Add a working tts library for Chrome OS

[TipsyTheCat]

Simple JS tts api implementation that actually works on chrome browsers.
Done by using the built-in tts api and adding window.speechSynthesis.cancel() before speaking the message, which fixes tts not working.

[jmoenig]

Umm, can you tell us what this is about, in particular how it's different from the existing "text to speech" library?

[TipsyTheCat]

Ever since this, most (if not all) chrome users have been unable to invoke JavaScripts tts api using

var msg = new SpeechSynthesisUtterance();
msg.text = "Hello world";
window.speechSynthesis.speak(msg);

But, by canceling using window.speechSynthesis.cancel() allows speech to properly start.
example:

var msg = new SpeechSynthesisUtterance();
msg.text = "Hello world";
window.speechSynthesis.cancel()
window.speechSynthesis.speak(msg);

[jmoenig]

Hmm... I've just tried the existing library in Chrome 99 and it works just fine...

[TipsyTheCat]

On chrome os?

…

On Mon, Mar 7, 2022, 09:20 Jens Mönig ***@***.***> wrote: Hmm... I've just tried the existing library in Chrome 99 and it works just fine... — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#2999 (comment)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AXLNCV6OKUG5VI5PY4LFXB3U6YGEJANCNFSM5QDL4TKQ> . You are receiving this because you authored the thread.Message ID: ***@***.***>

[jmoenig]

no, in Chrome on a Mac and also in Windows.
Okay, I've read up on what you pointed out, and it seems that some user interaction with a page is required before tts will work. But that's literally the case when you click the green flag button to start a project, isn't it? I don't see how calling cancel() would circumvent the autoplay deprecation. Can you tell me more about this? How did you get the idea to call cancel()?

[TipsyTheCat]

Personally, I have not idea why it doesn't work or why doing this does work... This is a screen recording of using tts with and without cancel()

[TipsyTheCat]

Also, pardon my unclearness...

[TipsyTheCat]

Ok, so I noticed that on first run of the block it doesn't speak. I'm going to convert this PR into a draft to figure out how to fix this...