What’s new in Communicator 3.30?


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What’s new in Communicator 3.30?

VS Communicator 3.30 was released March 25, 2006.

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Import Files from Boardmaker/SDPro

If you have earlier on created communication pages or activities using Boardmaker or Speaking Dynamically Pro, you may now import these into VS Communicator.

This way therapists can easily help your clients migrate from SD pro into VS Communicator and get all the features of VS Communicator without having to do all the work over again.

The import process is just a matter of selecting File > Import on the program menu in VS Communicator, point to the files you want to have imported, and Communicator takes care of the rest.

New Feature: Read-As-You-Type
VS Communicator can be set to read sentences, words or letters as you type them in either via an on-screen or a regular keyboard. With this feature the user will experience a more natural communication flow.

Three New Voices Available
Following Acapela's release of three new US Englis voices, VS Communicator 3 now ships with 5 voices. During the installation you are asked to choose from these 5 voices: - Ryan, adult (male) - Heather, adult (female) - Laura, adult (female) NEW! - Nelly, child (girl) NEW! - Kenny, child (boy) NEW!

Verb Conjugation Feature

For higher-functioning users a feature that allows for on-the-fly verb conjugation has been added.

English verbs (with the nobable exception of "To be") has 5 different form (e.g. "write", "wrote", "written", "writing", "writes"). The user selects between these forms by choosing between 5 different buttons after the verb has been inserted, thereby enabling the user to write and communicate grammatically correct verbs with only 2 button selections.

For instance in WordPower the user may select "Drink" on the front page and then selecting the -ing button for Present Participle form of the verb "drink" ("drinking").

Assign Keystroke to Button

Added support for assigning a keystroke (pressing a key on a regular keyboard) to a button on a page in VS Communicator. Whenever the assigned key is pressed on a regular keyboard, the corresponding button on the page will be selected.

This feature is mainly intended for individuals that are capable of using a standard keyboard, but are still be interested in minimizing the number of keystrokes. Individuls with progressive diseases (such as ALS) may for example be capable of using a regular keyboard during parts of the day.

With this feature the user can type with a regular keyboard, yet still be capable of using Word Prediction by for example assigning keys F1 - F10 to the prediction buttons on a communication page.

New Touch Screen Capabilities

Three new touch screen settings for better selection for touch screen users:

Minimum time a button must be pressed: The user needs to press and hold the touch screen for a given amount of time before a selection occurs.
Ignore-time after button selection: Selections will be ignored a given interval after the previous selection have been made.
Delay click after mouse release: Used together with "Trigger selection when mouse button is released". Makes it possible for touch screen users to slide a finger across the screen and selecting a button by releasing the finger. With "Delay click after mouse release" enabled, they can momentarily release the finger without making a selection.

A lot of minor improvements
Viking Software is continuously working on small and large improvements. Please see the Updates page for more details.