Voice text is a feature that provides simple text-to-speech capabilities for Windows-based applications. You use voice text to convert words in a character string into speech played over the computer speaker or a telephone line.
Implementing voice text in an application involves the use of the voice-text object. The object manages the interaction between the text-to-speech engine that creates the speech and the computer speaker or telephone line that serves as the destination for the speech. Before an application can begin using voice text, it must create an instance of the voice-text object and register itself with the object. This section describes the voice-text object and explains how to use it to implement voice text in an application.
Some users do not wish to have the computer talk or to talk to the computer. For these users, Microsoft provides a speech control panel application that sets a registry entry indicating the user's preferences. An application can check this entry before trying to load its voice commands code, and save memory by not loading the code if it is not needed. For more information about the registry entry, see the section, "Common Elements of the Speech Application Programming Interface.".
The voice-text object is exposed as an OLE automation object, allowing it to be accessed and controlled through Visual Basic, Visual Basic for Applications (VBA), and other automation-aware application macro languages. You can take advantage of the OLE automation capabilities of the voice-text object to add voice text capabilities to your Visual Basic applications. For more information, see Appendix E, "Voice Commands, Text-to-Speech, and OLE Automation."