Voice Preferences

This combo box makes it possible for you to use different voices so that you can better distinguish uppercase and linked text from other text, and on-screen text from text added by Orca.

This combo box allows you to select your preferred speech system from those you have installed, such as Speech Dispatcher.

This combo box allows you to select the speech synthesizer to be used with your chosen Speech system.

This combo box allows you to choose which "person" or "speaker" should be used with the selected voice. For instance, you might wish to have David speak by default, but have hyperlinks spoken by Alice. Note that what you find in the Person combo box will depend on which speech synthesizers you have installed.

This combo box allows you to choose which Speech Dispatcher capitalization indication styles you wish to use in addition to Orca's capitalization voice. The options, which are named using Speech Dispatcher's terminology, are:

Default value: none

These three left-right sliders allow you to further customize the sound of the person you have just selected.

Depending on the enabled speech settings, Orca may have quite a bit to say about a particular object such as its name, its role, its state, its mnemonic, its tutorial message, and so on. Checking the Break speech into chunks between pauses checkbox will cause Orca to insert brief pauses in between each of these pieces of information.

Default value: checked

In some text, and especially when working with code, one often comes across a "word" consisting of several words with alternating case, such as "MultiCaseString." Speech synthesizers do not always pronounce such multicase strings correctly. Checking the Speak multicase strings as words checkbox will cause Orca to break a word like "MultiCaseString" into separate words ("Multi," "Case," and "String") prior to passing it along to the speech synthesizer.

Default value: not checked

Checking the Speak numbers as digits checkbox will cause Orca to break a number like "123" into separate digits ("1," "2," and "3") prior to passing it along to the speech synthesizer.

Default value: not checked