spd-say

spd-say [OPTIONS] [TEXT]

-o

    Selects the output method to use. Default: auto

-d
    Selects the Speech Dispatcher device. Default: default

-r
    Sets the speech rate (speed), range -100 to +100. Default: 0

-p
    Sets the speech pitch, range -100 to +100. Default: 0

-v
    Selects the voice to use. Use 'spd-conf --list-voices' to see available voices.

-i
    Sets an identifier for this message.

-l
    Sets the language for this message.

-e
    Echo the text to stdout.

-w
    Wait until the text is spoken.

--version
    Displays the version of spd-say.

-h, --help
    Displays help information.

The spd-say command is a simple command-line tool used to send text to the Speech Dispatcher. Speech Dispatcher is a system-wide common interface to speech synthesizers. This allows different applications to output speech without needing to implement specific speech synthesis interfaces. spd-say takes text as input, either directly as an argument or from standard input, and passes it to the Speech Dispatcher for speech synthesis.

It's primarily used for simple text-to-speech tasks and integration with scripts where auditory feedback is desired. The command can be configured to modify speech parameters such as voice type, speed, and pitch, allowing for some degree of customization of the spoken output. The command is blocking, meaning that the terminal will wait for the speech to finish before proceeding.

If no text is provided as an argument, spd-say reads from standard input. This makes it easy to pipe text from other commands into spd-say for speech synthesis.
Example: cat my_text_file.txt | spd-say

If the Speech Dispatcher is not running or is misconfigured, spd-say may fail to produce speech. Ensure that the Speech Dispatcher service is running and properly configured before using spd-say.

spd-conf(1), speech-dispatcher(1)