Re: [orca-list] How many people us voxin?

[Thomas Ward <thomasward1978 gmail com>]

Hi Alex,

I agree with you all the way. I use Voxin, AKA Eloquence, for many of
the same reasons. Its reliable enough to get the job done, I haven't
had many problems with it, and its affordable. Yes, it is a bit more
complicated than ESpeak to get up and running, but as long as I don't
have a personal problem installing and using it I don't really see the
harm.

Further more I respect the fact that Linux is free and open source,
and in most of the cases I am a supporter of the open source model
when and where applicable. However, I do not object to using a piece
of software simply on the grounds because it is proprietary or closed
source etc. As a programmer myself I am aware of the realities that a
programmer has to make his daily bread somewhere, and the most logical
way to do it is trade his/her skills for money. Its as simple as that.
If some open source activist doesn't like it they can write their own
free open source version and give it away, but let's not penalize the
person who has to make a living. :D

Cheers!


On 1/7/13, Alex Midence <alex midence gmail com> wrote:
> Ok, that didn't come out right.  I was using iPhone dictation software
> and it messed up on what I meant to say.  some clarification:
>
> If you choose not to use voxin, do it for other reasons than citing
> any potential unreliability.  Yes, there are bugs but they are not
> noticeable.  There are no spontaneous crashes, garbled speech, lags,
> delays or anything else like that.  It is clear and responsive and
> utterly reliable.  I use it litterally every day for hours and hours
> as my primary speech synth at work.  I prefer it to mroe
> human-sounding voices like the ones from cepstral or Nuance.  I
> certainly find it infinitely preferable to Festival.  IBM did a truly
> fantastic job with it.  Now, in Linux, Espeak is available right out
> of the box on all the distributions I have tried and it is also clear,
> responsive and utterly reliable.  Mr. duddington did a truly wonderful
> job on his speech synthesizer.  Add libsonic and it is a real, honest
> to goodness speed demon.  I use it on Linux exclusively because Voxin
> as Eloquence is known there seems more problematic to install on it
> and I am happy with  what is already in place.  When I evaluate any
> assistive technology my overarching concern is:
>
> Does it work?
>
> Next to that is:
>
> How easy is it to set up?
>
> then, there's cost:
>
> Can I afford it?
>
> This makes me a bit of a maverick among Linux enthusiasts but, I quite
> frankly don't give one single solitary darn about whether or not it's
> proprietary.  I am not a programmer.  I am an end user.  If I have to
> pay for it with money or time and community participation, it's all
> the same to me.  Most important is  usability, reliability, setup, and
> affordability.
>
> Thanks.
> alex M