Read_Text.0.7.30.oxt will now recreate a missing directory when saving audio files in Linux.

• If you changed the settings for the default My Documents path on Linux using the Preferences menu and subsequently removed or renamed the directory, the extension would not update the My Documents path, and could not save the audio files.
• The extension now tries to recreate the missing directory. If that fails the extension saves audio files in the default user home directory.

This release replaces a depreciated component function. It no longer uses ThisComponent.DocumentInfo function. Instead, it uses ThisComponent.DocumentProperties.

Read Text 0.7.28 works better with non-English versions of the Windows 8 Consumer Preview.

• If the default voice setting of the user is not an English voice, the "(SELECTION_LANGUAGE_CODE)" will default to an American English voice if the selection is an English voice.
• Windows 8 includes a United Kingdom English voice. To hear it, set the language locale of the selected text to English (United Kingdom) and use "(SELECTION_LANGUAGE_COUNTRY_CODE)" in the command line options tag.

Windows XP defaults to English for unknown languages. Newer Windows systems use W3 XML for unknown languages. Some Windows 8 language locales are silent if XML uses an unknown language, so we have reverted to looking up MS codes for most languages.

Read Text 0.7.26 includes improvements for non-English speech synthesis.

• It now uses w3 2001 Speech Synthesis XML for all languages in any Windows operating system newer than XP (5.1). This will permit more reliable and predictable use of Windows system voices for non-English users.
• The mailto: URL is now allowed in the web application settings dialogue.

Read Text 0.7.25 includes updates for the Ubuntu 11.10 Unity desktop and adds features to the About... dialog.

• Ubuntu 11.10 updates: Tools - Read Selection... - About - System Settings has a tooltip. 
• Ubuntu Unity System Settings Toolbox does not need to be dismissed before continuing to use the extension. 
• The Speech settings tooltip works for legacy Windows systems. 
• Web script will add “http://” to the beginning of the URL if the user forgets to include it in the settings box. 
• When appropriate, the About... dialog includes “Powered by Google” or “Powered by Vozme”.

Read Text 0.7.23 can detect more Asian and complex languages.

• The method of language detection for Asian and complex languages is more robust.
• Newly detected languages include Bengali, Gujarati, Oriya, Tamil, Telugu, Nepali, Kannada, Malayalam, Urdu, Thai, Khmer, Kashmiri, Kurdish, Burmese, Lao, Dzongka, Ethiopic, Limbu and Tibetan.

Read Text 0.7.22 has improvements for Windows users. In Windows, the Extension settings dialogue appears more quickly. Windows Vista and Windows 7 can use ISO codes to recognize more languages.

• The tts_wscript.vbs file for Windows used jp instead of ja for the Japanese language. This has been corrected.
• The languages that could be identified for Windows users was limited to those languages identified by Microsoft with an ID code.
  With SAPI 5.3, Microsoft added the ability to identify a language string using standard ISO language codes embedded in an XML wrapper. Now, Windows Vista and Windows 7 can use any valid language identifier, not just those identified with an Microsoft ID Code.
• The code used to enumerate installed voices in Windows has been improved for speed. The extensions dialogue appears a little more quickly.

Read Text 0.7.21 corrects errors for the Japanese locale, improves multilingual support for OSX Lion, facilitates opening the system control panel, adds French and German support to on-line help and adds information to the help system.

• The main dialogue and related code misidentified the Japanese language locale as jp instead of ja. This has been corrected.
• Users of supported languages and dialects in Apple OSX Lion will now be able to choose from a list of their native voices. English regional dialects include Australia, Great Britain, India, Ireland and South Africa. New languages include Arabic, Chinese, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hindi, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian Bokmal, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Slovak, Spanish, Swedish, Thai and Turkish.
• Users of legacy Windows systems may have had difficulty locating the Speech Control Panel in more recent versions of Windows. A button has been added to the About... dialogue to open the Speech Control Panel with one click in Windows Vista and Windows 7.
• The On-line Help button now points to a Google Code Wiki organized similarly to the integrated help included with the extension. This allows LibreOffice users who have not installed the optional LibreOffice help files to access Read Text Extension help in English, French and German.
• The help file had omitted a description of the (TITLE) token. This has been corrected.
• The source code is now published via a Google Code subversion repository. This allows developers and others to more easily evaluate changes to the source code and to incorporate the source code into their own open source projects.

Read Text 0.7.20 has Linux support for the Vorbis speex audio codec.

• If Linux has /usr/bin/speexenc then the main dialog will show the option to output a .spx audio file.
• If the speex library is installed, you can create .spx audio files with gst-launch or speexenc.

Read Text Extension 0.7.18 can use festival speech synthesizer's text2wave to create .wav .flac, .m4a, .mp3, and .ogg audio files. With Linux, it can also use text2wave to create.webm, .avi, .mpg, and mp4 video files.

• Linux platforms use a new (FESTIVAL_READ_TEXT_PY) script to create media files if festival is installed. The script token appears in the Read Text Extension dialogue if the programs are installed and python is selected as the external program.
• The “About” file in Spanish is now encoded as UTF-8 so that accented characters appear correctly across all platforms.
• The espeak and pico python scripts use English as a default speech language if no language is specified.

Read Text 0.7.17 can use several free and open source applications in Windows to create .flac, .m4a, .mp3, and .ogg audio files. The free and open source programs listed below are distributed in .zip files. Microsoft recommends that you set a system restore point before installing audio conversion software, that you verify that the software is from a trusted source, and that you uninstall the software if you have performance issues. Download the programs for the formats you want to use. Place the decompressed applications in the C:\opt directory. The Read Text extension automatically detects the command line programs in this directory and puts a new item in the extension dialog. You may be able to use the command line programs with the extension as an open source alternative to Apple iTunes for file conversions or to create ogg and flac open source audio files. .

• m4a – Put faac.exe or neroAacEnc.exe into the C:\opt directory to convert the output to high quality compressed m4a audio files.
• flac – Put flac.exe into the C:\opt directory to convert the output to lossless compressed audio files. Windows does not include a flac player by default. You can download a stand alone player or a plug-in for Windows Media Player, but you may need to discard and rebuild the music database to include flac files in the Windows Media directory listings.
• mp3 – Put lame.exe into the C:\opt directory to convert the output to compressed lossy audio files that are compatible with a wide range of portable music players.
• ogg – Put oggenc.exe or oggenc2.exe into the C:\opt directory to convert the output to open source audio files that are compatible with Chromium, Firefox and Google Chrome browsers. Windows does not associate the .ogg audio file format with a web browser by default, but you can choose the web browser as the preferred application the first time you double-click the ogg audio file. You can also download plugins that allow ogg audio files to be used with Microsoft Windows Media Player or Apple Quicktime.

The extension also includes some other minor improvements.

• Python (all platforms) – Code that is used in several scripts is consolidated into a single library.
• Linux – If you have installed ffmpeg, the flac audio file format appears as one of the Read Text options. The qrencoder option now uses the user name in the filenames for each user's temporary files.
• Apple OSX – If you choose python as the external helper program, the menu now shows all the standard English voices.

Read Text 0.7.16 - This release permits the use of the new (ESPEAK_READ_TEXT_PY) token with Windows 32 bit systems using the version of Python included with the LibreOffice or OpenOffice.org application.

• The Read Text Extension (ESPEAK_READ_TEXT_PY) Python script addresses a Python error when using the script with Windows (32 bit) platforms. The script now explicitly checks whether there is an x86 program directory environmental variable before using the variable to determine the path to the espeak.exe program.
• When you install the espeak program, it prompts you to ask which optional voices to install. These voices will appear in the Speech control panel. These voices are available in the drop down menu when you use Read Text Extension's default "wscript.exe" external program. Installed espeak languages will be used if you use "(TTS_WSCRIPT_VBS)" /language:"(SELECTION_LANGUAGE_CODE)" "(TMP)" in the command line options.

Read Text 0.7.15 - The Read Text Extension Apple OSX main dialogue now shows all the English Macintosh voices from Agnes to Zarvox. If you are using Linux, the (PICO_READ_TEXT_PY) and (ESPEAK_READ_TEXT_PY) Python scripts add the first few words of the text as a title meta-data tag to the audio and video files that support tagging.

• Windows - The (ESPEAK_READ_TEXT_PY) Python script has basic espeak and mbrola functionality. The script can detect and use mbrola voices in place of the espeak version for supported languages. It can speak aloud or output wav audio files.
• Linux - (PICO_READ_TEXT_PY) and (ESPEAK_READ_TEXT_PY) can use external programs to create audio or video files in different formats or speak the text aloud. The scripts are essentially equivalent, but use different speech engines. With no file converter programs, the scripts can speak aloud or output the text as wav files. When you install a converter program, a new item will appear in the main Read Text dialog. Optional converter applications include: faac, ffmpeg, gst-launch, lame, oggenc, and twolame. Some of the file formats are restricted in some jurisdictions, so you need to explicitly enable the non-free (universe and multiverse) repositories if you want to use them. For more information, read the notes in the script field of the About... dialog.
• Apple OSX - The dialog box now displays the following voice options: "Agnes", "Albert", "Bad News", "Bahh", "Bells", "Boing", "Bruce", "Bubbles", "Cellos", "Deranged", "Fred", "Good News", "Hysterical", "Junior", "Kathy", "Pipe Organ", "Princess", "Ralph", "Trinoids", "Vicki", "Victoria", "Whisper", and "Zarvox".

Read Text 0.7.14 has a new (ESPEAK_READ_TEXT_PY) token. Read Text extension now supports creating static video with espeak. Use ffmpeg to create video files for web publishing. You can create avi, mpg, and webm video. You can now add your own picture to the video using a file dialog box.

• The (ESPEAK_READ_TEXT_PY) python script automatically matches the language of the selected text with an installed voice. If a compatible mbrola voice is correctly installed in the /usr/share/mbrola/voices, C:\Program Files (x86)\eSpeak\espeak-data or C:\Program Files\eSpeak\espeak-data directory, the script will find it and use it.
• Linux users of SVOX Pico and espeak programs can create compressed audio and video files directly from the extension dialog. To ensure the most flexibility, make sure the following packages are installed: faac, ffmpeg, lame, libflac8, libflacc++6, libtwolame0 and vorbis-tools. When these tools are installed, the following export formats are supported: .aif, .avi, .flac, .m4a, .mp2, .mp3, .mpg, .ogg, .spx, .wav, and .webm. The video output shows a Read Text Extension poster by default, but you can change the image by entering the complete path to the .png or .jpg file you want to use.
• The extension can now use ffmpeg with Ubuntu Linux to create avi, mpg and webm movie clips that you can upload directly to Youtube without additional editing. Select the default poster picture or choose a picture using a file dialog. You need to be patient, because it takes a few minutes for ffmpeg to render the movie.
• Avi is a video format that can be viewed and edited on most computers. Many digital cameras use this format to record and store movies.
• Mpg is a video format that can be edited from the console using the Linux cat command, It is used for DVD and VCD videos.
• Webm is an open source format that is designed for the web. It be viewed on any computer that has Chromium or Google Chrome, or embedded in a web page. You can edit the webm movies with free movie editors like Pitivi or OpenShot. When you use the webm format for upload to Youtube, the movie is very quickly available for viewing and retains high quality with minimal compression artifacts.

Read Text 0.7.11 gives Linux users of SVOX Pico the ability to create compressed audio and video files for web publishing.

• Windows 64 bit users of 3rd party programs like mbrola, espeak and festival will have the correct path by default, regardless of whether the 3rd party program was installed in the 64 bit programs directory or the 32 bit programs directory.
• Linux users of SVOX Pico can use additional Linux programs to create compressed audio and video files directly from the extension dialog. To ensure the most flexibility, make sure the following packages are installed: faac, ffmpeg, lame, libflac8, libflacc++6, libtwolame0 and vorbis-tools. When these tools are installed, the following export formats are supported: .aif, .avi, .flac, .m4a, .mp2, .mp3, .ogg, .wav, and .webm. The video output shows a Read Text Extension poster by default, but you can change the image by entering the complete path to the .png or .jpg file you want to use. If you edit the video with an application like OpenShot, you can use a web publishing tool like Youtube to share your video.

Read Text 0.7.10 includes several refinements to the high quality SVOX Pico speech synthesizer for Linux. The SVOX Pico speech synthesizer packages are available in Debian's non-free repository and in Ubuntu's multiverse repository. Use a package manager like Synaptic or apt-get to install the following packages: libttspico0, libttspico-utils, and libttspico-data.

• You can now play the speech in the background without showing the media or movie player.
• You can record speech to your drive without the speech synthesizer talking aloud.
• You can change the rate and pitch of speech.
• An error when multiple users use SVOX Pico simultaneously has been corrected.
• All German, Spanish, French and Italian locales use the available native language voice instead of American English. When you use the (SELECTION_LANGUAGE_COUNTRY_CODE) token, the British English engine is used in the following locales: AU, BD, BS, GB, GH, HK, IE, IN, JM, NZ, PK, SA, and TT.
• For more information about the SVOX Pico speech synthesizer, consult the manual (PDF).
• The list of Festival voices recognized by the extension now includes two Vietnamese voices.

Read Text Extension 0.7.7 includes interface improvements for Ubuntu Festival users.

• Festival is an external program that reads text aloud. The extension dialogue now hides voice options for voices that are not installed. It can show the festival voices available in the Ubuntu multiverse repository.
• A grammatical error in the German help text has been fixed.
• Linux QR Code users can now choose different error correction levels in the external programs command line options combo box.

Read Text 0.7.6 now has a help file for German. The dialog boxes have been revised by a native German speaker.

• When mbrola is installed, the mbrola voices shown in the combo box now show the most likely options near the top of the list.
• The German description file, menus and dialog boxes have been completely revamped. Context sensitive help [F1] is available in German.
• The script that tests to determine if the Apple OSX operating system is in use does not depend at all on the name of the program or the installation path. (i. e.: BR-Office, LibreOffice, OpenOffice.org and StarOffice)
• Suggestions for Command Line options automatically update only if you enter a valid file name in the Read with an External Program field.
• The help is now organized by topic using the help tree view.

Read Text 0.7.5 has improvements to the main dialog and offers new functionality.

• Users of espeak and mbrola will now see a list of installed mbrola voices in the drop down menu. 
• Linux users now use python as the default external program, and a new python script to enable espeak is included. This change makes it easier for Linux users to change the task of the extension depending on what resources are installed. For example, if you have installed qrencoder, you can create QR Codes by selecting that function from the combo box. If you installed python-speechd, you can initiate speech with the speechd speech management system. People who use languages that are not supported by espeak can set up the speech server to use tools for their language, including commercial voice engines. Third party python programmers can easily add new modular functions to the Read Text Extension. 
• The Linux qrencoder python script now displays the image immediately. If you are using the extension to transfer information to your mobile device, this can save a lot of time. 
• Windows users using espeak will find that the extension's default program remains Wscript.exe. Feedback at the download site indicated that it was not easy to remember how to find the Wscript.exe program once you installed espeak. 
• The web applications combo box now includes Google definitions. Highlight some text, then look up the meaning using the web application.

Read Text 0.7.4 improves the QR encode web application by explicitly replacing "&" with the escaped string.

• When transferring a bookmarklet (javascript embedded in a browser bookmark) to a mobile device using QR Code, code following the ampersand was omitted, so the Bookmarklet would not work correctly. This minor update corrects the defect so that javascript bookmarklets transfer correctly, even if the code includes an ampersand sign.

Read Text 0.7.3 improves the QR encode web application by explicitly replacing "+" with the string "%2B"

• When transferring a Bookmarklet (javascript embedded in a browser bookmark) to a mobile device using QR Code, the URL encoding function automatically replaced the plus symbol with a space, so the Bookmarklet would not work correctly. This minor update corrects the defect so that javascript bookmarklets transfer correctly, even if the code includes a plus sign.

More...

Read Text 0.7.2 improves QR Code image creation. Icelandic language is available in the dialogs, menus and tool tips.

• With non-ASCII characters, the Linux python QR Code script uses the system encoding (UTF-8) instead of escaped characters. This means that accented characters and smart quotes appear correctly on supported mobile devices. The Linux python script now allows you to adjust the size of the image. “QR Code” is registered trademark of DENSO WAVE INCORPORATED in the following countries: Japan, United States of America, Australia and Europe.
• The Web tool code to create QR Code no longer relies on identifying custom URL schemes. Any valid URL scheme is okay.

Read Text 0.6.12 adds the ability to use a web charting application to create QR code labels regardless of computer platform.

• The main dialog of the Read Text Extension now includes access to a web application for creating QR codes. QR codes are patterns of squares that embed text in a visual image so that mobile devices can quickly and reliably read information with a built-in camera. The application is powered by the Google Chart API.
• There is a new token (OOO_WEBTEXT250) for use with QR code creation. The new token returns the first 249 characters of the selected text encoded for the web.
• The (OOO_WEBTEXTSMALL), (OOO_WEBTEXT250), (OOO_WEBTEXT) and (OOO_WEBTEXTBIG) tokens encode uniform resource locations (URLs) correctly so that they can be used with on-line QR code and barcode encoding applications.
• The help is updated.
• The function that writes QR Code web bookmarks is updated.

More...

Read Text.0.6.9 improves how LibreOffice handles Read Text Extension's context sensitive help [F1] when LibreOffice Help is not installed.

• LibreOffice only makes an extension's context sensitive help available if you have installed an optional LibreOffice Help Pack. Formerly, pressing F1 for help while using a Read Text Extension dialog opened a browser window pointing to a non-existent page. Now, if you have not installed a help pack, pressing F1 opens a help page for the LibreOffice tool that you are currently using. I still recommend that you install a help pack for your language or in English so that you have access to Read Text Extension help. You can access LibreOffice on-line help by bookmarking the LibreOffice help link in your web browser.
• The OpenOffice.org application includes a help pack by default. You can access the OpenOffice.org on-line help using the OpenOffice.org support link.
• This update restores the Read Selection toolbar and Read Selection... Add-on menu to the web writer and master document tools. It also restores the Read Clipboard Add-on menu to the basic macro editor, formula and database tools.

Read Text Extension 0.6.8 includes sample python utilities, including a utilty to create QR code labels with the Linux platform.

• To create barcode labels with Linux, install qrencode using your package manager, then open the Read Text dialog and select /usr/bin/python as the external program. Select the option that includes "(CREATE_QR_LABEL_PY)" in the command line options.
• The Extensions Manager uses localized descriptions for Read Text Extension in English, French, German, Hindi, Portuguese, Russian, Simplified Chinese and Spanish. 
• The About... dialog shows a total of the number of characters selected and the number of characters in the system clipboard.
• The (NOW) token now uses YEAR-MONTH-DAY_HOUR-MINUTE-SECONDS format for all versions and locales.

Read Text 0.6.7 makes it easier to set up different speech synthesis options.

• When you choose a different external program in the main dialog, the extension instantly updates the program options depending on what external program you want to use. For example, if you choose espeak as your external program, it shows voices that are available for your language on your computer. If you choose a web browser like Chrome or Firefox, it shows URLs of on-line speech synthesis applications.
• The language support for complex languages is improved. For example, if your local language is Farsi, and you use Arabic script, the (SELECTION_LANGUAGE_CODE) returns “fa” instead of “ar”.
• The About Read Text dialog now has a new “test” icon to test your speakers or headphones. Why? Some language, voice and locale settings may not work on your computer. If a language is not installed, then the system might try to use the default voice, but your computer may be silent if you are using an unsupported language, or if the speech application does not understand UTF-8 encoded text.
• In the source code, each function has a standardized prefix depending on function type.
• The directory structure of the extension has been cleaned up using NetBeans IDE.

Read Text.0.6.6 adds support of the (SELECTION_LANGUAGE_CODE) token to Arabic and Hindi text.

• The application's built in CharLocale.Language property does not identify locales when complex text layout is used, so Read Text Extension identifies them by looking at the UTF-8 code of the first letter of the selected text.
• If your system doesn't read complex text correctly, make sure that you have enabled complex text layout (CTL) support with Tools > Options > Languages > Language > Enhanced Language Support.
• This version uses the correct options for Apple OSX say.

About multilingual support...

Read Text.0.6.5 lets you use the (SELECTION_LANGUAGE_CODE) token with Chinese, Japanese and Korean text.

• The application's built in CharLocale.Language property does not identify oriental text locales, so Read Text Extension identifies oriental languages by looking at the UTF-8 code of the first letter of the selected text and by looking for things in the text that characterize the language.
• If your system doesn't read oriental text correctly, make sure that you have enabled Asian language support with Tools > Options > Languages > Language > Enhanced Language Support. If you set up your application with a Chinese, Japanese or Korean locale, the Enhanced Language support should be enabled by default.

About multilingual support...

Read Text.0.6.3 adds support for Indonesian, Tagalog and Ukrainian. For Windows users, the tts_wscript.vbs table now indexes more countries with the appropriate Microsoft Windows locale code.

• In Windows, the tts_wscript.vbs and tts_list_voices.vbs scripts can be used as stand-alone applets. To speak a plain text file, drag and drop it onto the tts_wscript.vbs file. For a dialog to enter text to speak, double-click tts_wscript.vbs. To see a list of correctly installed SAPI voices, double-click tts_list_voices.vbs. In the Windows command console, you can use -h with either of the scripts to view the command line options.
• The help file has been simplified and made more accurate.
• Unique Windows locale codes have been added to tts_wscript.vbs for most regions where Arabic, English, French, German and Spanish are spoken.

Read Text.0.6.2 has bug fixes, security and performance improvements.

• It displays the settings dialog faster.
• On Windows computers, the tts_wscript.vbs script explicitly returns the iTunes encoding setting to how the script found it.
• An error message when you tried to read the clipboard outside of Writer, Web Writer, Calc or Impress has been fixed.
• You now need to specify parameters for an external program, or it won't run. This can help prevent an external program from reducing your computer's performance if it is started incorrectly.

Read Text 0.6.1 uses more sensible default settings for Macintosh computers.

• If you have installed espeak in a standard location like /usr/bin/espeak or /usr/local/espeak then the Read Text Extension will use the espeak program and show settings that are appropriate for that program.
• If you have not installed espeak on your Macintosh OSX computer, then Read Text extension will use /usr/bin/say and will show settings that are appropriate for that program.
• The espeak or say program selection method now matches the behavior on the Windows platform.

Why use espeak? It is multilingual and can be set up to parse XML as speech commands. You can improve the quality of the voices by installing mbrola and mbrola voices.

Read Text 0.6.0 works better with LibreOffice 3.3.0.

• The Windows main dialog lets you easily change the rate of speech when using the (SELECTION_LANGUAGE_CODE) tag.
• A temporary Windows settings file is erased when it is not needed.
• The Windows tts_wscript.vbs script shows a more informative dialogue if iTunes is needed to convert a wav file to a different file format, but is not installed.

Read Text 0.5.8 has been updated to work with version 3.3 of the OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice applications.

• This version corrects an error where LibreOffice 3.3 displays a "bad node" error message when attempting to upgrade or install the extension.
• If you replace an OpenOffice.org application with a LibreOffice application, the LibreOffice application will use the default Read Text Extension settings. This is because the OpenOffice.org application settings files are stored in a different directory. i.e.: For Windows Vista local user settings, the OpenOffice.org application uses C:\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\OpenOffice.org and the LibreOffice application uses C:\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\LibreOffice.
• If you want to use Read Text Extension help with the LibreOffice application, you need to install a LibreOffice "Help Pack" for your language. 

Read Text 0.5.7 lets Apple OSX users save native speech as aif, wav, mp3 or m4a sound files. Windows users can now save items in aif format using iTunes.

• The Apple OSX dialog now includes usable export to file options.
• Windows wscript now allows exporting to .aif sound files using iTunes.
• Windows wscript now uses switch /soundfile:"(HOME)(NOW).xxx" instead of /wavefile:"(HOME)(NOW).xxx".
• The Windows wscript now correctly identifies the sound file extension regardless of the sound file name.

Read Text 0.5.6 lets you use iTunes on your Windows computer to convert speech sound files to mp3 and m4a formats and to manage speech files on your portable music player.

• Please update iTunes before you use the extension to produce mp3 or m4a sound files. If the iTunes update dialogue appears while you are encoding a file, the extension may not be able to convert the sound file or tag it correctly. If this happens, run the extension again once iTunes is updated to produce a correctly tagged mp3 or m4a file.
• To use iTunes to manage transcoding, select mp3 or m4a as the file output type in the Command line options combo box in the main Read Text Extension dialog. Once you click OK, it may take a few moments to produce an mp3 or m4a file. The iTunes application signals with a sound when it has finished producing your audio file.
• The extension uses iTunes to assign the first thirty or so letters of the selected text as the Title, and the full selected text as the Lyrics. The Genre is Voice Memos, the Author is sites.google.com/site/readtextextension and the Album is Read Text Extension.
• The extension places one copy of the output sound file in the iTunes library and one copy in the place you specify in the command line. By default, the extension uses the Home or My Documents folder and names the file with the date and time.
• If you do not want to use or install iTunes, you can still read text aloud and make wav sound files. Select wav as the output type in the Command line options combo box. The wav files are high quality, but they take up more space on your computer. Wav files are a good choice as a starting point if you plan to edit them or save them in multiple formats. For more information about alternative sound encoders, see the Ogg Vorbis and RareWares web sites.

The tts_wscript.vbs table includes Hindi and Indonesian. Windows performance and responsiveness is improved.

• Language strings are cached to improve performance. 
• The 64 bit version of wscript is used if it is available. 
• The tts_wscript.vbs language table is smaller and better organized for faster speed. 
• The audio quality of the recording function has been improved (16 bit mono 44.100 Kilohertz).

This release lets Windows correctly distinguish Norwegian Bokmal (Literary Norwegian) and Norwegian Nynorsk.

• The tts_script.vbs language table has a new entry for Norwegian Nyorsk (nn)
• The script language table identifies Norwegian (no) and Norwegian Bokmai (nb) as Norwegian. 

This release corrects an error message that may appear when using web tools.

• The Windows program directory is taken directly from the Windows system environment variable
• The web text function corrects an error when using web tools.

Windows computers can now create an audio wave file as well as speaking aloud.

• The Windows tts_wscript.vbs script includes a new switch - /wavefile:"(HOME)(NOW).wav" to create a sound file for uploading to a server or to a portable music player. The switch is optional - if it is omitted, the script speaks aloud.
• The Windows tts_script includes language and country locales in the translation table for each supported language.
• A wscript error appeared when using an older version of Windows. This has been fixed.

This release corrects a "String could not be analysed" error message that might have appeared the first time the extension was run on a Windows system. The Windows Wscript VBS file adds code to the table for South Africa English and Great Britain English.

If you have installed voices in different languages, this version of the Read Text Extension lets you read the selected text using different languages while editing writer, web writer, calc and impress documents. The selected voice tag uses the same language and country properties that the spell checker and thesaurus use.

• Ukrainian (uk) language code was added to the index in the Windows VBS script.
• The code that identifies the country code is corrected (i. e.: UK for United Kingdom or FR for France).
• The language of the selected text is attached to the character formatting when editing writer, web writer, calc and impress documents. To change the language of the selected text in writer, you can select it from the language area of the status bar. With Impress, Calc or Draw, select some text, then use Format > Character > Font > Language to select the language. 
• With Calc, changing the format of the cell does not change the language that the spell checker, thesaurus and the Read Text Extension use. You need to change the language using the Font > Language setting as shown above.  
• If you want the whole document to be in a different language, use Tools > Options > Language Settings > Languages. Choose a language, then make sure For Current Document Only is checked.
• New token for the Application country code - US for United States; FR for France, etc. (COUNTRY_CODE) 
• New token for the Application regional code - fr-CA for French in Canada; en-UK for English in the United Kingdom, etc. (LANGUAGE_COUNTRY_CODE)
• The help menus have been updated.

When the selected text country value cannot be determined, the value defaults to the system's country instead of US (United States of America).

This update adds new and corrected language and country locales for the ISO code translation table in Windows. The tts_wscript.vbs script for Windows has additions or corrections of ISO codes for the following languages:

• Basque
• Catalan
• Georgian
• Hebrew
• Icelandic
• Slovak
• Slovenian
• Thai

The word processor application can tell the language of the selected text and choose a voice with the same language. This is particularly useful if you are teaching or learning a language.

The menus and description for Spanish have been revised by a native speaker. ¡Muchas gracias ArielEnter!

Once you set up your speech preferences, the application reads in the document's language if the voice is installed. When you write or edit a multilingual document, you can change the language of selected text with Tools > Language > For Selection. The language you choose determines which language is used for the dictionary and thesaurus. It also can be used to tell an external program, script or web application the language of the selection.

Use with an external program
You may need to install applications or voices to use different languages.

• Open the Tools > Add-Ons > Read Selection... dialog, 
• Under Command Line Options, use the (SELECTION_LANGUAGE_CODE) token to stand for the two letter language code of the selected text. 
• Use the (SELECTION_COUNTRY_CODE) to stand for the two letter country code of the selected text.
• Use the (SELECTION_LANGUAGE_COUNTRY_CODE) to stand for the regional language code of the selected text.

Use with a web application
You can also use the codes with a web application. For example, use it with Google Translate to translate foreign text to your language:

• http://translate.google.com/?&langpair=(SELECTION_LANGUAGE_CODE)|(LANGUAGE_CODE)&tbb=1&ie=&hl=(LANGUAGE_CODE)&text=(OOO_WEBTEXT) 

See the Read Text Software Web Applications page for more ideas. 

What's new?

• The tts_wscript.vbs script for Windows now has a language switch. For supported languages, you can use a two letter ISO code for your language. If your language isn't directly supported, use the MS Locale ID (hex). See: OpenOffice.org Wiki: Languages.
• The Spanish dialogs and description were revised by a native Spanish speaker using a Google Documents form.
• There are three new tokens for the command line interface:
• Selection language code – en for English; fr for French etc. (SELECTION_LANGUAGE_CODE) 
• Selection country code - US for United States; FR for France, etc. (SELECTION_COUNTRY_CODE) 
• Selection regional code - fr-CA for French in Canada; en-UK for English in the United Kingdom, etc. (SELECTION_LANGUAGE_COUNTRY_CODE) 
• The (SELECTION_LANGUAGE_CODE) token was added as an option in the main dialog Command Line Options. 
• Some tokens were coded twice. Duplicate listings of tokens have been merged into a single sequence.

This release adds additional language support.

• The (DATE) and (WEEKDAY) tokens work for all languages instead of defaulting to English for some languages.
• The (AUTHOR) tag now trims extra spaces from the left and right of the string.
• Supported User interface languages include:
  • af – Afrikaans
    
  • bg – Bulgarian
    
  • ca – Catalan
    
  • cs – Czech
    
  • da – Danish
    
  • de – German
    
  • el – Greek
    
  • en – English
    
  • es – Spanish
    
  • et – Estonian
    
  • fi – Finnish
    
  • fr – French
    
  • ga – Irish
    
  • hi – Hindi
    
  • hu – Hungarian
    
  • it – Italian
    
  • jp – Japanese
    
  • ko – Korean
    
  • lt – Lithuanian
    
  • lv – Latvian
    
  • mt – Maltese
    
  • nl – Dutch
    
  • pl – Polish
    
  • pt – Portuguese
    
  • ro – Romanian
    
  • ru – Russian
    
  • sk – Slovak
    
  • sl – Slovenian
    
  • sv – Swedish
    
  • tr – Turkish
    
  • zh – Chinese
    
  • zh-cn – Simplified Chinese
    
  • zh-tw – Traditional Chinese
    
• The Windows VBS Script now explicitly sets the Speech object to nothing before finishing.

Windows SAPI users can choose any SAPI5 voice using a combobox. The About... dialog has new language resources. The fonts are consistent.

• On Windows computers, if you are using Wscript as a speech tool, this release looks up the Windows SAPI voices and uses them in the Read Text Extension Dialogue. The dialogue allows you to select a voice and reading rate all from the combo box.
• The About Read Text dialogue can now show a description in several languages, including Simple English.
• Clicking the Read Text Extension logo in the About Box reads text about the extension.
• The logo for Read Text Extension no longer appears to overlap one of the dialog fields with some Linux GNOME themes. The text in the About box is now all the same size and font.

A path problem with some installations of Festival is corrected. Windows users get easier to use Wscript options. The About... dialog is improved.

• Festival will now find a script correctly if the path to the script file includes spaces.
• When using Windows Wscript as a speech tool, the Combo Box for the external extension now proposes more than one working example.
• The Windows Wscript speech synthesis script has been placed in the /script subdirectory in the extension's directory instead of using a macro to write the script each time. The script should launch a little quicker.
• The About... dialog uses the concise description from /help/components.txt, because you can access more detailed help with F1. The script section of the About... dialog is bigger, so it is easier to read scripts. The About... dialog includes an icon. The version displayed in the About... dialog comes from description.xml.
• The help files have been made more concise.
• The package directories and files have been reorganized to conform to NetBeans IDE style.

This version lets you use different Windows voices, and lets you read the clipboard, even with text from an external program.

Select different Windows built in voices
If you are using Windows, and you have installed different SAPI voices, you can now select a different voice and voice rate than the default.

Normal usage: "(TTS_WSCRIPT_VBS)" "(TMP)"
Custom usage: "(TTS_WSCRIPT_VBS)" /voice:"Microsoft Anna" /rate:-3 "(TMP)"
/voice:"Microsoft Anna" - (optional) Uses Microsoft Anna.
/rate:-3 - (optional) The slowest rate is -10 and the fastest is 10.
"(TMP)" (required) - Path to text document to speak.

Read clipboard

• You can read any text you can copy to the clipboard. For example, you can read macro code, the contents of text fields, data sources, captions and text in selected parts of tables. You can read text copied from external programs like web browsers, help or news feeds.
• Select some text.
• Use Edit → Copy or Ctrl+C.
• Use Tools → Add-Ons → Read Clipboard.

• Unfortunately, the version 0.4.3 did not upload completely to the extensions web site, so that version was corrupted. It was only available publicly on-line for 45 minutes. To minimize your chance of problems, uninstall the old version of this extension with Extension Manager prior to installing this update.
• This release uses the application's regular help system. With Windows or Linux, if the Read Text Extension dialog is showing, just press the F1 key to show a help page for the extension. If you are using an Apple computer, use fn+F1.
• If you are using at least version 3 of the OpenOffice.org application, or its equivalent, then the extension's help menu is searchable, and the help appears on the help menu's tree frame under Contents.
• The last release included high contrast icons for visually impaired users in the toolbars and menu items. This release now can display a high contrast icon in the Extension Manager as well.
• French users now see a French translation of the open source license as well as the official translation.

This is a minor update to improve the appearance and polish of the Read Text Extension.

• The icons have been redone to improve the appearance of small size icons and includes high contrast icons for visually impaired users.
  
• The extension briefly shows a progress bar at the bottom of the window.
  
• The spacing for the Italian license notice has been corrected.
  

This release supports Portuguese. An incorrect tool tip has been corrected. Some redundant code is removed. The packaging has new language and picture resources.

Extension

• Version 0.4.1 adds Portuguese strings to menu items, dates and times.
  
• Apple OSX external program default paths are now checked using the same code as Linux.
  
• The tool tip for the on-line help button now updates the help URL according to the computer's display language.
  

Packaging

• The Manage Extensions dialog now shows the extension icon.
  
• The extension description includes a unique id.
  
• French resources have been added to the package description and license.