TTS+ Plugin for FBReader - Free!
Current version number: 2.3.6

You may download and install this plugin on your Android device from the link below or from Amazon App Store.

• Download signed APK file directly from this server
• Download from Google Play Store
• Download TTS+ Plugin from Amazon App Store (may be an older version)
• Visit source code repository on GitHub

TTS+ Plugin is an enhanced Text-To-Speech plugin for FBReader for Android, the popular free eBook reader created by geometerplus. The plugin module created by Hyperionics and offered here has several enhancements over the original TTS Plugin created by FBReader author:

• Bluetooth play/pause and previous/next controls are handled correctly
• Plays in the background and Bluetooth controls are still handled, allowing you for example to use Navigation software on your phone while driving somewhere, while listening to your book at the same time, and pausing/resuming playback as needed.
• Reads by sentences - the plugin pauses and resumes at individual sentences, instead of entire paragraphs. Upon resume, you don't have to listen from the beginning of a long paragraph again.
• Enhanced control panel to set book language, open system TTS Settings to change speech engine, control speech rate, pitch and volume, more...
• Sleep timer
• Optional start reading upon inserting a wired headset plug, stops when disconnecting headset.
• The control panel can be minimized to display only a row of small buttons at the bottom over the main FBReader screen, if you want to watch the text it reads at the same time.
• Can highlight individual sentences instead of full paragraphs, but this reqires a small code change in the main FBReader code.

I hope you'll enjoy listening to your books with this enhanced plugin. I have more ideas for its improvement, and will gladly listen to your suggestions and comments as well - post them in our TTS+ Plugin Forum.

NOTE: Some user comments posted on our Play Store pages relate to the specific TTS Engine and voice they are using, to to this Plugin product, e.g. "can't pronounce contractions", "cannot stand this voice", "stops on ..." - in these cases please try another TTS Engine and voice (e.g. download from Play Store and select between IVONA, SVOX Classic, Acapella...)

Greg at Hyperionics

Change Log:

Ver. 2.3.6

* Small bug fixes

Ver. 2.3.5

* Correcting pronunciation errors for some Spanish voices
* Bug fixes and performance improvements

Ver. 2.3

* For Android 4 (ICS) and higher, added a better lookup of TTS engines, languages and voices.
* Many bug fixes and performance improvements

Ver. 2.2.1, May. 11, 2013

* On Android 4 and above, you can now select a TTS Engine different from system default for the Plugin to use - click "More..." button, "TTS Settings"
* The playback control buttons have now labels that are spoken when using TalkBack.
* Added Bulgarian translation

 Ver. 2.1.1, Apr. 24, 2013

* Provided an option to use network speech synthesis also on cell networks.

Ver. 2.1.0, Apr. 23, 2013

* Added option to use network speech synthesis. Works under Android 4.1 JellyBean and newer, for now only with Google TTS engine. Works only if connected via WiFi, offering much better voice quality than local speech generation.
* Several bug fixes and performance improvements. 

Ver. 2.0.4, March 27, 2013

* Added option to keep screen on during reading
* Option to auto-start reading when Bluetooth headset connected - click "More..." settings button, then turn on "Start talking when headset connected"

Ver. 2.0.0, Feb. 12, 2013

• New options to read word-by-word instead of continuous sentences. Useful for learning for children with reading difficulties. To enable these options, first click the "More..." button in the expanded control panel, and turn on the "Show read by word options".

Ver. 1.9.4, Feb. 7, 2013

• Nuance TTS would stop on very long sentences. Now working around this problem by splitting them into smaller fragments

Ver. 1.9.3, Jan. 29, 2013

• Work-around for some TTS engines mis-pronouncing contractions like "can't", "he'll" etc. when Unicode code U+2019 is used for apostrophe.

Ver. 1.9.2, Jan. 22, 2013

• Fix: Google TTS (and maybe some other TTS engines too) was stopping on empty sentences (e.g. an isolated dot)

• Fix: Sometimes after stopping speech and FBReader, and re-starting, would start reading from the beginning of paragraph, instead of the last sentence

Ver. 1.9.0, Jan. 7, 2013

• Preventing a bind to a wrong service (in an app based on FBReader open source code, keeping the original service action name), which made TTS+ plugin inoperational.

• Fixed: with some speech engines (e.g. Loquendo) would stop or crash on an empty paragraph.

Ver. 1.8.2

• Another bug fix - selecting specific speaker voice like "eng-USA-Heather" Acapela would later prevent you from using e.g. Samsung voice, which does not have the same speaker voices.

Ver. 1.8.1

• Bug fixes - preventing crashes.

Version 1.8.0

• "Set Language" button let's you choose also voice (speaker name) for TTS engines with multiple voices per language, e.g. Acapela, SVOX Classic.

Version 1.7.7

• Performance improvements and bug fixes.

Version 1.7.6

• Fixing crash upon return from TTS Settings.

 Version 1.7.5

• Fixing "long pauses between sentences" problem on some hardware.

Version 1.7.4

• Removed "examine application stack" permission, found a better and more reliable way to decide when to start TTS speech when headset button pressed.

Version 1.7.3

• More but fixes... Works really well for me now :)

Version 1.7.2

• Restoring bottom margin correctly even if plugin crashes.

Version 1.7.1

• Added an option to start talking when main FBReader is on top and you press headset "play" button. On by default, if unwanted, turn off in "More..." settings. Also works for plugging in a wired headset, if appropriate option is turned on as well.

Version 1.6.1

• A small bug fix (crash when reading a "paragraph" of 0 length)

Version 1.6.0

• Work-around a bug in Google TTS Engine under jellybean (would not start correctly until all voices for German, Spanish, French and Italian were installed).

Version 1.5.9

• Correcting pronunciation of ellipses (...), long dash and non-breaking space.

Version 1.5.8

• Disabled ACRA error reporting, and the Internet permission needed for it - there are no more useful error reports coming that way.

Version 1.5.7

• Added WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE permission, needed to TTS activation on some devices.

Version 1.5.6

• More bug fixes from incoming crash reports.

 Version 1.5.5

• English abbreviation replacements did not work with the original, unmodified version of FBReader. This resulted in reading phrases like "Mr. Brown" with a long pause after Mr., as if it was the end of sentence.

Version 1.5.4

• Removed "read logs" permission, turns out it's not necessary for our debugging needs.

Version 1.5.0 - 1.5.3 (2012.07.27)

• The error reporting added in ver. 1.4.7 helped me to localize and fix several bugs, including possible crashes. Big "Thank you!" to everyone who clicked the button to send me the crash info!

Version 1.4.7 (2012.07.25)

• Added error reporting.

Version 1.4.6 (2012.07.17)

• Asks about installing TTS language data, if the language required for current book is not installed.

Version 1.4.4 (2012.07.10)

• Added "Add a new language..." option to the language choice screen.

Version 1.4.3 (2012.07.07)

• Small improvements to sentence extractor, e.g. will read initials like T. J. Smith without long pauses after each dot.

Version 1.4.1 - 1.4.2

• Updated Russian translation

Version 1.4.0

• Added sleep timer
• Start talking when wired headset plug inserted is now a configurable option. Should fix "Mark the reviewer's" complain about autostart, if disabled.
• Handling of wired headset key is now an option as well.

Version 1.3.3 and 1.3.4

• Preventing crash on startup in some strange situations
• Removed wired headset button handling, causes trouble for some users.

Version 1.3.2, released 6/15/2012

• Handles on/off button on some wired headsets, which previously did not work.

Version 1.3.1, released 6/15/2012

• TTS+ now does not change volume setting when it starts.
• Changed the way volume slider works - it now shows the current volume no matter how it's set (with the slider, volume rocker, headset etc.)

Version 1.3, released 6/14/2012

• Pauses speech when a wired headphone is unplugged, resumes upon pressing the plug back in.
• An option added for additional pause (in milliseconds) upon reaching paragraph end.

Version 1.2, released 6/12/2012

• Had to remove the ability to start TTS+ by pressing Bluetooth play button, when the main FBReader screen was active. It was impossible to stabilize the code and prevent crashes otherwise.
• Please use FBReader menu to start TTS+. Once it's started that way, you may use Bluetooth pause/resume and next/previous buttons normally.
• To make FBReader start TTS+ from Bluetooth button press, and to have it highlith sentences instead of entire paragraph, it will be necessary to modify the main FBReader code. I'm considering making my own fork of FBReader in order to do this, as Geometer is very busy with his real work, no time to work on free software...

Versions 1.0.8 ... to ver. 1.1

• Various unsuccessful tries to stabilize the code and prevent crashes

Version 1.0.7 released 2012.06.06

• Music does not stop any more when you open FBReader. It only stops when TTS+ starts talking.
• Added "Rate TTS+" button to About dialog.

Version 1.0.6 released 2012.06.05

• Fixed crash when book file did not have language set.
• Screen is no longer dimmed when TTS+ is active.
• Option added to choose if the text read should be highlighted or not.
• Remembers last read sentence even if you stop TTS+ completely, and starts reading from that sentence, if you did not change the page in FBReader.
• When geometer implements API enhancements we proposed, will highlight sentences it reads, instead of whole paragraphs, and will not hide text under TTS+ minimized toolbar.

Version 1.0.4 released 2012.06.01

• Fixed bug where "Speak+" item on FBReader menu would disappear after selecting TTS Settings from our button. 

Version 1.0.3 released 2012.05.28

• Removed phone status permission
• A rare crash on startup fixed.

Version 1.0.1 released 2012.05.26

• Crashes fixed
• Added Polish and Russian translation

Version 1.0 released 2012.05.24

•  TTS+ Plugin first released to Google Play Store