One of the best ways to start a blog is to any speak from your own voice and from the heart.

Unfortunately, some people get demotivated when they realize that you have may have to type a lot of text every day in order to blog. I understand that not everyone has an IT background like myself, or type as fast as they want to.

One recommendation that I can give is to use voice recognition. In fact, Windows XP by itself comes with a voice recognition software. All you have to do is to configure it, and then train the profile.

After good training, you can get easily up to 90% accuracy when the computer types as you speak. Once this is being set up (one time), all you have to do every day is just put on your microphone and speak your heart out!

To get started with voice recognition in Windows XP:

Go to your control panel and double click on “Regional and Language Options”. Under the languages tab, click the “details” button in the “Text services and input languages” area.

Blogging using speech recognition, step 1

In the installed services list, click add.

Blogging using speech recognition, step 2

In the “Add input language” dialog box, select the “speech” checkbox. Click OK.

Blogging using speech recognition, step 3

The dialog box should close and the “speech recognition” item should be added to your list of input methods.

Blogging using speech recognition, step 4

Initially you’ll find that the accuracy of recognition is pretty low. That is because the computer has not been trained to listen to your voice. So, you need to train your speech profile.

Click on “speech recognition” entry and click “properties”.

Blogging using speech recognition, step 5

Click the “advanced speech” button at the bottom.

Blogging using speech recognition, step 6

Click on “train profile” on the right hand side of the dialog that pops up, and follow the instructions, reading a few passages to the computer.

Blogging using speech recognition, step 7

The more you train your profile, the better accuracy it gets!

After you are done with training, you will want to start talking to your computer and get started with blogging! To start talking to your computer, make sure that your language bar is shown on your desktop, and then click on the microphone.

Windows XP Language Bar

Whip up Microsoft Word, and start talking!

Whatever you say will be best recognized by the speech to text engine, and translated into words. After that, simply copy the words in your document to your blog post!