ReadAloud

Skanna tryckt text med kameran och få den uppläst.

Scan printed text with your camera and have it read aloud — with Swedish voice support.

Features

• Camera OCR — Capture text from printed documents using your webcam
• Text-to-Speech — Read scanned text aloud with Swedish or English voices
• Accessible UI — Large buttons, high contrast, screen reader friendly (ARASAAC-compatible)
• Multi-language — Swedish as primary language, English fallback
• Editable text — Review and edit scanned text before reading
• Multiple TTS backends — Piper, espeak-ng, macOS say, or pyttsx3

Installation

System Dependencies

Ubuntu/Debian:

sudo apt install python3-gi python3-gi-cairo gir1.2-gtk-4.0 gir1.2-adw-1
sudo apt install tesseract-ocr tesseract-ocr-swe
sudo apt install espeak-ng

Fedora:

sudo dnf install python3-gobject gtk4 libadwaita
sudo dnf install tesseract tesseract-langpack-swe
sudo dnf install espeak-ng

macOS (Homebrew):

brew install pygobject3 gtk4 libadwaita
brew install tesseract tesseract-lang

Optional — Piper TTS (high-quality Swedish voices):

pip install piper-tts
# Download Swedish voice model:
# https://github.com/rhasspy/piper/releases

Python Dependencies

pip install -r requirements.txt

Install the App

pip install .

Compile Translations

msgfmt locale/sv/LC_MESSAGES/readaloud.po -o locale/sv/LC_MESSAGES/readaloud.mo

Usage

readaloud

Or run directly:

python -m readaloud.main

1. Click "Skanna text" to capture from your camera
2. Review the extracted text in the text area
3. Click "Läs upp" to hear the text read aloud
4. Use Pause/Stop to control playback

Project Structure

ReadAloud/
├── readaloud/
│   ├── __init__.py      # Package metadata
│   ├── main.py          # Entry point
│   ├── app.py           # Gtk.Application
│   ├── window.py        # Main window UI
│   ├── ocr.py           # OpenCV + Tesseract OCR
│   ├── tts.py           # Text-to-Speech engine
│   └── i18n.py          # Internationalization
├── locale/
│   ├── readaloud.pot    # Translation template
│   └── sv/LC_MESSAGES/
│       └── readaloud.po # Swedish translation
├── data/
│   └── se.readaloud.App.desktop
├── setup.py
├── requirements.txt
└── README.md

Accessibility

ReadAloud is designed for users with visual impairments and dyslexia:

• Large touch targets (minimum 52px height)
• High-contrast text (16px+ font size)
• Full keyboard navigation (Ctrl+Q to quit)
• Screen reader compatible labels and tooltips
• ARASAAC-compatible design principles

License

GPL-3.0