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Let PowerShell Read for You

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As a Chief Petty Officer in the US Navy, I often find myself with a really long article or email to read.  This can be a bit of a pain when I have a lot of work to do.  Don’t get me wrong, I go through everyone.  I just do it a bit of a different way.  Back in August of 2013, I published my Out-Voice cmdlet.  It simply uses the Windows Text-to-Speech converter to read what ever strings you send it.  Below is my Read-Article cmdlet.

To use it, just copy your long email or article into a text file and let it go. I’m including this in the source code that I am sending my PowerShell students home with since it gives two examples of basic error handling. If you need a copy of Out-Voice, you can get it here.  I have it loading as one of my PowerShell modules.

 

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Function Read-Article

{

<#

.SYNOPSIS

Reads a text file.

 

.DESCRIPTION

Reads a text file.  The cmdlet Out-Voice must be loaded in memory.  You can get

a copy of Out-Voice at:

http://mctexpert.blogspot.com/2013/08/have-powershell-verbally-provide.html

 

.PARAMETER $File

The name of the txt file to read.

 

.PARAMETER $Voice

Allows for the default choice to be changed using the

default voices installed on Windows 8. Acceptable values are:

US_Male

UK_Female

US_Female

 

.EXAMPLE

Read-Article News.txt

 

Reads the text file News.txt

 

.NOTES

===============================================================================

== Cmdlet: Read-Article                                                      ==

== Author: Jason A. Yoder                                                    ==

== Company: MCTExpert of Arizona                                             ==

== Date: February 11, 2015                                                   ==

== Copyright: All rights reserved.                                           ==

== Version: 1.0.0.0                                                          ==

== Legal: The user assumes all responsibility and liability for the usage of ==

== this PowerShell code.  MCTExpert of Arizona, Its officers, shareholders,  ==

== owners, and their relatives are not liable for any damages.  As with all  ==

== code, review it and understand it prior to usage.  It is recommended that ==

== this code be fully tested and validated in a test environment prior to    ==

== usage in a production environment.                                        ==

==                                                                           ==

== Does this code make changes: NO                                           ==

== Requirements: Out-Voice must be in memory.  To get a copy of Out-Voice:   ==

== http://mctexpert.blogspot.com/2013/08/have-powershell-verbally-provide.html

===============================================================================

#>

#>

[CmdletBinding()]

Param

(  

    [parameter(Mandatory=$true)]

    [String]

    $File,

 

    [ValidateSet("US_Male", "UK_Female", "UK_Female")]

    [String]

    $Voice = "US_Female"

)

 

# Verify that the cmdlet Out-Voice is present in memory.

Try {Get-Command -Name Out-Voice -ErrorAction Stop}

Catch {Write-Host "The Cmdlet Out-Voice is not in memory,"}

 

# Load the file

Try {$A = Get-Content -Path $File -ErrorAction Stop}

Catch {Write-Host "File not found"}

 

$A | Out-Voice -VoiceType $Voice

 

} # END: Function Read-Article

 

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