newbie question...

[Steve Holmes]

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Hi Laura,

Buddy addressed your questions concerning distributions; I personally
like Slackware as it has a ready-made kernel containing a recent
version of Speakup but as you should realize, to get optimal results
on your system, an eventual recompile would be in order but at least
this precompiled kernel should get you off to a good start.

The Tuxtalk thinggy you mentioned is probably dead by now but there is
a software speech solution now.  It involves using Speech Dispatcher,
a kinda driver that will talk to several popular software speech
synths.  Speechd-up connects Speakup to this software speech
dispatcher and then there are several synths: Software Dectalk, Flite,
and I believe Sepstral.  Flite is free and Dectalk runs $50 and they
do have a Linux run-time available.  

Sorry, I don't have the URL's at my finger tips right now but will try
and find them later when I get home at which time I can push them up
there if no-one else has done it yet.

I should note that Hardware speech will give you access right from the
first kernel messages where software won't begin talking till later
after your principal file system has been checked and remounted.  I
use it on a laptop though and works well.  I just use the hardware on
the laptop when diagnosing problems.

On Wed, Jan 05, 2005 at 01:10:49PM -0800, Laura Eaves wrote:
> Hello -- I'm new to the list and am looking to get a new laptop on which i 
> want to run linux with speakup.
> I am an experienced unix user, but switched to windows when my vision got to 
> the point where i could not read the screen with screen mag any longer, and 
> so i started using a windows screen reader.
> However now i understand there are quite good screen readers for linux, of 
> which yasr, speakup, emacspeak and gnopernicus are recommended by various 
> people.
> i want speakup as i want to administer my household linux box and so want 
> control of the console as early in the boot process as possible.
> 
> Ok, now after having read the blurbs on the speakup web pages, i have the 
> following questions:
> 
> I noticed one of the pages listed a project called Tuxtalk that was a 
> minimal software synth compiled in with speakup in the kernel to eliminate 
> the need for a hardware synth.  However, the page was dated 2002 and the 
> project wasn't finished.
> Since i don't have a hardware synth (yet anyway), is there currently a 
> version of speakup that runs without a hardware synth?
> If so, what are the hardware requirements? i.e., sound card etc.
> 
> Also, i noticed speakup works with a bunch of hardwaare synths and also most 
> or all of the major linux implementations, but i couldn't find at first 
> glance whether i needed to comppile the kernel myself or whether there were 
> binaries available.
> could someone point me to a place for newbie linux-speakup installers to 
> learn about hardware requirements and how to build and/or select and install 
> the right version of linux with speakup?
> Can speakup with linux run well on a laptop?
> 
> Thanks for any info on these topics!
> there is actually general interest among several people on another lisst --  
> and I have posted the address of this list for them to join if they want --  
> but if they don't id like to pass along any info I find out.
> Thanks in advance and happy new year!
> --le
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup at braille.uwo.ca
> http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup
> 
> 

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