: > Are their any open source text to speech programs for the blind?
Microsoft Speech API (SAPI 5.1) is an SDK for making text-to-speech, voice
recognition, and (I think) voice command. It's free and comes with lots of
demo apps, but I am personally on the look-out for an open-source
alternative that is more platform-independent. I think I found one,
too--[
http://www.isip.msstate.edu/projects/speech/index.html]! I just
recently found it and this is the first time I've even come back to it to
read.
In other words, I may be wrong about it being FREE opensource, but it was my
impression that it is free.
AnalogX has a pathetic voice - robotic and hard to understand. Don't bother
with it.
A much better deal is with the freebee prog YRead from
www.spacejock.com.
Its voice is also poor but download the M$ voice engine - link given there
and select Mike to get a very tolerable read.
Yeah, that's typical. All the computer "voices" are like that.
Like I said before, SAPI 5.1 SDK comes with free apps. Many programs and
Downloads.com can use MS Agents to "read" text, as well. The GutenbergReader
uses MS Agents to read Project Gutenberg e-texts (though I have not had
complete success yet, but it seems to work).
Best of all, though--Acrobat Reader 6 can "read" PDF files to you, either a
page-at-a-time or all of it (with the ability to pause, if you remember the
keystroke combination).
Hope That Helps,
Aaron