Frequently Asked Questions

Q: How do I configure Speech Dispatcher in user-mode?

A: Run
        spd-conf
   and answer some basic questions

Q: During the instalation, when running `make' and `make install',
   I get some strange message from libtool and the process crashes:
    ../../libtool: s%^.*/%%: is not a file or directory
    ../../libtool: -e: command not found
    ../../libtool: -e: command not found
    (repeating several times)

A: Libtool uses `sed' as it's tool to modify text, but the new versions rely on
   the environment variable SED to contain the name of the command to call.
   This variable must be set when building programs using these versions of
   libtool.  You can run make like that (if you have `sed' in your PATH):

    $ SED=sed make
    $ su root
    $ SED=sed make install

   or
   
    $ export SED=sed
    $ make
    $ su root
    $ make install


Q: Flite has only a very crappy voice!

A: Flite is only a simple light software synthesizer and it's voices are not of
   a very high quality.  Festival can do much better and it also supports
   various languages.  But if you are compiling Flite and Speech Dispatcher
   yourselves, there are still chances that you can improve the Flite voice
   considerably by using the 16-bit KAL voice instead of the (in the
   distribution tarball default) 8-bit voice.  To be able to use the 16-bit
   voice, you have to compile Flite with a special flag, please consult it's
   documentation or ./configure --help.  Then you should recompile Speech
   Dispatcher (no flag is necessary, it will be automatically installed with
   the better voice).

   If you are using Debian or any other package based distribution, the 16-bit
   voice should be installed by default and there is no need for you to care
   about it.

Q: Festival doesn't speak. What can I do?

A: Are you sure you have installed festival-freebsoft-utils 0.3 or higher as
   described in the file INSTALL?

A: Are you sure you are not running into the famous 'server_access_list'
   problem?  Please see the file INSTALL.
