Tips from users - can we do it this way??

[Bill Dickerson]

We are a small government agency in the U.S. We are wanting to move away (quickly!!) from the Olympus software we now use, and which is VERY ill-behaved on a WAN.

What we have:

A network based here where our servers reside.

Over 40 offices of various size - from 1 or 2 people part time to 10 to 12 people full time.

Each office will typically have a few counselors with some support staff.

The offices are connected to our home office here via WAN - Internet connections and VPN hardware (Cisco PIXs) so everyone accesses files and servers here, including voice files, documents, email, etc. - all comes back here via those WAN connections.

Further, there are:

about 120 counselors in 40 some offices around the state.

Probably 20 people who will transcribe for them, also scattered in our offices around the state.

Each has a computer running XP PRO SP2.

Currently, the counselors dictate, dock their portable recorders and the files eventually end up in folders on a server.

Counselors in city A drop their voice files (DSS files) into folder A, counselors in city B drop their files into folder B, and so on.

The transcription people use their software to open and transcribe those voice files - they "go" to the folder they are assigned to, see the list of voice files and open them from there. The transcription software REALLY bogs down when there are over a couple dozen voice files in their folder.

 

We need to follow a similar pattern - where the counselors voice recordings (files) end up in folders and the transcription people then go to that folder and either get or transcribe them from there.

(the express delegate is interesting looking but would require a shared folder on every single computer)

 

How would you do this?

What do you people who already use this software do?

 

Let me just state - after living with the Olympus software for almost 2 years, this stuff looks like a welcome relief!

You've not seen bad or complicated or buggy software until you've walked this path.......... constant updates, patches, glitches, lost or missing files, etc. and it's nearly impossible to walk a counselor through retreiving a lost dictation!

We need simple - so simple your grandmother could use it.