Read 2 Me app for iPhone and iPad
4.5 (
9695 ratings )
Productivity
Book
Developer:
Retinal Media
4.99 USD
Current version:
2.0, last update: 7 years ago
First release : 30 Apr 2009
App size: 187.47 Mb
Read 2 Me is the FIRST AND ONLY iPhone App that allows full speech synthesis for an entire library of texts. You can even import you own URL based *.txt files straight into your bookshelf!
Forget the Kindle 2! (Okay, dont because its pretty cool.) But, why pay hundreds of dollars for another handheld device? Grab Read 2 Me, and experience Acapela-Groups text to speech synthesis -- be in control of your text-to-speech content, and listen to whatever you want, whenever you want -- with a SMALL ONE-TIME PURCHASE. Take advantage of this incredible value and remarkable new technology that will revolutionize the iPhone. Give Read 2 Me a listen.
"Yet another WOW app that also has a practical side."
"...sounding like a real person to a greater extent than ANY text to voice app I have seen!"
-WhatsOniPhone.com Reviews
For a demo featuring the voices that are shipped with v1.0, visit: http://www.Read2MeApp.com/demo (COMING SOON!)
Read 2 Me iPhone App is optimized to import Gutenberg.org text files that are of the type: Plain Text / us-ascii / none (compression).
Visit: http://www.Read2MeApp.com/faq.html
to see just how to prepare your text files of choice to be imported.
Its this simple:
1. Convert any ASCII plain-text file to UTF-8 encoding (see FAQ for step-by-step instructions).
2. Upload your custom source .txt file to any accessible URL location. Ex: http://www.mydomain.com/myTextFile.txt
3. Launch Read2Me and point the import web browser to your custom URL in order to display the text and have Read 2 Me speak your ENTIRE e-Material!
Visit http://www.Read2MeApp.com for more information.
Read2Me is the only iPhone app that imports your custom text for a one time app purchase, and features state of the art text-to-speech synthesizer from Acapela.
Read2Me Version 1.0 supports:
-optimization for Gutenberg.org plain-text ASCII files
-optimization for ANY.txt file in UTF-8 encoding at ANY URL
-bookmarks, and application options savings including:
-section of text file in 3,000 word increments
-customized color options
-Skip-to-Prev/Next Custom Bookmarking Indices
-An elegant text view of imported text with line break optimization for ease on the eyes
-Automatic scrolling of the spoken text
-Easy navigation of sections of texts, saved bookmarks, and library content!
Read2Me features 4 unique and distinguished voices:
-US American Male
-US American Female
-UK British Male
-UK British Female
Dont be fooled by competitors claims. Gutenberg.org provides over 27,000 complete copyright-free texts for importing into Read2Me, and Read2Me can import any Web Based custom UTF-8 ASCII .txt files to be imported with the touch of a button.
Dont believe it? Give Read2Me a try.
Note: Read2Me text importing requires an internet connection to connect to URLs outside of its sample text library.
Complete Sample Texts included:
-Alices Adventures In Wonderland
-Call Of The Wild
-Dracula
-Heart Of Darkness
-Jane Eyre
-A Tale Of Two Cities
-The War Of The Worlds
-War And Peace
Look for future Read 2 Me improvements and updates including blue tooth and wifi file transferring, additional voices, advanced voice control options, and MORE!
***Note: Version 1.0 Imported texts should be less than 1.5 MB in size. Visit http://www.Read2MeApp.com/faq.html for more information, and for future announcements and updates.
"Secure eBooks" or DRM copies of texts that cannot be saved to a UTF-8 .txt file may not be imported in version 1.x
At this time, importing ONLY uses a web based URL platform for transferring files via HTTP request. A web server or FREE FTP hosting site is required for this purpose. We hope to make additional features and improvements. We welcome all feedback.
Please file all bug reports! http://www.retinalmedia.com
Help keep Read2Me, the #1 Text-to-Speech & eReader Program for iPhone, bug free!
Pros and cons of Read 2 Me app for iPhone and iPad
Read 2 Me app good for
It works pretty well. You have to load US-ASCII from Gutenberg, not UTF-8. you can get your own files, but you have to make your own web page with links to the .txt files and then it will get them. It will download files in the "wrong" text format but it wont read them. So, if you get a file and it wont read it, it is probably the wrong format.
I got the app when it was still fairly buggy and worked around the problems mentioned by other reviewers by turning off autolock. Now this and other problems have been solved and turned Read 2 Me into a really nice program.
In version 1 the reading speed was a bit on the fast side. It also spelled out dashes, underscores and other junk. Not anymore. You can tell the readers, who sound quite good and natural, to go as slow or as fast as you want in v 2.
The program now imports from google docs, which makes inputting your own text quite easy. I found "the little prince" on the Internet and now Im enjoying it on my commute back from work. Next Im going to input some management books ;-)
Take the plunge!
For some reason when I quit the application while in one of the screens, I think its the book reading mode, or perhaps its the paste mode for a new import. Read2Me will suddenly crash and then it WILL NOT relaunch, not after a force quit from the multitask bar (IOS 4), not after a total shutdown and cold boot of the iPhone 4. Not ever again.
The only way to get Read2Me to start up is to delete it from the device. Restart the device, and then to repurchase/download the app (for free) and install it.
I have emailed the author and have gotten NO reply in regards to this after 1 month. Should you buy this app?
Yes, because nobody else can match or exceed its value, and because the voices rock. Should you really pester the developer? YOU BET! The developer wont listen until we get their attention, and clearly sending emails to him/her is not nearly enough.
Some bad moments
The app continually shuts down and I cant get it to read or download the book I want.
Ok, I was utterly excited when I saw this. Seems greeat at first and comes with ready installed books, however to import your own texts (articles/email etc) you need to have your own website...And upload of there first. Then I think Id rather use ghostreader on my mac which takes any file any size and makes an mp3 file in less than a minute. Hoping for some nice updates here:-)
Unable to upload custom text files. Spent several hours with no luck after following examples as exactly written in FAQ section of company webpage. Tried to use Notepad (Windows) and TextEdit (Mac). Only files which could be uploaded were from the Project Gutenberg website.
Very promising program, but current implementation needs work.
The built-in browser is extremely slow, says "cant connect to the internet" even when connection is available,
and in the end I have been unable to use it to get my own text into the program, after much trying.
Need to allow file transfer methods used by other programs ( wi-fi, like many programs, and/or USB, like Good Reader).
Need to allow setting the speed of the voice that reads the text.
In short, great concept, the built-in texts read pretty well, but needs significant work before becoming generally useful.
This is potenial a great app but suffers from a fatal flaw in its current form (ver. 1). The reader shuts off when the Ipod goes into sleep mode. It appears that the Ipod does not recognize that it is running. Thus, if you have the auto-lock set for 1 minute the reader shuts down in 1 minute and will start again only when the Ipod is turned back on manually. Programs author did not respond to request for help.
I am an assistive technology coordinator working with learning disabled youth. I really wanted this to have a copy and paste option from anywhere. So when they are in an instructional app and they find themselves unable to read it they could select it, copy and then paste into the app. I dont think this should be too hard of a feature to add. When they do it will be one of my favorite and Ill re-rate it with 5 plus stars.
