problem with MS Agent

[Kaverin]

I was trying to mess around with some text-to-speech stuff, but I've been having problems getting it to work. I've installed both MS Agent and the standard English TruVoice engine, but I still can only get the MS Agent Control to appear in the VB environment. There is an actual control called TextToSpeech that I need for this to work. Is anyone familiar with using these things in VB that could tell me what I am doing wrong? It almost has to be something I'm doing, but I don't know what.

[crispin]

I've been doing a lot of work with MS Agent lately, are you talking about an ActiveX Control for Text to Speech. I didn't need one of those. I installed the speech control panel module, then the L&H Speech engines (take your pick of languages). Then I used the Agent.Speak method, and the speech was fine.
What route did you go down?

[mlewis]

crispin is right. I do tons of Agent progging and I never needed to use a control. The Speak method's always been fine for me.

Unless you're doing something different, that should work.

[Kaverin]

I tried messing around with that tutorial on http://www.vb-world.net/misc/agent/ and I couldn't get it to work. When this line runs:

Set CoreAgent = New Agent

I get a message box that says "Compile error: Invalid use of New keyword". Does anyone know why it's doing that, and what to do to fix it?

How do you two go about setting up the agent for making it speak?

[crispin]

You need to install msagent.exe from the microsoft site, and then you need to add the reference to "Microsoft Agent Control 2.0" OCX. then put a control on your form and name the agent control (in this case AgtPeedy), then the code below (you might want to change the frmmain references) in principle should work.


Global Peedy As IAgentCtlCharacter

Public Sub LoadPeedy()

'CSW310700 just called once on app load and sets a boolean upon error if
'CSW310700 we can't load peedy
On Error GoTo errLoadPeedy

frmMain.AgtPeedy.Characters.Load "peedy", "peedy.acs"
Set Peedy = frmMain.AgtPeedy.Characters("peedy")
Peedy.LanguageID = &H409
gblnPeedyLostFocus = False
Peedy.MoveTo 612, 1, 0
Peedy.Show
Peedy.Play "Explain"
Peedy.SoundEffectsOn = True
Peedy.Commands.Add "PdyOptions", "Advanced Options...", , True, True
Peedy.Commands.Add "PdyAnimate", "Animate...", , True, True
Peedy.Speak "Hello World!"
Peedy.Play "restpose"
'glngPeedyHandle = FindAgent
errLoadPeedy:
Select Case Err.Number
Case 0
gblnAssistantLoaded = True
Case Else
gblnAssistantLoaded = False
End Select

End Sub

[Kaverin]

Ok, I used that method and it seemed to work fine. I did notice that I never got any of the character files. I thought there was just a cheesy basic one already in it, but I guess not. Plus I only have a dialup at home, and didn't want to wait (I'm on the T3 at my grad school now ) Now I've got another question... can I get around needing an agent at all? All I want is just the capability for a program to read text from a textbox, then blurt it out (minus all the cheesy animation of some character on the screen).

[crispin]

Yes, that would be v.cool, I think you might need to get into the Text-to-Speech DLL, anbd poke the functions that make this happen, it might be complex. The first hurdle to overcome (assumption here) is that the TTS DLL is C++ and you will have to figure out all the declarations somehow (there is very little documentation on hardcore agent programming out there)
Once you have done that you will have to work out how to set or fake the appropriate properties that mimick an agent, and just use the TTS with the contents of a textbox.

NB The above are general assumptions and if the above is a piece o' cake and im on my soapbox would someone kindly push me off

Thanks

In the meantime i'm going to give this a go - i'll letcha know...

[crispin]

Kaverin et al,


Discard all the other crap above, this what you need to do.

After installing the speech engines you should be able to add a reference to XVoice.dll in VB.

Do this and add the following code and it should work.

Private Sub Command1_Click()
Dim X As New ACTIVEVOICEPROJECTLib.DirectSS
X.Speak "Hello World"
End Sub

good luck

[Kaverin]

Do you know where that particular dll came from? I must be from the voice control panel thing or one of the characters, because I don't have it anywhere. I didn't get those at first because I didn't think they were absolutely necessary. I didn't have the presence of mind to check on the comp in my office while on the network earlier, but I did use your (crispin's) method to get Merlin working on it. Of course I went all out and got the control panel and all the chars

Have just hit the problem on this PC, and am now waiting for the friggin service pack to finish downloading from msdn. They should mention this in their documentation. ZOn my other PC no problems with SP3.

[crispin]

http://activex.microsoft.com/activex...pi/spchapi.exe

download the above.

Ok downloaded for a look

Have done SP3 and crispin's download. Am still getting an error on 'Agent1.Characters.Load "Merlin", sPath'. Aaaarrrgghhh!!!!!!! out of ideas at this stage. Some thing to do with property incorrect. Any one have any ideas?

[Kaverin]

You do have the merlin.acs file right? If you don't, trying to load it won't work.

Grabbed our version 1.5 of MS Agent from the office and that works fine, but not version 2.0. Am running on a Win 98 SE box and this may be having an effect. No problems with Win 95 or Win 98 or Win NT 4.

[crispin]

You've gotta have Agent 2.0 Amigo!!,
http://activex.microsoft.com/activex...t2/MSagent.exe

let us know if you get any more probs

Version 1.5 no problems, version 2.0...what the heck!

[crispin]

Mail me Jethro, and I'll mail you back a sample project that works with merlin, and we'll go from there - if you want..

Any one heard when version 3 is being released. It is now well over six months since MS annouced it.