrieve data from those applications.
The suite runs under Microsoft Windows 9x, Windows NT Workstation 4.0 and IBM OS/2 Warp
4.0. It requires about 180M of storage. SmartSuite 4.5 continues to run under Windows
3.1x.
Federal users of Lotus SmartSuite include the Environmental Protection Agency and
Marine Corps.
SmartSuite, priced from $399, is $149 to upgraders or users of competing products. IBM
bundles SmartSuite Millenium with its PCs.
Agencies also can buy the suite from 18 General Services Administration Information
Technology Schedule holders.
Contact Lotus Federal at 703-243-7666.
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