Now, select the Use Enhanced Dictation box. We’ll take care of this in the next step, so click Enable Dictation.

A warning cautions you that your speech will be sent to Apple to be converted to text and that the names of your contacts may be sent as well to help your Mac recognize what you’re saying. Get started by going to System Preferences > Dictation & Speech > Dictation and setting Dictation to On. New! El Capitan adds a new feature for starting dictation with only your voice, as well as ten built-in “workflow” commands for Dictation. These let you tell your Mac to switch apps, click menus, and more. Enhanced Dictation also makes it possible to enable Dictation Commands. With Enhanced Dictation, none of your recorded speech is sent to Apple and you can dictate continuously, with live feedback. The Enhanced Dictation software makes it possible for speech recognition to happen on your Mac, as opposed to on Apple’s servers, as it does with Siri. To use El Capitan’s full powers of speech, you must first download additional components from Apple.

We’ll first look at how you can talk to your Mac, and then later in this chapter we’ll look at how you can Have Your Mac Talk to You. ① Yes, you can search Spotlight using just your voice-no Siri required. And though your Mac won’t tell you jokes, it can read you a book. But you don’t have to wait for Apple’s digital assistant to arrive on OS X, you can talk to your Mac now-dictating messages, Spotlight searches ①, launching apps, issuing commands, and more. Let’s face it: You wanted Siri on your Mac and you didn’t get it.

Apple dictation commands mac