Text to Speech, Speech Recognition & Mouse Alternatives (Carpal-tunnel friendly)

[Arizona]

Decades of computer use and many years of smartphone use has been slowly catching up with me. I recently had minor surgery in my left elbow (ulnar nerve transposition) to treat the constant tingling in my pinky and ring finger. So I am hoping to avoid the same surgery on the other side. Another motivation is the appeal of ubiquitous computing as a healthy alternative to chronic sitting.

But given my love of the keyboard (and the awkwardness of dictation in many environments), I am mostly interested in text to speech for reading content and mouse alternatives (rather than speech recognition for creating content).


Included with Mac:

Voice Control (rated #1 dictation software for Mac by New York Times)

Use Voice Control on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch

With Voice Control, you can navigate and interact with your device using your voice to tap, swipe, type, and more.

support.apple.com

Dictate messages and documents on Mac

When you turn on Dictation on your Mac, you can dictate text anywhere you can type it.

support.apple.com

Have your Mac speak text that’s on the screen

Press a keyboard shortcut to make your Mac speak text that’s on the screen.

support.apple.com

Use your keyboard like a mouse with Mac

On your Mac, use the keyboard instead of the mouse to perform actions.

support.apple.com

Included with Windows:

Use voice recognition in Windows - Microsoft Support

First, set up your microphone, then use Windows Speech Recognition to train your PC.

support.microsoft.com

Chapter 1: Introducing Narrator - Microsoft Support

Learn about Narrator, a screen reading app in Windows, including how to start and stop Narrator before and after you sign in to your PC.

support.microsoft.com

Use Mouse Keys to move the mouse pointer - Microsoft Support

Use your keyboard to move the mouse pointer by turning on MouseKeys.

support.microsoft.com

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Word/abbreviation expansion:

https://www.autohotkey.com/ (Windows only)

aText - Text template, shortcut, expansion for Mac and Windows

aText accelerates your typing in any application by replacing abbreviations with frequently used phrases you define

www.trankynam.com

(Windows & Mac with cloud sync)

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Mouse-alternative software:

Vimium - The Hacker's Browser

vimium.github.io

(for Google Chrome and Firefox)

Learn Vimscript the Hard Way

learnvimscriptthehardway.stevelosh.com

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Beam Eye Tracker - Turn Your Webcam Into An Eye Tracker

The first-ever webcam eye tracker for gaming. Say goodbye to bulky hardware trackers and upgrade your webcam with eye tracking AI. Free trial on Steam!

sense.eyeware.tech

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Build software better, together

GitHub is where people build software. More than 100 million people use GitHub to discover, fork, and contribute to over 420 million projects.

github.com

Mouse-alternative hardware:

The best touchscreen monitors in January 2024

Get more out of your work monitors with touchscreen, and discover a workflow that allows you to get more creative.

www.creativebloq.com

9 Best Alternatives to a Regular Mouse (from an Ergonomist)

Here are the 9 best alternatives to a normal mouse you should consider if you suffer from wrist pain, and why. From an ergonomist.

ergonomictrends.com

Pocket Mouse

Pocket Mouse (2-Pack) - 2.4 ghz USB 2.0 Wireless Optical 2-in-1 Digital Pen Mouse & Stylus, Adjustable 800/1200/1600 DPI, Ergonomic Mouse for Laptop Notebook Desktop & Tablets

www.amazon.com

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Third-party apps for dictation:

Dragon NaturallySpeaking

Windows: Dragon Home (rated #1 for dictation in Windows by New York Times)

Mobile ($15/month):

Dragon Anywhere—Professional-Grade Mobile Dictation App | Nuance

Dragon Anywhere, a professional-grade mobile dictation app, lets you dictate and edit documents by voice on your iOS or Android mobile device quickly and accurately so you can stay productive anywhere you go.

www.nuance.com

Phillips SpeechLive (for Windows & Mobile):

Speech to text - Philips SpeechLive

Speech to text converts your speech automatically to text. Transcribe as you speak or upload audio files for automated transcription.

www.speechlive.com

"Transcribe as you speak or upload audio files for automated transcription."

"Use our Windows app to use speech to text in any desktop software or our smartphone app to record on the go."

14-day free trial

Dictanote - Dictation-Powered Note Taking

Switch effortlessly between using the keyboard and your voice to type out notes. Work smarter and more productively with fast, accurate dictation and transcription.

dictanote.co

"Dictanote is a notes app with speech recognition integrated, making it easy for you to voice type your notes. "

"Install the Voice In voice typing extension from the Chrome Web Store."

Dictanote Transcribe - Convert Audio Files to Text using AI

Convert your audio and video files to text in 80+ languages. Very high accuracy + low cost.

dictanote.co

"Dictanote Transcribe costs just $0.1 per minute."

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Text to speech only:

Readme - Text To Speech (TTS)

AI-powered text-to-speechе tool. Voice over for books and PDF files. ChatGPT summarizer for anything.

chrome.google.com

Speechify (Text to speech for Google Chrome & Mobile):

Speechify | Turn Any Reading Into Audio

The leading text to speech app with millions of downloads on Chrome, iOS, & Android. Hear the Internet on any device. Try Speechify for free today.

speechify.com

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Wikipedia articles on TTS and speech recognition:

List of screen readers - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Comparison of speech synthesizers - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

List of speech recognition software - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

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Ubuntu:

Accessibility - Community Help Wiki

help.ubuntu.com

Red Hat: https://access.redhat.com/documenta...ility_using-the-desktop-environment-in-rhel-8

Linux:

Speech recognition software for Linux - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

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Cloud APIs (free tiers):

Azure AI Speech | Microsoft Azure

Explore AI Speech from Microsoft Azure that include speech recognition, text to speech, speech translation, voice-enabled app features, and more.

azure.microsoft.com

https://www.oracle.com/artificial-intelligence/speech/ (first 5 hours of free transcription)

Free Machine Learning Services - AWS

Get started today with machine learning cloud services on AWS for free with the AWS Free Tier machine learning services.

aws.amazon.com

IBM Watson Text to Speech

Watson Speech to Text is an API that transcribes speech to text in a variety of languages. It’s available as SaaS or for self-hosting.

www.ibm.com

 

[Retro]

This shows just how much harder it is to use a computer if one can't use keyboard and mouse.

Glad the op helped and hope you don't need more.

 

[Arizona]

Talon, which is free software, is interesting because it allows for both voice input and eye-tracking input. Talon is compatible with Mac, Linux, and Windows. Its Slack channel is also very active. However, the eye tracking feature requires external hardware: "depends on a single Tobii 4C, Tobii 5 or equivalent eye tracker."

An expert in R posted a video 3 years ago of using Talon for R programming. This was after only a week of becoming familiar with the software:

"R programming by voice with mouse eye tracking: I'm using the Tobii 4C and Talon software to code by voice in R using some custom and built in commands."

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