[Kde-accessibility] Another speech engine for KTTS?

[Hynek Hanke]

> I notice that linux_speak also offers the following command line options:
> -a<integer>
> Sets amplitude (volume) in a range of 0 to 20.  The default is 10.
> -s<integer>
> Sets the speed in words-per-minute 
>[...]
> To support these, we'd need to write a plugin for ktts.  This would include a 
> configuration dialog where users could adjust the volume and speed settings.  
>[...]
> Furthermore, I plan to replace the ktts backend with Speech Dispatcher for 
> KDE4.  Therefore, it would be better to develop a linux_speak driver for 
> Speech Dispatcher.  I will approach the SD folks about that, assuming you 
> release linux_speak under GPL or LGPL.

I disagree we should write a linux_speak module to Speech Dispatcher :)
The priority now once Speech Dispatcher 0.6 was released, is to resume
our work on TTS API, I think. 

The developement of Speech Dispatcher is pretty much postponed now until
the first versions of TTS API are created (pretty much like KTTSD,
I hope we can do it all for KDE 4) and then the right thing to do
of course will be to write a driver for TTS API. I now started working
on the missing part of the TTS API document which deals with the SSML
subset in use and hope to post a proposal to freedesktop very soon.

As for the rate and volume settings, this is possible in the Speech
Dispatcher generic module. So for this basic support as a command line
tool, all that is needed for Speech Dispatcher is a configuration file,
which can be just put somewhere on the web for users to download. I see
it might be important for the german speakers.

Have a nice day,
Hynek