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I'm making a project for school where we'll teach children to calculate for the first time. Unfortunately these children can't read so the task will be spoken to them in there native language, which in this case is Dutch.
I've been looking around and most text-to-speech javascript libs provide great support for English, but not for any other language. Also the HTML5 speechSynthesis doesn't support Dutch:
In further research I've come across an article where you can use Google Translate Voice to generate any text into speech.
You take this as a base URL: http://translate.google.com/translate_tts
Attach your language you want so in my case Dutch
http://translate.google.com/translate_tts?tl=nl
and attach your text:
"This is a test" translated to Dutch
You would expect this to work with longer text but it doesn't.
Text to speech which is not working
Are there any other solutions? The Google Voice speaks Dutch pretty well so I would like the link to somehow work.
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The SpeechSynthesisUtterance interface of the Web Speech API represents a speech request. It contains the content the speech service should read and information about how to read it (e.g. language, pitch and volume.)
cancel() The cancel() method of the SpeechSynthesis interface removes all utterances from the utterance queue. If an utterance is currently being spoken, speaking will stop immediately.
On any web page, open up the developer tools console and enter the following code: speechSynthesis. speak(new SpeechSynthesisUtterance("Hello, this is your browser speaking.")); Your browser will speak the text "Hello, this is your browser speaking." in its default voice.
DISCLAIMER: This is probably not allowed by Google. Don't use this without permission from Google.
It's possible to use Google's text to speech with texts of any size. It requires a little tweaking though.
Here's the script:
function textToSpeech(text, language) {
if(text === undefined || text === null || text.length === 0)
return
var vid = document.createElement("video")
var textParts = []
text.split(" ").forEach(function(word) {
var textPartsIndex = textParts.length - 1
var currentStr = textParts[textPartsIndex]
if(currentStr !== undefined && currentStr.length + word.length < 100)
textParts[textPartsIndex] += " " + word
else
textParts.push(word)
})
function play(txt) {
vid.src = "http://translate.google.com/translate_tts?tl=" + language + "&q=" + txt
vid.load()
vid.play()
}
var partIndex = 0
play(textParts[partIndex])
vid.addEventListener("ended", function() {
var part = textParts[++partIndex]
if(part !== undefined)
play(part)
else
vid.removeEventListener("ended")
})
}
BEFORE using it you must close all Chrome browser instances and, on a windows machine, open "Run" (WIN+R) and type "chrome --no-referrers" without "
On your page, you can now write (I don't understand dutch, so it's just some sample text I found)
textToSpeech("Ik ga ervan uit dat de mens een groot vermogen bezit om externe informatie op te slorpen ,\" legt professor Georges uit . Hij kan zelfs 5 tot 6 maal méér informatie verwerken dan het debiet van het gesproken woord , 120 woorden per minuut . Teamgeest is voor mij geen ijdel woord . In de tweede plaats komen puur betekenisloze verhaspelingen niet in aanmerking , want die zijn niet ontstaan door verwarring met een ander woord .", "nl")
If your application is only run locally, ie not hosted, you don't have to run chrome with the --no-referrers command.
The reason for disabling referrers is that Google cancels your request if there's a referrer-header.
IFRAME VERSION WHICH DOESN'T REQUIRE --no-referrers
http://jsfiddle.net/9tTeg/
<body>
<script>
textToSpeech("Ik ga ervan uit dat de mens een groot vermogen bezit om externe informatie op te slorpen ,\" legt professor Georges uit . Hij kan zelfs 5 tot 6 maal méér informatie verwerken dan het debiet van het gesproken woord , 120 woorden per minuut . Teamgeest is voor mij geen ijdel woord . In de tweede plaats komen puur betekenisloze verhaspelingen niet in aanmerking , want die zijn niet ontstaan door verwarring met een ander woord .", "nl")
function textToSpeech(text, language) {
if(text === undefined || text === null || text.length === 0)
return
var vid = document.createElement("iframe")
document.body.appendChild(vid)
var textParts = []
text.split(" ").forEach(function(word) {
var textPartsIndex = textParts.length - 1
var currentStr = textParts[textPartsIndex]
if(currentStr !== undefined && currentStr.length + word.length < 100)
textParts[textPartsIndex] += " " + word
else
textParts.push(word)
})
function play(txt) {
vid.src = "http://translate.google.com/translate_tts?tl=" + language + "&q=" + txt
}
var partIndex = 0
play(textParts[partIndex])
var intervalId = setInterval(function() {
var part = textParts[++partIndex]
if(part !== undefined)
play(part)
else
clearInterval(intervalId)
}, 9000)
}
</script>
</body>
Improvements: Instead of separating the string by words, use dot and comma, so the pauses are more natural. Each part is currently being played with 9 seconds each, but if the words are grouped by dots and commas, you could instead calculate the amount of time each part has by looking at the length of the part, since 9 seconds might be too much then.
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