Introducing Olympus ODMS R6.4
In case you missed it, Olympus® was quick off the blocks in July 2015, releasing version 6.4 of their professional dictation and transcription management software, ODMS. This update comprises a couple of important improvements and a number of bug fixes—so let’s take a look.
Olympus Updates
- Since the publication of this guide, Olympus has confirmed that ODMS R6.4 officially supports Windows® 10.
- Olympus has developed several new application patches. Be sure to download and install ODMS R6.4 Patch 0016.
New Olympus Features (Windows)
Automatically add emailed dictations to the speech recognition queue (Transcription Module only)
This is my favorite new feature, by a long-shot. In previous iterations of ODMS, you were able to automate quite a bit of your workflow, including tasks related to integrated speech recognition (Dragon®). There was one particular limitation you could not surmount, though.
Transcriptionists receiving dictations via email would have to manually drag new files into the voice recognition queue (if they intended them to be auto-transcribed). Of course, the queue itself could be configured to start processing any files added to the queue… once they got there.
No more dragging is necessary for this process. Emailed dictations can now be set to enter the speech recognition queue automatically. This feature is turned on by default when doing a fresh install of ODMS 6.4. If you’re updating from a previous version of ODMS, and have already automated your background speech recognition workflow, this new setting is probably enabled.
To change this setting in the ODMS R6.4 Transcription Module, find the menu bar at the top of the window, and then navigate to Voice Recognition > Voice Recognition Settings > Background Voice Recognition. You’re looking for the checkbox next to “Add to recognition queue after receiving E-mail / FTP.”
As an added bonus, this feature does integrate with any dictation routing rules you might be using, as well as your document return workflow.
Configure the font size of the main window
In case the text is too small, Olympus has added the ability to change the font size of the items in the Content List View and the Information View of ODMS. You likely know these as the main window, where all of your dictations are visible, and the document list / voice recognition queue, situated at the bottom of the window.
To change this font size, click on View > Font Size.
Add a font toolbar to the Voice Recognition Editor window (Dictation Module only)
For those of you who use ODMS for front end speech recognition, you now have the ability to add a font toolbar, to make changes to text size and formatting a little easier.
To enable this feature, click on View > Toolbar > Font in the VR Editor window.
Larger toolbar icons
For new installations of ODMS R6.4, the toolbar icons are now larger, by default. For those upgrading from ODMS R6.3.1 or earlier, you may need to change the icon size manually in a few places.
Click View > Toolbar > Customize to change the icon size settings.
Dragon v13 support
Although ODMS R6.3.1 unofficially supported Dragon NaturallySpeaking v13 (Legal and Professional editions), Olympus has stated unequivocally that R6.4 officially supports these editions of the Dragon speech recognition system.
DR-1000/2000 RecMic end-of-life
The DR-1000/2000 RecMics, can no longer be configured in ODMS R6.4—nor do they work with the Device Detector to open the Dictation Module. They will record audio, but the buttons are rendered inoperable.
Enhanced smartphone integration
For those of you using the Olympus smartphone app, there’s been a significant improvement made to the transcriptionist’s user experience. In the past, if your typist was using the Transcription Module to receive dictations via the Olympus app, she would see a “sender” email address referencing the ODP.
While this indicates that the email was sent via the Olympus app, it does not reveal what email address it was sent from. Additionally, it renders the routing and return document features useless—as they both depend on the sender’s email address.
In the ODMS R6.4 Transcription Module, Olympus made a simple change that eliminates this limitation. The sender’s email address now displays the account used to send the dictation.
ODMS Fixes in R6.4
- Some Dragon voice commands didn’t work in the Voice Recognition Editor window. If you’ve used ODMS for front end speech recognition (with Dragon), you may have noticed that the “undo” voice command (and a few others) didn’t work in the VR Editor. Olympus has fixed this in R6.4. You may now use any command on this cheat sheet.
- In a few cases, when using templates, your header and footer were getting cut off. This has been rectified.
- FIPS140 was causing some users problems. No longer.
- During installation, when choosing “All user settings,” each user was still being shown the Setup Wizard. Additionally, they were not able to use the wizard to change the file path for the Download Tray. Now, ODMS R6.4 reserves the Setup Wizard for the admin, and will allow the Download Tray folder path to be configured.
- Users can now transition from a trial to a full license without having to wait the entire 30 days, and without having to uninstall / reinstall ODMS.
- Release 6.4 also includes all of the fixes from previous R6.3.1 patches—except for patch 0008.
ODMS R6.4 Patch 0001
If you use Microsoft® Outlook 2013 for email, you may be familiar with a particularly intractable problem ODMS R6.3.1 encountered sending and receiving your dictations. There were several patches developed to address the problem, but none of them quite sealed the deal. Patch 0008 for R6.3.1 was a sort of capstone for the issue; unfortunately, Olympus wasn’t able to get the fix into the R6.4 update.
That’s why we have patch 0001 for R6.4. Essentially, it solves the Outlook 2013 problem, including the issue with dictations getting stuck in the Outbox. This patch only works for ODMS R6.4, so if you’re not running that version, you’ll need to get it first.
A note regarding ODMS patches:
Because Olympus has moved well beyond Patch 0001, please install ODMS R6.4 Patch 0016 instead. This patch includes all of the fixes that were introduced in previous patches.