In February I found myself unable to type because of severe RSI. I began to use dictation software (Dragon NaturallySpeaking) in order to be able to continue working on a computer. It took a while to learn the software and to adjust to a new mode of working. I was eager to get back to musicbrainz and finally had the chance. However, when I dictate into certain fields on the musicbrainz website what I dictate isn’t always registered by the website. For instance I copy and paste tracklists (on the tracklist page) that I’ve dictated into other software and then use dictation to add the track times directly to the website, which show up as I’m dictating them. When I click the next button and go to the recordings page the track times aren’t there. Which fields show isn’t entirely consistent. A Dragon extension on chrome is what makes it possible for me to dictate directly into fields on a web page but it doesn’t always work. When it doesn’t Dragon opens up a box for me to type things into and then transfer into the field on the webpage. When I do that the track times work and any other fields that aren’t working with the direct typing. I’m wondering if anybody else’s encounter this and if you have found any way to work around it. Also, do people who are more knowledgeable about web development know why this is happening?
Thanks for notifying us of this issue. I couldn’t reproduce it with the dictation ability macOS provides (and the Dragon software costs money), but I have an idea of how we can work around it. I opened a potential fix at https://github.com/metabrainz/musicbrainz-server/pull/650 and will update this thread once it’s deployed onto our beta website (https://beta.musicbrainz.org/) where you’ll be able to test it.
Edit: It’s now deployed to the beta site. Note that any edits you make there are real and affect the production database. 
Hey bitmap,
Thanks for answering so quickly!I didn’t expect anybody to answer for a while.
I’ve also tried using the Apple software which does work well in the page. It’s not able to do as much as Dragon does, though so it’s harder for me to use.
Thank you for working on it so quickly! Unfortunately I’ve had to send my Windows computer back to HP for some service but I’ll try it as soon as it comes back and report back to you.
Hi Bitmap,
I’ve got my computer back and have tried to duplicate what was happening before but Dragon isn’t playing nice. The program works in two modes - it can either work directly with a program like chrome or it opens a box that you can dictate into and then transfer what you’ve dictated onto the page. The problem that I had in musicbrainz happened when Dragon worked directly in the browser which admittedly, it doesn’t seem to do very often. I’m going to keep trying. Eventually I’ll be able to duplicate the circumstances again and then I can tell you if what you did worked. Thanks again for working on it!
I’ve had a chance to do a few release edits and I’ve had mixed results. The interaction between Dragon and my browser (chrome) is very inconsistent. However when I’m able to dictate edits into the fields on the page they are sometimes not being recognized by musicbrainz. But sometimes they are. So I don’t really know if this is a problem at your end or mine. I’ll keep working in the beta and see if I can give you any more specific information. What I can tell you is when the interface between Dragon and chrome isn’t giving me full Dragon capability I don’t have any problems because I have to copy and paste everything into the fields. When I’m able to dictate into the fields some of them work and some don’t but I can’t see a pattern. Anyway I’ll keep trying and let you know if a pattern declares itself. Thanks again for trying to work this out.