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Speaking dictionary/pronunciation help, Part 2 – The technology: Installation & configuration of the free Windows XP text-to-speech wizard
- MS-Speech synthesis which comes free with Windows XP is a mature technology which gets even better if combined with free downloadable voice/language combinations and a simple interface.
- Since 2005, I have set up the following text-to-speech environment in language learning centers, wherever I could: The pleasant, speedy interface and convenient integration into the computing productivity environment (Clipboard, Internet Explorer) seems to lead to higher usage than online speaking dictionaries. And the price is hard to beat (all components are free on Windows XP).
- The Deskbot pronunciation – most of my own testing has been for German and English, but I rely on the feedback of native speaking other teachers and tutors for other supported languages – is good on a word level . The prosody of sentence pronunciation leaves a lot to be desired, but is a start nevertheless.
- If you want to install the Deskbot Text-to-speech wizard for your users, or for your own testing and language learning, here are the steps and settings we recommend:
- Use these installers:
-
Language TTS Engine Language Add-On American English tv_enua.exe already installed British English lhttseng.exe already installed Dutch lhttsdun.exe agtx0413.exe French lhttsfrf.exe agtx040C.exe German lhttsged.exe agtx0407.exe Italian lhttsiti.exe agtx0410.exe Japanese lhttsjpj.exe agtx0411.exe Korean lhttskok.exe agtx0412.exe Portuguese (Brazilian) lhttsptb.exe agtx0416.exe Russian lhttsrur.exe agtx0419.exe Spanish lhttsspe.exe agtx0C0A.exe - Move the Deskbot near the lower right corner notification bar to have it not clutter the user interface.
- Do not automatically read clipboard when changed
- Do NOT play animation sound effect: effects wear out quickly and become distracting or annoying.
- Default set to American male: or whatever in your shared environment is the language all learners understand .
- You have to click “set” to actually effect a change, and close the options dialogue.
- Set read random greeting at startup: in a shared computer setting, you can on startup.
- Have the Deskbot introduce himself with basic usage instructions: In order to have this feature self-advertise in the LRC, beyond my face-to-face-classes in the language center, I have the Deskbot read out an informational welcome message every time it starts up (you could use this feature also to have the Deskbot issue a random greeting in your target language).
- Show balloon – useful since words scroll in as spoken.
- In the Speech control panel, you can set the speed to slow – useful for language learners.
- MS Agent Options: TBA
- You can view the Deskbot install process in sequence as a screencast:
- Or you can view the configuration options screens with recommended settings in this screenshot gallery:
- For my own – and maybe your – reference, here is a raw screencast of the most recent installation and configuration of Deskbot multilingual text-to-speech engine for MS-Windows.
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time
content
0,00
Base install begin
2,50
Deskbot – including its installer – cannot handle the character encoding of some non-western languages that it speaks (Japanese, Korean, Russian). In order to have Deskbot speak these languages, you have to use the Deskbot option “Read Word document” (allowing Word to translate the character encoding into a format Deskbot can understand enough to aurally (even if not visually) display).
4,13
fine tuning for language learning purposes in deskbot options and speech control panel after install
6,09
“advanced character options”: set the speaking speed
Returning to the base installation of some more languages
8,04
more deskbot options
10,34
test of Spanish pronunciation with elpais.com
- In a computer lab environment with Faronics Deepfreeze and Symantecs Ghost imaging, you will also want to copy these settings to the Default user, and make sure that the deskbot startup items gets added to all users or HKLM registry hive (the interface does not allow for installing for all users).
Protected: How to conduct an easy oral exam with Sanako1200 (Model imitation/Question Response) – Part II: Implementation/instruction of examined students
Foreign Language Character Input on Windows XP in the LRC
The LRC offers the following foreign language characters writing support:
| American English | us international | not needed | us-int |
| Arabic | Google;MS;MS-maren;fontboard | maybe later, now osk | demo |
| British English | us international | not needed | us-int |
| Dutch | us international | not needed | us-int |
| Farsi | Google;MS | maybe later, now osk | demo |
| French | us international | not needed | us-int |
| German | us international | not needed | us-int |
| Greek | Google;MS | maybe later, now osk | demo |
| Italian | us international | not needed | us-int |
| Japanese | MS | not needed | |
| Korean | MS | maybe later, now osk | demo |
| Mandarin | MS;pinyinput | not needed | pinyin |
| Portuguese (Brazilian) | us international | not needed | us-int |
| Russian | Google;MS | maybe later, now osk | demo |
| Spanish | us international | not needed | us-int |
The support is best accessed from the “international toolbar”, like so: 
You can also use the windows on-screen keyboard to input non-Western characters on a computer that has not the corresponding keyboard overlay stickers. In the small-group workspaces, which have writing pads, you can also use the MS-Handwriting IME for East-Asian languages.
How to: Send email with non-western (e.g. Japanese) characters in Outlook Web Access (e.g. 2003, e.g. from Safari)
- If your emails with Japanese sent from Safari arrive with unreadable characters (squares or question marks, meaning the recipient’s computer cannot decode how to display the character your computer sent), you may have set your browser to the wrong characterr encoding.
- However, the encoding Unicode (e.g. UTF-8) can handle both western and .
- Simply go to Safari (similarly in other browsers)/ Preferences / Appearances / Default Encoding and change to UTF-8, like so:
- This has been tested to work already from/to OWA 2003.
- However, for your reference, here a matrix of imminent upgrades of email clients on your computer and the corresponding university server software:
|
When? |
Your office computer |
recommended? |
Any computer (travel, home) |
University server |
|
|
mac |
pc |
|
|||
|
soon |
Outlook 2011 |
Outlook 2010 |
is better than |
Outlook web access 2010 |
Exchange 2010 |
|
recommended? |
is better than |
is better than |
|
is better than |
is better than |
|
now |
Entourage (limited support for Exchange) |
Outlook 2007 |
is better than |
Outlook web access 2003 |
Exchange 2003 |
Calendaring: How students can view the LRC schedules
- As of Fall 2011, this is obsolete. View instead the new and improved procedure.
- Calendars you can subscribe to:
|
Ind.Instr.Spanish |
webcal://calendars.office.microsoft.com/pubcalstorage/6d826ffz2216669/COED_434-Tutoring-Spanish_Calendar.ics |
|
Tutors French |
webcal://calendars.office.microsoft.com/pubcalstorage/6d826ffz2216669/COED_434-Tutoring-French_Calendar(1).ics |
|
Tutors Russian |
webcal://calendars.office.microsoft.com/pubcalstorage/6d826ffz2216669/COED-434-Tutoring-Russian-2_Calendar.ics |
|
Tutors Portuguese |
webcal://calendars.office.microsoft.com/pubcalstorage/m8qcbqfz1289583/COED-434-Tutoring-Portuguese_Calendar.ics |
|
Tutors Japanese |
webcal://calendars.office.microsoft.com/pubcalstorage/m8qcbqfz1289583/COED-434-Tutoring-Japanese_Calendar.ics |
|
Lab Assistants |
webcal://calendars.office.microsoft.com/pubcalstorage/6d826ffz2216669/COED_434-Lab_Assistants_Calendar.ics |
|
Director Free/Busy |
webcal://calendars.office.microsoft.com/pubcalstorage/m8qcbqfz1289583/Plagwitz_Thomas_Calendar.ics |
- How?
“You can subscribe to published calendars if you use a program that supports the WebCal protocol, such as Outlook, Windows Live Calendar, Google Calendar, or Apple iCal” (MS-Office online Help), as well as Yahoo Calendar.
Is Windows Live Calendar available to everyone with a Windows Live ID?
Yes, the Windows Live Calendar is available to all Windows Live ID accounts. To learn more about setting up and maintaining your calendar, open Windows Live Calendar Help. (Microsoft Live Services for Moodle User FAQ)
Windows Live ID = UNCC Live@edu ID
Using the “webcal://”-links (to be posted also on the LRC website), students will be able to view live LRC schedules from live@edu (and many other applications that support the iCalendar format, like listed on
http://blogs.office.com/b/microsoft-outlook/archive/2007/08/08/publishing-a-calendar-using-office-online.aspx or here):
-
Application
Publisher
Open Source Applications Foundation
Novell & GNOME
Facebook.com
Google
iCal and iCal Server
Apple Computer
The Kontact Team
IBM
Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft
Sun
Zimbra
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How to set this up, taken from the Windows Live help:
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Sign into Windows live (or later live@edu) with your Windows live (or later live@edu) ID.
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On the toolbar, go to Calendar.
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Click Subscribe.
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Select Subscribe to a public calendar, and then, in the Calendar URL box, paste the “webcal://” link from the LRC website for the tutoring hours or other LRC schedule that you want to keep an eye on. You begin the link either with “webcal:” or “http:”. Note, however, that trying to subscribe to “webcalS” will result in this error:
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In the Calendar name box, type a name for the calendar.
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Next to Color, select a color for the calendar.
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Click Subscribe to calendar, and then click Done. Result:
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- This calendar will be live, i.e. every subscriber will see any updates the LRC makes (like for late-breaking changes and cancellations of tutoring hours). Note however, that synchronization is not instantaneous. Give it up to 30 minutes, under normal circumstances.
Questions? Read the About. Or just ask me a quick Our Databases: Resources with calendars -- Language learning material Moodle Sites, multimedia files -- films
FAQs for LRC student staff or for students or for teachers. To search our FAQs, in the browser addressbar, add after "https://plagwitz.wordpress.com/feed/?tag=faqs+/" "+TAG1" (from tag cloud below) OR "https://plagwitz.wordpress.com/feed/tag=faqs
&category_name=" "CAT1" (from category hierarchy below). OR search both categories and tags, and multiple TAGs/CATs (connect with "," for OR-search, with "+" for AND-search), like so: https://plagwitz.wordpress.com/feed/?tag=TAG1+TAG2+...TAGn&category_name=CAT1
+CAT2+...CATn"
Other ways to find help
If you cannot find it here, look there: 5,500 Language-Learning Links and Programs for learning or teaching 150 languages
Shortcuts:Our Lists, Our Maps, LRC Staff Moodle Site,LRC Project Moodle Site, 49erexpress, UNCC Moodle, Student Recordings: s:claslcslrcsanakostudent
Learning usage samples: Sanako oral exam, Kaltura webcam presentation, Dictation with speech recognition, Sanako written exam, Chinese and Japanese interactive stroke-order practice
Test the Sanako Installer, Webbrowser Popup Konfigurator for XP, or Windows7, faster LRC TeacherPC Log-in Let MS facilitate diacritics writing by installing for you US-International keyboard layout
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