LOS ANGELES--After years of trying to decipher your scribbles on its own, Microsoft is looking for a little help.

In Vista, the new incarnation of desktop Windows, due next year, the software giant will let people give the operating system examples of their own handwriting in an effort to improve handwriting recognition. The personalization feature, which is optional, is one of a number of Tablet PC enhancements disclosed this week as part of an updated test version of Vista.

Other new Tablet-specific features in this latest version of Vista include new "gestures" designed to make it easier to navigate through Web pages, send e-mail and manage other frequent tasks without having to switch to a keyboard.

Getting on the write track

For years, Microsoft has resisted allowing users to teach the software their individual writing style, preferring instead to continually expand its centralized base of thousands of handwriting samples in an effort to improve accuracy. This stance was not universally supported, with Chairman Bill Gates among those arguing that some personalized training would be useful.

In Vista, the "personalize handwriting recognition" feature presents two options. For those having a problem with a particular letter, word or phrase, there is a "target specific recognition errors" window. For those who are having more pervasive problems, there is an option to provide a more extensive set of samples--from A to Z.

With Vista, tablets will learn not only how users write particular words but also which words they turn to frequently, making those more likely guesses in cases where the software is unsure which word was meant. The software will also adopt Web sites and e-mail addresses that are not part of its standard dictionary.

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