Push to Listen: Interprets words incorrectly

[mistermannindy]

Okay ... I know this is a strange one.  I have VA setup to only listen when I press a button on my Joystick.  Often (maybe 90% of the time), when I press the button, VA wakes up and interprets an incorrect spoken command. 

It usually thinks its hearing the number 9 or the number 5 or the number 0. 

Unfortunately, I have these numbers also setup within my VA profile so it ends up executing unexpected commands. 

Making matters worse (for me), I use VA in a Virtual Reality environment so I am never able to actually see the VA screens to know if its hearing me correctly.  Attached is a screen shot of the VA window and how it reacts to me pressing the "Push to Listen" button.  As you can see, VA thinks I am saying "nine".  I am not.

Anyone ever experience anything like this?  VA works fine once the improper character is interpreted as long as I keep the listening button pressed.  Once I release the button VA goes back into "Not Listening" and the process repeats itself.  I hope I am explaining myself properly.

Thoughts?

[Pfeil]

If you uncheck the "Notification Sounds" option on the "Audio" tab of the VoiceAttack options window, does that make a difference?

Are you using speakers for audio playback, or headphones (built into your VR headset)?


The speech recognition engine is apparently receiving input. Short command phrases with few syllables are the most likely to be recognized unintentionally, as there will be very little information for the speech recognition system to work with.

[mistermannindy]

DISREGARD - problem not solved.  Leaving here for thread integrity.

That's it!  The notification sound is the culprit.   

I will see if I can find a sound that doesn't produce this undesired effect.  I was under the impression that the VA program didn't start listening until after the notification played.

If I can't find a suitable sound, I will adjust my use case and eliminate the notification.

Thanks!!

[mistermannindy]

Update .... changing the setting did NOT solve the problem.

I am currently testing this with NO sounds coming from my speakers.  No notification sounds selected in VA and I get the same issue where VA interprets something as a command.

Admittedly, this anomaly happens less often, but it still happens.

The only sound in the room is the background noise of the central air furnace fan.

Also ... this happens without the joystick connected.  I am testing this just by pressing the VA listening button (the headset icon).  Running current version of software (v1.8.9 64-bit).  I have paid a license. 

[Gary]

There is enough noise coming through that the speech engine is interpreting the sound as human speech. 

If you mute your microphone when you turn on listening, does this still occur?  If not, your mic is potentially too hot (or has other problems).  If so, you've got some type of system line noise that is making its way to the input.

Ref:  https://forum.voiceattack.com/smf/index.php?topic=1635.0  ("I'm not saying anything but VoiceAttack keeps hearing things")

[mistermannindy]

There is enough noise coming through that the speech engine is interpreting the sound as human speech. 

If you mute your microphone when you turn on listening, does this still occur?  If not, your mic is potentially too hot (or has other problems).  If so, you've got some type of system line noise that is making its way to the input.

Ref:  https://forum.voiceattack.com/smf/index.php?topic=1635.0  ("I'm not saying anything but VoiceAttack keeps hearing things")

Thanks Gary.  Yeah, turning off my mic solves the problem.  Of course it does.   

The odd thing here is VA doesn't pickup extraneous commands after the first one.  Wouldn't you think it would constantly pickup bogus commands if the problem were the mic or background noise?  Not being argumentative, just trying to understand.

The only time this happens is when I first put VA back into listening mode.

Update
Here's reality - VA works for me 99% of the time.  I can manage through the environmental issues on my end.  I don't have a "clean" environment and have to cope with the possible noise being interpreted as commands.  I have some small commands to emulate the keyboard when I need to type while in VR.  I suspect that's the real issue since it's numbers that are being interpreted when I activate listening. 

VA team - thanks for helping me out.  Appreciate the assistance.  This is a "me" issue.   

[Gary]

What is your command weight set to? (Options > Recognition tab)

The higher the value there, the more the speech engine will try to make best guesses (mine is set to 50) -

Also, you can set the minimum confidence level for that command to maybe 75 or higher to see if that helps.