READ THIS BEFORE POSTING OR WATCH THE PROJECT:
TL;DR: ANY “WORKAROUND” INVOLVING CODE AT ALL IS NOT VIABLE FOR THE PERSON VIEWING THE PROJECT.

The following is not a workaround:

define say (text)
say (text)
speak (text) :: pen tts
say []

Picture this. You are someone who creates a project. You can hear and use sound on your device just fine. You make a project with text to speech, and you can use it perfectly. You don't think to add subtitles, because you can use the project just fine. So, you share it without subtitles.

Then, imagine you are someone who is hearing impaired, or cannot use sound on your device. You see the project above and want to view it. However, you can't. This severely limits the things you can do with Scratch and is just a bad experience in general.

This suggestion is not for the people making projects. It is for the people viewing them, so they can enjoy it as much as possible.

Thank you for reading. And now onto the post:

Description:
My suggestion is to add an option in the editor to see subtitles of the TTS.
This is how the subtitles would look:

If there are two or more sprites talking, they would look like see in the picture.

As pointed out by #100, some people use different languages to get more voices and adjust the text to fit the language. However, this isn't very helpful in subtitles, for example “Helo, hau a iu duing?”, “Хэлоу, хау а иу дуин?” or even “해로, 하 ㅏᆯ ㅠ 두ᅱᆼ” for “Hello, how are you doing?”. Therefore, a new block would ideally be added:

speak [Helo, hau a iu duing?] transcript [Hello, how are you doing?]::pen tts
speak [Хэлоу, хау а иу дуин?] transcript [Hello, how are you doing?]::pen tts
speak [해로, 하 ㅏᆯ ㅠ 두ᅱᆼ] transcript [Hello, how are you doing?]::pen tts

Pros:
Hearing impaired people can play text-to-speech projects
Some people don't have audio output on their devices

ScolderCreations wrote:

sometimes TTS doesn't work properly even if it should.

Cons:
None I can think of. If you think of any, please post them.

Edit: There is now an ASL tutorial. The ST clearly cares about accessibility!

So basically, TTS subtitles? Support, because not everyone can hear the project, and sometimes TTS doesn't work properly even if it should.

ScolderCreations wrote:

So basically, TTS subtitles?

Yes! I'll rename this topic because that explains it better, thanks!

ScolderCreations wrote:

sometimes TTS doesn't work properly even if it should.

Really? I've never experienced that? If you did, then that's another pro.

Support. subtitles are a great way to include deaf people, so they can enjoy your project too, without the creator having to go through the process of creating text. maybe this could be an option in account settings instead? I also tend to have my volume low all the time, so this may prove useful to me, too.

mitdk wrote:

I also tend to have my volume low all the time, so this may prove useful to me, too.

Funny, I thought about that, then edited the OP to add that, and then I see you just posted this!

mitdk wrote:

maybe this could be an option in account settings instead?

That was my original idea, but then I decided to change that because of the offline editor.

mybearworld wrote:

mitdk wrote:

I also tend to have my volume low all the time, so this may prove useful to me, too.

Funny, I thought about that, then edited the OP to add that, and then I see you just posted this!

mitdk wrote:

maybe this could be an option in account settings instead?

That was my original idea, but then I decided to change that because of the offline editor.

Ah, OK. I think we should also have it somewhere on the project page. It wouldn't be the best idea to keep this sort of feature hidden away under the edit tab. Maybe, on the project page, under the text to speech extension box thing, there could be an option where you can turn on/off subtitles? Kinda like the ‘See data’ button on Cloud vars.

mitdk wrote:

Ah, OK. I think we should also have it somewhere on the project page. It wouldn't be the best idea to keep this sort of feature hidden away under the edit tab. Maybe, on the project page, under the text to speech extension box thing, there could be an option where you can turn on/off subtitles? Kinda like the ‘See data’ button on Cloud vars.

Now you said that, what about cloud variables? Having to see inside would break those. I'll add some mockups in to the OP:

mybearworld wrote:

mitdk wrote:

Ah, OK. I think we should also have it somewhere on the project page. It wouldn't be the best idea to keep this sort of feature hidden away under the edit tab. Maybe, on the project page, under the text to speech extension box thing, there could be an option where you can turn on/off subtitles? Kinda like the ‘See data’ button on Cloud vars.

Now you said that, what about cloud variables? Having to see inside would break those. I'll add some mockups in to the OP:

Yeah, that second mockup was exactly what i meant.

mybearworld wrote:

Maybe instead of an arrow there could be a ‘CC’ icon at the beginning? No need to change the mockup though, it captures the general idea. I also think that the subtitles should play under the project player, so it doesn't disrupt any visuals, or it could be movable, like youtube.

mitdk wrote:

Maybe instead of an arrow there could be a ‘CC’ icon at the beginning?

Maybe, I'm not sure how it would be designed though.

Support. I think this is a great way to make scratch more accessible to people with hearing difficulties.

mybearworld wrote:

Cons:
None I can think of. If you think of any, please post them.

In terms cons, the only one I can think of is how would you make sure the subtitles don't cover an important part of the project.

Quantum-Cat wrote:

-snip-
In terms cons, the only one I can think of is how would you make sure the subtitles don't cover an important part of the project.

Yeah that's what i was thinking too:

mitdk wrote:

-snip-
I also think that the subtitles should play under the project player, so it doesn't disrupt any visuals, or it could be movable, like youtube.

Quantum-Cat wrote:

In terms cons, the only one I can think of is how would you make sure the subtitles don't cover an important part of the project.

Something like that maybe?

mybearworld wrote:

Quantum-Cat wrote:

In terms cons, the only one I can think of is how would you make sure the subtitles don't cover an important part of the project.

Something like that maybe?

Yeah, works. You should add this mockup to the OP. I'm assuming that if it got too long, it would automatically move to the next line?

mybearworld wrote:

Quantum-Cat wrote:

In terms cons, the only one I can think of is how would you make sure the subtitles don't cover an important part of the project.

Something like that maybe?

that would overlap “turbo mode”

ScolderCreations wrote:

mybearworld wrote:

Quantum-Cat wrote:

In terms cons, the only one I can think of is how would you make sure the subtitles don't cover an important part of the project.

Something like that maybe?

that would overlap “turbo mode”

I think it could move to the side if turbo mode is activated.

support

BUCKCLUCKFROMROBLOX wrote:

support

Please explain why.

ScolderCreations wrote:

that would overlap “turbo mode”

It would be after “Turbo Mode” of course.

mitdk wrote:

I'm assuming that if it got too long, it would automatically move to the next line?

Yes.

mitdk wrote:

You should add this mockup to the OP.

Done.

bump