Raspberry Pi Text To Speech IRC Service

27 Feb 2013 These are my notes for installing Eastein's announce. It's a IRC bot that will receive a message and do text to speech on the message: https://github.com/eastein/announce

Installation:

Download announce and extract it to it's own folder.
apt-get install python-irclib
apt-get install python-pip
sudo apt-get install python-dev
apt-get install festival festlex-cmu festlex-poslex festlex-oald libestools1.2 unzip
apt-get install speech-tools
pip install pyzmq --install-option="--zmq=bundled"
or (if you have easy_install installed):
easy_install pyzmq
download mediorc and move mediorc into directory
easy_install dnspython
apt-get install mplayer
apt-get install sox
Fix permissions:
chmod 777 saypitchprase
chmod 777 pitchphrase2wav

Running The Program:

Run process in background by starting a screen (first navigate to the Announce folder):

(start a new screen)
python announced "tcp://*:4900"
(detach from screen)
(start a new screen)
python announcebot "chat.freenode.net" "voicebot" "#yourircchannel" "tcp://0:4901"
(detack from screen)

Starting the program using mp3 files in the JSON file (as always, start in the folder which has Announce):

wget http://fake.com/fake/eye_tiger.mp3 (use a real URL with an mp3 file)
nano default.json
enter into the json file: [ ["eye of the tiger", "eye_tiger.mp3"] ]
ctrl+x and save
(start a new screen)
python announced "tcp://0:4900" default.json
(detach from screen)
(start a new screen)
python announcebot "chat.freenode.net" "voicebot" "#yourircchannel" "tcp://0:4900"
(detach from screen)
now "!say eye of the tiger" in the IRC channel will trigger the mp3

Troubleshooting:

Ensure your Raspberry Pi audio is working: http://jeffskinnerbox.wordpress.com/2012/11/15/getting-audio-out-working-on-the-raspberry-pi/

Testing Festival (create a text file named mytext.txt with some words first):

echo "This is a test." | festival --tts

echo "this is a test" > mytext.txt

text2wave -o myaudio.wav mytext.txt

aplay myaudio.wav

better voices:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=677277

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=751169

adjust the volume:
http://blog.scphillips.com/2013/01/sound-configuration-on-raspberry-pi-with-alsa/
or use amixer?

Find An Image Font

27 Feb 2013 This page will tell you what font an image is using: http://www.myfonts.com/WhatTheFont/

I wish this feature was included in GIMP or Photoshop.

Regex Debugger

23 Feb 2013 http://www.debuggex.com/?re=&str=

Don't want to lose this link, it's going to make regex related programming a lot easier.

Tableizer

19 Feb 2013 Freaking brilliant tool that converts spreadsheet format things to HTML: http://tableizer.journalistopia.com/tableizer.php

PhoneGap Build - cordova-2.4.0.js

19 Feb 2013 If you're using Phonegap Build, you don't need to include cordova-2.4.0.js or any other specific version of cordova/phonegap. Just use phonegap.js, but you don't actually need to include phonegap.js in the file you upload to Phonegap Build.

Quote from the Phonegap Build site:
"Once you've included the necessary assets, remove the phonegap.js (cordova.js) as Build will automatically inject it during compile time."

Sharepoint Lists Crashing

05 Feb 2013 If your sharepoint lists crash IE as soon as they open, try disabling the following IE addons:

Sharepoint spreadsheet Launcher

Sharepoint export database~

Open File With Excel Macro

05 Feb 2013
This macro will ask the user to input an excel file, then open that excel file:

Sub RunMacro()

Dim vaFiles As Variant
Dim i As Long

vaFiles = Application.GetOpenFilename _
(FileFilter:="Excel Filer (*.xls),*.xls", _
Title:="Open File(s)", MultiSelect:=False)

If Not IsArray(vaFiles) Then Exit Sub

With Application
.ScreenUpdating = False

For i = 1 To UBound(vaFiles)
Workbooks.Open vaFiles(i)
Next i

.ScreenUpdating = True
End With

End Sub

Java - Swing's Nimbus Look & Feel

01 Feb 2013

Since Java SE 6 Update 10, Java has had an updated interface called Nimbus. Comparison pictures are below.

All I needed to do to use it was add this import to the top of the .java file with my main() method: import javax.swing.UIManager.*;

And this code to the top of the main() method (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4617615/how-to-set-nimbus-look-and-feel-in-main):

public static void main(String[] args) {
try {
    for (LookAndFeelInfo info : UIManager.getInstalledLookAndFeels()) {
        if ("Nimbus".equals(info.getName())) {
            UIManager.setLookAndFeel(info.getClassName());
            break;
        }
    }
} catch (Exception e) {
    // If Nimbus is not available, fall back to cross-platform
    try {
        UIManager.setLookAndFeel(UIManager.getCrossPlatformLookAndFeelClassName());
    } catch (Exception ex) {
        // not worth my time
    }
}
new Controller();
}

Default: