[GUI Plugin] TTS to MP3: Create MP3 audiobook using Windows TTS

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by carlinhOS

Thank you very much @jackie_w for your quick response.

After doing and undoing many things I discovered the error was caused by exceeding total length of the path+filename in Windows, not because of your plugin. As I said I installed last version and it runs properly.

Sorry for bothering you and the other members.

No need to be sorry. Testing your sample helped me identify a previously unknown bug which happens for books with no calibre library cover if the plugin is configured to embed the cover thumbnail in each MP3 ... even if that wasn't your actual problem!

Let's call it a happy accident. I'll release a plugin update in the next few days.

[jackie_w]

• Bug fix: Stop plugin crashing when config set to embed cover thumbnail in each MP3 but book has no cover

This update should be available within the next couple of hours via the normal calibre plugin update system.

[Muskillogemi]

Hi Jackie, after working for quite some time everything perfect, I am encountering a problem with Ivona's voices when trying to read books or trying to transfer them to mp3. I send you the error text. Until a few days ago they were working perfectly. Thank you.:

***I have tested in other applications such as Text Aloud and Ivona's voices work perfectly.

calibre, version 5.21.0
ERROR: Excepción no considerada: <b>OSError</b>:C:\r\src\src\calibre\utils\windows\winsapi.cpp : 281:Failed to speak:[hr=0x80040154 wCode=0] Clase no registrada

calibre 5.21 [64bit] embedded-python: True is64bit: True
Windows-10-10.0.19041 Windows ('64bit', 'WindowsPE')
('Windows', '10', '10.0.19041')
Python 3.8.5
Windows: ('10', '10.0.19041', '', 'Multiprocessor Free')
Interface language: es
Successfully initialized third party plugins: Amazon.com Multiple Countries (1, 0, 0) && Author Book Count (2, 2, 2) && Clipboard Search (1, 3, 1) && Consolidate All Library Metadata (2, 0, 40) && Count Pages (1, 11, 0) && EpubMerge (2, 11, 0) && EpubSplit (3, 1, 0) && Extract ISBN (1, 5, 0) && Favourites Menu (1, 0, 5) && Find Duplicates (1, 8, 5) && Goodreads (1, 5, 1) && Goodreads Sync (1, 15, 1) && Job Spy (1, 0, 190) && Manage Series (1, 2, 11) && Open With (1, 5, 13) && Perrypedia (1, 2, 0) && Prince PDF (1, 5, 0) && Similar Stories (1, 0, 58) && TTS to MP3 (0, 5, 9) && View Manager (1, 6, 0) && Wiki Reader (2, 2, 1)
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "calibre_plugins.tts_to_mp3_plugin.other_dlgs" , line 197, in play_or_stop
File "calibre_plugins.tts_to_mp3_plugin.other_dlgs" , line 204, in start_speech
File "calibre_plugins.tts_to_mp3_plugin.other_dlgs" , line 213, in play
OSError: C:\r\src\src\calibre\utils\windows\winsapi.cpp:281 :Failed to speak:[hr=0x80040154 wCode=0] Clase no registrada

**I am also sending you the error that I get when reading any book with Ivona's voices in Voice: calibre, version 5.21.0
ERROR: Excepción no considerada: <b>OSError</b>:C:\r\src\src\calibre\utils\windows\winsapi.cpp : 281:Failed to speak:[hr=0x80040154 wCode=0] Clase no registrada

calibre 5.21 [64bit] embedded-python: True is64bit: True
Windows-10-10.0.19041 Windows ('64bit', 'WindowsPE')
('Windows', '10', '10.0.19041')
Python 3.8.5
Windows: ('10', '10.0.19041', '', 'Multiprocessor Free')
Interface language: es
Successfully initialized third party plugins: Amazon.com Multiple Countries (1, 0, 0) && Author Book Count (2, 2, 2) && Clipboard Search (1, 3, 1) && Consolidate All Library Metadata (2, 0, 40) && Count Pages (1, 11, 0) && EpubMerge (2, 11, 0) && EpubSplit (3, 1, 0) && Extract ISBN (1, 5, 0) && Favourites Menu (1, 0, 5) && Find Duplicates (1, 8, 5) && Goodreads (1, 5, 1) && Goodreads Sync (1, 15, 1) && Job Spy (1, 0, 190) && Manage Series (1, 2, 11) && Open With (1, 5, 13) && Perrypedia (1, 2, 0) && Prince PDF (1, 5, 0) && Similar Stories (1, 0, 58) && TTS to MP3 (0, 5, 9) && View Manager (1, 6, 0) && Wiki Reader (2, 2, 1)
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "calibre\gui2\viewer\tts.py", line 88, in action
File "calibre\gui2\viewer\tts.py", line 93, in play
File "calibre\gui2\tts\windows.py", line 213, in speak_marked_text
File "calibre\gui2\tts\windows.py", line 192, in speak
OSError: C:\r\src\src\calibre\utils\windows\winsapi.cpp:281 :Failed to speak:[hr=0x80040154 wCode=0] Clase no registrada

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by Muskillogemi

Hi Jackie, after working for quite some time everything perfect, I am encountering a problem with Ivona's voices when trying to read books or trying to transfer them to mp3. I send you the error text. Until a few days ago they were working perfectly. Thank you.:

***I have tested in other applications such as Text Aloud and Ivona's voices work perfectly.

**I am also sending you the error that I get when reading any book with Ivona's voices in Voice: calibre, version 5.21.0

Just to clarify ... you're running calibre 5.21 64-bit on Windows 10 and when you try to run either of the following with one of your purchased Ivona voices

• 'TTS to MP3' plugin
• calibre Viewer's Read aloud feature

you're seeing the same error, i.e.

OSError: C:\r\src\src\calibre\utils\windows\winsapi.cpp:281 :Failed to speak:[hr=0x80040154 wCode=0] Clase no registrada

It looks like that error message is a complaint from Windows. The path to calibre's speech program (winsapi.cpp) looks a bit odd but I'm no expert.

Do you see the same error message when:

• using one of the Windows built-in Voices?
• reading a Spanish book with a Spanish Voice versus an English book with an English Voice?

I'm running the same versions of Win10/calibre 64-bit as you. I own 3 Ivona Voices (all English) and I've just tested them in both 'TTS to MP3' and calibre Viewer's Read aloud. Everything is still working OK for me.

Your Spanish Ivona Voices running OK in TextAloud doesn't really confirm anything because TextAloud is a 32-bit program and is accessing the Voices from a different part of the Windows registry. The standard installation for all my Ivona Voices correctly updated both the 32-bit and the 64-bit parts of the registry. I didn't need to do anything special to make them appear in calibre's drop-down menus for Voice selection.

[Muskillogemi]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

Just to clarify ... you're running calibre 5.21 64-bit on Windows 10 and when you try to run either of the following with one of your purchased Ivona voices

• 'TTS to MP3' plugin
• calibre Viewer's Read aloud feature

you're seeing the same error, i.e.

OSError: C:\r\src\src\calibre\utils\windows\winsapi.cpp:281 :Failed to speak:[hr=0x80040154 wCode=0] Clase no registrada

It looks like that error message is a complaint from Windows. The path to calibre's speech program (winsapi.cpp) looks a bit odd but I'm no expert.

Do you see the same error message when:

• using one of the Windows built-in Voices?
• reading a Spanish book with a Spanish Voice versus an English book with an English Voice?

I'm running the same versions of Win10/calibre 64-bit as you. I own 3 Ivona Voices (all English) and I've just tested them in both 'TTS to MP3' and calibre Viewer's Read aloud. Everything is still working OK for me.

Your Spanish Ivona Voices running OK in TextAloud doesn't really confirm anything because TextAloud is a 32-bit program and is accessing the Voices from a different part of the Windows registry. The standard installation for all my Ivona Voices correctly updated both the 32-bit and the 64-bit parts of the registry. I didn't need to do anything special to make them appear in calibre's drop-down menus for Voice selection.

Thanks for the help, with Microsoft's voves it works perfectly, but with Ivona's it does not. A month ago they all worked perfectly, but maybe it was one of the latest Windows 10 updates that messed it up. I don't know. At the moment I've looked into the problem and haven't found anything, so for now I'll use it with Microsoft voices. I will wait for new updates to see if it is solved because I have not modified anything; it stopped working suddenly. Anyway, thank you very much for the support and for this great program. Regards.

[Muskillogemi]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

Just to clarify ... you're running calibre 5.21 64-bit on Windows 10 and when you try to run either of the following with one of your purchased Ivona voices

• 'TTS to MP3' plugin
• calibre Viewer's Read aloud feature

you're seeing the same error, i.e.

OSError: C:\r\src\src\calibre\utils\windows\winsapi.cpp:281 :Failed to speak:[hr=0x80040154 wCode=0] Clase no registrada

It looks like that error message is a complaint from Windows. The path to calibre's speech program (winsapi.cpp) looks a bit odd but I'm no expert.

Do you see the same error message when:

• using one of the Windows built-in Voices?
• reading a Spanish book with a Spanish Voice versus an English book with an English Voice?

I'm running the same versions of Win10/calibre 64-bit as you. I own 3 Ivona Voices (all English) and I've just tested them in both 'TTS to MP3' and calibre Viewer's Read aloud. Everything is still working OK for me.

Your Spanish Ivona Voices running OK in TextAloud doesn't really confirm anything because TextAloud is a 32-bit program and is accessing the Voices from a different part of the Windows registry. The standard installation for all my Ivona Voices correctly updated both the 32-bit and the 64-bit parts of the registry. I didn't need to do anything special to make them appear in calibre's drop-down menus for Voice selection.

Hi Jackie. I have finally decided to buy some voices from a website that was recommended to me.: https://www.cereproc.com/en/products/sdk

The truth is that they are some of the best and most natural voices I have ever heard.There are times when it sounds like a real narrator is reading the book, but I run into a new problem when I convert the book from TTS to MP3 with this new voice. The conversion time without being exaggerated takes a very long time to complete, at least 20 times longer than any other voice, a 333 pages book at this moment takes 44 minutes of conversion and only 16% of percentage. At that rate it will take many, many hours to convert a single book, what could be the problem? Thank you.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by Muskillogemi

Hi Jackie. I have finally decided to buy some voices from a website that was recommended to me.: https://www.cereproc.com/en/products/sdk

The truth is that they are some of the best and most natural voices I have ever heard.There are times when it sounds like a real narrator is reading the book, but I run into a new problem when I convert the book from TTS to MP3 with this new voice. The conversion time without being exaggerated takes a very long time to complete, at least 20 times longer than any other voice, a 333 pages book at this moment takes 44 minutes of conversion and only 16% of percentage. At that rate it will take many, many hours to convert a single book, what could be the problem? Thank you.

I don't own any Cereproc Voices for Windows so I can't offer any real insights. A couple of questions ...

Some newer Voices now have an online component and will only work if you're connected to the internet. Is it possible that your Cereproc Voices do this? That might slow things down. Ivona and the standard Windows Voices run entirely from your local disk. My current version of Win10 does have some new online Voices. I don't know how (or if) calibre could ever be made to 'see' them but they do work in MS Edge's Readaloud function as long as there's an active internet connection.

Another common culprit when things run slow is antivirus software.

You could try temporarily disconnecting from the internet and disabling all antivirus activity and see what happens. Did all your problems start after you installed the Cereproc Voices?

I think if you want to get to the bottom of these problems you're going to need to strip everything back to basics. At the moment you've got multi-layered potential problems - this plugin on top of calibre on top of 2 different types of 3rd-party Voices, both of which were probably sold as fit-for-purpose in a 3rd-party 32-bit app, TextAloud, and nowhere else.

If this was happening on my PC this is what I'd do:

• Temporarily uninstall all 3rd-party Voices and forget about this 'TTS to MP3' plugin for the moment. Make sure that calibre Viewer's Readaloud is now working OK with the MS Voices.
  
• Then reinstall a single Ivona Voice. Does calibre Readaloud still work? or are you now getting that OSError you initially reported?

If the basic calibre Readaloud is failing then this plugin has no chance of working. At this point we can ask Kovid the calibre guru if he has any suggestions.

[Muskillogemi]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

I don't own any Cereproc Voices for Windows so I can't offer any real insights. A couple of questions ...

Some newer Voices now have an online component and will only work if you're connected to the internet. Is it possible that your Cereproc Voices do this? That might slow things down. Ivona and the standard Windows Voices run entirely from your local disk. My current version of Win10 does have some new online Voices. I don't know how (or if) calibre could ever be made to 'see' them but they do work in MS Edge's Readaloud function as long as there's an active internet connection.

Another common culprit when things run slow is antivirus software.

You could try temporarily disconnecting from the internet and disabling all antivirus activity and see what happens. Did all your problems start after you installed the Cereproc Voices?

I think if you want to get to the bottom of these problems you're going to need to strip everything back to basics. At the moment you've got multi-layered potential problems - this plugin on top of calibre on top of 2 different types of 3rd-party Voices, both of which were probably sold as fit-for-purpose in a 3rd-party 32-bit app, TextAloud, and nowhere else.

If this was happening on my PC this is what I'd do:

• Temporarily uninstall all 3rd-party Voices and forget about this 'TTS to MP3' plugin for the moment. Make sure that calibre Viewer's Readaloud is now working OK with the MS Voices.
  
• Then reinstall a single Ivona Voice. Does calibre Readaloud still work? or are you now getting that OSError you initially reported?

If the basic calibre Readaloud is failing then this plugin has no chance of working. At this point we can ask Kovid the calibre guru if he has any suggestions.

Hi Jackie, thanks for the reply. Ivona's voices don't work with either Readaloud or the plugin. A month ago they were working perfectly, but not anymore. As for Cereproc's voice you are right, if I am not connected to the internet it does not work well. That must be the speed problem when switching to MP3. The Microsoft voices work perfectly in Readaloud, but after uninstalling the Ivona voices and reinstalling them I have the same problem both in Readaloud and in the Plugin with the Ivona voices. I would appreciate if you can check it since the Ivona voices are for both 64-bit and 32-bit versions. In any case if you need the Ivona installation files I can send them to you if you give me an email via Wetransfer so you can check it yourself. Best regards. Thank you very much.

[jackie_w]

@Muskillogemi,

I raised your TTS problem with Kovid in the calibre development form. There's no magic solution, I'm afraid, but there are a couple of suggestions from @rantanplan you could try.

Unless you know different, I can't help thinking that the installation of the Cereproc Voices may have made a permanent change to your Windows which is not compatible with the older Ivona Voices on a 64bit PC.

I think you said that the Ivona/Cereproc Voices are co-existing quite happily in 32bit TextAloud. So something else you could try is to install an additional copy of calibre Portable, which you can find on the standard calibre Download page.

You can install it on a pen drive or just somewhere convenient on any connected hard disk. Keep it away from your main calibre installation. All books/settings for the Portable version are independent from those for your main calibre books/settings. Calibre Portable always runs as 32bit, even on a 64bit PC so Voices should be accessed from the same part of the Windows registry as TextAloud is using.

[Muskillogemi]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

@Muskillogemi,

I raised your TTS problem with Kovid in the calibre development form. There's no magic solution, I'm afraid, but there are a couple of suggestions from @rantanplan you could try.

Unless you know different, I can't help thinking that the installation of the Cereproc Voices may have made a permanent change to your Windows which is not compatible with the older Ivona Voices on a 64bit PC.

I think you said that the Ivona/Cereproc Voices are co-existing quite happily in 32bit TextAloud. So something else you could try is to install an additional copy of calibre Portable, which you can find on the standard calibre Download page.

You can install it on a pen drive or just somewhere convenient on any connected hard disk. Keep it away from your main calibre installation. All books/settings for the Portable version are independent from those for your main calibre books/settings. Calibre Portable always runs as 32bit, even on a 64bit PC so Voices should be accessed from the same part of the Windows registry as TextAloud is using.

Thank you very much Jackie. Ivona's voices were already failing me before I installed Cereproc's voice, but I will try the alternative method you advise me. Thank you very much for your support. Best regards.

[Chrixm]

Hi

I tried all the answers in here updating my plugin from this page, checking the path and checking to special characters but still I'm getting this error

calibre, version 5.22.1 (win32, embedded-python: True)
Failed to run TTS to MP3: Failed: TTS to MP3:MiguelAngelRuizMacias - Elquintoacuerdo (31)

TTS to MP3:MiguelAngelRuizMacias - Elquintoacuerdo (31)
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "runpy.py", line 194, in _run_module_as_main
File "runpy.py", line 87, in _run_code
File "site.py", line 82, in <module>
File "site.py", line 77, in main
File "site.py", line 49, in run_entry_point
File "calibre\utils\ipc\worker.py", line 216, in main
File "calibre\utils\ipc\worker.py", line 151, in arbitrary_n
File "calibre_plugins.tts_to_mp3_plugin.jobs", line 95, in do_book_action_worker
TypeError: cannot unpack non-iterable NoneType object

Logfile for 31 / 02 / OEBPS/Text/titulo.xhtml


I'm using windows 10 calibre 5.22.1 64 bits

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by Chrixm

I tried all the answers in here updating my plugin from this page, checking the path and checking to special characters but still I'm getting this error

A couple of questions ...

• Is one particular book giving this error or does the same happen with all books?
• When you selected the directory where you wanted the MP3s to be created, what was its full path name? A long directory path and/or long book title and/or long TOC chapter titles can combine to create MP3 filenames which are too long for Windows to handle.

If you have access to Cloud storage please put a temporary copy of your book there and PM me a link to it, so I can investigate further.

Originally Posted by Chrixm

I'm using windows 10 calibre 5.22.1 64 bits

By the way, the first line of your error log says that you're running calibre 32bit not calibre 64bit but, at the moment, I've no reason to believe that this has anything to do with your reported problem.

[Muskillogemi]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

@Muskillogemi,

I raised your TTS problem with Kovid in the calibre development form. There's no magic solution, I'm afraid, but there are a couple of suggestions from @rantanplan you could try.

Unless you know different, I can't help thinking that the installation of the Cereproc Voices may have made a permanent change to your Windows which is not compatible with the older Ivona Voices on a 64bit PC.

I think you said that the Ivona/Cereproc Voices are co-existing quite happily in 32bit TextAloud. So something else you could try is to install an additional copy of calibre Portable, which you can find on the standard calibre Download page.

You can install it on a pen drive or just somewhere convenient on any connected hard disk. Keep it away from your main calibre installation. All books/settings for the Portable version are independent from those for your main calibre books/settings. Calibre Portable always runs as 32bit, even on a 64bit PC so Voices should be accessed from the same part of the Windows registry as TextAloud is using.

Hi Jackie, in the end I was able to solve all the problems by installing the portable version, but then I noticed that on the Calibre page there is also a 32-bit version of Calibre, which works perfectly as well. There must be some problem with the voices and the 64-bit version of Calibre, because although the voices work for both 64-bit and 32-bit with the 64-bit version they don't work when they did before, something must have changed in the internal code of the program? Thank you very much for your help. Best regards

[jackie_w]

Unfortunately, due to unexpected issues at home, I am unable to provide any support for this plugin for the forseeable future.

Hopefully the current version will continue to work OK in calibre 5.xx

[Muskillogemi]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

Unfortunately, due to unexpected issues at home, I am unable to provide any support for this plugin for the forseeable future.

Hopefully the current version will continue to work OK in calibre 5.xx

Thank you Jackie for all your work. It's been a while since I've been on this forum...I hope those problems are solved soon. Best wishes.