Now available in Luxembourgish: free voice services for smartphones and computers
Luxembourg has taken an important step towards improving digital accessibility and supporting the national language. Two new text-to-speech models are now available to users, enabling them to have texts read aloud in Luxembourgish on computers and mobile devices.
The new text-to-speech engines have been named Mia and Mil. One is a female voice, the other a male voice. They are now available free of charge to users of Windows, macOS, Android and iOS.
The project is primarily aimed at blind and visually impaired users, but anyone can make use of the new technology. Voice models enable text displayed on a computer, smartphone or tablet screen to be read aloud, making it much easier to use digital services in the Luxembourgish language.
The new voices are compatible with the most popular screen reader programmes:
- VoiceOver on Apple devices;
- TalkBack on Android;
- NVDA and JAWS on Windows.
In addition, text-to-speech software can be used to simply read text aloud on computers running Windows and macOS.
The project was funded by the Luxembourg Ministry of Digitalisation as part of the Tech-in-gov initiative. The project involved the State Information Service, the Centre for the Luxembourgish Language (ZLS), the Centre for the Development of Skills for the Visually Impaired (CDV), and the specialist company LouderPages.The developers note that both the linguistic resources and expertise of the ZLS and the feedback from CDV users played a key role, helping to adapt the technology to people’s real-world needs.
In addition to making the software available free of charge for major operating systems, the developers have made the project’s source code open-source. This means that the technology can be used and developed by a community of developers, researchers and organisations working in the field of digital accessibility.
The introduction of fully-fledged voice synthesisers in the Luxembourgish language marked an important milestone in the country’s digital development and provided yet another tool for preserving and promoting the national language in today’s digital landscape.
