The technology is already there and seems to be fairly benign as far as CPU power. I work at Lockheed Martin and a few guys there have been experimenting with some new voice recognition software. There is no calibration -- it's guaranteed to work on anyone over 12 years old. I tried it out and it was fantastic. I watched one afternoon as myself and 3 other guys/gals were able to flip through a technical manual and "instruct" the software what to do by speaking in a normal voice.It seems like this could be done in FS also; perhaps by release 2006. It would really add to the immersion to be able to say responses into a microphone via a teleprompter option. After a few hundred hous of flying the teleprompter could be turned off...Any comments here?

Yes,You can do it the easy and 'free' way.Join Vatsim and online flying community. Not only you talk to your mic, but there is a live, well trained person on the other side you communicate with.check www.vatsim.netBest DomMy system specs:AMD Athlon 1.2GhzASUS A7V133 200Mhz512MB SDRAMnVidia GF3 Ti200 (running on 40.72)Sony Trinitron 19'CH Yoke USB + CH Pro Pedals http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/images/wxrebeta.jpg

This is a technology I've started to study for some projects more than 10 years ago. With a card in a PC, it allowed more than 36000 words, untrained. So the technology has not that evolved too much in ten years, well, except that now you don't need to cut between each word!! (and that there are software only solutions). Besides, I think it is already available in your PC if you install Office XP (and it might even be a free download from MSFT). Just need to write an application on top of the "recognition engine" to make this for FS2002.The problem is that if you have a US software, it requires you not only to be fluent in English, but to pronounce the words as a US born people would do. Even if speaking with a close and good enough tone, if it's not 100%, you end up with a lot of unrecognized words. This definitely limit the application...

Voice recognition would be ideally suited to sim ATC because, unlike other vocal communications, pilot-controller communication syntax is rigorously structured, with a limit number of clearly defined words spoken in limited patterns. Also, enunciation is (usually) better between radio-trained aviation people than it is in normal conversation. About 10 years ago I read about a control tower simulator for training ATC that had voice recognition to represent the pilots so students could use it without an operator. It only needed about 200 words. In FS200X that would have to be expanded to include airline and place names, which in FS2002 amounts to something like 5000 words.

I would never use ATC without voice recognition, be it MSATC or otherwise. On my old 98SE system with FS2000 I made many flights using PROFLIGHT and GAME COMMANDER with good results. Game commander is not yet compatable with my XP system to my knowledge, but Larry in the Radar contact forum made me aware of a small freeware program (the link is www.thelindercompany.de.vu ) that does the job just fine, however you need to download a huge (50 meg or so)Microsoft Speech SDK for it to work. I am anxious to try this with the new Radar Contact release. With the MS ATC, some clever command programming is required. For example, given the circumstance, "Roger" will require hitting either 1,2, or 3 on the keyboard. I have assigned the voice commands "Roger" to activate key #1;"Roger That" to activate key #2; and "That's a Roger" to activate key#3 to circumvent this problem. I could just never get used to the pilot voices answering for me after having to press a key.Take care, John

I'm currently using Game Commander 2 with FS2002, FlightDeck Companion and Windows XP Service Pack 1.The only minor problem I had, unrelated to Windows XP, was that I had to create a custom profile in GC2 for FS2002 since it only comes with a profile for FS2000.I've reassigned voice commands to certain keystroke commands, and I use this with FlightDeck Companion. So I get the virtual First Officer in FlightDeck Companion reading out the checklist, I reply in my own voice, and the command is executed.There's something so cool to saying "Flaps 15" and having the flaps set without taking my hands off the controls; or saying "Gear Down," see the gear descend, then hearing the co-pilot respond "Gear Down, three green and locked."

I recall when Proflight98 was released for FS98, I was elated.When PF2k was released for FS2k and the add-on Game Commander II,I was ecstatic. Things seemed to have died since then. I must say I was really dissappointed that PF2k was not patched for FS2K or even re-released as PF2K. I would gladly have shelled out the bucks for the program. I Understand that RC is now the ATC program of choice and from what I have read its quite good but the voice interaction isn't there....Still hoping.

You can already talk to controllers (and a heck of a lot better ones at that :-) )www.vatsim.netRyan-Flightpro08 :-cool VATSIM Pilot/ControllerZLA ARTCC Senior Controller (C-3)SAN TRACON Lead ASRC (Advanced Simulated Radar Client) Beta Tester-----------------------------My "Home Made" System Specs:Intel Pentium 4 2.2GHz ProcessorTurbo Gamer ATX Mid-Tower with 420W Power SupplyEPoX 4G4A Motherboard with Intel 845G ChipsetVisiontek XTASY GeForce4 128MB Ti4600 (Det 30.30 Drivers)512MB PC2100 DDR RAM40GB Matrox 7200RPM Hard DriveWindows XP Home Edition SP1*No CPU or GPU Overclocking*3dMark2001SE Score: 11298-----------------------------Click [link:ftp.avsim.com/library/esearch.php?DLID=&Name=&FileName=&Author=Ryan+Fretwell&CatID=Root]Here to Download my American Eagle POSKY CRJ-200!

How well would FS2002, and Squawkbox with voice work on a 56k dialup modem? I've alway wanted to try flying on vatsim with voice (all I need is to go get a microphone), but I always have a bad feeling my modem wouldn't be able to handle the bandwidth.......

My old 56k always worked fine :)Jason

ONe Word! "VATSIM":-)

56K works just fine with Sqawkbox and Roger Wilco. :-)Ryan-Flightpro08 :-cool VATSIM Pilot/ControllerZLA ARTCC Senior Controller (C-3)SAN TRACON Lead ASRC (Advanced Simulated Radar Client) Beta Tester-----------------------------My "Home Made" System Specs:Intel Pentium 4 2.2GHz ProcessorTurbo Gamer ATX Mid-Tower with 420W Power SupplyEPoX 4G4A Motherboard with Intel 845G ChipsetVisiontek XTASY GeForce4 128MB Ti4600 (Det 30.30 Drivers)512MB PC2100 DDR RAM40GB Matrox 7200RPM Hard DriveWindows XP Home Edition SP1*No CPU or GPU Overclocking*3dMark2001SE Score: 11298-----------------------------Click [link:ftp.avsim.com/library/esearch.php?DLID=&Name=&FileName=&Author=Ryan+Fretwell&CatID=Root]Here to Download my American Eagle POSKY CRJ-200!

Hi John.I can't get your link to the Linder Company to work. Do they have another site?Thanks,Jim

I really wish Squawkbox to FS was a bit more of a seamless interface. Having to learn how to set radio freqs and squawk codes in Squawkbox instead of in FS would be a drag since I have GoFlight radios. If they would make an interface that allowed me to dial in my Squawk and radio freqs on my GF-166 and have squawkbox read them from FS2K2 then I would start flying online. It should be possible to do since the GoFlight panels read the freqs from FS and change accordingly ,if you let FS autotune your Squawk or radio freq it changes on the GF Panel, so there has to be some kind of Output within the FS file structure that the GoFlight panels pick up. Maybe FSUIPC or some other module can make this a reality in the future. VATSIM looks like the way to go but until the interface is more integrated and seamless a lot of people, Myself included, either cannot or will not take the time to figure it all out and use it.Ken

Hi Jim,I just sent you the file,good luck !John