man say (OS X)

SAY(1)			   Speech Synthesis Manager			SAY(1)



NAME
       say - Convert text to audible speech

SYNOPSIS
	   say [-v voice] [-r rate] [-o outfile [audio format options] | -n name:port | -a device] [-f file | string ...]

DESCRIPTION
       This tool uses the Speech Synthesis manager to convert input text to
       audible speech and either play it through the sound output device
       chosen in System Preferences or save it to an AIFF file.

OPTIONS
       string
	   Specify the text to speak on the command line. This can consist of
	   multiple arguments, which are considered to be separated by spaces.

       -f file, --input-file=file
	   Specify a file to be spoken. If file is - or neither this parameter
	   nor a message is specified, read from standard input.

       --progress
	   Display a progress meter during synthesis.

       -v voice, --voice=voice
	   Specify the voice to be used. Default is the voice selected in
	   System Preferences. To obtain a list of voices installed in the
	   system, specify '?' as the voice name.

       -r rate, --rate=rate
	   Speech rate to be used, in words per minute.

       -o out.aiff, --output-file=file
	   Specify the path for an audio file to be written. AIFF is the
	   default and should be supported for most voices, but some voices
	   support many more file formats.

       -n name, --network-send=name
       -n name:port, --network-send=name:port
       -n :port, --network-send=:port
       -n :, --network-send=:
	   Specify a service name (default "AUNetSend") and/or IP port to be
	   used for redirecting the speech output through AUNetSend.

       -a ID, --audio-device=ID
       -a name, --audio-device=name
	   Specify, by ID or name prefix, an audio device to be used to play
	   the audio. To obtain a list of audio output devices, specify '?' as
	   the device name.

       If the input is a TTY, text is spoken line by line, and the output
       file, if specified, will only contain audio for the last line of the
       input.  Otherwise, text is spoken all at once.

AUDIO FORMATS
       Starting in MacOS X 10.6, file formats other than AIFF may be
       specified, although not all third party synthesizers may initially
       support them. In simple cases, the file format can be inferred from the
       extension, although generally some of the options below are required
       for finer grained control:

       --file-format=format
	   The format of the file to write (AIFF, caff, m4af, WAVE).
	   Generally, it's easier to specify a suitable file extension for the
	   output file. To obtain a list of writable file formats, specify '?'
	   as the format name.

       --data-format=format
	   The format of the audio data to be stored. Formats other than
	   linear PCM are specified by giving their format identifiers (aac,
	   alac). Linear PCM formats are specified as a sequence of:

	   Endianness (optional)
	       One of BE (big endian) or LE (little endian). Default is native
	       endianness.

	   Data type
	       One of F (float), I (integer), or, rarely, UI (unsigned
	       integer).

	   Sample size
	       One of 8, 16, 24, 32, 64.

	   Most available file formats only support a subset of these sample
	   formats.

	   To obtain a list of audio data formats for a file format specified
	   explicitly or by file name, specify '?' as the format name.

	   The format identifier optionally can be followed by @samplerate and
	   /hexflags for the format.

       --channels=channels
	   The number of channels. This will generally be of limited use, as
	   most speech synthesizers produce mono audio only.

       --bit-rate=rate
	   The bit rate for formats like AAC. To obtain a list of valid bit
	   rates, specify '?' as the rate. In practice, not all of these bit
	   rates will be available for a given format.

       --quality=quality
	   The audio converter quality level between 0 (lowest) and 127
	   (highest).

ERRORS
       say returns 0 if the text was spoken successfully, otherwise non-zero.
       Diagnostic messages will be printed to standard error.

EXAMPLES
	  say Hello, World
	  say -v Alex -o hi -f hello_world.txt
	  say -o hi.aac 'Hello, [[slnc 200]] World'
	  say -o hi.m4a --data-format=alac Hello, World.
	  say -o hi.caf --data-format=LEF32@8000 Hello, World

	  say -v '?'
	  say --file-format=?
	  say --file-format=caff --data-format=?
	  say -o hi.m4a --bit-rate=?

SEE ALSO
       "Speech Synthesis Programming Guide"



1.0				  2012-01-31				SAY(1)