Hi Phil, First, let me correct my instructions for navigating to the Services menu option in any application by adding that after you move to the menu bar with Control-F2 and Right arrow to the application, you first have to Down arrow into application before you can press "s" to move to the Services menu. This is where "Add to iTunes as Spoken Track" will appear as an option, if it is checked as one of the services menu options for your system. Let me also add that this, and other service menu options, will not appear unless you have highlighted/selected text. Services operate on selections, so if nothing is selected, you won't get a list of possible service options under the menu. I usually have a TextEdit file open, and I select the text that I want made into a spoken track under iTunes. I think it shows up under a name like "Text to speech". If you create an Automator workflow, you can set this up to select files that you highlight from Finder.
I agree that having access to Voice Dream Reader on iOS is great, and that you can also get the Acapela group's Infovox/iVox voices to read text in both English and other languages by making an in-app purchase at a very modest price of $1.99/voice in that app. But that reminds me that on the Mac, before there was access to other language voices within Mac OS X, and before Acapela allowed Assistiveware to change the pricing model to let you buy individual voices, instead of charging a single price for a license for all the available Infovox/iVox voices for a language, we used to suggest that people who bought a language bundle consider getting the GhostReader program for a small add-on price. GhostReader is a text-to-speech program that has an interesting undocumented feature: you can switch voices (and hence, languages) between the Infovox voices via a code sequence that specifies the voice to use. The program also had a menu option to create an audio file from the read text. (This was back in the days of Mac OS X 10.4 and 10.5 -- Tiger and Leopard. You didn't have the features for the additional language voices or automatic audio file creation of read text built into the system.) The way the voice/language switching works is by using the sequence: \vce=speaker=newspeaker\ when I specify a French voice, e.g. \vce=speaker=margaux\ the text that follows gets pronounced with French intonation. Changing to an English voice, e,g. \vce=speaker=heather\ gives the text in English. If you want to read through a dialog with voices speaking multiple languages, this is great. It only works in GhostReader, and only with Infovox voices of the same type -- which used to be "HD" or "HQ". (I think everyone who buys voices to work with VoiceOver gets the "HQ" high quality voices that work system-wide, but GhostReader let you buy lower quality compressed versions of voices that would only work in this software to read mail, text document files, and browse web pages.) So I can mix languages, and even words, and take manual control of the voice used to speak a selection of the text. And if you make an audio file of the dialog, it will have multiple voices and languages. You could also use this for dialogs in multiple English voices, too, but the language switching feature is slicker. You can read about this feature in an old ATMac article from 2008: • Changing Narrators With Ghostreader or Infovox iVox Voices http://atmac.org/changing-narrators-with-ghostreader-or-infovox-ivox-voices The down side is that you don't have the same control of pronunciation, etc. with the Infovox voices used this way as you do through VO. GhostReader was sold as "ConvenienceWare" to mainstream users. I haven't used this for a long time! HTH. Cheers, Esther On Mar 24, 2013, at 6:43 AM, Phil Halton wrote: > This is great information, but you know, with the VoiceDream app, it almost > becomes a moot point. > > Thanks though, I will be investigating this further. the iPhone is not always > the most appropriate platform. > > > ----- Original Message ----- From: "Esther" <[email protected]> > To: "Mac OSX & iOS Accessibility" <[email protected]> > Sent: Saturday, March 23, 2013 9:19 PM > Subject: Re: adding spoken tracks to iTunes > > > Hi Phil, > > One of the useful Services menu options is "Add to iTunes as Spoken Track". > It allows you to highlight a text file selection then have that file turned > into an audio file that gets added to iTunes. If you want to control the > speaking rate, though, you'll need to have a string at the beginning of the > file to put in the speech rate controls within a double set of brackets at > the start of the file, as in: > > [[rate 300]] > > That's two left brackets (where left bracket is the key to the right of the > "p" key), the word "rate", a space, and a number which is the words per > minute, then two right brackets. In the example used above, the rate is 300 > words per minute. I think George was asking about this on list yesterday. > > I think you need to check this as one of your active Services, but I don't > recall the default settings, since I have this checked under my Services. You > can find out your checked Services menu options by navigating to the menu bar > (Control-F2 or VO-M), right arrow to your current application (e.g., could be > "Mail" if you're reading this post), press "s" to move to "Services", right > arrow to the submenu, Command-down arrow to the end of the Services sub-menu, > which should be "Services Preferences…" and press return. This puts you into > the correct tab of the keyboard shortcuts under System Preferences… so you > can navigate past the "Shortcuts categories" table (where "Services" will > already be selected and highlighted") to the second table of shortcuts for > that category. One of the options under the text category is "Add to iTunes > as Spoken Track", which you can check, and optionally assign a shortcut key > sequence to. > > You select a text file, then either apply your shortcut, or navigate to the > Services menu in the menu bar and select "Add to iTunes as spoken track". > > Alternatively, you could use Automator and use the "Text to Audio File" > action, which lets you select a voice, and was a way this could be done > before there was a services menu option. > > If you want to learn more about the command arguments that can be used to > control speech, check out the guide at the Apple Developer's Web site for > information on how to embed commands into the text to speed it up or change > other attributes: > > http://developer.apple.com/documentation/UserExperience/Conceptual/SpeechSynthesisProgrammingGuide/index.html > > Embedded commands are described in the section titled "Techniques for > Customizing Synthesized Speech" > "Use Embedded Speech Commands to Fine-Tune > Spoken Output". There are a number of four-letter commands in addition to > "rate" that will let you do things like increase or decrease volume ("volm"), > change the way numbers are spoken ("nmbr" with the LTRL argument to speak > digit by digit, as in phone numbers, or with the NORM argument to go back to > the default mode). They can all be used together, enclose within two left > and two right brackets, and separated by semi-colons. You have to read the > strings character by character to hear the arguments. > > If you're comfortable using the Terminal command line, you can test out > commands on speech strings by enclosing them in quotation marks, and using > the unix "say" command. Note that embedded commands cannot be used to select > a voice, although the "v" switch of the "say" command can accept an argument > for the voice. > > For example, here's the command to get Fred rather than Alex, speaking fast > at slightly boosted volume, with the "say" command. Open up Terminal, paste > the string in, and press "return" to hear the results: > > say -v Fred "[[rate 400; volm +0.2]]Am I speaking too fast?" > > HTH. Cheers, > > Esther > > > > On Mar 23, 2013, at 2:30 PM, Phil Halton wrote: >> is it the case that you can have a text document read by VoiceOver and added >> as a audio file to iTunes? >> >> How exactly is that accomplished? >> <--- Mac Access At Mac Access Dot Net ---> To reply to this post, please address your message to [email protected] You can find an archive of all messages posted to the Mac-Access forum at either the list's own dedicated web archive: <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/pipermail/mac-access/index.html> or at the public Mail Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/>. Subscribe to the list's RSS feed from: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.xml> As the Mac Access Dot Net administrators, we do our very best to ensure that the Mac-Access E-Mal list remains malware, spyware, Trojan, virus and worm-free. However, this should in no way replace your own security strategy. We assume neither liability nor responsibility should something unpredictable happen. Please remember to update your membership preferences periodically by visiting the list website at: <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/mac-access/options/>
