How To Use Natural Reader's Text-to-Speech App

I swear I wrote this before but it seems to have “poof” somewhere in cyberspace. Here we go again on the topic of text-to-speech tools.

Speech-to-text apps

You may have seen something I have written on text-to-speech apps. In those pages I have said I use Natural Reader. I got it in the App Store. It is relatively inexpensive and does the job with a few glitches and weird pronunciations. I am not saying it is the best or the worst text reader. It is the one I know and therefore saves me the hassle of learning a new system. In my limited forays into using apps, I have discovered few come with guide books that I can find.

Using the Natural Reader app

I just put an article into NaturalReader so it can read to me.

Download or open Natural Reader

Download the Natural Reader app or open the online Natural Reader tool.

Step 1: Select an article

First of all, the article is a pdf, which means it is read-only. The article is also not encrypted. I found the article on the web.

Step 2: Copy the URL

When I had the article's address in my browser, I lightly pressed my finger on it and the word copy appeared. (Please note I am working on an iPad and other devices may differ). Touch "copy".

Step 3: Open Natural Reader

Now it is time to open your Natural Reader. At the top of the page, there will be a plus sign. That means you want to add text to be read. Once you touch the "+", a page with seven different options will open. For the purposes of this page, we are concentrating on the one that is on the upper right of the page. It says webpage. Touch "webpage".

Step 4: Paste the URL

The next thing to come up is the page where you enter the article’s address. Touch the box with the cursor and the word paste appears. Touch "paste" and the address should appear in the box. Once it is there go down to your keyboard and hit "done". Done is where return usually is.

Step 5: Select a format

When your article appears, go to the bottom right and finder the speaker icon. Touch that. It will give you two options, ".pdf" and ".txt" for saving the article in the app - .txt works better for me.

Step 6: Listen, start & stop

After that, just touch the "listen now" button and it should start. If there is a lot of additional information before the actual article, be aware the app will read all of that first. However, it is easy to touch where you want the reading to start and the app will start there. Stop at any time by hitting the button in the lower, right corner of the screen. The same button will restart it.

Other options

Those are the basics of using Natural Reader to read a webpage article.

Typing the webpage address

You also have the option of typing a webpage address into the search box if you prefer.

Copy & paste

If you want to copy and paste text into the app, it is almost just as easy. Touch the beginning of the paragraph you want to copy and drag your finger down it. On an iPad it will turn blue. Click the "copy" blurb option that shows up.

Once you have copied what you want read to you, go to the Natural Reader app and go to the left hand option. The icon is a pencil and it says input. When you touch the "pencil icon", you will get a blank page. Touch the page and the word paste will appear. Touch "paste" and then go to "done".

Typing your own content

You can also type on that page and the app will read it back to you.

Practice makes perfect

Computer apps such as text readers can be confusing and scary if you are not used to them. However, they can be relatively easy once you get the hang of things. Hope this little tutorial was helpful!