Reports are coming in that Apple are developing a text-to-speech feature for its next version of Mac OS X, Lion. There’s recently been a lot of talk surround Apple’s interest in voice recognition experts Nuance, so perhaps this is what they want them for.
Early developer previews for Mac OS X Lion show that Apple have added an option to install text-to-speech voices. Some digging carried out by Netputing has revealed that the voices used are the same ones used in Nuance RealSpeak Solo, so it seems Apple may have struck a deal with them already.
We’ve been thinking that Apple were tapping up Nuance to help the Cupertino company build their own mapping and voice navigation software for the next version of iOS, but now it seems Nuance may be helping develop speech features for OS X Lion as well.
The rumour mill is already chugging away at a steady pace, taking in rumours for the next iteration of the iPhone as well as the iOS software it will use, so why not throw in one more: Perhaps Apple will be developing text-to-speech functionality for the next version of iOS for iPhone and iPad?
Take for instance if you were in a loud environment but needed to make a call; you could use the onscreen keyboard to type out a message, and iOS would relay the message automatically using pre-installed voice software to the person on the other end of the phone. That would be neat.
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Via: Mac Rumours
IMG Source: 9to5mac