Chatter On

Balabolka means “Chatter” in Russian. Balabolka delivers by making your computer a real conversation piece by adding text to speech to your arsenal of “reading” and learning programs.

Developed by several Russian programmers, Balabolka is a free download. This is a Windows only program. Sorry MAC and LINUX. It is also available in a portable version.

Balabolka will open AZW, CHM, DjVu, DOC, EPUB, FB2, HTML, MOBI, ODT, PRC, PDF and RTF files, If you don't recognize all of those, the most common ones you'll use will be the DOC (and DOCX), MOBI, EPUB, PDF. RTF and possibly HTML files. AWZ files are formatted for the Kindle and often have Digital Rights Management (DRM) preventing them from being read by open programs or without some type of id. CHM files are the help files for programs stored in a compressed format. ODT is the Open Document format which almost all word processing programs can open.

One of the big features of Balabolka is the text to speech feature. Opening one of the file types above, you can have the text read back to you. The program uses the Speech Application Program Interface (part of Microsoft Windows) to talk to you. Specific text can be selected or the entire file can be read. As well as reading the text aloud, the program will track (or block) it to add a visual element to the reading. This can sometimes increase comperehension for persons with learning disabilities.

The other distinctive feature is the ability to save the text as an audio file. It can be saved as a WAV, MP3, MP4, OGG or WMA file Unless you're familiar with the other formats, most of your audio files will be saved as MP3 files and then transferred to your MP3 player.

Read On or in the case of Balabolka, LISTEN ON!