Speakup is a screen review package for the Linux operating
system. It allows you to hear all output directed to the console
and move around the screen using the typical screen review
functions.
This is an alpha release which means it is by no means
complete.
It is quite usable in it’s current incarnation though, with the
blaring lack of cursor output support. That means in an editor it
doesn’t read each line as you move up and down the screen. It
tracks the cursor so you just need to do a say current line but it
doesn’t do it all by itself. There is more to be said for cursor
tracking and speaking than meets the ear at first glance.
Speakup is a set of kernel patches which means you should have
some experience with kernel compiling. It currently works on the
Linux development kernels 2.2.7 or 2.3.x and above. At this release
we are at kernel 2.2.13 or 2.3.18 development.
What’s new in v-0.08? Read the Changes file included in the tar
archive for full descriptions of my changes. Speakup now has
accompanying utilities load_spk for loading and dumping its
configuration settings. Speakup has a totally new device driver
mechanism which reduces the size of the driver code. Speakup now
supports a number of various synthesizers including the DoubleTalk
PC, the LightTalk and DoubleTalk LT, the Accent PC and
SA/Transport, and last but not least the Speakout. The current
version is now configurable within the make config system which
will make installation much more straight forward.
The new features are go to position X or Y, to allow placement
of the reading cursor at any point on the screen. Pronunciation of
punctuation and control keys such as alt, shift and control.
Uninterruptable keystrokes set in the config file for loadspk.
There are also a number of bug fixes.
There is a mailing list for speakup which you are welcome to
join if you are interested in it’s on going development. You can
subscribe to the mailing list by sending a message to listserv@braille.uwo.ca with a
line in the body of the message like this:
subscribe speakup (YourFirstName YourLastName)
The mailing list is currently a very low traffic forum so you
probably won’t be overwhelmed with mail.
The official speakup distribution point is ftp://ftp.braille.uwo.ca/pub/linux/speakup.
The ftp area includes all of the current speakup files and
utilities. It also includes a subdirectory containing older
versions of speakup. There is a new directory tree which contains
the base debian installation disks with speakup already installed,
as well as boot images for Redhat and Slackware. So if you have a
doubleTalk card you can down load the disk images and install your
entire system with speech. The installation disks currently contain
speakup version-0.07. There is also a Linux kernel image “linux”
which contains speakup and the drivers usually included in the
Debian kernels. There are images available for Slackware users as
well. We will hopefully have boot disks and or kernel images
available for the newly supported synths in the near future..
We are in the middle of writing a set of web pages for speakup.
You can check them out at http://www.braille.uwo.ca/speakup.
We would like to hear what you think of them and will gladly
consider recommendations on their improvement. We have what we
consider a way cool logo for the speakup project as well, it would
be nice to hear your opinions on that also.
Speakup is written by Kirk Reiser and Andy Berdan. It is covered
by the GPL (GNU Public License).
So, like I think that’s about it. If you have any questions feel
free to write me at kirk@braille.uwo.ca. If you have
any of the synths now covered by speakup, we could really use your
feedback. If you are just diing to get involved in a software
project, boy do we have a bridge to sell you! ‘grin’
Kirk
email: kirk@braille.uwo.ca
phone: (519) 679-6845 (home)