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Express Delegate - Suggestions / Questions


mpappert

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Let me preface my post with how awesome this new version of Express Delegate looks!

 

I have a few questions as I can't seem to find the information in the help files or by poking around in the configurations of the application and clients. Where does one set the "deadline"? I want all new incoming dictations to be flagged with a default deadline based on certain criteria. As an example, Client A has a paid turn-around time of 24h with "High" priority dictations receiving a 12h turn-around time. Client B has a paid turn-around time of 48h with "High" priority cases having a 12h turn-around time. Is this possible in the current version?

 

There doesn't seem to be a way to reset a user's password - except via deleting the current user (and since you can't transfer the statistics to another account bcs you want it all linked to the real email address) it means a loss of stats for that user. It would also be nice to see the "pools" that a user is part of on the "view" screen (specifically typists) so managers can verify that a typist is setup correctly for all of the pools rather than having to look at multiple pools to accomplish the same task (time saver).

 

Also, it doesn't seem like the current system will handle "amendments" or "corrections" easily. For example, say Client A sends a dictation for transcribing and it is later reported back that there is an error. There doesn't seem to be a way that the typist can "re-upload" a corrected document to the server ...

 

Lastly, where does one set the "purge" policy for dictations - ie. we want to keep up to 30 days of finished work on the server and then purge to conserve space and make information more legible (after 30 days the list would be LONG and the page might take some time to load - in order to keep it fast it should either limit the number displayed with arrows to move back and forth between "pages" or provide a search ability).

 

As I use the product more I might have more questions or suggestions - but it is definitely one great upgrade from the old version! Great work!

 

M.

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Where does one set the "deadline"?

Currently the only way of setting the deadline is via Delegate's web control panel, on the "Create New Dictation" or "Edit Dictation Details" pages. We plan to have a way to set the deadline in Express Dictate in a future version.

 

I want all new incoming dictations to be flagged with a default deadline based on certain criteria. As an example, Client A has a paid turn-around time of 24h with "High" priority dictations receiving a 12h turn-around time. Client B has a paid turn-around time of 48h with "High" priority cases having a 12h turn-around time. Is this possible in the current version?

No, this is not possible is the current version.

 

There doesn't seem to be a way to reset a user's password

You can use the "Forgot your password?" link on the web control panel "Login" page to reset the password for that user and have the new password emailed to them.

 

It would also be nice to see the "pools" that a user is part of on the "view" screen (specifically typists) so managers can verify that a typist is setup correctly for all of the pools rather than having to look at multiple pools to accomplish the same task (time saver).

Good idea.

 

Also, it doesn't seem like the current system will handle "amendments" or "corrections" easily. For example, say Client A sends a dictation for transcribing and it is later reported back that there is an error. There doesn't seem to be a way that the typist can "re-upload" a corrected document to the server ...

True. Would the speaker have to report back the mistake to get it fixed, or do typists discover mistakes without being told?

 

Lastly, where does one set the "purge" policy for dictations - ie. we want to keep up to 30 days of finished work on the server and then purge to conserve space and make information more legible

If the speaker is using Express Dictate, if / when they delete the dictation from "Work Progress" or "Recover Sent Dictations" dialogs then the dictation is also deleted from the Delegate server.

 

Delegate currently doesn't keep track of whether or not the transcript has been downloaded by the speaker, so if dictations are automatically purged then there's a danger that a transcript will be deleted before it's been downloaded. Perhaps if some system of warnings (emails?) was put in place then this would be less of a problem.

 

after 30 days the list would be LONG and the page might take some time to load - in order to keep it fast it should either limit the number displayed with arrows to move back and forth between "pages" or provide a search ability.

Good point.

 

As I use the product more I might have more questions or suggestions - but it is definitely one great upgrade from the old version! Great work!

Thanks for all the feedback.

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Thanks for the fast responses! I've been playing with the system a little bit more this morning (and plan on it for a couple more hours as I want to rollover to this new setup as quickly as possible for all the great new features) ... Here are a few more things I've come across ...

 

When a dictation is downloaded from Express Delegate into Express Scribe (ES) there is a dispatch issue. If you don't type anything (no notes, no word document) and click the dispatch button - then you get the dispatch to delegate window. If you link a word document to the dictation (which is how our work is done) via the word templating feature, when you click the dispatch button you get the send by email window instead of the dispatch to delegate. This might actually be within Express Scribe, but I am going to post all my findings in one post rather than spread them out between forums.

 

Yesterday, it seemed that when a dictation was assigned a "pool" via a rule, it was moved to the "assigned" queue and when it was downloaded by a typist it would move to the "transcribing" section. Today when I tested, it remains in the unassigned after both being assigned a pool via a rule and after downloading it (via automatic incoming) whereas it should have moved to the assigned pool and transcribing pool respectively. I have made no changes to the configurations other than installing the new v4.28 of ES. I can't really think of a logical explanation for this so if you need any more information that can help you troubleshoot - let me know and I'll send it off or post it =)

 

For the deadline feature that you plan on implementing into Express Dictate - I have some concerns on how that will affect a businesses workflow. Specifically, if we allow too much influence on the "urgency" of a dictation from a dictator, then it could have detrimental effects on a companies overall workflow and output. To draw a picture, a client dictates and flags it as high priority and sets the deadline to a date in the past (which the system allows for). When it enters our system, it is now flagged as both high priority and overdue, which should technically boost it to the top or very near it according to how you calculate urgency (Quote from online help: "Urgency is calculated using priorities, deadlines, and the relative ages of dictations.") So, by doing this they have effective bypassed the workflow policies that we have instituted. I know this is a bit of an exagerration, but it's a scenario to simply illustrate my point. From a business perspective, the client can have limited influence on the turn-around times and this functionality exists - low, normal and high priorities. The deadlines, I see, as a tool for management to ensure that contractual and internal policies are met - rather than a method for cleints to "bump" their dictations to the top of the pile. So, I would prefer to see this feature implemented into Express Delegate rather than Express Dictate.

 

I have a suggestion on how this could be done - but still has a potential drawback.

 

My first thought on implementing this, is to allow managers to set default deadlines for "pools" based on priority. So, when creating/modifying a pool - a manager/admin can set the turn-around time in fields marked "low", "normal" and "high". Then when a dictation is assigned a pool, either manually or automatically via a rule, then it would add that time to the dictation time and that in turn becomes the deadline. The potential drawback for this method, is how to handle the changing of pools once it has been assigned. I would suggest that the old "deadline" would just become superceded by a newly calculated deadline based on the new pool (as it's calculated from the dictation time, the effective deadline would be the same as if it was assigned that pool initially - and turn-around time is met accordingly).

 

One last request, specific to ES, is to have more flexibility in the naming of files when using templating. Our clients request our files to be saved in a specific naming format. In order to fully utilize the new Express Delegate system - it would be great if we could have the same flexibility in naming the document much in the same way we can name dictation files in Express Dictate (ie. file name format in Express Dictate - %userid%-%filenumber% %filename% by %username% for example). I can provide further details on what type of fields I would like to be able to include, if this is something you will consider implementing.

 

oK, I lied - this is my last suggestion lol ... and this is piggy-backing off of one of your thoughts in your reply to my original post. In Express Delegate there is a configuration screen already for e-mail. I had originally thought this was to send notifications of completed work (or status updates) ... but from your reply, I may have jumped the gun. An idea, if not already in the works, would be to check boxes on a user's screen to optionally receive notifications of completed work. I say optionally because some clients have a large amount of work they can put through in a day and I'm sure they don't want to receive an email every few minutes as new work is completed lol. Another idea, is to send an "end-of-day" status report of all work that was completed and assigned, etc ... again if this is of interest, then I can definitely elaborate further ... =)

 

Almost forgot to answer your question regarding the uploading of corrected documents. The scenario we specifically face is usually that a portion of the dictation is unclear (due to background noise, muffling, etc) and we mark the unsure transcribed text with ? ... example:

 

? the quick brown fix jumped over the fence ?

 

Silly example, but we then send the document as such and also comment in the email informing the client to check that document and feedback with what the correct text should be. We then correct the document and resend it. In Delegate, a feature to upload a corrected document is a must for us because we do medical transcription - and if the information remains incorrect there could be legal issues we face.

 

That's all for now ... Thanks again!

 

Cheers!

M.

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When a dictation is downloaded from Express Delegate into Express Scribe (ES) there is a dispatch issue. If you don't type anything (no notes, no word document) and click the dispatch button - then you get the dispatch to delegate window. If you link a word document to the dictation (which is how our work is done) via the word templating feature, when you click the dispatch button you get the send by email window instead of the dispatch to delegate.

Express Scribe will only show the Delegate dispatch dialog if it has downloaded that particular dictation directly from Delegate. The dictation in question wasn't loaded from a DCT file or some other source, was it?

 

Yesterday, it seemed that when a dictation was assigned a "pool" via a rule, it was moved to the "assigned" queue and when it was downloaded by a typist it would move to the "transcribing" section. Today when I tested, it remains in the unassigned after both being assigned a pool via a rule and after downloading it (via automatic incoming) whereas it should have moved to the assigned pool and transcribing pool respectively.

Did you use your browser's Refresh button to check for changes? (The web pages are not updated in real-time.) Also note that the background task that assigns dictations to typists only runs once every few seconds, so changes may take a few seconds to be reflected in the web pages.

 

For the deadline feature that you plan on implementing into Express Dictate - I have some concerns on how that will affect a businesses workflow. Specifically, if we allow too much influence on the "urgency" of a dictation from a dictator, then it could have detrimental effects on a companies overall workflow and output. To draw a picture, a client dictates and flags it as high priority and sets the deadline to a date in the past (which the system allows for). When it enters our system, it is now flagged as both high priority and overdue, which should technically boost it to the top or very near it according to how you calculate urgency (Quote from online help: "Urgency is calculated using priorities, deadlines, and the relative ages of dictations.") So, by doing this they have effective bypassed the workflow policies that we have instituted. I know this is a bit of an exagerration, but it's a scenario to simply illustrate my point. From a business perspective, the client can have limited influence on the turn-around times and this functionality exists - low, normal and high priorities. The deadlines, I see, as a tool for management to ensure that contractual and internal policies are met - rather than a method for cleints to "bump" their dictations to the top of the pile. So, I would prefer to see this feature implemented into Express Delegate rather than Express Dictate.

 

I have a suggestion on how this could be done - but still has a potential drawback.

 

My first thought on implementing this, is to allow managers to set default deadlines for "pools" based on priority. So, when creating/modifying a pool - a manager/admin can set the turn-around time in fields marked "low", "normal" and "high". Then when a dictation is assigned a pool, either manually or automatically via a rule, then it would add that time to the dictation time and that in turn becomes the deadline. The potential drawback for this method, is how to handle the changing of pools once it has been assigned. I would suggest that the old "deadline" would just become superceded by a newly calculated deadline based on the new pool (as it's calculated from the dictation time, the effective deadline would be the same as if it was assigned that pool initially - and turn-around time is met accordingly).

I think we have two different scenarios here: Scenario A, where a Speaker runs the Delegate server, and scenario B, where a transcription service runs the Delegate server. You obviously fall into scenario B, and would like as much control over deadlines as possible, but in scenario A, the Speaker would obviously benefit from having deadline control integrated into Express Dictate. We need to support both scenarios, and some more thought will have to go into how to do that.

 

One last request, specific to ES, is to have more flexibility in the naming of files when using templating. Our clients request our files to be saved in a specific naming format. In order to fully utilize the new Express Delegate system - it would be great if we could have the same flexibility in naming the document much in the same way we can name dictation files in Express Dictate (ie. file name format in Express Dictate - %userid%-%filenumber% %filename% by %username% for example). I can provide further details on what type of fields I would like to be able to include, if this is something you will consider implementing.

Sounds like a good idea. I've added this as a feature suggestion for a future version of Scribe.

 

In Express Delegate there is a configuration screen already for e-mail. I had originally thought this was to send notifications of completed work (or status updates) ... but from your reply, I may have jumped the gun. An idea, if not already in the works, would be to check boxes on a user's screen to optionally receive notifications of completed work.

Notifications like those are definitely something we've been thinking about for Delegate.

 

Almost forgot to answer your question regarding the uploading of corrected documents. The scenario we specifically face is usually that a portion of the dictation is unclear (due to background noise, muffling, etc) and we mark the unsure transcribed text with ? ... example:

 

? the quick brown fix jumped over the fence ?

 

Silly example, but we then send the document as such and also comment in the email informing the client to check that document and feedback with what the correct text should be. We then correct the document and resend it. In Delegate, a feature to upload a corrected document is a must for us because we do medical transcription - and if the information remains incorrect there could be legal issues we face.

Thanks for clarifying that. And thanks again for all your feedback.

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  • 1 month later...
after 30 days the list would be LONG and the page might take some time to load - in order to keep it fast it should either limit the number displayed with arrows to move back and forth between "pages" or provide a search ability.

 

Hello,

 

Same request for us, after using delegate for a few days, the web page already takes some times to load, it would be great if, we could have some options like displaying only the 20 latests dictations on the 1st page.

 

Best regards, loic

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  • 2 weeks later...
Hello,

 

Same request for us, after using delegate for a few days, the web page already takes some times to load, it would be great if, we could have some options like displaying only the 20 latests dictations on the 1st page.

 

Best regards, loic

 

 

Hello,

 

At least, I need a way to clean the database because the delegate webpage became too fat :

- For example, there is no "check all" button to select all the finished dictations and delete. I don't need to keep it because typists are using another software to store and manage transcripted dictations.

- As an alternative if there is no way to easily clean the database, is there any url that we could use to access only "transcribing dictations", I l mean that server dictation url is http://ip:port/dict-list-all, is there any http://ip:port/dict-list-transcribing ?? (ok, i've tried this one and it does not exist but maybe nch team have a magic url ?;)

Thanks for your help.

byye

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- For example, there is no "check all" button to select all the finished dictations and delete. I don't need to keep it because typists are using another software to store and manage transcripted dictations.

There's no "Check all" button, but there's nothing stopping a manager from selecting many finished dictations and deleting them.

 

- As an alternative if there is no way to easily clean the database, is there any url that we could use to access only "transcribing dictations", I l mean that server dictation url is http://ip:port/dict-list-all, is there any http://ip:port/dict-list-transcribing ?? (ok, i've tried this one and it does not exist but maybe nch team have a magic url ? ;)

There are no "magic" URL's, that I know of.

 

These both sound like good suggestions though. I recommend you use the "Send improvement suggestion or feedback" link in the Help menu of Delegate's main window to submit them through official channels, to make sure they're not lost. Preferably one idea per submission.

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There's no "Check all" button, but there's nothing stopping a manager from selecting many finished dictations and deleting them.

 

 

There are no "magic" URL's, that I know of.

 

These both sound like good suggestions though. I recommend you use the "Send improvement suggestion or feedback" link in the Help menu of Delegate's main window to submit them through official channels, to make sure they're not lost. Preferably one idea per submission.

 

Hi,

 

Thanks a lot for your answer.

Like you suggest, i'm gonna send an improvment suggestion using the link in the help menu.

best regards, loic

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  • 1 month later...
There's no "Check all" button, but there's nothing stopping a manager from selecting many finished dictations and deleting them.

 

Hi & Happy New Year to all !

 

As long as there is no "check all" button in Express Delegate, I would recommend the use of this little firefox extension :

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/2708

 

One you've installed it, you've got a new option to simply select all the checkboxes, right-clic and choose "check all".

Much faster than checking boxes one by one.

byye

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