Speech Central can read aloud web pages, browse web pages and RSS feeds (allowing you to enqueue the reading of the articles while headlines are read), documents and e-books for you while you are doing something else. The app can create a speech or audio file from any page that you browse inside the app or by pasting a link of an internet page from any other app. The text to read and its language will be detected automatically. It can also read Microsoft Word (.docx), PowerPoint (.pptx), PDF, emails (.eml) and many other text file and ebook formats (.epub, .fb2) and turn them into the speech.
By using the app you'll build your knowledge base in an easy way. Each read item is automatically moved to the Old Articles which supports powerful search and filtering features. Those texts are always available offline. Annotation tools are there to mark an item as favorite, or bookmark an important paragraph in it. You can use app with any of supported languages for text to speech on macOS. Latest macOS features including the Touch Bar are supported.
Reinvent your life, if you are busy cut the time you spend in front of the screen and listen to the news articles, documents and e-books while you are doing housework or even commuting and jogging (by using the audio files). For people with visual impairments and disability like dyslexia this can be a great assistive technology as the app is tested to be fully accessible with VoiceOver.
Step 3: Customise the spoken alerts
- If your OS of choice is Mac OS X, and all you need is basic but extremely solid text to speech (TTS) functionality, you don’t even have to bother with a third party software application, as the OS’ native Text to Speech feature has you covered.
- Text-to-speech (TTS) is the ability of your computer to play back written text as spoken words. Depending upon your configuration and installed TTS engines, you can hear most text that appears on your screen in Word, Outlook, PowerPoint, and OneNote.
To set it so the alert speech for dialogue boxes starts with a phrase, tick the box next to 'Announce when alerts are displayed' by clicking on it, or press Tab until it is highlighted and then press the Spacebar to tick it.
Click the 'Set Alert Options' button, or press Tab until it is highlighted and then press the Spacebar, to open the pop-up window shown in Fig 4.
Fig 4
Click the drop-down button to the right of 'Phrase', or press Tab until it is highlighted and then press the Spacebar, to see a list of available phrases. Click on the one you want, or use the up and down arrow keys to select a phrase. (You can edit the list of phrases and add your own by choosing 'Edit Phrase List').
GhostReader is an easy to use, fully customizable Text to Speech app that allows you to listen to written text on your Mac. Read selected texts from any other application, import texts in several formats and listen to them on the go.
To adjust how long the computer waits before speaking, click and drag the slider next to 'Delay', or press Tab until it is highlighted and then use the left and right arrow keys to select the delay (in seconds). To have the computer speak the dialogue immediately, select a value of 0.
Click the 'OK' button or press Enter to return to the 'Speech' window (shown in Fig 3).
To have the computer read any text that you have highlighted on your screen, tick the box next to 'Speak selected text when the key is pressed' by clicking on it, or press Tab until it is highlighted and then press the Spacebar to tick it. Click the 'Set Key' button, or press Tab until it is highlighted and then press the Spacebar, and then enter a combination of keys that you can easily remember in the dialogue box. Click on the 'OK' button or press Enter.
When you are happy with your settings, click on the window's red close button or press Apple + W to finish.
Speak Text Windows
Note: If this does not work it could be because your computer settings cannot be changed due to local IT policies - contact your local IT support for further help.