Talk to and listen to your mac!

Talk to and listen to your mac!

In OS X 10.8, the ability to listen to you as well as talk is really impressive. Although these are sometimes framed as being accessibility features, they can be useful for everyone. For example, it's a good idea to read through any important text before you send it off, but it's easy to skip mistakes when you're reading your own work. Instead, select the text and go to Edit > Speech > Start Speaking. You can control the speed and pick from a range of different voices (our favourite's the Scottish 'Fiona') in the Dictation and Speech System Preference pane. If you find you use the feature often, you should enable the option to trigger speaking aloud using a keyboard shortcut - the default is OptionEsc, which you can change in the Dictation and Speech pane. (If you do have restricted vision, investigate the VoiceOver feature in the Accessibility pane of System Preferences too; this can read aloud buttons and other on-screen items, and more.)

Your s just as good a listener as it is a talker, though. Not only can you control your sing Speakable Items (check the Accessibility pane) but in OS X 10.8 you can also dictate text anywhere you would type. By default you just press the Function key twice and then start talking.;