Listen to the web

Increasing accessibility to your web site should be a primary aim of all people involved in the editing and creation of materials for the web. One of the ways that this can be achieved is through the use of voices.

talkThere are three ways of using voice

1. Text to voice
2. Recorded Voice
3. Video

Text to Voice

There are a number of internet browsers which can read the screen, the problem I find with them is that it is difficult to be selective about what will be read out.

You can download applications to read web site content, my preference is Natural Reader, Natural Reader has a free download version for personal use. In the free version the voices are not the most natural. Download the programme and run it, highlight the text and click play and the highlighted text will be read out loud.

Whilst talking to people with dyslexia they said they wanted a system that could read individual words that they were having a problem with. Other people just want to hear the small print terms and conditions. This software will read any text on your screen, documents, emails etc.

natThe problem with all voice to text programmes is pronunciation. Some words are not understood by the software and sound strange to the ear.

http://www.naturalreaders.com/

Recorded voice

What could be better than for you to read your own content, you can add the emphasis through your voice and choose which part you emphasise.

Deciding which tools to use will depend upon where you will record the voice. For example: if you plan on sitting at your desk then a programme like Audacity (opensource) can be useful. However you should consider where the sound file will be stored and how it will be streamed. Do you pay for the amount of data you store on your site and does your hosting company offer a streaming service?

One method I use is with Jing - Jing is an open source solution which captures your screen and your voice, the resultant file can be stored on Jing's server and linked from your site. In this manner you can record voice without an overhead. I use a powerpoint slide as a simple background.

ipadioThe most flexible system is without doubt IPADIO. You register your phone number (e.g. a mobile) and Ipadio will provide you with a phone number and a pin number. Dial their number enter your pin and you are broadcasting live to the web. The file it creates on the ipadio site can be embedded into you site. This means that you can conduct interviews with clients, report live from meetings or conferences. On the Ipadio site are examples of charities broadcasting from across the world.

Ipadio also uses spinvox to create a transcript of your speech.

www.ipadio.com

Video

Have you played with YouTube yet? You really should, armed with a small web cam you can talk to camera and let people see you while you tell them about your site, you can edit clips to show your work and show discussions of real people who are involved with your work.

www.youtube.com

How do I embed these into my site

Natural Reader - Create a link from your site to Natural reader and enable your users to listen to your site
Ipadio provides the code for you to embed the HTML code into your site (if you use Drupal remember to turn of rich text first)
YouTube provides the code for you to embed the HTML code into your site (if you use Drupal remember to turn of rich text first)
If you create your own sound files using Audacity or similar file, then you can attach this as a file in a Drupal site. You can install a sound module to replay the clip or your computer will try to play the clip using an Microsoft media player.

If you have any comments on this article please let me know Pete@illuminateict.org.uk