Re: emacspeak speech server

[Dmitry Paduchih <paduch@imm.uran.ru>]

            Hello Tim,

>>>>> "TC" == tcross  <tcross@northnet.com.au> writes:

TC> Dmitry Paduchih writes:
>> 
>> I have read several postings here stating that speech servers provide
>> an abstraction of some generalized speech device for emacspeak. This
>> point being amusingly simple and attractive isn't so evident for me
>> however. Indeed, emacspeak distribution contains the modules
>> 
>> dtk-tcl.el
>> outloud-css-speech.el
>> outloud-voices.el
>> 
>> and I personally use modules
>> 
>> mbrola-css-speech.el
>> mbrola-voices.el
>> 
>> which came separately from main emacspeak distribution.
>> 
>> At least for their names I would assume that emacspeak contains some
>> knowledge about implementation related issues: dtk, tcl, outloud, and
>> mbrola.

TC> I don't think this disputes the conceptualization model at all.
TC> However, there is a bit of confusion regarding terminology and
TC> exactly what is being referred to by the term emacspeak and speech
TC> server.

TC> I will try to clarify how I interpret it. I consider emacspeak itself
TC> to comprise mainly of the lisp source files which start with
TC> the word emacspeak-. The modules you refer to I see as the interface
TC> layer between emacspeak and the speech servers. The fact the emacspeak
TC> package comes with some speech servers, such as those for the dectalk
TC> or outloud does not to my mind break the layered conceptual model.

There is also emacspeak-remote.el, though in general I agreed with You.

Anyway, I only wanted to say that your point isn't so evident for me.
Say, not so evident as if emacspeak uses model similar to one found in
X Window System.

That is, X clients do not know anything about X server besides X
protocol and they are physically different programs. At least on my
level of understanding.

TC> I argued that emacspeak was different from screen readers under
TC> windows because it was able to perform speech 'markup' - that is, use
TC> different voices and tones/sounds to indicate different contectual
TC> information such as headings, keywords in programming languages
TC> etc. Software like JAWS or windows-eyes is not able to do
TC> this.

I was told that jaws is able. Not so smart as emacspeak perhaps, but
yet not completely dumb.

I also wouldn't call accessibility programs for windows "screen
readers". There is nothing to read from screen under windows unless
program has strong O C R possibilities. <smile>


Best regards,
        Dmitry

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