Help for Reader. Version 2A. After Reader has been started, you can activate it's window from any other windows application by pressing the Pause key. Then press 'R' to read a file. You can also copy text to the clipboard from another application ( by pressing CTRL +'C'), then have Reader read it by pressing Pause, then 'B' after Reader is active. When the main window is active, the following hot keys apply. To read the clipboard type B. To configure Reader type C. To hear the date type D. To register reader (or get the serial number), type G. To switch hot key information, type H. ( When the main window hot key info is displayed the read file hot keys are then displayed and vice versa.) To hear the time type M. To read a file type R. To start the trainer & Talker type T. To clear a bookmark type 0. To close reader completely, type X. When the configuration or trainer window is open. Tab moves to next input field. Shift+Tab moves to previous input field. Alt+F speaks the contents of the current input field. Buttons are activated by pressing Alt+Button Letter. When reading a file sentence by sentence or line by line. The P key pauses the reading. Press the space bar to start again. The Q key aborts the reading. The left arrow gos back back and repeats the previous sentence or current line. The right arrow moves forward and skips a sentence or line. The up arrow goes back two or three sentences. Reader now remembers the previous 20 sentence locations. The down arrow goes ahead and skips two sentences or lines. The S key stores a bookmark of the current location if the bookmark variable is zero, otherwise Reader goes to the bookmark location identified in the bookmark variable. The Zero key clears the current bookmark entry to zero. The E key will make Reader repeat and extract the current sentence and store the text to a file named "extracts.txt". It will continue storing sentences to this file while it is reading the sentences verbally, until the E key is pressed again. Text is always appended to this file so it could become big, you must manage the file independent of Reader. You may also have to add carriage returns later, as the text that is formatted for Reader to read has control characters removed. NOTE: Reader won't act on a navigation key until it is finished reading the current or next sentence (depending on when the key is pressed), so be patient and wait for two sentences to be spoken before any action is taken. Pressing more navigation keys before Reader has time to act on one, can cause problems. A new feature with this version is designed for our Reader customers who are not visually challenged. As Reader reads a file it will display the current sentence being spoken in the top half of its display window, and the next sentence that has been loaded into memory in the bottom half. Generally, Reader will need to speak the bottom sentence as well before a hot key is acted upon. You may find this display feature useful for studying or proof reading. You can adjust Readers speaking speed to match your comfortable reading speed. While reading a file you can save the current file position by pressing the S key. This saves a bookmark. The next time you press the 'S' key, Reader will go to that position in the file, after it finishes reading the current sentences. It will then reset the bookmark to zero. It is your responsibility to remember which text file has a bookmark for it. Only one bookmark can be saved at any one time. If you know you will not use a bookmark, or want to save another before using an older one, press the Zero key at any time. This will clear the bookmark. It is the only way to clear an unwanted bookmark. The bookmark is saved to the configuration file, so it will be valid even if you stop reading a file, and/or quit Reader. The next time you run Reader and ask it to read that same file, you can press 'S' to go to the bookmark. The bookmark is then reset to zero. While in the configuration window, you can move through the edit fields by pressing the Tab key, or Shift+Tab to move back one. While in any input field, you can press Alt+F, and Reader will speak the value that is in the field, IF YOU HAVE THE VERBAL INTERFACE TURNED ON. You can then type in a new value and press Tab to move on. Press Alt+S to save the configuration and return to the main window, Press Alt+R to return without saving. To read a text file if you don't know the file name and path, in the Read a File window, press Enter or click on the Read button with a blank file name. A file selection dialog will appear as in other Window's applications. Be careful to select a text file only. If you do know the file name, enter it in the read file edit field. You can then press Alt+F to hear the name. Press tab to get to the read mode field. Enter W, S, L or G if you want to change it, then press Alt+F to here what it is. Press Alt+R or press Enter to read the file, press Alt+C to cancel. If you select read mode W, the whole file is loaded into memory and spoken in the background. You can carry on with other activities. But, the file size is limited to 64,000 bytes. Suitable for plain text and some control codes are tolerated. If you select read mode S, the file can be any size, and it can include some control characters. No other activities can be performed during the reading. If you select read mode L, the file can be any size, but it should be a plain text file. No other activities can be performed during the reading. This mode is suitable for unusual files with no sentences, or extremely long sentences. If you select read mode G, a special text file that you must create is read. This file has a first line that says "Reader Group File" beginning at the left margin. Each line after that can contain the path and file name of a text file. Reader will begin by reading the first file then pause until you press the space bar key, then read the next file, etc. This is designed for presentations where you may want to have Reader read passages between segments of your presentation. If you wanted Reader to read a number of files, you can do it this way instead of typing-in the file name each time. After the last file is read, press the space bar again to activate Reader's main window. See the file sample.grp to see how this file is structured. You can use any name or extension. While in the trainer, use the TAB key to move between the two input fields. The first one is the original word you want to train, and it is ready to accept inputs when the trainer is loaded, and the second one is the field where you enter a sounds-like word, words or phrases. When you get a combination of sounds-like syllables that work right, press Alt+I to insert the word and sounds-like phrase into the dictionary, then Press Alt+S to save the changes to the dictionary. The following hot keys apply in the trainer: Tab - move to the next input field. Alt+O - say the original word. Alt+L - say the sounds-like word/words. Alt+I - insert this word into the dictionary. Alt+D - delete this word from the dictionary. Alt+S - permanently save the changes to the dictionary. Alt+Q - quit the trainer. If you are ambitious enough to want to fine-tune Reader's pronunciation of a word, you can insert phonetic symbols on the sounds-like line. The best way to do this is to first insert the word even though it is pronounced wrong, then Find it. This puts the Reader internal phonetic codes on the sounds-like line. You can then amend the phonetic codes. See phonetic.txt. TYPE AND SPEAK You may have discovered that you can use the Trainer window to type and read text immediately. Using the Original Word field, type in a sentence. Then press Return or click the 'Say Original' word button (or press Alt+O), and reader will speak the sentence. The field will scroll for longer sentences ( up to 256 characters). You can clear the field for the next sentence by pressing the Backspace key after hearing Reader speak the phrase or, you can just start typing a new sentence as this clears it automatically. If you want to retain the text and amend it, use an arrow key to de-highlight the text, then make any changes. This feature, together with the next one are designed for people who have difficulty speaking. NOTE:You shouldn't try to save a sentence to the dictionary. The dictionary is for single words only that Reader doesn't say correctly. TALKER AID A new feature with this version is the addition of a talking aid for users who are unable to speak. Click on the Talking Aid Inactive button to change the trainer into the talker. You can create a text file called phrases.txt that contains any phrases you want to speak, one phrase or word per line (up to 300 lines). Type in the first few characters of a phrase (enough letters to identify the phrase), click on Find/Speak Phrase button or press Alt+P. TALKER will find the first occurrance of that partial phrase, and speak the whole phrase. After you hear the speech, you can clear the field by starting to type a new partial phrase, or press the Backspace key. Although this is similar to typing in a sentence with the Trainer, it allows faster responses since only a few letters or just one letter needs to be typed. Click on the Talk Aid Active button to return to the Trainer window. NOTE: I discovered after much consternation that the Window's screen saver function can interfere with the Speech Engine and cause Reader to freeze, making it necessary to reboot your computer. Turn off the screen reader by selecting 'none' for a screen reader under the desktop window in the Window's Control dialog, when using Reader if you experience this problem. End of help.