Tone before TTS messages?

Apps & Remote Access VeraAlerts
1

Sorry if this has already been discussed! I tried to search but could not find anything relevant.

I would like a tone before my TTS messages. Think of it like the announcements on airports. The tone is to draw attention that a spoken message will follow.

Is this possible with Vera Alerts?

2

Currently the only way to do this is to have the tone set like: {tone:3} and to have the Text To Speech Override specified for all messages.

I repeat all of my spoken messages with a 15 second delay. Long enough for me to cancel the message before the repeat if I have the phone in hand.

3

That’s a great idea for the Sonos plugin too

4

This seems to work! However, the sound plays simultaneously with the TTS notification. Is it possible to inserts a pause or delay after the tone, before the TTS notification is spoken?

5

There is no indication of how long the tone is … and they are sent to the Audio controller via 2 independent paths that do not know about each other.

I might be able to force these into the same path … there by making them sequential … I will look into this.

6

I work as a clinical neuropsychologist in Sweden and became interested in smart home technology several years ago working with patients with cognitive impairment and in need of cognitive aids.

We have a occupational therapist named Inga-Lill Boman (http://ki.se/en/people/ingbom) here in Sweden doing research on technology for these patients group, amongst other patients with memory impairment after acquired brain injuries (stroke, traumatic brain injuries etc.).

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=inga-lill+boman

One of her research findings was that a sound or alert before a spoken message was essential for drawing the attention focus of a person and increasing the chance of listening to the notifications. This was voice notifications about meetings, remembering to take medicine and such but the cognitive principle is sound for everyone! :slight_smile:

7

[quote=“RichardTSchaefer, post:2, topic:179947”]Currently the only way to do this is to have the tone set like: {tone:3} and to have the Text To Speech Override specified for all messages.

I repeat all of my spoken messages with a 15 second delay. Long enough for me to cancel the message before the repeat if I have the phone in hand.[/quote]

Richard,

Are you saying that you do this for your alerts, or is this something in Vera? I’ve noticed that for my “door unlock” message and my “[Person] is home” that there is about a 15 second delay between the messages (sometimes the latter is repeated more than once). I’m trying to track it down and saw this and thought that maybe this was it. I can start another thread to discuss it if necessary.

8

The Message Delay in Vera Alerts is the amount of time between messages.

It does not matter if this is multiple independent messages or the same message repeated.
This is to make sure there is some time between messages so they do not run together.

9

To add a delay after a tone but before the TTS kicks in, I did the following (it works but am not sure if there are any side effects):

  • Under Vera Alerts plugin Profiles tab, added {tone:tts} to MessagePrefix
  • For each notification, added something like “{tone:1}<<1500>> Garage was opened” (where the time is in milliseconds)
  • Note: If I set Vera Alerts mobile to repeat the message, it only repeats the TTS (not the tone; but I do prefer this behavior).
10

Great way of getting a delay fcol!

It also seems to work if I add “{tone:1}<<1500>>” directly under the profiles tab, under MessagePrefix. The individual notifications under the Notification Configuration tab can then be “clean” of formatting. I am trying to use Vera Alerts both for my wall mounted Android tablets and for my iPhone (with Pushover), and Pushover did look a bit weird with the additional formatting.

It also spares your from adding the formatting every time you add a notification. I have, however, “Override Alert Tone” enabled in the Vera Alert app.