Mac only unix command

Text to speech functionality from Command Line

I am a big fan of Apple and recently bought a Macbook pro. I just come across this ‘Text to Speech functionality in Mac’. Its quit good and very simple to use.

syntax: say [your text to read]

This will read your “[your text to read]” in a default voice set in your Mac.

for e.g., <br/>
Codedairy-MacBook-Pro:~ jyo$ say "Hello CodeDairy"<br/>
Codedairy-MacBook-Pro:~ jyo$ say "Hello CodeDairy"<br/>
Codedairy-MacBook-Pro:~ jyo$ say "This is just Awesome!"<br/>
say "This is just Awesome"<br/>

You can change the default voice using the “Voice over Utility” application or you can choose your own voice type from the command line itself

Syntax: <br />

say [your text to read] -v Vicki <br/>
say [your text to read] -v Whisper <br />
say [your text to read] -v Fred <br />


for e.g., <br/>
Codedairy-MacBook-Pro:~ jyo$ say "Wow, This is cool !" -v Vicki<br/>
say "Wow, This is cool " -v Vicki<br/>
Codedairy-MacBook-Pro:~ jyo$ say "Wow, This is cool " -v Whisper<br/>
Codedairy-MacBook-Pro:~ jyo$ say "Wow, This is cool " -v Fred<br/>
Codedairy-MacBook-Pro:~ jyo$ say "Wow, This is cool " -v Zarvox<br/>

You can also tell to read a file and the syntax for that is

Syntax: say [your text to read] -f [readfileName.txt]

for e.g., <br />
Codedairy-MacBook-Pro:~ jyo$ say -f readfile.txt


This basic text to read command is quite useful in the cases where you have a long running process and want to get an alert message to say when its done.
basically an Alert message when action completes.

for e.g., <br />
mv -R [dir1] [dir2]; say "Directory moved boss!"


You can also output audio as AIFF file and the syntax for that is

Syntax: <br />
say -f [your text to read] - o [audio_file.aiff]


Isn’t it just Awesome !!!!!
We all Love MAC right !