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<H2><a name="irssi2fest">irssi2fest</a></H2> 

<TABLE>
	<TR>
		<TH>The Apology</TH>
	</TR>
	<TR>
		<TD>
		irssi2fest is a <a href="http://irssi.org/">irssi</a> script that
		glues irc communications to the <a
		href="http://www.cstr.ed.ac.uk/projects/festival/">Festival Speech
		Synthesis System</a>. This is beta software and should be audited
		before use.
		<br><a href="mailto:mick@lowdrag.org">email me</a> with comments,
		patches or
		problems, or better yet stop by #alg on irc.distributed.net.
		</td>
	<TR>
		<TH>The Files</TH>
	</TR>
	<TR>
		<TD>
Things available here:<BR>
<A HREF="./irssi2fest.01.tar.gz">irssi2fest.01.tar.gz</A><BR>
Things you also need, available elsewhere:<BR>
<A HREF="http://www.cstr.ed.ac.uk/projects/festival/">festival Speech
Synthesis System</A><BR>
The <A
HREF="http://search.cpan.org/author/GOSSAMER/Festival-Client-1.0/Client.pm">Festival::Client</A>
Perl module<BR>
		</TD>
	</TR>
	<TR>
		<TH>The Howto</TH>
	</TR>
	<TR>
		<TD>
			<OL>
				<LI>Installation of files: install the file <tt>speak.pl</tt>
				in <tt>~/.irssi/scripts</tt>.
				<LI>Install the perl modules Festival::Client.
				<LI>Install festival and get it running in server mode. This
				can be on the localhost or another host reachable from the
				machine running irssi. The script will offer to start festival
				on the localhost if it's not running there. The script will
				offer to write a config file if there isn't one. The config
				file is commented and will allow non-standard host:port
				setups.
				<li>Load the script from within irssi. (<tt>/script load
				speak</tt>)
				<LI>Listen. If no one is talking, an unobtusive way to test it
				is to <tt>/msg</tt> yourself.
			</OL>
		</TD>
	</TR>
</TABLE>

<H2><a name="bx2fest">bx2fest</a></H2> 

<TABLE>
	<TR>
		<TH>The Apology</TH>
	</TR>
	<TR>
		<TD>
bx2fest is a scheme that allows one to hear IRC conversations rather than just
reading them. For people who frequent low-traffic channels this allows leaving
the IRC window on a different desktop and just forgetting about it until
something interesting happens.<BR>
bx2fest uses the Festival Speech Synthesis System, Free software from the University of
Edinburgh. If you don't mind buying and installing <A
HREF="http://www.ibm.com/us/">IBM</A>s Via Voice, I recommend <A
HREF="http://users2.ev1.net/~lemonaide/">ascii's</A> bxspeak. ascii's app is
more featureful (real word?) and Via Voice does some cool stuff that festival
doesn't.<BR>
Some time ago I cobbled this together so that I could listen to IRC while I
wrote a good one. It turns out that this does about what I want, and I can't
really decide how this <I>should</I> be done, so I've been using it
as-is for some time. I toy with the idea of a gui just to have a mute button
sometimes, but then I decide it should have a volume control and checkboxes
for what sort of things the user wants to hear, an editor for the translation
tables, pictures that show who's talking and maybe a mail user agent. So I leave it alone.<BR>
This version works with BitchX, when I decide how I really want to do this
I'll probably do it for irssi. If someone takes this idea and runs with it I'd
like to hear about it.<BR>
This runs under Perl's Taint pragma and has been running on my personal machine
for maybe a year with no incident of mass file system erasure, fire or
baldness; but I recommend auditing the code for security problems before
running. This software is offered "as-is" and you're on your own if something
terrible happens.<BR>
This system is known to run on a Debian system running Perl 5.8.0, and I don't
know why it wouldn't work on about any sane UNIX-ish system.<BR>
I'm posting this hoping for some feedback, feel free to <A
HREF="mailto:mick@lowdrag.org">email me</A> if I've messed up the
instructions, it just doesn't work, you have a patch or a better idea or whatever. I can
also be caught on irc.distributed.net #alg .
	<TR>
		<TH>The Files</TH>
	</TR>
	<TR>
		<TD>
Things available here:<BR>
<A HREF="./bx2fest.01.tar.gz">bx2fest.01.tar.gz</A><BR>
<A
HREF="./Local-Irclog-Bitchx-0.01.tar.gz">Local-Irclog-Bitchx-0.02.tar.gz</A><BR>
Things you also need, available elsewhere:<BR>
<A HREF="http://www.cstr.ed.ac.uk/projects/festival/">festival Speech
Synthesis System</A><BR>
The <A
HREF="http://search.cpan.org/author/GOSSAMER/Festival-Client-1.0/Client.pm">Festival::Client</A>
Perl module<BR>
		</TD>
	</TR>
	<TR>
		<TH>The Howto</TH>
	</TR>
	<TR>
		<TD>
			<OL>
				<LI>Installation of files: make a directory called ".bx2fest"
				in your home directory. Populate it with the files "trans.def"
				and "festserv" from the bx2fest tarball. put the executable
				"bx2fest" somewhere in your $PATH. make sure it's +x.
				<LI>Install festival and get it running in server mode (this is the tricky
				part). I start festival thusly:
				<BLOCKQUOTE> festival --server ~/.bx2fest/festserv
				&</BLOCKQUOTE>
				The file "festserv" is written to make festival listen to the
				localhost, salt to taste to run festival on a different
				machine.
				<LI>Install the perl modules Festival::Client and
				Local::Irclog::Bitchx. Festival::Client is a CPAN module and
				Local::Irclog::Bitchx is available here.
				<LI>move your "~/IrcLog" to "~/IrcLog.real" and make
				"~/IrcLog" a named pipe.<BLOCKQUOTE>
				$ cd  # make sure you are in "~/"<BR>
				$ mv IrcLog IrcLog.real<BR>
				$ mknod IrcLog p</BLOCKQUOTE>
				<LI>execute bx2fest.
				<LI>in BitchX "/set log on"
				<LI>Listen. If no one is talking, an unobtusive way to test it
				is with the "/topic" command.
			</OL>
		</TD>
	</TR>
</TABLE>
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