Speech synthesis and voice reading e-books

Voice engines

At the moment, voice engines are best suited for speech synthesis:

• Acapela ALYONA Multimedia (Acapela Multimedia Alyona)
• Acapela ELAN NIKOLAI Tempo Multimedia (Acapela ELAN Tempo Multimedia) V5.1.0.0 Russian (255 channels)
• Other Russian voices

Add. Information: Text-to-speech (TTS) engine or speech synthesis engines - programs similar to drivers are designed to convert and synthesize text into a sound wave. Speech synthesis engines do not have built-in controls and just one TTS is not enough for your computer to speak. To use TTS, you need a synthesis program (TextAloud, Cool Reader, Balabolka, etc.), which replaces the interface, allowing you to work with TTS, change its settings, sound and timbre of speech, and manage other features.

Acapela, the developers of the popular Russian-language voice module Nikolay, released a new Russian, female voice engine, which was called Alyona, runs on SAPI-5 with a frequency of 22 kHz, Alyona is far ahead of Nikolai in the quality of synthesized speech, the voice timbre and intonation are more pleasant than users Katerina’s engine from ScanSoft RealSpeak.

Along with the engine comes Lexicon Manager - a dictionary editor that allows you to change the pronunciation of words both literally and phonetically.

For example, using KooBAudio, mp3book2005 and this voice engine - a 4-hour novel can be voiced and transferred to mp3 in 10 minutes

Acapela Alyona - works well with programs such as: KooBAudio 0.7.0.7, mp3book2005, Balabolka, Cool Reader ...

Good voice engine! In general, he really reads more clearly than all the other Russian-speaking ones, including Nikolai, but the latter has a more pleasant voice due to the low timbre of his voice and makes less mistakes in stresses.

Book reader

Preparation for installation

1. Download the speech synthesis engine:

• Alyona Russian 2.220 ( Alyona_Russian_ID2220.rar ) (148.93 Mb) - Russian speech synthesis engine.
• Nicolai ( Acapela-Elan-TTS-Nicolai.rar ) (10.7 MB) is another high-quality voice.

2. Download the Infovox Desktop 2.220 Engine SP3 ( Acapela_Infovox_Desktop_2.220_EngineSP3.rar ) (24.08 Mb) - a control and activation program, with a native, simple reader, and most importantly, the program for editing the Alenin pronunciation dictionary - Lexicon Manager.

3. Download US English 2.220 ( English_ID2220.rar ) (233.13 Mb) - an engine for synthesizing English speech.

4. Download the Reader , a program for reading books ( links above ).

5. Download AlyonaSlovari-Alyona22k ( AlyonaSlovari.rar ) (1.2 Mb) - dictionaries for Alena for 24345 words.

7. Download MSagent.exe and ms_speech_api.exe ( sintez_bib.rar ) (1.09 MB archive) - MSagent.exe (400 KB) - agent for working with speech recognition and synthesis engines, ms_speech_api.exe (830 KB) - libraries necessary for the operation of speech recognition and speech synthesis programs (not needed for Windows 7).

Supports OS: Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, 8.

All links listed below on the page!

Installation and launch

• 1) Install the main Infovox Desktop 2.220 Engine control
• 2) On top, install the voice engine Alyona Russian 2.220
• 3) Launch the License Manager and copy the "Copy to Clipboard" License Code button
• 4) Run key.exe, paste the code there and click "Make Key" to generate a license file.
• 5) Import the resulting file into the License Manager by clicking "Import License File"
• 6) Add dictionaries using the Lexicon Manager (Lexicon-Voice Associations - Add Lexicon ... or File - Import Lexicon)

Additional libraries are required for operation (install in this order!):

• 1. MSagent.exe and ms_speech_api.exe - libraries necessary for the operation of speech recognition and synthesis programs. (not needed for Win 7)
• 2. Acapela ELAN Tempo Multimedia V5.1.0.0 Nicolai - Russian language synthesis engine for the agent.
• 3. ToM Reader 2.73 or MP3book2005 - programs for reading, which one will like.
• 4. Download the stress dictionary for ELAN Tempo Multimedia Nikolai .

We copy the main dictionary exc_rus.txt, and abb_rus.txt for abbreviations, in the C: \ Program Files \ Elan package, and exc_rus.txt also in Program Files \ MP3book2005 \ DIC, with a replacement.

MP3book2005 only edits exc_rus.txt, abb_rus.txt needs to be edited in Notepad or Word. These are company dictionaries, they are used by ELAN Tempo Multimedia.

There is also a dictionary that is embedded in the ToM Reader reading program (Digalo Russian Nicolai.dic). In no case do not use such dictionaries, they only worsen the pronunciation.

In ToM Reader, the engine settings are approximately the following:

To edit the dictionary in MP3book2005, click the Dictionary button, and if necessary, load the dictionary exc_rus.txt. To add a new word to the dictionary, press the button at the top of Pronunciation, write the word on the bottom line, if it is highlighted in the text, it will already be there, click the Check button, place the cursor on the correct stress, press (<), and if the pronunciation is suitable click Add. Then the button at the top Save to overwrite the dictionary. Abbreviations, such as asterisks, are not used in company dictionaries, each word is written separately. This is not convenient, but the pronunciation is better.

You can keep ToM Reader and MP3book2005 open at the same time. You read in ToM Reader, edit in MP3book2005, and after changing the dictionary, ToM Reader needs to be rebooted. Only MP3book2005 can be used. It should be borne in mind that ToM Reader is free, and not a registered MP3book2005 has minor restrictions.

Disadvantages:

Acapela ELAN Tempo Multimedia sometimes reads words written in CAPITAL letters, spelling.

Digalo Nicholas is an old version.

You can take Digalo TTS 2000 (DigaloCoreRus.exe-7.44 MB, SAPI 4) and ToM Reader Russian. Digalo TTS 2000 is a voice engine that supports several languages, including Russian. It is paid, but you can find crack. ToM Reader Russian is a program that uses Digalo TTS 2000 to read books.

Digalo TTS 2000 has the Russian voice Nicolai, it is better than voices from other companies, but not perfect, so it needs a dictionary. There are two options: use the dictionary embedded in ToM Reader, and use the dictionary in Digalo itself. The first is simpler because it uses asterisks (*) that replace part of the word, but are of lower quality, the second is more complex, but also of higher quality.

In the first case, we take the dictionary Digalo Russian Nicolai.dic and copy it to the dict folder in ToM Reader, which appears when you open ToM Reader and in the settings set: use the dictionary. In the second case, the process is slightly longer. But its advantage is that you will get a better pronunciation, and other programs, such as PROMT, which do not have the ability to connect a dictionary, will have the correct pronunciation, because Digalo will use its vocabulary.

So, take DigaloEditor 1.0 and unpack it in c: \ Program Files \ Digalo \ Digalo 2000 Russian \ russian \ data. There appear: DigaloEditor.exe - a program for editing the dictionary, abb_rus.txt and exc_rus.txt - dictionaries. abb_rus.txt for abbreviations, exc_rus.txt for other words. DigaloEditor.exe only edits exc_rus.txt, abb_rus.txt needs to be edited in Notepad or Word.

Now about the features of editing in DigaloEditor.

If you want to add a word or find, click the Add button and start typing, and a search will automatically occur, and if there is such a combination, it is highlighted in red. And the most important thing. When typing a word, it is already recorded in the dictionary, and if you exit it while saving the result, it will be in the dictionary. In independence, is there such a word in the dictionary or not. Therefore, if you wrote the correct word, click the save button. If it is not correct or there is already such a word, then delete the entered line with the Delete button. And so save-delete after each set. The accent is put with a "<" without quotation marks, there should be an equal number of spaces on one side and the other. For example: "fish trout fish foret <l". Line: “fish trout fish-foret <l” will cause an error in Digalo. Words with variable emphasis, depending on the meaning, must be written in a phrase. Padlock = padlock <k.

The result is heard after restarting the reading program.

Russian Speech Synthesis Program Talker 2.0.6 and Digalo and SpeechCube Voice Engines

• Developer's site
• Release year: 2006
• Version: 2.0.6.0
• Developer: Ryazanov Anton
• Platform: Windows 9x / nt / 2000 / xp
• System requirements: minimum P200 + sound card
• Interface language: English + Russian
• Tabletka: Not required

Govorilka is a small voice reading program. She can read aloud any text that you give her in any language, in any established voice. Records text to an MP3 file.

Key features of the Govorilka program.

• Reading text by voice.
• Writing readable text to an audio file (* .WAV, * .MP3) with increased speed * and with a breakdown into parts of a given size.
• Adjust reading speed and pitch.
• Automatically scrolls the text on the screen so that the readable fragment is always visible (tracking the speech). In this case, the read text can be highlighted in color.
• Refillable pronunciation dictionaries, which makes it easy to adjust the pronunciation of individual words and phrases.
• Opens large files in DOS and Windows encoding.
• Opens texts from Microsoft® Word and HTML files.
• Read text size up to 2 gigabytes.
• The text and cursor position when exiting the program are remembered.

Please note that the current version of the program is a test (beta) - there may be minor errors.

What is useful Govorilka: Govorilka protects your eyesight. With it, the texts of electronic books can be listened to, and not read from the monitor screen. You can find out how words and phrases sound in a foreign language. You can quickly burn books to MP3 files and listen to them on your MP3 player. With the help of Talkers, you can evaluate the capabilities of computer speech synthesis and teach your computer how to talk.

Description: A speaker is needed for someone who likes listening to texts more than reading them from the monitor screen or takes care of their eyesight and wants to read electronic book texts while sitting away from the monitor, who wants to know how words and phrases sound in a foreign language. Anyone who wants to teach their computer to speak and who is just curious to find out how it all works needs a talker.

Additional features: change in reading speed and pitch; opening large files in DOS and Windows encoding, as well as reading text from MS Word files; record speech into an audio file (wav or mp3); automatic scrolling of text on the screen so that the readable fragment is always visible; reading text on the clipboard, the ability to change the pronunciation (dictionary).

Add. Information: Govorilka’s interface is multilingual, in Windows 2000 / XP the program will start working immediately, but Windows 95/98 / NT users may have to download some missing files - text-to-speech engine and SAPI (for details, see the home page) .