Dragon Naturally Speaking 12.5 is causing major problems with Thunderbird for me. Inadvertent dictated keystrokes create absolute havoc in Thunderbird. Emails are moved deleted and archived, settings changed. The latest fiasco here: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1057112

Any help on stopping this from happening would be much appreciated!

(So far as I can see, the only solution will be for Thunderbird to stop using simple text keys for instructions and use only alt/control combinations.)

The only function of Dragon (but for me with AMD, a major one) which does not work for me in version 13 is that it will not print my dictation, or use any commands associated with dictation. In all other respects, it works normally with commands like "Click Send", "Click File, Click Exit", "Click Write", etc., but simply, no text appears when I dictate. So to use Thunderbird I have two always call up the Dictation Box, which is a nuisance. Somebody in Nuance must have made a simple mistake when upgrading from version 12.5 to version 13, a mistake which only involves this tiny area in Thunderbird, so I just cannot understand why they cannot check it out and correct it. Previous versions of Dragon where superb with Thunderbird. When I sent them a complaint, they simply replied saying they were sorry for the inconvenience, but that Dragon version 13 was simply incompatible with Thunderbird. End of story no offer to investigate or help – I just wish there was an alternative company with a similar product, and I would switch instantly!

THANK YOU FOR THAT! I am looking for an alternative company too.

I haven't upgraded, I wasn't going to pay them any more money anyway after the last buggy product and non-customer support (12.5, which I am still struggling with but is great when it works, despite constantly rewriting profiles, losing all my customisation and vocab additions, and suddenly going deaf).

Interesting stuff! I have had exactly the same problems with V 12.5. V 13 is a curious mixture. It refuses to dictate in Thunderbird and strangely, in Internet Explorer, but is a superb program in all other areas including Firefox, Outlook, and the web based TalkTalk email system. The only snag here is that Thunderbird is light-years better than any other email system.

All the old problems you mention regarding V 12.5 appear to have been corrected, and apart from the two dictation areas mention, I have not had a single problem with V 13.  If Nuance could suddenly realise what the word "customer support" means, this one tiny slip (but for us, a big problem) I'm sure could easily be rectified, so I guess we can only but hope!

Meantime I laboriously use Thunderbird by continually bringing up the Dictation Box, which allows me to use T-bird but not as it was intended, or I would obviously prefer!

Hah - a cynic might say Nuance put these "mistakes" in and won't fix them to make you spend more money on the next upgrade - when they then fix those, and add in other "mistakes". A lawyer might say that's illegal.

Check the documentation, and check it fast. Did it say "Thunderbird is no longer supported"? Is the dialog box in the attached picture still there? The help centre is more than likely lying (they have done before to me, on SEVERAL issues where I later found well-known solutions elsewhere, where they told me there were none. I even have private emails from some "moderator" saying they remove answers from their forum). Ask for your money back while its still under warranty.

"I used to be called a conspiracy theorist til I found out I was right"

gm3hbt30 said

Somebody in Nuance must have made a simple mistake when upgrading from version 12.5 to version 13, a mistake which only involves this tiny area in Thunderbird, so I just cannot understand why they cannot check it out and correct it. Previous versions of Dragon where superb with Thunderbird. When I sent them a complaint, they simply replied saying they were sorry for the inconvenience, but that Dragon version 13 was simply incompatible with Thunderbird. End of story no offer to investigate or help – I just wish there was an alternative company with a similar product, and I would switch instantly!

no option to delete a post?

How strange! The Dragon Options/Miscellaneous screen with me does not contain Thunderbird (see attachment) . Curiously I find that ticking or not ticking the boxes in this screen seems to make no difference to the actual operation in the programs which are shown. The information I received from Nuance when I tackled them on the dictation problem was not "Thunderbird is no longer supported" – it simply said that Dragon V13 was 'not compatible with Thunderbird',and then (ha-ha) apologised for any inconvenience.

Perhaps out mate Matt might like to get Mozilla.org notify all Thunderbird users of this, and thereby save each Thunderbird user paying $385 for the non-working upgrade.

And notify all Thunderbird users who have paid and have LOST the TB functionality, to ask for refunds.

Now, that is a good idea! If he could drum up a worldwide campaign of Thunderbird users to highlight this problem, and the cavalier treatment that we receive from Nuance, where any other company would fall over backwards to correct what is really a small fault and gain the approval of their customers! The problem is that there is no alternative program to Dragon with anything like the facilities which it has (apart from this dictation exception), so we are between a rock and a hard place unless Nuance suddenly become human.

Please find and post all the links where this issue is mentioned in dragon support site/forums. Thanks

Please find and post all the links where this issue is mentioned in dragon support site/forums. Thanks

Sorry – silly old me doesn't know what that means……

I've tried that, and sending to their customer non-service. Unfortunately I don't think either gets through to the people in charge of the company, who either don't have a clue it is happening or don't care. A phone call to management is probably the only way, when I got up in the middle of the night (our time) to do so I got pingponged and couldn't get through to anyone.

For an illustration, it is hard to believe the management were unaware of this: http://nuance-community.custhelp.com/posts/9b3b5a6fc1?page=5 You will find 5 pages over 2 1/2 years of unactioned complaints, secret emails with solutions which are kept off the site...NEVER FIXED. And ONE happy customer at the end - happy with a $380 UPGRADE. Yeah right, as we say in NZ - HAPPY to pay $380 for an installation fix???? (Either that 1 happy customer got customer non-service induced dementia, or got a FREE upgrade. And doesn't use thunderbird!).

Here's a better idea - Mozilla BabelFish speech-to-text!  :-)

Wayne Mery said

Please find and post all the links where this issue is mentioned in dragon support site/forums. Thanks