Can Voice over read text?

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Level 1

15 points

Can Voice over read text?

I have tried everything I know. I read all the comments here, I searched, I googled ,
How do you basically get this utility to work.
I found it in the Utilities folder. Its here. I dragged the voiceover icon onto the desktop.
I followed the suggestions in the help menu.
I highlighted the text I wanted read.
I made sure the cursor was at the beginning.
I used the short cut cmd. F5

Do I need to highlight the text I want read?
Do I need to select the text?

Nothing seems to be working.

I just want to know the basics

2007 Macbook with 2 gig Ram, Mac OS X (10.4.9), 5G iPod 80 gig

Posted on Nov 28, 2007 7:23 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

Tom Gewecke

Level 10

115,910 points

Nov 28, 2007 8:14 PM in response to moh2o

What app is your text in?

Here are the basics for TextEdit:

+Type some text

+Do Edit > Speech > Start Speaking

Let us know if it works or not.

(Put the Voice Over Utility back where you found it. There's no point to moving things around like that)

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Answer 2

Nov 29, 2007 3:03 PM in response to moh2o

Hello moh2o!

VoiceOver is not a simple utility for reading text, though it does this extremely well. It is a full spoken interface for OS X, and enables blind users to use the Mac with keyboard commands only.

To learn to use it, leaving the VoiceOver utility where it is, as Tom suggested, simply activate VoiceOver using the command-F5 keystroke, then press Ctrl-Option-Command-F8. You will hear a tutorial which gives you the basics of handling your Mac with VoiceOver.

On the other hand, if you simply want to hear your Mac read a block of text, then use the Start Speaking command as Tom suggested, or set up the Speak Selected Text command as follows:

Go to System Preferences—>Speech. Click on the Text to Speech tab. Choose the System Voice you want, then check the Speak selected text checkbox. Use the Set Key… button to choose a keyboard shortcut to suit yourself, then quit. Subsequently, you can highlight a block of text, then press the shortcut and listen. Stop the output simply by repeating the same keystroke.

HTH

Archie

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Answer 3

moh2o Author

Level 1

15 points

Dec 1, 2007 8:20 PM in response to moh2o

Thanks , Tom and Archie also,

Yes your suggestions helped. And I found the text reader in Preferences and I created a shortcut, and as I found not to use "shift + (a letter).
Because it makes problems later when you are typing a need to capitalize a letter.

Works great, Oh yeah Tom I was using text edit as the app. to read text from.

thanks,

-Mo

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