Friday, September 28, 2018

Tips for Using Voice Dictation to Blog on the New iPad







Would not it be great if blogging were as simple as sitting down with a friend to share a story, your thoughts, or a point of view? Oh, to be freed from the computer keyboard and writer's block - to be able to simply say what is on your mind without freezing up in front of the computer screen without any idea what to write? Well, now it can be that simple.

Whether you are an aspiring writer or a professional who wants to share your knowledge and opinions with the world - whether it is writing about food, pets, cars, reporting the news, or simply keeping an online journal - blogging just got easier with the help of Apple's new iPad, featuring voice dictation. When combined with the blogging app Blogsy, the iPad becomes the ultimate tool for bloggers. I am going to explain to you how easy it is to use. Before you begin blogging, you will need to establish a site for your blog. There are plenty of free options on the web like Blogger, WordPress, Moveable Type, and Drupal, all of which only take a few minutes to set up and even offer themes to make your blog unique. then you can get started.

Step 1: Setting up Blogsy

The first thing you have to do is set up Blogsy with your blogging account. Open Blogsy and click on the gear icon in the lower right corner. This will bring up the Setting tab, where you will find several options like Service Settings, General Settings, How-To Videos, FAQs, and few others. Tap on Service Settings and you will be presented with a list of blogging platforms. Select the platform you have chosen on which to blog, enter your account details, and tap Sign In. Then head back out to the main input screen and get ready to starting blogging!

Step 2: Writing your post with voice dictation

Now that you have ready to write, let's go over the Blogsy interface. Across the top of your screen, you will see a toolbar that features all of your text editing tools. Positioned vertically on the right are options from which you can pull in media (pictures and videos). The majority of your screen is made up of the text or input box, which is broken into two parts, the title and the body.

Now, let's get to the part you have been waiting for - blogging with your voice. It is as easy as pushing a button.

Title:

A blog post's title is very important. The title not only joins readers, but it is also what Google's web crawlers will find when cataloging your site's data. Make it short, catchy, and to the point. Tap on the grayed-out word, "Untitled." A cursor will appear, and the on-screen keyboard will pop up. To the left of the space bar is a microphone; This is the button to activate / deactivate the voice dictation function. When you are ready to begin, tap the button, wait for the chime, speak your title, then tap the button again. Within a second or two, your words should appear exactly as spoken. A word of advice: When you are using voice dictation, remember that the microphone is on the top of the device (look for the hole directly above the camera on the aluminum side). It helps to lean the iPad toward you when speaking. It is also very important to speak slowly and enunciate your words. Try not to whisper or use slang, as the iPad will probably get it wrong, and you will just end up wasting time with edits.

Body:

Now tap directly below the title in the body box so that you can begin to write your post in the same manner. While the dictation feature is powerful, it is not without limitations. It would be nice to talk continuously until you have finished your thought, but you risk overloading the iPad and losing some of what you said. Pace your thoughts, speaking one or two sentences at a time.

And that's it! Simply continue to follow this method of speaking slowly and clearly, taking breaks between thoughts, and you'll have a complete blog post in far less time than it would have taken to type.

Step 3: Adding images or videos to your post

Images within a blog post help the reader visualize your thought, so they are important to include. Blogsy makes adding media extremely easy with its ability to drag and drop images and videos from multiple sources, including YouTube, Flickr, Google Images, the Internet, and your own photo files, as well as images stored in your WordPress image library.