Use Text-to-Speech in Word and non-Cocoa applications

Mar 30, '04 09:39:00AM

Contributed by: nsb3000

As a dyslexic college student, I often use Mac OS X's text-to-speech capabilities to proof my papers before submitting them to professors. As was noted in this hint, this can be accomplished in Cocoa applications using the Speech command in the service menu. In Microsoft Word, the option is unfortunately, grayed out, as it has no support for Services.

After reading an excellent article on Macdevcenter.com about Panther's enhanced speech capabilities, I realized a work around is now possible. In the Speech preference pane, under the tab Spoken User Interface, there is an option entitled "Selected text when key is pressed�. This option allows you to set a key command (I use option-S) so that when pressed, Mac OS X will read any selected text, in any application, including Microsoft Word, and other non-Cocoa programs.

[robg adds: Yes, this is a hint on an "obvious" preference panel item, but I figured it was worth sharing -- the fact that it now works at a system level, as opposed to an application level, is a blessing for many people.]

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