On 1/17/26 14:37, Samuel Thibault wrote:
Hello,
Samuel, thank you for responding. I have a test laptop that I'm
installing onto over and over right now. A couple of months ago I was
able to install Trixie on it with the Mate desktop and thought I had
both Speakup and Orca running so that I could work on the Mate desktop
and get Orca feedback and ctrl-alt-f1 into a shell and get Speakup
feedback. I've been reinstalling Trixie on that machine for a bit now
and haven't been able to re-create that setup, to the point where I feel
like I'm gaslighting myself.
Aaron Chantrill, le ven. 16 janv. 2026 12:51:31 -0500, a ecrit:
Does anyone know how to set speechd-up up with pipewire and systemd?
It's speech-dispatcher that you'd want to make use pipewire. speechd-up
itself doesn't deal at all with the audio. It just takes text from
speakup and gives it to speech-dispatcher.
This is my understanding also. I have set up a stack with speakup and
speakup_soft kernel modules:
$ lsmod | grep speakup
speakup_soft 16384 1
speakup 159744 1 speakup_soft
then espeakup set up using the correct sound card in /etc/espeakup.,
plus libespeak-ng1:
$ dpkg -l | grep espeak
ii espeak-ng-data:amd64 1.52.0+dfsg-5
amd64 Multi-lingual software speech synthesizer: speech data files
ii libespeak-ng1:amd64 1.52.0+dfsg-5
amd64 Multi-lingual software speech synthesizer: shared library
ii speech-dispatcher-espeak-ng 0.12.0-5 amd64
Speech Dispatcher: Espeak-ng output module
running espeak-ng "Hello World" has the expected results, but when
pipewire is installed I get no output from speakup.
it's calling speech-dispatcher and that is set up to run as a user
service.
You can set it up to run as a system service.
This is not recommended, and I would like to understand how to do this
correctly.
Aaron Chantrill, le ven. 16 janv. 2026 13:45:07 -0500, a ecrit:
One more thing. Does speakup still write to /dev/softsynth when using the
speakup_soft module,
It rather reads from it. Actually it should rather read /dev/softsynthu,
I have added:
https://github.com/williamh/speechd-up/issues/9
or is it using /sys/accessibility/speakup/synth
speakup/synth just contains the name of the current speakup driver.
or synth_direct
synth_direct is the converse, it's for making e.g. emacspeak emit its
synth through the speakup-supported hardware synths.
Yes, my current understanding is that /sys/accessibility/speakup/synth
should contain the single word "soft" if I want to use speakup with
software TTS. /sys/accessibility/speakup/synth_direct, as I understand
it, could be used to send text directly to speakup.
Is there a way for me to read what speakup is writing to make sure it
is working correctly?
speechd-up has a log file, as well as speech-dispatcher.
Here is my speech-dispatcher log:
$ sudo cat /var/log/speech-dispatcher/speech-dispatcher.log
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:40 2026 : 95201] speechd: Speech Dispatcher started
with 3 output modules
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:40 2026 : 95254] speechd: Speech Dispatcher will
use local unix socket:
/run/speech-dispatcher/.cache/speech-dispatcher/speechd.sock
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:40 2026 : 95334] speechd: Daemon mode, forking
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:40 2026 : 96307] speechd: Creating new thread for
speak()
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:40 2026 : 96416] speechd: speak_queue Creating new
thread for stop or pause.
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:40 2026 : 96479] speechd: speak_queue Creating new
thread for playback.
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:40 2026 : 96497] speechd: speak_queue Stop or pause
thread starting.......
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:40 2026 : 96575] speechd: Speech Dispatcher started
and waiting for clients ...
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:40 2026 : 96602] speechd: speak_queue Playback
thread starting.......
Here are the contents of my speechd-up log, with log level set to 5:
$ ps -ef | grep speechd-up
root 893 1 0 16:27 ? 00:00:00 /usr/bin/speechd-up -l5
$ sudo cat /var/log/speechd-up.log
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:40 2026] speechd: Speechd-speakup starts!
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: Main loop characters read = 27 :
(^A2s^A5p^A5r^A5v^A1x^A0b^A0o^A5f
^AP)
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: cmd: s, param: 2, rel: 0
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: [rate -56, param: 2]
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: cmd: p, param: 5, rel: 0
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: [pitch 0, param: 5]
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: cmd: r, param: 5, rel: 0
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: ERROR: [r: this command is not
supported]
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: cmd: v, param: 5, rel: 0
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: [volume setting not supported yet]
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: cmd: x, param: 1, rel: 0
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: [tone setting not supported]
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: cmd: b, param: 0, rel: 0
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: [punctuation none]
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: cmd: o, param: 0, rel: 0
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: [Voice MALE1]
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: cmd: f, param: 5, rel: 0
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: WARNING: [frequency setting not
supported,use rate instead]
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: text: |
|
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: [speaking (2)]
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: Text before recoding: |
|
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: cmd: f, param: 5, rel: 0
[Sun Jan 25 16:27:41 2026] speechd: WARNING: [frequency setting not
supported,use rate instead]
Samuel
So, my goal is to be able to take a Debian system and enable both Orca
to work with the Mate desktop and speechd-up to work with speakup. What
is it that I am not understanding right now?
Thank you,
Aaron
