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Kurzweil 1000 Version 7 -
Patches and Updates
Please click on the below link to view and download a patch:
Kurzweil 1000 Version 7.02 (2.73 MB)
Version 7.02
Version 7.02 of Kurzweil 1000 is now available, free of charge, to
customers who have Version 7 or 7.01. If you have Internet access, you
can use the Online Update feature of Kurzweil 1000 or download the
patch from the Kurzweil Educational Systems website. Please note that you do not need to
install 7.01 prior to installing 7.02 - the 7.02 upgrade contains all
of the changes that were made in 7.01.
If you have Internet access on the computer which contains Version 7 or 7.01, you can retrieve and install this update using the Online Update mechanism in Kurzweil 1000. Just do the following:
- Select the Update menu item in the Online menu (Alt, then N, then U will do it).
- The Online Status dialog will indicate that a search is in progress. When it completes, you should press the space bar to select Patch 7.02 for download, and then press enter.
- You can do other things in Kurzweil 1000 while waiting for the download to complete. The update contains about 2.73 megabytes of data. When it completes, you will hear a message indicating that the update has been successfully downloaded, and that you should exit from Kurzweil 1000 to install it. When it is convenient to do so, exit from Kurzweil 1000.
- At that point, the update will be automatically installed. The next time you run Kurzweil 1000, you should hear that you are using Version 7.02.
If you have more than one computer running Kurzweil 1000, and if it is more convenient for you to download the update on only one computer, you can always copy the update executable to your other machines and manually run that program. After you have downloaded and installed the update, you can find its executable in the "Download\Completed Patches" folder under your Kurzweil 1000 document home. The name of the executable is k1000patch702.exe.
If you wish to download this patch directly, click: Download Kurzweil 1000 Patch 7.02 (2.73 MB)
If you do not have Internet access, we will be happy to send you the update on CD. Give us a call at 800.894.5374 x 607. For more information about this release, please contact technical support at 888.995.9905, or send an email to k1000support@kurzweiledu.com.
What follows are the release notes for this update. Once you have installed the update, you can find another copy of this in your General folder. The file name is patch702.txt.
In addition to bug fixes, Version 7.02 adds the following new features:
- Online Magazines - Access to online repositories of periodicals, which can be searched by title and date.
- The ability to send files to Book Courier.
- The ability to send files to PAC Mate.
Once you install the upgrade, you will find release notes in your general folder, in a file titled Patch702.txt. The contents of that file are below.
Changes introduced by Patch 7.02 into Kurzweil 1000 - July 16th, 2003
Enhancements
- Support for New NLS Web Braille Interface
When one of the sources for online books changes its web interface, we need to change
our code as well. A new web interface has been introduced for the National Library
Service's Web Braille repository. We now support that interface.
- Multiple Users at Institutions
Large institutions often want to control the default settings available to a user of
Kurzweil 1000. In the past, they have been able to distribute a default settings
file, knowing that we would see it if it was placed in the settings folder underneath
Kurzweil 1000's program folder. That is no longer possible with Version 7. Settings
are now expected to be in the user's application data folder, which can be in a variety
of places depending upon the operating system and the user's name. At one such
institution's request, we have made it so that if no default settings file is found
in the usual place, we will look in the "All Users" settings area: typically
"C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\KESI\Kurzweil 1000".
- Speed Improvement for Printing Images
Printing Images, either in Kurzweil 1000 itself or in the Photocopier application,
has been sped up considerably.
- Online Magazines
If you have an account with NLS Web Braille, you can now use Kurzweil 1000 to
search, list, select, download, and open their magazines.
To do so, use the new Online Magazines menu item, which is located under the Online
menus. Using mnemonics, you could use ALT, then "N", then "M". A dialog is brought up.
This dialog begins with a text box that allows you to narrow your search by entering
all or part of a title. There is then a list followed by a text box which allows you
to enter the starting month and year for periodicals. A similar pair of controls
follows for the ending month and year. Like the online books dialog, there is then
a query text box, and a list of the sites searched. Only one site exists at the moment,
labeled "Web Braille".
Once you have filled out the appropriate fields and press enter, you are asked for
your NLS Web Braille account name and password. When those have been filled out
successfully, you are brought to the online status dialog, which is the same dialog
that you have used before for online books. Select one or more magazines here, press
enter, and a download will begin.
- Book Courier Support
We have added support for Springer Design's Book Courier to Kurzweil 1000. You can
now send documents to it using the Send To menu item, available under the File menu.
You will find Book Courier in the list of devices to which Kurzweil 1000 can send
files. If you select Book Courier and then activate the Properties button, you will
find that you can select a Destination Folder on that device, and that KES files can
be directly filtered and sent.
- PAC Mate Support
We have added support for Freedom Scientific's new note taker, PAC Mate. You can
send documents to it using the Send To menu item, available under the File menu. You
will find PAC Mate in the list of devices to which Kurzweil 1000 can send files.
If you select PAC Mate and then activate the Properties button, you will find that
you can select a Destination Folder on that device, and you can choose between Text,
Braille, MS Word, RTF, and MP3 as file formats.
- Improved Braille Note Support
The properties dialog for sending documents to Pulse Data's Braille Note now permits
you to select among its folders to choose a destination.
Bug Fixes
- Search and Replace
If an attempt was made to replace all occurrences of one group of characters with
another in a multipage document using the Replace dialog, and if the characters in
the replacement would match the characters in the search field, Kurzweil 1000 would hang.
This has been fixed.
- Spell Checker Word List
If an attempt was made to edit the spell checker word list before a document had
been opened, that attempt was ignored. This has been fixed.
- Language Identification and Voice Choices
Kurzweil 1000 will automatically switch from one voice to another when it identifies
text that should be spoken in another language. Usually it will pick the first voice
it finds that can speak in that language. That can be annoying if you have a favorite
voice for a language, and that voice was not chosen. If you manually switch to that
language, Kurzweil 1000 will now remember your choice for the remainder of the
session when it automatically switches to a voice of that language.
- Virtual Printer Hang
Office XP had problem printing using the Virtual Printer on Windows NT, Windows 2000,
or Windows XP. This has been fixed.
- Problem with Adobe Acrobat
Many versions of Adobe Acrobat do not exit properly when they are run under the
control of another application. As a consequence, opening a PDF file in Kurzweil
1000 often works once, but not a second time. We now explicitly cause Adobe Acrobat
to exit in these circumstances.
- Registration Woes
Under some rather mysterious circumstances, people are unable to register, regardless
of the registration method chosen. We have worked around this problem.
- Scanners
We have fixes for misbehaving scanner drivers in nearly every release. This one is no
exception.
- RealSpeak Hangs
On some Windows 2000 and XP systems, Kurzweil 1000 would hang at start-up if RealSpeak was on the system. We have fixed the hang.
- MP3 Conversion
Conversion to MP3 requires the presence of an MP3 converter on your
system. Version 6 of Kurzweil 1000 used the LAME encoder, available as
a dynamic link library called lame_enc.dll. Version 7.0 used MP3
encoders which were extensions of Microsoft's operating system, in a
subsystem called ACM. Unfortunately, some systems did not
contain appropriate ACM converters, and some software packages damaged
or deleted those encoders. With this patch,
we now support both lame_enc.dll and ACM. If the former DLL is present
on your system in a path that is normally
searched for DLL's (Windows\System or \Windows\System32 will usually
work), then that DLL will be used. If not,
we will attempt to use an ACM converter.
Changes introduced by Patch 7.01 (1.44 MB) into Kurzweil 1000 - December 12, 2002
Enhancements
- Some New Keyboard Shortcuts
The following shortcuts will bring up fairly simple dialogs to perform some simple file management tasks:
Control plus Shift plus S: Save the current document as a text file onto a floppy disk.
Control plus Shift plus H: Save the current document as a KES file into the current folder.
Control plus Shift plus O: Open a text file from a floppy disk.
Control plus Shift plus A: Open a KES file from the current folder.
Control plus Shift plus D: Delete a text file from a floppy disk.
Control plus Shift plus E: Delete a KES file from the current folder.
Please note that these shortcuts were added to assist a third party vendor who uses the Kurzweil 1000 within a specialized user interface. Their presence in this patch is more or less a fortuitous side effect. These shortcuts are not documented, but we would be interested in knowing if people find them useful.
- Skipping Backwards
If you skip backwards through a document using the left shift key, you can now cross page boundaries.
- Spell Check and Language
We have a number of different spelling word lists for different languages, and will now switch to the appropriate word list when the language associated with the reading voice changes. Until this release, we changed word lists based on the recognition language. Note that we will also change to a different user word list, again based on the reading voice.
- ScanConf Improvement
The scanner configuration diagnostic now has a new check box labeled Debug Scans. If you check that box and then exit from ScanConf, every scan that you make within the Kurzweil 1000 will log a variety of information to a file called TWAINInterface.log in your "My Documents" folder. If you are having a problem with the Kurzweil 1000 and a scanner, this log may contain information that will help us find a solution to that problem.
- New sites for Online Books
NLS Web Braille has been added to the list of sites that can be searched for online books. Like BookShare.org, you will need a user name and password to access this site, and membership is available only to citizens of the United States.
Note that if you wish to search by author in the Web Braille site, you must specify the author's last name first. Also note that many selections will cause multiple files to be downloaded. If you choose to automatically open what you have downloaded, more than one file may be opened.
Fondazione Ezio Galiano has also been added. If you speak italian, this might be of interest. (Yes, this is primarily for our clients in Italy.)
Bug Fixes
- Scanner Interface
If a scanner takes a long time to initialize, it is possible to get a scan failed message. This occurs most frequently during the first scan, but has been known to happen in a later scan. So far we have only been able to demonstrate this problem with scanners that use HP PrecisionScan as a Twain driver, but it is possible that it would occur with other scanners as well. We also improved support for a new version of HP PrecisionScan.
- GrayScale Thresholding and Two Page Mode
We have fixed a recognition problem that mostly affects isolated words, such as titles and page numbers, when the scanner thresholding setting is grayscale, and when two page mode is in effect.
- TripleTalk PCI Problems
We have had a number of problems controlling speech with a TripleTalk PCI card. We have addressed some of them. Note that you may need new software from the manufacturer of TripleTalk to address others.
- FineReader, Tables, and Blank Pages
If you use FineReader as your recognition engine, and recognize a page which contains nothing but a table, and if the treatment of blank pages is set such that they should be ignored, the contents of this page will be ignored, and you will be told that it is a blank page. In fact, recognition was done, but the OCR engine reported that no words were recognized. We have worked around this problem.
- Virtual Printer on Windows 9x
If you have both the Kurzweil 1000 and the Kurzweil 3000, it becomes necessary to specify the application you wish the Virtual Printer to run when you print directly from another application, such as Microsoft Word. We have added a printer properties dialog for that. This already existed for Windows NT, 2000, and XP, but has now been added for Windows '95,
Windows '98, and Windows ME.
- Common File Dialog and WindowEyes
If you choose to use the Common File Dialogs for operations such as File Open and File Save, and if you had WindowEyes active but asleep, those dialogs were not spoken properly. They are now.
- Telephone Registration
The phone number in the telephone section of the online registration was wrong. Our apologies to whoever owns 800-894-5376.
- Very long Paragraphs
If a document contained a single paragraph that had more than 32,000 characters, the Kurzweil 1000 would crash. This highly unusual circumstance has been fixed.
- Context in Ranked Spelling
The last word of a sentence was not spoken properly when one read the context of a misspelled word in the Ranked Spelling dialog.
- Premature Top or Bottom of List
If a listview contained duplicate itmes, erroneous top of list or bottom of list messages could be heard. This mainly occurred in lists of online books.
- Printer Properties Crash
It was possible to crash in the printer properties dialog if the currently selected printer did not have a properly
initialized paper size. This has been fixed, both in the Kurzweil 1000, and in the Copier application.
- Echoing in the Editor
If the reading language does not match the language used by the message voice, it isn't a good idea to use the
message voice to echo characters or words in the editor. We normally use the message voice to echo while you
are typing or selecting text. We will instead use the reading voice if it is for a different language.
- Microtek Scanners
We were unable to complete, or even begin, a scan with one of Microtek's newer Twain interfaces. This has been fixed.
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