On 2009-11-07 15:47:36 +0000, James Jolley said:

> On 2009-11-07 10:44:32 +0000, Jaimie Vandenbergh 
>  said:
> 
>> On Sat, 7 Nov 2009 06:38:54 +0000, Steve Hodgson 
>> wrote:
>> 
>>> At the end of the day it’s a personal choice and there is no perfect
>>> device but the Kindle works for me.
>> 
>> Thanks for that, good to get another personal review.
>> 
>> Would you do a "second impressions" post in a month or so? I'm more
>> interested in the actual use and practical ergonomics than the
>> unboxing.
>> 
>> 	Cheers - Jaimie
> 
> I'm glad you've written this. What's the TTS like for reading? Is it 
> continuous or do you have to turn pages manually? Also, does the TTS 
> speak the UI?

TTS for reading works quite well and the voice, although basic, is not 
unpleasant. Once enabled it will read the text continuously and pages 
will turn in sync with the text. It doesn't seem to recognise 
punctuation with any subtlety, only really pausing on full stops, and 
this can make the voice a bit monotone.

TTS only works for reading text which would be better if they had 
included an option to enable it system-wide.

Most significantly TTS is enabled on a per-book basis - all of my 
'Kindle' books have it enabled as does my Instapaper archive but my 
copy of Iain Banks' 'Transition' doesn't (presumably because it's ePub 
format). This suggests to me that the majority of material will work 
but NOT all.

Hope this helps.
-- 
Cheers,

Steve

The reply-to email address is a spam trap.
Email steve 'at' shodgson 'dot' org 'dot' uk

On 2009-11-07 18:53:27 +0000, Steve Hodgson  said:

> On 2009-11-07 15:47:36 +0000, James Jolley said:
> 
>> On 2009-11-07 10:44:32 +0000, Jaimie Vandenbergh 
>>  said:
>> 
>>> On Sat, 7 Nov 2009 06:38:54 +0000, Steve Hodgson 
>>> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> At the end of the day it’s a personal choice and there is no perfect
>>>> device but the Kindle works for me.
>>> 
>>> Thanks for that, good to get another personal review.
>>> 
>>> Would you do a "second impressions" post in a month or so? I'm more
>>> interested in the actual use and practical ergonomics than the
>>> unboxing.
>>> 
>>> 	Cheers - Jaimie
>> 
>> I'm glad you've written this. What's the TTS like for reading? Is it 
>> continuous or do you have to turn pages manually? Also, does the TTS 
>> speak the UI?
> 
> TTS for reading works quite well and the voice, although basic, is not 
> unpleasant. Once enabled it will read the text continuously and pages 
> will turn in sync with the text. It doesn't seem to recognise 
> punctuation with any subtlety, only really pausing on full stops, and 
> this can make the voice a bit monotone.
> 
> TTS only works for reading text which would be better if they had 
> included an option to enable it system-wide.
> 
> Most significantly TTS is enabled on a per-book basis - all of my 
> 'Kindle' books have it enabled as does my Instapaper archive but my 
> copy of Iain Banks' 'Transition' doesn't (presumably because it's ePub 
> format). This suggests to me that the majority of material will work 
> but NOT all.
> 
> Hope this helps.

It does, greatly. I am guessing this has something to do with the 
author's guild complaining that TTS readings are effectively a 
performance of there work. Pathetic really but there we go.

I'm glad you've tried the TTS, I' guessing it's similar to the iPhone 
3GS voice witch is of course system wide.

What's the likelyhood of them actually making the TTS work system wide? 
Do they update the software often?

Best

-James-