speakup is nice

[Michael Whapples]

You are wrong in believing that speakup requires a software synth to
install linux, have a look at the GRML distro (www.grml.org). GRML (I am
always referring to the full version of GRML when I say GRML, not GRML
medium or small which I will always specify if I am referring to these
cut down versions) I find is wonderful for those of us who want to use
speakup on a LiveCD without any hardware synth. To use GRML with
software speech just enter:
grml swspeak
at the boot prompt and then when you get the voice message saying
booting finished (I find it can say this a couple of seconds before
booting really has finished, so you may wish to just wait a few seconds)
you just need to enter the command:
swspeak
and you will have speakup with software speech output (providing your
sound card is detected correctly but this is a problem for any software
synth output, even orca can't solve that). If you want to install to
hard disk then you can use grml2hd or grml-debootstrap (grml-debootstrap
is to install debian instead of GRML).

The computer I am using here has speakup with software speech output, it
also has gnome and orca installed and I did all this installation with
software speech (speakup for the install process). Also it is a laptop
and I can take it anywhere (with no other hardware) and use speakup or
orca without problems.

I will admit distros including speakup with software speech output
during install are rare and this is why I like GRML so much, the ability
to have linux on CD which I can insert into any computer and use speakup
with a software synth.

I will just explain one comment I made earlier. I said about use GRML
full version, this is because GRML medium and small do not include any
accessibility features (IE. no speakup or brltty). Only the full version
have the accessibility software.

Hope this helps

Michael Whapples
On Wed, 2009-01-28 at 10:15 -0500, James Homuth wrote:
> Not my impression at all. I am aware it can. However, not to install the
> software. And not to install Linux speakup-enabled. That requires a hardware
> synth for at least that process. Again, this is so far as I'm aware. Which
> is as said, the drawback to my already not having installed it at least
> until I can install a desktop interface.
>