Speech

In a Cocoa or services-compatible application, any selected text can be sent to the Speech service to be read aloud, by selecting the text and choosing the Services Start Speaking Text command as shown in Figure 11-8. To stop, use the Services Stop Speaking command. To change the settings for Speech, use the Speech pane in System Preferences. (System Preferences are covered in more detail in Chapter 13.) This service is helpful for comparing long numbers or exact wording (listen to one as you look at the other).

Figure 11-8: Use Speech’s Start Speaking Text command to hear the text, notes, or email read aloud.

If you select an icon in the Finder and choose the Start Speaking Text command, Speech will speak the item’s path! For example, if you select the application that makes this possible, System/Library/Services/SpeechService.service, and invoke Start Speaking Text, you will hear “System, Library, Services, SpeechService.services.” This is mostly just a nifty trick, because you could more easily hold down the Command key and click on the title of the Finder window to see the path. Perhaps if you have to type the path, it would be helpful to hear it as you do so.