AVSpeechUtterance - Swift - phrase initialization

Question

So, I'm just trying to use AVSpeechSynthesizer with Swift. I cannot figure out how to set the phrase for AVSpeechUtterance.

@IBAction func buttonSpeakClicked(sender:UIButton) { var mySpeechSynthesizer:AVSpeechSynthesizer = AVSpeechSynthesizer() var myString:String = "This is the phrase to say" var mySpeechUtterance:AVSpeechUtterance = AVSpeechUtterance(string:myString) println("\(mySpeechUtterance.speechString)") println("My string - \(myString)") mySpeechSynthesizer .speakUtterance(mySpeechUtterance) } 

First println - Nil

Second println - This is a phrase to say

The documentation says init (string string: String!), But I can't figure out where to put it

Answer 1

The code is OK, the speech string is set correctly. However, the problem is that AVSpeechUtterance does not work as expected on the beta version of iOS 8. I suggest writing a bug report here .

The code works great on an iOS 7.1 device and simulator.

Answer 2

Yup, his mistake. For iOS8 GM, it seems the first attempt to get AVSpeechSynthesizer to speak AVSpeechUtterance will lead to silence.

My workaround is to get AVSpeechSynthesizer to speak a one-character statement immediately after it is initialized. It will be quiet, and after that your AVSpeechSynthesizer will work as usual.

In Objective-C:

 AVSpeechUtterance *bugWorkaroundUtterance = [AVSpeechUtterance speechUtteranceWithString:@" "]; bugWorkaroundUtterance.rate = AVSpeechUtteranceMaximumSpeechRate; [self.speechSynthesizer speakUtterance:bugWorkaroundUtterance];