NAME

       espeak - A multi-lingual software speech synthesizer.

SYNOPSIS

       espeak [options] [<words>]

DESCRIPTION

       espeak is a software speech synthesizer for English, and some other languages.

OPTIONS

       -h     Show summary of options.

       --version
              Prints the espeak library version and the location of the espeak voice data.

       -f <text file>
              Text file to speak

       --stdin
              Read text input from stdin instead of a file

       If  neither -f nor --stdin, <words> are spoken, or if none then text is spoken from stdin,
       each line separately.

       -q     Quiet, don't produce any speech (may be useful with -x)

       -a <integer>
              Amplitude, 0 to 20, default is 10

       -l <integer>
              Line length. If not zero (which is the default),  consider  lines  less  than  this
              length as and-of-clause

       -p <integer>
              Pitch adjustment, 0 to 99, default is 50

       -s <integer>
              Speed in words per minute, default is 160

       -v <voice name>
              Use voice file of this name from espeak-data/voices

       -b     Input text encoding, 1=UTF8, 2=8 bit, 4=16 bit

       -b     Input text encoding, 1=UTF8, 2=8 bit, 4=16 bit

       -m     Indicates  that  the  text contains SSML (Speech Synthesis Markup Language) tags or
              other XML tags. Those SSML tags which are supported are  interpreted.  Other  tags,
              including  HTML, are ignored, except that some HTML tags such as <hr> <h2> and <li>
              ensure a break in the speech.

       -w <wave file name>
              Write output to this WAV file, rather than speaking it directly

       -x     Write phoneme mnemonics to stdout

       -X     Write phonemes mnemonics and translation trace to stdout. If rules files have  been
              built with --compile=debug, line numbers will also be displayed.

       --stdout
              Write speech output to stdout

       --ipa  Write  phonemes  to stdout using International Phonetic Alphabet. --ipa=1 Use ties,
              --ipa=2 Use ZWJ, --ipa=3 Separate with _

       --path=<path>
              Specifies the directory containing the espeak-data directory

       --pho  Write mbrola phoneme data (.pho) to stdout or to the file in --phonout

       --phonout=<filename>
              Write output from -x -X commands and mbrola phoneme data to this file

       --punct="<characters>"
              Speak the names of punctuation characters  during  speaking.  If  =<characters>  is
              omitted, all punctuation is spoken.

       -k <integer>
              Indicate  capital  letters  with: 1=sound, 2=the word "capitals", higher values = a
              pitch increase (try -k20).

       --voices[=<language code>]
              Lists the available voices. If =<language code> is present then only  those  voices
              which are suitable for that language are listed.

       --voices=<directory>
              lists the voices in the specified subdirectory.

       --compile=voicename
              Compile  the  pronunciation  rules and dictionary in the current directory. =<voice
              name> is optional and specifies which language

       --compile=debug
              Compile the pronunciation rules and dictionary in the current directory  as  above,
              but include line numbers, that get shown when -X is used.

AUTHOR

       eSpeak  was  written  by Jonathan Duddington <jonsd@jsd.clara.co.uk>. The webpage for this
       package can be found at http://espeak.sourceforge.net/.

       This manual page was written by Luke Yelavich <themuso@ubuntu.com>, for the Ubuntu project
       (but may be used by others).

                                          August 6, 2010                                ESPEAK(1)