Number to Speech

[Brian]

VTech PreComputer Prestige

The VTech PreComputer Prestige educational computer was manufactured in the 1990’s and came with a built in BASIC interpreter. This portable model is a great way to learn BASIC at a reasonably price. They can be obtained second-hand from eBay, thrift stores and yard sales. The Prestige model had a unique BASIC command that converted a text number or letter to spoken audio. The voice is a good quality female voice.

The command is:-

VOICE(n) n is the voice number.

n spoken word
0 zero
1 one
2 two
. .
. .
9 nine
10 ten

The program listed will accept a 10 digit telephone number including the two hyphen’s and will then read out the telephone number. When prompted to enter the telephone number type in the number in this format:-

652-309-4871

Code: Select all

1 REM Number to Speech
2 DIM N$(12)
4 DIM N(12)
6 LET A = 0
8 INPUT “ENTER TELEPHONE NUMBER”;I$
10 LET B = LEN(I$)
12 IF B <> 12 THEN PRINT “INPUT ERROR – TRY AGAIN!” : GOTO 8
14 LET A = A + 1
16 LET N$(A) = MID$(I$,A,1)
18 IF A = 12 THEN GOTO 22
20 GOTO 14
22 FOR L = 1 TO 12
24 LET N(L) = VAL(N$(L))
26 NEXT L
28 FOR L = 1 TO 12
30 IF L = 4 OR L = 8 THEN GOTO 34
32 VOICE N(L)
34 FOR E = 1 TO 200
36 NEXT E
38 NEXT L
40 PRINT “>> END OF TRANSMISSION <<”
42 END

[admin]

You got a Vtech? Awesome!

I forgot about the voice command. Does it voice out floating point numbers and negatives? Or does it just speak the digits while ignoring the decimal or sign?

[Brian]

Hello, Gemino.

Yes, I was able to obtain the Prestige model at a good price on eBay. The voice command unfortunately is not able to convert floating point numbers or negatives to speech. It can only translate the numbers 0-10 and alphabetical characters A-Z to speech. One number or character at a time. The voice command was added to the Prestige model at the expense of the Sound command available on other VTech models. The Prestige does not have the facility to play musical notes.