VTML Support for Text to Speech

Hello Sri Harsha!  That's a great question.  Currently, you can edit the content and the voice of the text to speech feature.

We always listen to what customers are saying as they try out our new features, so thanks for chiming in!  I'll add your discussion to our feature request for more editing tools with text to speech.

I'll echo Sri Harsha's statement. I've just begun a new assignment and have come to Storyline 360 from, (*cough*) a competing eLearning design too. That tool has VTML support and I have invested significant effort in learning how to use it to make text-to-voice "sing" as it were.  I sincerely hope you can bring this into S360 to augment its text-to-voice capabilities.

Going further, if you could find a way to address one feature of VTML that **doesn't** seem to work at all, despite being documented (the ability to add or subtract emphasis or stress on selected syllables)... then, I'd be prepared to assume the "I'm not *worthy*" pose! :)

Just as FYI, VTML is subtly different than "editing the content" of the content and the voice.

As one example, although VTML can be used to add "pregnant pauses" within lines of text as can also be done by editing the waveform that results in S360... VTML also enables you to address things like how a string of numbers is read (you can tell it to read a phone number with the familiar pauses, and not expressing the "dash" between the third and fourth number of a 7-digit phone number), how to handle abbreviations and acronyms, parts of speech (different subtleties inherent in reading a word that can be a noun or a verb, as one example, like "chair" as either a piece of furniture to sit on or the process of leading a meeting), and, to use a common expression, decide whether to read "tomato" as Tuh-MAY-to, or toh-MA-to. 

Thanks, Allen. That's really helpful context and insight into how you'd use that feature and the VTML style enhancement. I'll share this with the team as we continue evaluating options and will keep you posted if it's added to our roadmap! 

Please do!!!

Allen Dickerson
Training Developer
[Daimler

For a guide on VTML tags, check out: http://media.neospeech.com/document/vt_eng-Engine-VTML-v3.9.0-3.pdf

These VTML tags are available in text-to-speech for *cough* Cap******.

Yup. Well aware of that difference between the two.  I have that document close at hand.

Pointing this out for others that might not be aware.

I too am looking for VTML in S360. I would also love to have it in Rise.

After 3 years of the initial request, we haven't seen a progress towards VTML for emphasis or other pronunciation edits. Neospeech seems to be the company using this and implemented in Adobe Captivate. I'm sure Storyline can do the same; this tool is robust and you have good developers. Having it in Rise will be a blessing.

It's been almost 6 years since the original request, and I'd still like to see the implementation of VTML. Some words, like "coordinates," are pronounced differently when used as different parts of speech. With VTML, you can insert markup in the content to indicate which pronunciation to use. For example, <vtml_partofsp part=”verb”>coordinates</vtml_partofsp>.

Hi, everyone!

I have some great news to share. We just released another update for Storyline 360. In Update 83, we've included important fixes and new features!

One of the new features we've included:

• Unlock new possibilities for text-to-speech audio. Use speech synthesis markup language (SSML) to adjust the speaking rate, modify pronunciation, emphasize words, add pauses, and more.

Launch the Articulate 360 desktop app on your computer to take advantage of this update, and click the Update button next to Storyline 360. You'll find our step-by-step instructions here.

Please let me know if you need additional help!