What is it?

21/02/2021 Note: this page refers to an old version of mathfly. Talon can do everything that mathfly could and more. See the homepage for details.

A free, open source utility for dictating mathematical notation and LaTeX quickly and easily using Dragon Professional Individual. Currently supports the free, open source LyX document processor and Scientific Notebook 5.5 (allowing for drop-in replacement of MathTalk). Based on Natlink, dragonfly and Caster. With thanks to Alex Boche and David Conway.

Quick

Mathfly interprets dictated commands on-the-fly quickly and continuously, making it far faster than other systems. As fast as you can speak, Mathfly can interpret.

While I have no data comparing dictation speed with normal writing speed, I will say that I have been using versions of this software to do exams throughout my economics undergraduate degree, and have never needed extra time or struggled to finish. Video demonstration:

Infinitely modifiable

The vast majority of Mathfly's commands are contained in plaintext config files in mathfly/config/, designed to be easy to edit and extend. If you need a new command, it's as simple as adding one line of plaintext. If you keep getting a command wrong, you can change it. If there are commands you don't need, you can delete them.

For an even easier way of adding new commands, alias turns highlighted text into a new command.

LaTeX

Mathfly also contains a module for dictating into LaTeX documents, with commands for inserting objects, beginning and ending environments, reproducing premade templates, and crawling the web for references, all with simple voice commands. For a full list of commands, read the LaTeX documentation.