Friday Tech Tip: How to get Microsoft Word to read to you

At my talk last night "Editors as Partners, not enemies" for Art of the Book I mentioned that you can get Microsoft Word to read out loud to you.

Here's how to add the Speak command to your Quick Access Toolbar and use the tool:

1. Open Microsoft Word.
2. From the top of your screen next to the Save, Undo, and Redo buttons, click Customize Quick Access Toolbar arrow.

The Word Options dialog box opens.

3. From the Choose commands from drop-down, select All Commands.

4. Scroll down to the Speak command, select it, and then click Add.

5. Click OK.

The Speak icon appears on your Quick Access Tool.

To use the Speak command

1. Select the text you want to hear or select your entire document Ctrl+A.
2. Click the Speak command.

Word will read to you. Admittedly, it reads to you in one of those computer voices and you might feel like you are on the Skytrain or have just been read to by Marvin the Paranoid Android.

Adjusting Voice Settings

If your computer’s sounds too computer generated or if it speaks too quickly you can easily adjust the settings.

1. From the lower left-hand corner, pressing the Start button.
2. In the search box, type narrator.
3. Click on Narrator.

4. Click Voice Settings.
5. Edit the speed, volume, and pitch.
6. Click OK when you are done.
7. Click Exit.
   
   
   
   

Art of the Book with Brian Murdoch

Have you ever thought about books having a story to tell beyond the words on the page? Why was the book written? Who owned it? Did the owner write something of significance in the margin?

Brian Murdoch brought up these ideas and more on April 9 during his talk “The Importance of Books Beyond the Text: Books as Historical Artifacts.”

Brian made me think about why I love book stores and what we have lost with the demise of so many independent stores and the shift to online. I love the smell of ink, the feel of the paper, the promise of the spine of a book, and the potential of the covers. I enjoy displays in bookstores of books that have been banned through time or the favourite books of one of the employees. I enjoy it when you tell an employee that you like an author and they say “well if you like her, then you might like….”

In 2012 I attended Vancouver O'Reilly's Mini TOC (Tools of Change for Publishing). I wrote about how I heard a lot of discussion about discoverability, curated content, and interactive books. Although it is now 2015 I do not think that the challenge of discoverability for online book stores has been solved.  A number of social cataloguing websites exist where users can add books to their personal bookshelves, rate and review books, and see what their friends are reading. There are algorithms on these sites and the online shopping sites that suggest books based on your reading and shopping habits. However, there is no algorithm that can replace a passionate book store employee or antiquarian book dealer who loves books and creates “for his customers the joy of discovering a book they didn't know existed.”

Book selling and reviewing is now too often about the best-sellers. At chain stores we are often pointed by a disinterested employee in the direction of the genre rather than guided to an author waiting to be discovered.

Brian also talked about the art of books. The beauty of illustrations created by hand on metal plates and printed separately from the text; a world away from our digital creations. He talked about leather covers gilt edged by hand. He talked about how to tell a first edition and cautioned us about online purchasing. He asked why books are not valued as art on the same level as paintings.

This post just glosses over the depth and range of topics that Brian covered. I look forward to the second talk in the series on book design with Bill Glasgow of William Glasgow Design.

For more information or to register, follow the link:

Help send W.T. Waterston's Medals Home

Photo courtesy Gerry Lister

Photo courtesy Gerry Lister

Photo courtesy Gerry Lister

Friday mystery. My cousin has a World War I war medal that was in our family collection. The medal was issued to a W.T. (William Thomas) Waterston, regimental number 429616. We do not know of any family connection to our own family. The possible connections are that W.T. could either have served with Thomas Lister or known Carl Grossman through the Westminster Regiment.


His Attestation Paper is available at Library and Archives Canada but his service file has not been digitized yet.

According to this record he was born in Woodstock, Ontario June 17, 1882.

He is living with his parents and siblings in Vancouver in the 1901 Census. Father: Thomas Waterston, age 46, occupation mining; mother, Francis E., age 40; sister, Mattie, age 21; sister Katie, age 17, and brother Albert, age 11. (Year: 1901; Census Place: Vancouver (City/Cité), Burrard, British Columbia; Page: 14; Family No: 150)

Photo courtesy Gerry Lister

There is a marriage record for a William Thomas Waterston, age 30. Residence, Milner, BC. He married Ruby Miller Florence April 15, 1912. Says he was born in the United States. Parents: Thomas W. Waterston and Frances E. Bristol.



I am not sure what happened to wife #1 as his lists himself as no married on his Attestation.

He enlisted March 13, 1915 at New Westminster, British Columbia. Civilian Occupation: Farmer    

Next of Kin: Mrs. McKane, sister, of 6052 Hornby Street, Vancouver, British Columbia

Invalided to Canada for further medical treatment in Aug 1917 on the Letitia.

Married Eliza Jane Biggins at Vancouver December 9, 1918. Residence, Huntington, BC. He lists his place of birth as Morris, Minn, USA. Father, Thomas William Waterston, Lawyer and Frances Elizabeth Bristol.

I can find him in the directories living in Huntington in 1919.


He and Eliza lost their son, Harold Malcolm Waterston, born 12 Jul 1921 and died Jan 9, 1923.

Died at Sumas, British Columbia December 20, 1940 and is buried in Hazelwood Cemetery in Abbotsford, BC. His registration of death lists his birth as Woodstock Ontario, June 17, 1881. His father having been born in Scotland and his mother in the USA.