Thanks for this Ester. You helped me understand the app a lot more and I can
see how it may be useful to some.
On 20 Apr 2010, at 21:56, Esther wrote:
> Hi Marie,
>
> The Mac voices are more expensive than the extra voices for the iPhone/iPad
> because the iPhone/iPad voices are only being used for text to speech. What
> makes it expensive to get a good voice that will work with a Screen Reader is
> the extra configurability that will let this operate in absolutely every
> system application and in all environments. When I use an Infovox voice on
> my Mac, I can do all sorts of spell checking, position marking in reading
> books and documention, edit the pronunciation tables, etc. The difference
> between using one of the Infovox voices and a less expensive voice from
> Cepstral, for example, is that my VoiceOver won't crash when I use all these
> functions. In fact, Assistiveware does sell cheaper versions of its voices
> as "convenienceware" text to speech in the form of its GhostReader product.
> List price for GhostReader for one country is $39.99, I think. GhostReader
> uses compressed versions of the InfoVox voices and only uses them for text to
> speech for Web browsing, email and reading documents. It's not designed for
> the visually impaired, but at only $10 more when you buy an Infovox voice in
> a bundle, I think it's worth it. The question is, do you want to use a voice
> just for text to speech without VoiceOver control? Also, these voices are
> less expensive than you might think once you more than one package. I think
> the French voices cost me $49.99. You can also use them on multiple
> machines, or get a household license for using them. Even GhostReader has
> multi-language bundles that cost less.
>
> I'm mostly interested in reading books and articles, but also in different
> language translation. This is why I really want the language rotor, because
> it's a pain to have to change the voice to read in another language.
>
> The way I'm using this app right now is through the SimpleNote application.
> I can either type or paste directly into SimpleNote by opening Notational
> Velocity on my desktop and pasting in there. (Both SimpleNote and Notational
> Velocity are great, free products). Then, I use the rotor to copy the
> documents and paste to Speak It! I think that Read 2 Me, with current upload
> support from Google documents may be worth looking at again. Before, the
> issues for Read 2 Me were stability and the inability to adjust the voice
> rate, plus a really clunky way of getting the documents loaded.
>
> I'll repeat again that Speak It! also has other advantages for low vision
> users, in being able to store the documents or notes in much larger font
> sizes than they can use in other apps.
>
> Just a few thoughts.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Esther
>
> marie Howarth wrote:
>
>> Thanks for this information Ester.
>>
>> I have two questions.
>> 1. Why are the mac voices so expensive compared to the extra voices on the
>> IPhone/IPad?
>> 2. Other than it being able to read books what else do you think this app
>> could be useful for?
>>
>> On 20 Apr 2010, at 21:29, Esther wrote:
>>
>>> Hi All,
>>>
>>> "Speak It!" is an app that lets you use the Acapela group's Infovox voices
>>> on the iPhone or iPod Touch, and supposedly also for the iPad, on text that
>>> you type or paste into the app, and create audio files with these voices
>>> that you can either play back or mail. This is absolutely great, because
>>> you can control the speed and volume of the voices, and use voices that you
>>> may choose to purchase for other languages. The basic app ($1.99) from
>>> Future Apps, Inc. comes with Heather (U.S.), Graham (U.K.), Lucy (U.K.),
>>> and Ryan (U.S.). You can buy additional voices through in-app purchase for
>>> $0.99 each. I've just finished downloading Alice (France) through the app
>>> (took about 10 minutes to download and install). There's a text entry area
>>> (I copied and pasted what I wanted into it instead of typing it in), and a
>>> picker wheel at the bottom of the page to select the voice.
>>>
>>> The screen when you start the app has two buttons at the top ("Settings" at
>>> the left and an unlabeled button for info at the right), and three buttons
>>> at the bottom ("Speak It", "Actions", and an unlabeled button for saved
>>> items created as a result of using the "Actions" button). Below the top row
>>> of buttons is an area for text entry following the label: "Enter text to
>>> say" where you can either type in or paste in copied text. This is accessed
>>> in the usual way by double tapping in the text area to bring up the virtual
>>> keyboard. Below the text entry area and occupying the bottom section third
>>> or so of the screen is picker wheel labeled "Select Voice".
>>>
>>> You'll likely want to double tap the "Settings" button at the top left of
>>> the screen to adjust the voice rate before you start speaking with the
>>> Speak It! voice. There are three settings options to adjust: Text font size
>>> (for low vision folks), Voice volume, and Voice rate. Each control has
>>> both a button and a slider. The button doesn't do anything except update
>>> to a number you can read off -- I think this is words per minute in the
>>> case of the rate. When you make your adjustments flick left to get back
>>> from your settings to the "Done button" on the right edge (not quite at the
>>> top of the screen; maybe a fifth of the way down from the top of the screen
>>> in the vertical screen extent if you touch it directly) and double tap.
>>>
>>> When you enter text, you have the option of either leaving the virtual
>>> keyboard up, and double tapping the "Speak It!" button, which has now moved
>>> up so it is just above the virtual keyboard and below the text entry area,
>>> at the left side of the center of the screen, or of first flicking right
>>> from the "Speak It!" button to the "Done" button at the right side of the
>>> center of the screen, and double tapping to dismiss the virtual keyboard.
>>>
>>> The first mode is convenient when you want to review material and continue
>>> to type in. When you've finished entering text, you'll want to use the
>>> "Done" button to dismiss the virtual keyboard so you can also gain access
>>> to the "Actions" button for saving items, either as text or to create audio
>>> files, and to access the saved items (via the unlabeled button to the right
>>> of the "Actions" button) under either the list of "Saved Phrases" or the
>>> "Saved Audio Files". Double tapping one of the "Saved Audio Files"
>>>
>>> To have Speak It! read the text, double tap the "Speak It!" button at the
>>> bottom left. Once you double tap that button, two buttons, the left for
>>> "Play/Pause" and the right for "Stop", will appear in the location of the
>>> "Speak It!" button. You have to move your finger slightly to the left to
>>> double tap the "Play/Pause" button. Double tapping the "Stop" button causes
>>> the "Play/Pause" button to disappear, and for the area occupied by the
>>> "Play/Pause" button and "Stop" button to be replaced with the "Speak It!"
>>> button.
>>>
>>> As mentioned before there are two unlabeled buttons: one at the top right
>>> and one at the bottom right corner for saved items. The button at the top
>>> right, that you will use to purchase new in-app voices, takes you to an
>>> Info screen where there is a Help button at the top left that gives you
>>> information about trouble-shooting issues with Speak It!, and where the
>>> first listed button is the "Speak It! Store" button, which you can use to
>>> purchase additional voices. (The also have buttons further down the list
>>> for their other applications, but you probably don't want to leave the app
>>> to find out about these or buy them when you're first setting up Speak
>>> It!.) The additional Acapela group voices currently available for this app
>>> are for (U.K. or U.S.) English, French (including a Canadian French voice),
>>> German, Spanish (including an American Spanish voice), and Italian.
>>>
>>> Miscellaneous other comments: Just after downloading the Alice French
>>> voice I found VoiceOver's behavior a bit sluggish. There are various
>>> suggestions on their FAQ (reached from "Help" button via the unlabeled
>>> button to the "Info" page) about possibly deleting the app, shutting down
>>> and restarting the iPhone/iPod Touch, and then downloading and installing
>>> updates for the app through iTunes on your computer if this happens (you
>>> will not be charged again). I didn't have to do any of this, but I did
>>> restart my iPod Touch. There may be practical limits on the size and
>>> number of voice recordings and saved phrase files you can keep. I haven't
>>> used the app often enough to tell. I did notice that when I saved longer
>>> files (130,000 words -- novella length) that sometime buttons would simply
>>> click and not get announced when I navigated the control pages quickly.
>>> I'd also guess that saving and emailing lengthy audio files may also take
>>> up memory resources of the iPhone and affect VoiceOver performance. The
>>> audio files are AIFF -- not compressed, and the default format for Macs.
>>> They'll play in Windows iTunes, and on your iPhone, but maybe not in other
>>> Windows apps without conversion to a compressed format. They can also get
>>> quite large, so do some judicious experimenting on small scales before you
>>> get carried away. Low vision users will like the ability to save these
>>> phrases in large font text. This app is also supposed to be universal
>>> binary and work on the iPad, too. If you have listened to the Infovox
>>> voices from the Assistiveware page and downloaded the trial (for the Mac)
>>> at:
>>> http://www.assistiveware.com/ivoxsamples.php
>>> you'll probably have a much better feeling for what these voices sound
>>> like, particularly speeded up, than trying out the same voices at the
>>> in-app purchase store. Some list users will also like the fact that male
>>> English voices are available. I typically don't try to run these voices as
>>> fast as the regular voices for the iPhone/iPod Touch. As Brett has
>>> mentioned previously, when you set rates over 90 per cent for the English
>>> language voices, and you don't use the default U.S. voice, you're likely to
>>> experience some dropped bits of speech. This is not the only app that uses
>>> the Infovox voices for text to speech. Anne recommended the "Read 2 Me"
>>> app ($4.99) by Retinal Media. I'll have to explore the latest update,
>>> because they have recently added adjustable voice speed (yay!) and Google
>>> Docs importing, along with larger file support, and appears to be less
>>> buggy. But the "Speak It!" app has support for other language voices.
>>>
>>> FutureApps, the developer of Speak It!, also has translation apps that use
>>> these voices. It's possible that some of the other languages from their
>>> iSpeak series that are demoed on their web site will also make it into
>>> Speak It! (e.g., Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, and Polish). Here's the
>>> FutureApps URL:
>>> http://www.future-apps.net/
>>>
>>> • Speak It! Text to Speech ($1.99) by FutureApps is available
>>> internationally at the iTunes Store:
>>> http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/speak-it-text-to-speech/id308629295?mt=8
>>> Comes with 4 U.S. and U.K. English Infovox voices. Additional voices
>>> (currently in English, French, Italian, German, and Spanish) may be
>>> purchased for $0.99/each via in-app purchase. This app is universal
>>> binary, and also works for the iPad.
>>>
>>> • Read 2 Me ($4.99) by Retinal Media:
>>> http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/read-2-me/id313752154?mt=8
>>> English only Infovox voices, and also universal binary to work with the
>>> iPad. New features of variable voice speed, Google Docs importing, and
>>> more.
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>>
>>> Esther
>>>
>
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