I want to dictate a lengthy document on my iMac Sequoia 15.6.1. I can make a recording and convert it to text. But I can't edit, save or print it. How can I use this feature to create Pages document of the dictation. If I can get it as text to Pages, I can just use the WP features there. This dictation will require much revision and correction.
iMac 24″, macOS 15.6
Another approach to getting an accurate voice to text transcription is in Apple Notes when you have macOS Sequoia or later, or iOS/iPadOS 18 or later installed. Create a new note and then drag and drop the audio file onto that Note.
You will see the following, where the actual M4A audio file name is text2voice.m4a.
When you double-click on the above panel, the text transcription will appear in a right-hand, resizable column of Notes broken out by individual sentences. At the top of that transcription will be an ellipsis whose menu provides a means to Copy Transcript, or Save Attachment… — either allowing you to place/append that content into a Pages document.
One of the issues that I discovered in macOS Sequoia v15.6.1 is that Apple's Shortcut action to transcribe dictated voice audio files (e.g. .m4a) to text fails before even a paragraph of text has been transcribed.
Whether on Intel, or my M4 Mac Mini Pro, I can convert three paragraphs of text to a M4A audio file and when transcribed, the last two paragraphs and last sentence of the first paragraph are absent in the resulting text. Upon listening to the audio file, all content is present. The English voice performing the Text to Voice activity is clearly understood in the audio content. This suggests that you may need a competent third-party transcirption tool to completely process the audio file.
In my own experience with dictating directly into Pages with a decent microphone, this will create more lost productivity fighting with the dictation process than if you just resigned yourself to directly type the content into Pages. Dictation does not tolerate pauses in your speech while you think about what to say next. Your mileage may vary though… 😉
Thanks for confirming what I described is not due to some quirk of my own but a defective and unsatisfacotry Apple app. Maybe Apple should take a look at those small hand-held digital dictation machines.
With the Notes application open to a newly created note, you can click on, then drag and drop a dictated voice memo from the Voice Memos application directly into Notes. Then my preceding post about obtaining the transcription.
dsbfromca wrote:
Thanks for confirming what I described is not due to some quirk of my own but a defective and unsatisfacotry Apple app. Maybe Apple should take a look at those small hand-held digital dictation machines.
You can let Apple know your thoughts here:
I will try it. Thanks.
How may I dictate a Pages document using Voice Memos app?
