Ink Handwriting recognition in one Note

[Thomas Wenzl [MVP]]

Hello Grant,

It would be more accurate to say that the necessary files are
included in the SP-2 download, if you download the entire thing, but
they are only installed when the service pack is applied to a Tablet
PC.

yep, that's the way it works. Thanks.

Regards

 

[Chris H.]

And Tablet PCs do exceptionally well with voice dictation, too, Stephen.
A nice voice-enabled headset (under $30 these days) and you don't even
need to use your hands. Extremely versatile machines.
--
Chris H.
Microsoft Windows MVP/Tablet PC
Tablet Creations - http://nicecreations.us/
Associate Expert
Expert Zone -

 

[Chris_Pratley \(MS\)]

Grant, my goodness, you are one bitter gentleman.

I think this time I only disagree fundamentally with about half of what you
wrote (the speculation parts, mainly).

As an example of how idle speculation can be utterly wrong and perpetuate

I'm starting to suspect that he [Chris] hasn't been working at MS long and only came on board
when they bought OneNote from someone else.

*ahem* I have been with the company just over 10 years now, and was a
primary original designer of OneNote, which was entirely built and designed
in-house. Read more on my blog at
http://weblogs.asp.net/chris_pratley/archive/2004/01/30/64898.aspx

Be careful what you speculate, since later that will get repeated as fact
since someone "read it somewhere".

You also repeat the same sort of "MS puts in stuff to break other companies'
apps" allegation without attribution, then claim you don't need to give an
attribution because a lot of other people have repeated the same thing, so
it must be true. Nice tautology.

Reality: I have a friend whose entire job for Windows95 was to install and
test other companies' software, find where they had bugs or broke the rules
or had just plain terrible design, then get the Win95 team to add in ugly
hacks *just to make the other software work*. His performance was rated on
how compatible Win95 was in running other companies' applications, including
competitors to our own products. He would find your theory intriguing, to be
sure. But of course, it doesn't need to be backed up, people repeat it a lot
after all, so it must be true. I also read that more planes and ships
disappear in the Bermuda Triangle than anywhere else. Must be something
weird there - it gets written about a lot after all by some book authors and
such whose names I don't need to supply.

That said, there have been one or two famous, highly unprofessional acts by
rogue developers who ended up getting fired and their mistakes corrected,
but that hardly counts as company policy.

Your whole theory about how features are introduced in limited settings to
get people "hooked" on them simply doesn't make any sense. Surely it would
make more sense to release such features broadly to get even more people
"hooked" on them? And what does "hooked" mean? They are useful? That's a bad
thing? Please.

Chris Pratley (MS, but not speaking for the company)
OneNote design team, MS 10 year veteran, and slightly miffed newsgroup
contributor...

 

[Paul]

I use it for the occasional (personal) email. Helps with a more conversation
style but once you take into account the time to correct errors there is
probably no time saving (and it is very easy to miss some goofs) but it is
nice to be able to get away from the keyboard for a short while.

I also use it (and think it is more useful) for voice commands, particularly
if I am doing something repetitive where it is desirable for the mouse to
stay in part of the screen (not move to menus on toolbar or right click) and
for which there is no keyboard shortcut or the keyboard shortcuts are on two
different sides of the keyboard. For this sort of situation it is a big time
saver. It would be a huge time saver if selecting styles in Word worked
properly through voice activation but thats a whole other thread (on a
different newsgroup).

I wait for the day when voice options in Office are improved and extended to
Windows. I have a third part app on my smartphone that allows me say the
name of the person I want to dial (can be anyone in the contact list, no
need to 'teach' the phone first). It would be great if you could do the same
thing when addressing emails in Outlook and if the voice system could learn
from mistakes and then transfer that information to other devices (like your
PDA or Smartphone) when you synch.

While I'm off on a complete tangent its also about time that Office/Windows
supported an 'Import/Export your settings with USB memory stick' so that you
could go to any PC and (once logged on) put in the stick and have you
familiar desktop and office settings, custom dictionary, normal template,
voice profiles, favourites etc. It would make the almost ubiquitous
Windows/Office combination even more so, as everyone would expect to be able
to plug their settings into any PC and might help to drive hardware sales
(as folk holding off purchasing a PC due to the hassle involved in
duplicating settings and re-installing apps would have at least one of those
hurdles removed).

These sort of ideas aren't rocket science but would help to transform the PC
use experience into someting more like what we hoped the 21st century would
be.

Anyway, rant over.

NOBODY who writes seriously uses dictation, except for some initial
brainstorming. Personally I think dictation far inferior for writing
from start to finish. Having dictated lengthy notes daily for twelve
years, I speak from personal experience with both methods. But cognitive
psychology speaks against dictation too. The auditory modality competes
for processing space with verbal thinking, whereas the hands draw on their
modality-specific attentional resources.

srdiamond

 

[Paul]

I'm not an MS basher (largely because the thought of a world where we all
use alternatives such OS/2 Lotus Notes and Word Perfect Office brings me out
in a cold sweat (and don't even start on Linux and Open Office)) nor a lover
(I'm not blind to the stupid bugs and design floors in many
products/features).

However given the number of court cases MS is losing for anti-competitive
practices and the number of developers who claim there are
hidden/undocumented APIs in Windows that MS Software takes advantage of but
others' cannot, you can see why MS gets a bad reputation (personally I think
bundling software with the OS is great - as a consumer I get free browsers
and music players, but it is not consumers taking MS to court).

While you're here (if you are) can you please do what you can to ensure the
next version of OneNote has at least some support for handwriting on
graphics tablets? I really think that all that is needed is a messge when
you attempt to convert that says "this handwriting was captured on a device
not fully compatible with OneNote, the results may not be accurate, are you
sure you wish to proceed?".

I doubt that there are many installs of OneNote where the rest of office
(and office ink) are not present. Until the time when we all (or at least
more than a tiny minority) have tablet PCs or 'fast/high quality' graphics
tablet I think it is a bit aloof to leave the rest of us in the cold with
this feature. Until then I think many will take the view that I do that
OneNote is only for the tablet PC and will harbour our suspicions that this
is an attempt to sell more copies of Tablet OS and Tablet PCs (to keep the
hardware partners happy).

Grant, my goodness, you are one bitter gentleman.

I think this time I only disagree fundamentally with about half of what you
wrote (the speculation parts, mainly).

As an example of how idle speculation can be utterly wrong and perpetuate

I'm starting to suspect that he [Chris] hasn't been working at MS long

and
only came on board

when they bought OneNote from someone else.

*ahem* I have been with the company just over 10 years now, and was a
primary original designer of OneNote, which was entirely built and designed
in-house. Read more on my blog at
http://weblogs.asp.net/chris_pratley/archive/2004/01/30/64898.aspx

Be careful what you speculate, since later that will get repeated as fact
since someone "read it somewhere".

You also repeat the same sort of "MS puts in stuff to break other companies'
apps" allegation without attribution, then claim you don't need to give an
attribution because a lot of other people have repeated the same thing, so
it must be true. Nice tautology.

Reality: I have a friend whose entire job for Windows95 was to install and
test other companies' software, find where they had bugs or broke the rules
or had just plain terrible design, then get the Win95 team to add in ugly
hacks *just to make the other software work*. His performance was rated on
how compatible Win95 was in running other companies' applications, including
competitors to our own products. He would find your theory intriguing, to be
sure. But of course, it doesn't need to be backed up, people repeat it a lot
after all, so it must be true. I also read that more planes and ships
disappear in the Bermuda Triangle than anywhere else. Must be something
weird there - it gets written about a lot after all by some book authors and
such whose names I don't need to supply.

That said, there have been one or two famous, highly unprofessional acts by
rogue developers who ended up getting fired and their mistakes corrected,
but that hardly counts as company policy.

Your whole theory about how features are introduced in limited settings to
get people "hooked" on them simply doesn't make any sense. Surely it would
make more sense to release such features broadly to get even more people
"hooked" on them? And what does "hooked" mean? They are useful? That's a bad
thing? Please.

Chris Pratley (MS, but not speaking for the company)
OneNote design team, MS 10 year veteran, and slightly miffed newsgroup
contributor...

Cool! Paul, you are the first person I have met in here that actually
likes to DISCUSS these things rather than just spout Microsoft rhetoric.
Not counting the newbies who ask questions that can easily be answered by
reading the help files.

(for

me

I guess I never paid much attention to that feature.


In name only. There are programs written by high-school students that
have better Office integration. In the SP-1 they tossed in a couple of
things that sound good in the feature list but upon examination you can
tell they were just tossed in because they were easy to code. The create
Outlook Contact feature just creates a contact and puts the selected text
in the note. The user then has to cut and paste the note text to all the
correct fields in Outlook. Geez, a high-schooler could do that in VBA in
about 15 minutes. (Except of course NOT in OneNote because it only has
enough of an API to justify saying that it has one.)

OS.

I agree. I just gave up arguing the point a long time ago. Microsoft is
dead set on not offering the Tablet PC handwriting engine on anything but
the Tablet PC until (maybe) when Longwait comes out. This is a standard
Microsoft tactic. They will offer a feature as a trial balloon in only
one product. Wait to see if people really like it and get enough people
hooked on it that they can't live without it. At the same time they will
work on code in their OS that secretly interferes with other third-party
versions of the same feature. They have often been caught including this
code in 'security updates' or even updates for other popular software.
(For all you MVP's having fits: No I haven't saved a bibliography of all
these references over the years. Suffice it to say I have read them from
trusted sources like popular computer magazines and reputable authors.)
Granted, handwriting recognition doesn't really need this kind of tactic
because not many companies have the R&D budget to compete with Microsoft
in this arena anyway. Once people are hooked on the feature they will
include it in some new version of a product as incentive for people to
upgrade yet again. Many companies had to install Exchange Server just to
get BACK the shared folders feature that Microsoft yanked out of Outlook.
I think it was version 98 or 2000 that allowed you to share folders
without Exchange Server but the next version didn't. They can cite all
the technical reasons why the Exchange Server version was better but that
is no reason to yank out code that worked just fine for most people.



Have you thought about setting up your Tablet PC in a location that
allows you to use it as a note pad? They claim that the OffLine files
feature works better with ON SP-1. Perhaps you could set the main
location for your My NoteBook folder to be on your desktop, even for your
Tablet (if you get one). Then make those available offline to your
Tablet. Now, when you take a note on your tablet it will immediately be
available on your desktop. I have found that notes handwritten on my
tablet can be converted to text on my desktop. This is because all the
recognition was done at the time you actually wrote it. You won't have
all the options of various possible interpretations available on the
desktop but usually the first one is good enough.

Right now I don't use this system because I got turned off to OffLine
files before SP-1 but Chris Pratley says it is better now and I generally
trust him. He seems to tell it like it is most of the time. I'm starting
to suspect that he hasn't been working at MS long and only came on board
when they bought OneNote from someone else. This is all speculation on my
part but MS has a long history of buying or stealing technology then
claiming they invented it themselves. Naturally Chris couldn't admit to
such a thing and keep his job so we won't ask him to comment.



I was actually going to say that exact thing but got distracted and
forgot to include it in the message.




Partly because the initial recognition is done at the time you are
actually writing. Probably because the data to do the recognition is much
more involved that that required to simply display the ink. I think the
way it works is to do the recognition as you are writing, then only
actually store the ink plus the list of possible interpretations in the
OneNote file itself. Since recognition requires watching how fast you are
making each stroke and possible even the angle of the stylus at each
point, I think this volume of data would quickly overwhelm even the
biggest hard drives. So they use what they need to do the recognition
then only keep the results and enough to display the ink. Again, this is
only speculation, but it is the way I would do it.

major

OS

the

new

I agree except this time I haven't seen much info about any new version
of Office. Maybe I'm just not paying attention to as many sources as I
used to.



Nice talking to you. I gotta get back to my real life now.

 

[Erik Sojka]

Such a thing exists, and it's included in every copy of Office since 2000 I
believe.

Look for the "Save My Settings Wizard" under the Start Menu. It takes all
of the registry settings and saves them to a *.OPS file, which can be
transferred on whatever media and restored using the same app.

 

[Grant Robertson]

Grant, my goodness, you are one bitter gentleman.

Not normally. Just when it comes to MS trickery. (Oh, and conspicuous
consumption) On the other hand I'm the first one to stand up for them
when it comes to innovation. Who else would have had the nerve to come
out with the Tablet PC after the Newton bit the dust so hard?

You have to remember that I was into computers since before there even
was an IBM PC or an MS-DOS. I remember PC-DOS and IBM-DOS and the bogus
contracts Microsoft forced the small computer stores that were just
opening to sign. This isn't just rumor. I spoke with some of the shop
owners themselves. They told me the reason they sold MS-DOS almost
exclusively is that they had to sign a contract saying that the way
Microsoft would measure how many licenses they sold was by the number of
PC's they sold. This effectively said they had to pay for a license of
MS-DOS for every PC they sold whether it was installed or not. They told
me they had to sign these contracts or Microsoft wouldn't allow them to
sell MS-DOS at all. The owners were forced to accept this contract
because enough of their customers requested MS-DOS that they wouldn't be
able to stay in business if they didn't sell it. So no one would buy the
other versions of DOS because it would cost extra. This was also the
story all over the country. If it weren't for this contract (which I
suspect was actually illegal though these beginning business people
didn't realize it) then IBM-DOS, PC-DOS, DR-DOS, and Caldera-DOS would
have had a chance in the marketplace. Some of them were arguably much
better. People think what Microsoft did to Netscape was unfair
competition. That was nothing compared to this original licensing
contract.

It's not that I think all MS employees are in on the 'conspiracy' but
those at the top know what they are doing and I have to wonder how they
sleep at night. I know the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation does a lot
of good things with some of that extra money. But I don't think they
would be raking it in quite so fast if Bill weren't so good as stifling
true competition. I've got my suspicions about the SCO lawsuits as well
but let's not go there.

*ahem* I have been with the company just over 10 years now, and was a
primary original designer of OneNote, which was entirely built and designed
in-house.

Be careful what you speculate, since later that will get repeated as fact
since someone "read it somewhere".

I'll give you that. You just happen to be the most straightforward MS
employee I have ever 'met'. Rather than spewing the standard MS BS about
some feature being left out because 'the customers asked for it' you just
tell the truth and say you didn't have time and it was harder to code
than you thought it would be. Heck, even I can accept that.

You also repeat the same sort of "MS puts in stuff to break other companies'
apps" allegation without attribution, then claim you don't need to give an
attribution because a lot of other people have repeated the same thing, so
it must be true. Nice tautology.

Not just a lot of other people. A lot of trusted writers in the industry.
I still remember the "DOS isn't done till Lotus won't run" rumors before
MS-DOS 3.3 came out. Guess what, when it came out Lotus was suddenly full
of bugs and ran slower.

Reality: I have a friend whose entire job for Windows95 was to install and
test other companies' software, find where they had bugs or broke the rules
or had just plain terrible design, then get the Win95 team to add in ugly
hacks *just to make the other software work*. His performance was rated on
how compatible Win95 was in running other companies' applications, including
competitors to our own products. He would find your theory intriguing, to be
sure. But of course, it doesn't need to be backed up, people repeat it a lot
after all, so it must be true. I also read that more planes and ships
disappear in the Bermuda Triangle than anywhere else. Must be something
weird there - it gets written about a lot after all by some book authors and
such whose names I don't need to supply.

When Windows 95 was coming out there were lots of businesses who said
there was no way they would upgrade from Windows for WorkGroups 3.11
unless all their software ran. So, in this case, Microsoft knew Win 95
would be a huge flop unless it had maximum compatibility. Even then, it
took almost a year before enough apps had been upgraded to run on Win 95
that most of the people I knew were willing to upgrade. Two years for
some others.

As far as Bermuda goes: I've seen some research that shows that,
statistically, more planes and ships do go down there. But the research
attributes it to a confluence of weather patterns rather than mystical or
other-worldly forces.

That said, there have been one or two famous, highly unprofessional acts by
rogue developers who ended up getting fired and their mistakes corrected,
but that hardly counts as company policy.

I would be interested to know what those were and to hear their side of
the story. I am the eternal cynic, you know.

Your whole theory about how features are introduced in limited settings to
get people "hooked" on them simply doesn't make any sense. Surely it would
make more sense to release such features broadly to get even more people
"hooked" on them? And what does "hooked" mean? They are useful? That's a bad
thing? Please.

You're right there. Better to get millions of small businesses used to
using a feature like shared folders in Outlook then make them install a
whole new server just to keep that feature if they need to upgrade to a
new version of Office. What was I thinking?


We don't really need to go over and over this issue, especially in this
newsgroup. I know I started it, so I should end it. I'm sorry if I
offended you, but you have to admit that if Bill and Steve had secret
plans up their sleeves they certainly wouldn't tell all their thousands
of employees.

I will always believe what I believe and you will always believe what you
believe. There ain't no changin' that. This is why I will never be an MVP
and will probably never be allowed to write a book about MS stuff because
I'm not afraid to say when I think something is an out and out but or
poor design. I have to laugh sometimes when I read some books that dance
around some really nasty bugs and pretend they just aren't there. I just
can't wait to read some of the new OneNote Books that are coming out. I
know you worked really hard on OneNote and you were terribly constrained.
My complaint is that the people above you should have given you more
money and manpower to do it right. As I've said before. OneNote is really
only an Office product in name only. I think you would have done better
if they had allowed you to so don't take it personally. But that has been
discussed to death also so you can just call me an idiot and we will be
done with this conversation.

 

[Ben M. Schorr, MVP-OneNote]

was also the story all over the country. If it weren't for this
contract (which I suspect was actually illegal though these beginning
business people didn't realize it) then IBM-DOS, PC-DOS, DR-DOS, and
Caldera-DOS would have had a chance in the marketplace. Some of them
were arguably much better. People think what Microsoft did to Netscape
was unfair competition. That was nothing compared to this original
licensing contract.

There's no grudge like an old grudge, I guess.

It's not that I think all MS employees are in on the 'conspiracy' but

Few of the current MS employees were at MS when the offenses you describe
took place. A lot of them were not yet in high school.

I know the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation does a lot
of good things with some of that extra money. But I don't think they
would be raking it in quite so fast if Bill weren't so good as stifling
true competition.

We could say the same about AT&T and Standard Oil? (among many others)
Capitalism is a game which should not be played too well.

Not just a lot of other people. A lot of trusted writers in the industry.
I still remember the "DOS isn't done till Lotus won't run" rumors
before MS-DOS 3.3 came out. Guess what, when it came out Lotus was
suddenly full of bugs and ran slower.

Once again, an example from 20 years ago.

You're right there. Better to get millions of small businesses used to
using a feature like shared folders in Outlook then make them install a
whole new server just to keep that feature if they need to upgrade to a
new version of Office. What was I thinking?

If you're referring to Net Folders it never worked very well to begin
with; hard to blame MS for changing that feature in a future version.

I will always believe what I believe and you will always believe what
you believe. There ain't no changin' that. This is why I will never be
an MVP and will probably never be allowed to write a book about MS
stuff because I'm not afraid to say when I think something is an out
and out but or poor design.

MVP's frequently tell MS when they think something is a poor design.
My NDA won't let me tell you about the friendly difference of opinion I
had with some of the OneNote marketing team some months back.

 

[Kathy J]

I'll second Ben's "my NDA won't let me tell you". He's not the only MVP who
tells MS employees when things aren't what the customers want or don't work
right. In fact, if you were to read the forward to my PPT book (written by
a major member of the PPT team), you would see that he flat out likes that
fact about me (and the other MVPs).

Just my two cents, as always
--
Kathryn Jacobs, Microsoft MVP PowerPoint and OneNote
Author of Kathy Jacobs on PowerPoint - Available now from Holy Macro! Books
Get PowerPoint answers at http://www.powerpointanswers.com
Featured Presenter at PPT 2004 - http://www.pptlive.com

I believe life is meant to be lived. But:
if we live without making a difference, it makes no difference that we lived

 

[Grant Robertson]

MVP's frequently tell MS when they think something is a poor design.
My NDA won't let me tell you about the friendly difference of opinion I
had with some of the OneNote marketing team some months back.

See, now this is something that concerns me. Could you at least tell me
if the NDA was just from being an MVP or was it to get early inside scoop
for writing a book or something. If it was for a book then I can
understand but if you gotta sign an NDA just to be an MVP then I'm damn
glad they didn't make me one.

 

[Grant Robertson]

I'll second Ben's "my NDA won't let me tell you". He's not the only MVP who
tells MS employees when things aren't what the customers want or don't work
right. In fact, if you were to read the forward to my PPT book (written by
a major member of the PPT team), you would see that he flat out likes that
fact about me (and the other MVPs).

Good for you then. Again, I am interested to know if the NDA is from
being an MVP or for the early knowledge necessary to write a book.

 

[Kathy J]

Umm ... Yes? Yes, you have to sign an NDA to be an MVP. But it only covers
NDA-able material. I didn't have to sign an additional one for either book,
because all special knowledge used was covered under the MVP one and then
made public.

It's too bad that you feel that way about the NDA. I think you would find it
isn't as imposing as you think it is.
--
Kathryn Jacobs, Microsoft MVP PowerPoint and OneNote
Co-Author of Life on OneNote - Coming Fall 2004 from Holy Macro! Books
Get OneNote answers at http://www.onenoteanswers.com
Get PowerPoint answers at http://www.powerpointanswers.com

I believe life is meant to be lived. But:
if we live without making a difference, it makes no difference that we lived

 

[Chris H.]

There are things we are involved in as individual MVPs that even other MVPs
don't know, Grant. I cannot tell you the times I had to stop to think which
beta or which telephone conference so-and-so was in to determine whether or
not they're allowed to hear an answer. Some situations are within a
particular "team" at Microsoft only and not even involving MVPs, with others
not even knowing the project exists. Some projects are across the MVP award
categories for a more broadly based response. And a whole lot don't even
get out of the team area itself.

You've elsewhere posted your opinions about Microsoft coming out with a
Tablet PC after the Newton failure. Personally, I don't believe it was so
much following up on a failure, but waiting for years until it was done
correctly. People cross reference Ink and Handwriting Recognition as if it
is the same thing, and it isn't.

Office has contained a "handwriting" for a long time, but it doesn't (even
now) have the recognizers a Tablet PC has so you can turn that "handwriting"
into text. The Office "handwriting" engine is definitely different than the
Tablet PC Ink process. Even with Office XP (the 2002 version family
products), the Tablet Pack was necessary for the built-in Office handwriting
functions to be operational. But the Office programs (even with Office
2003) still don't have Ink recognition, even on Tablet PCs.

Only specialized programs like Windows Journal, a Tablet PC-only program,
have Ink recognition where the user's pen input can be selected and turned
into text, while the Office programs need to rely on the Tablet Input Panel
to recognize and convert Ink to text before being inserted into the program.
With the Tablet PC Edition 2005 superset running on top of Windows XP
Service Pack 2, that recognition is very much improved.

How did it get to this point? Years and years of research and development
by Microsoft. The company has spent something like $36 billion in research
and development since 1986. Hundreds of thousands of handwriting samples
are contained in the Tablet PC recognition package, which is augmented by
the Tablet PC MUIRP in many languages, to achieve the recognition. Is it
perfect? No, but it is a darn sight better than anything before it. And it
is has made a huge jump with the 2005 edition which is coming with Windows
XP SP2.

As for the development of the Tablet PCs, this project has been underway at
Microsoft for many years at the request of Bill Gates. He was the one who
pushed the form factor, making a fully-capable computer smaller and more
mobile, offering rotating/digital screens and lots of of features for the
users. This wasn't done overnight. There are a lot of projects underway,
with a lot of information available here: http://research.microsoft.com/

As for MVPs and the contributions to Microsoft's programs, Steve Ballmer,
Chief Executive Officer, has said, "MVPs have a tremendous impact on
Microsoft customers and technical communities worldwide, and their passion
for technology is inspiring. Their commitment to helping customers optimize
their use of Microsoft technologies is key, as is the feedback they provide,
which is vital to product development and R&D. When I spoke at this year’s
MVP summit, it was the largest ever, with MVPs representing 63 countries. We
can’t thank the MVPs enough for their contributions."

He's also said we're Microsoft's most vocal critics.
--
Chris H.
Microsoft Windows MVP/Tablet PC
Tablet Creations - http://nicecreations.us/
Associate Expert
Expert Zone -

 

[Ben M. Schorr, MVP-OneNote]

See, now this is something that concerns me. Could you at least tell me
if the NDA was just from being an MVP or was it to get early inside
scoop for writing a book or something.

The NDA is the price I pay for getting access to inside information, the
opportunity to sit in on confidential conference calls and meetings, advance
copies of documentation and pre-release software and access to members
of the OneNote team even beyond the exceptional access Chris Pratley and
others offer here in the newsgroup.
It only applies to information that's covered under the NDA -- in this
case the friendly disagreement in question occurred during a confidential
conference call and during the succeeding related e-mail messages.
Since I'd like to continue to be invited to such exchanges and have the
opportunity to contribute my opinions I take my NDA seriously and don't
offer any specifics on such things outside those circles with the proper
"clearance" to know about it.
Suffice it to say that MVPs are certainly no strangers to dissent and
criticism with Microsoft. In some cases that criticism has been offered
to the highest levels. I've been in the room when MVPs have offered criticism
or complaint directly to Gates, Ballmer, Allchin and other top-level Microsoft
executives. I've been in meetings between MVPs and Microsoft development
teams when the discussion became so heated we feared it would come to blows.
(not with the OneNote team, by the way) With rare exception I've been
impressed with how professionally the criticism was received by the Microsoft
folks. They don't always agree, of course, but they usually seem to listen
and consider the criticism intelligently.
That said, let's get back to criticizing (and praising) OneNote.

 

[Paul]

Yes, I've used that before - what I was talking about was something more
extensive that also takes voice profiles, Windows preferences, bookmarks,
Start Menu (though grying out apps that are not installed on the target
machine), etc.

The ideal would be to be able to log in as a guest, put in your USB device
with the settings and when you are finished, have the option to clear the
information off the PC.

 

[Grant Robertson]

It's too bad that you feel that way about the NDA. I think you would find it
isn't as imposing as you think it is.

I can understand an NDA preventing me from releasing information that was
only made available to me as a result of signing the NDA. However, if an
NDA prevented me from talking about a bug or design flaw I had discovered
in a product or beta that was publicly available then I would consider it
too imposing. In fact, I would consider it corporate censorship of the
worst kind.

I am a strong believer in the public having a right to know. They have a
right to know about bugs and design flaws in existing products. They have
a right to know ahead of time if an important feature is going to be
yanked in a newer version so they can plan how their business will handle
the situation. They also have a right to know if a web browser can
actually be uninstalled from a computer without compromising the basic
functionality of the OS. There is now way I would ever sign an NDA that
would limit my ability to speak about these issues.

I think I would do a good job writing books telling users how to REALLY
use some of the software out there. However, I know I would be at a
disadvantage because I would not sign the kind of NDA that I suspect
Microsoft would expect me to sign in order to get the advance knowledge
that you get before you write your books.

 

[Erik Sojka]

It's not automated, but a quick and dirty batch file or WMI script to
copy C:\documents and settings\{you} to and from the USB drive will do
that.

 

[Grant Robertson]

There are things we are involved in as individual MVPs that even other MVPs
don't know, Grant. I cannot tell you the times I had to stop to think which
beta or which telephone conference so-and-so was in to determine whether or
not they're allowed to hear an answer.

Now this seems to be in contrast to Kathy's statement that the NDA's
aren't too imposing.

Some situations are within a
particular "team" at Microsoft only ... with others
not even knowing the project exists. ... And a whole lot don't even
get out of the team area itself.

I've noticed this. It seems over the years that certain Windows API's are
made available internally while different ones are made available to
competitors (I know, rumors). While at the same time it seems important
design standards which would really benefit users do not get shared
between departments. I remember a Microsoft rep giving a Visual Fox Pro
demo (I know, ancient days) stated that when Bill Gates saw its interface
he called the Visual Basic team on the carpet for not having a similar
interface. Now this wouldn't have happened if there had been better
communication between departments. This is why I have called for Bill to
delegate out his supposed role as Chief Software Architect. He just
doesn't have time to track all these kinds of details. As you mention
later, he does a much better job as innovator and evangelist.

You've elsewhere posted your opinions about Microsoft coming out with a
Tablet PC after the Newton failure. Personally, I don't believe it was so
much following up on a failure, but waiting for years until it was done
correctly. People cross reference Ink and Handwriting Recognition as if it
is the same thing, and it isn't.

What I meant there had more to do with public perception than technical
exactitude of technologies. As far as the general public is concerned,
the Newton didn't work because 'handwriting recognition just can't be
done.' This is regardless of whether the Newton really tried to do
handwriting recognition. That's just what people think. So for Microsoft
to come out with a Tablet PC with handwriting recognition as it's chief
selling point in the face of this public perception was very brave.
Realizing that the only way it would sell was if it was built on top of a
standard Windows XP PC was very smart. I had had my Tablet PC for only
two days before I couldn't live without it.

Office has contained a "handwriting" for a long time, but it doesn't (even
now) have the recognizers a Tablet PC has so you can turn that "handwriting"
into text. The Office "handwriting" engine is definitely different than the
Tablet PC Ink process. Even with Office XP (the 2002 version family
products), the Tablet Pack was necessary for the built-in Office handwriting
functions to be operational. But the Office programs (even with Office
2003) still don't have Ink recognition, even on Tablet PCs.

That's interesting. That's not what I had gathered from reading some of
the other posts from MVP's in here and the Tablet PC newsgroup. I never
really tried recognizing the handwriting I wrote into Word because it was
always just used for comments or annotations. If I want to edit the
actual body text I just use the TIP. Unlike others, I don't really expect
the handwriting in Word to be recognizable or searchable. I guess it
would be handy to be able to search for handwritten comments but I have
never needed it myself. Now that I think about it I am sure someone will
want it pretty soon though.

How did it get to this point? Years and years of research and development
by Microsoft. The company has spent something like $36 billion in research
and development since 1986.

Well, now, all that $36 billion couldn't have been spent on handwriting
recognition alone. Saying someone spends a lot of money on general
research doesn't really support a conversation about a specific thing.

Hundreds of thousands of handwriting samples
are contained in the Tablet PC recognition package, which is augmented by
the Tablet PC MUIRP in many languages, to achieve the recognition. Is it
perfect? No, but it is a darn sight better than anything before it. And it
is has made a huge jump with the 2005 edition which is coming with Windows
XP SP2.

Yes, yes, yes. I know all of this. Hey, I'm not complaining about the
quality of the recognition. I did for a bit then I re-examined how many
mistakes I make while typing, using Graffiti on my Palm Pilot, using the
FITALY keyboard on my Palm Pilot, and when I just hand write on paper.
Heck, I make so many weird mistakes while typing that sometimes I think
my brain must be turning to mush. And now I find I am making those same
mistakes when handwriting. Things like transposing letters or writing
'maid' instead of 'made' as I did just earlier in this message. Except
for a few little things like that 'l' in the TIP's 'Character Pad' we had
that tiff about, as far as I'm concerned, the only way to make the
handwriting recognition better would be to read peoples minds. (And I
certainly wouldn't want Microsoft doing that.)

... Steve Ballmer,
...
He's also said we're Microsoft's most vocal critics.

Yes, but as soon as you sign that NDA you can only criticize privately,
not publicly. And you guys have tried to tell me in the past that being
and MVP didn't restrict what you could say. Now I see you were telling
the truth by a narrow definition. It only restricted who you could say it
to. I just couldn't live with that. I need to be able to tell my
customers (and hopefully some future readers) what I really think if I am
going to be of any benefit to them at all.

 

[Grant Robertson]

That said, let's get back to criticizing (and praising) OneNote.

Good point. I hope you people realize that the only reason I criticize so
harshly in here is that I really want to improve the product. OK, I also
don't like to see newbies being misled by zealots. I truly believe they
will get a better experience from the product if they are made well aware
of the bugs, how to work around them, and why. Anything less is a
disservice to the user as well as to Microsoft. By the way, don't think I
reserve my criticism for Microsoft alone. I tick people off in many other
newsgroups by calling it like I see it. Sometimes it gets so bad that I
give up on the product entirely. Some product will have a bug so bad and
through so many versions while they keep adding so many frivolous
features that it is just too much. Then I just go away and leave them to
wallow in their own mire.

The reason I am still here is that I still use OneNote every day and
would like to evangelize it to others. However, I still think there are a
few too many things that will throw a regular person so I still push for
improvement. I only get ticked off when people try to tell me I am wrong
for bringing things out in the open or try to shove things under the
carpet. Perhaps I should have been a journalist.

 

[Chris H.]

Stuff below (-->)

Now this seems to be in contrast to Kathy's statement that the NDA's
aren't too imposing.

--> They aren't opposing, Grant, but some people work on certain projects
and with certain development teams, and the vast majority of MVPs don't.
Since "Product A" is running some things by a small, select group of MVPs,
doesn't make it common knowledge to all MVPs. Even not all MVPs are on
operating system betas, for instance. Remember, MVPs are global, but even
the XP SP2 beta has certain public releases (RC1 and RC2), yet all MVPs are
not included because the beta is currently only four languages.

I've noticed this. It seems over the years that certain Windows API's are
made available internally while different ones are made available to
competitors (I know, rumors). While at the same time it seems important
design standards which would really benefit users do not get shared
between departments. I remember a Microsoft rep giving a Visual Fox Pro
demo (I know, ancient days) stated that when Bill Gates saw its interface
he called the Visual Basic team on the carpet for not having a similar
interface. Now this wouldn't have happened if there had been better
communication between departments. This is why I have called for Bill to
delegate out his supposed role as Chief Software Architect. He just
doesn't have time to track all these kinds of details. As you mention
later, he does a much better job as innovator and evangelist.

--> I haven't a clue why they do that, although some of it has to do with
intellectual property. I think.

What I meant there had more to do with public perception than technical
exactitude of technologies. As far as the general public is concerned,
the Newton didn't work because 'handwriting recognition just can't be
done.' This is regardless of whether the Newton really tried to do
handwriting recognition. That's just what people think. So for Microsoft
to come out with a Tablet PC with handwriting recognition as it's chief
selling point in the face of this public perception was very brave.
Realizing that the only way it would sell was if it was built on top of a
standard Windows XP PC was very smart. I had had my Tablet PC for only
two days before I couldn't live without it.

--> One of the advantages of R&D, I believe is being able to create the
hardware through Microsoft's partners so it'll support the software's goal.
As you may have noticed, Wacom is working on additional advanced digital
devices to capture the speed and accuracy of Ink (not just "handwriting")
which is a key to the recognition and subsequent search or conversion to
text. A lot of what Microsoft does is actually parallel development, i.e.,
software AND hardware research, to attain a goal. That's how the Tablet PCs
came about. Eight or 10 or 12 years getting handwriting samples available
as just the basic package has evolved to the Recognizer Pack provides nine
handwriting-recognition engine languages and four speech-recognition
languages to add to the native languages of the original Tablets. Now even
the basic English machines wouldn't be as functional as they are had
Microsoft not driven the hardware section for development and research for
the digital screens which set the Tablets apart from a regular desktop or
laptop.

That's interesting. That's not what I had gathered from reading some of
the other posts from MVP's in here and the Tablet PC newsgroup. I never
really tried recognizing the handwriting I wrote into Word because it was
always just used for comments or annotations. If I want to edit the
actual body text I just use the TIP. Unlike others, I don't really expect
the handwriting in Word to be recognizable or searchable. I guess it
would be handy to be able to search for handwritten comments but I have
never needed it myself. Now that I think about it I am sure someone will
want it pretty soon though.

--> Grant, you can "write" in the Office family products even using a mouse
on a desktop, but recognizing Ink and converting to text natively is another
step. That's where the Tablet Input Panel bridges the current gap, allowing
the user to Ink in the Writing Pad, and automatically recognize and convert
the handwriting to text. Windows Journal is a specific, Tablet-only,
program to display the possibilities of Inking and recognition on a Tablet
PC within a native program. Now, when Office gets to the point (I expect by
Longhorn) where Ink is also native when installed on a Tablet PC, we're
going to see another big jump.

Well, now, all that $36 billion couldn't have been spent on handwriting
recognition alone. Saying someone spends a lot of money on general
research doesn't really support a conversation about a specific thing.

--> No, it isn't all on Tablet PCs or Ink. Only an example of the research
Microsoft does, long before a product or program reaches consumers.

Yes, yes, yes. I know all of this. Hey, I'm not complaining about the
quality of the recognition. I did for a bit then I re-examined how many
mistakes I make while typing, using Graffiti on my Palm Pilot, using the
FITALY keyboard on my Palm Pilot, and when I just hand write on paper.
Heck, I make so many weird mistakes while typing that sometimes I think
my brain must be turning to mush. And now I find I am making those same
mistakes when handwriting. Things like transposing letters or writing
'maid' instead of 'made' as I did just earlier in this message. Except
for a few little things like that 'l' in the TIP's 'Character Pad' we had
that tiff about, as far as I'm concerned, the only way to make the
handwriting recognition better would be to read peoples minds. (And I
certainly wouldn't want Microsoft doing that.)

--> This is one of the beauties of continued development. With the Tablet
PC Edition 2005 superset, the system takes the "word" instead of individual
letters into account when suggesting the text. I use a half-cursive,
half-print style of writing, and am honestly surprised by the improvement in
recognition for me over the original - which I thought was darn good. We
have such items as the Dictionary Tool for Tablet PC, a PowerToys add-on,
where were can make additions for "unusual" words we individually might use.
Also, Tablet PC MVP Fritz Switzer at the abletfactory.com has excellent,
industry-specific and language-specific dictionary packs he's developed.

Yes, but as soon as you sign that NDA you can only criticize privately,
not publicly. And you guys have tried to tell me in the past that being
and MVP didn't restrict what you could say. Now I see you were telling
the truth by a narrow definition. It only restricted who you could say it
to. I just couldn't live with that. I need to be able to tell my
customers (and hopefully some future readers) what I really think if I am
going to be of any benefit to them at all.

--> I can criticize publicly, Grant. I've only had one cup of coffee this
morning, but off the top of my head, I think the decision to remove Hearts
from LAN play is a stupid idea, for instance. Years ago, I taught 14
secretaries how to use Windows and computers as they clung to their precious
typewriters, by having them play Solitaire to get used to the mouse, and
setting up LAN play of Hearts during lunch times. With more and more homes
having LANs, having to play against unknown strangers over the Internet
instead of family and friends, is an idiotic idea.

--> And we tell Microsoft quite often that not everyone in the world has
DSL or better connections. As for speaking about individual products,
or Microsoft's business/development decisions and debate those, a beta NDA -
Not MVP NDA - would generally prevent any discussion for a period of five
years of the how or why a product reached the store shelves in a certain
design or placement. I was covered by NDA agreements, not just with
Microsoft, back in the days when a new program arrived via snail mail on a 5
1/4 inch floppy in a package that included postcards to send in for weekly
progress reports. Such agreements are common non-disclosure clauses and not
specific to just Microsoft's software or its beta test sites, but any
company protecting intellectual property.

And now back to OneNote.
--
Chris H.
Microsoft Windows MVP/Tablet PC
Tablet Creations - http://nicecreations.us/
Associate Expert
Expert Zone -