Emacspeak-23.0 (Retriever) Unleashed!

For Immediate Release

San Jose, CA, (Nov 26, 2005)
Emacspeak-23: --- Retrieving Full Access For Enlightened Users
--Zero cost of ownership makes priceless software affordable!

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Emacspeak Inc (NASDOG: ESPK) announces the immediate world-wide availability of Emacspeak 23.0 --a powerful audio desktop for leveraging today's evolving data and service-oriented semantic Web.

Investors Note

With several prominent analysts initiating coverage, NASDOG: ESPK continues to trade over the net at levels close to that once attained by the DogCom high-fliers of yester-years.

What Is It?

Emacspeak is a fully functional audio desktop that provides complete eyes-free access to all major 32 and 64 bit operating environments. By seamlessly blending all aspects of the Internet such as Web-surfing and electronic messaging into the audio desktop, Emacspeak enables speech access to local and remote information with a consistent and well-integrated user interface. A rich suite of task-oriented tools provides efficient speech-enabled access to the evolving service-oriented semantic Web.

Major Enhancements

  1. Alsa-powered speech server for software synthesis.
  2. Speech-enables emacs-jabber.
  3. New ssh-powered remote TTS servers.
  4. Atom support.
  5. Updated smart URLs including Blog Search
  6. Updated search wizards including PodCast search.

See the NEWS file for additional details.

Establishing Liberty, Equality And Freedom

Never a toy environment, All of Emacspeak is now voluntarily bundled with all major Linux distributions. Though designed to be modular, distributors have freely chosen to bundle the entire system without any undue pressure. The integrity of the Emacspeak codebase is ensured by the reliable and secure Linux platform used to develop the software. Extensive studies have shown that thanks to these features, users consider Emacspeak to be absolutely priceless. Thanks to this wide-spread user demand, the present version is being made available at the same zero cost as earlier releases. At the same time, Emacspeak continues to innovate in the area of speech interaction and carries forward the well-established Open Source tradition of introducing user interface features that eventually show up in luser environments. On this theme, when challenged by a proponent of a crash-prone but well-marketed windowing system with the assertion Emacs is a system from the 70's, the creator of Emacspeak expressed surprize at the unusual candor manifest in the assertion that it would take popular idiot-proven interfaces until the year 2070 to catch up to where the Emacspeak audio desktop is today. Industry experts welcomed this refreshing breath of Courage Certainty and Clarity (CCC) at a time when users are reeling from the Fear Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD) unleashed by complex software systems backed by even more convoluted press releases.

Independent Test Results

Independent test results have proven that unlike some modern software, Emacspeak can be easily uninstalled without adversely affecting the continued performance of the computer. These same tests also revealed that once uninstalled, the user stopped functioning altogether.

Speaking with Aster Labrador, the creator of Emacspeak once pointed out that these results re-emphasize the user-centric design of Emacspeak; It is the user --and not the computer-- that stops functioning when Emacspeak is uninstalled!

Note from Aster and Bubbles: (UnDoctored Videos Inc. is currently looking for volunteers to star in a video demonstrating such complete user failure).

Harnessing Emacspeak

You can visit Emacspeak at SourceForge. The latest development snapshot of Emacspeak is available via anonymous CVS from sourceforge.

You can subscribe to the emacspeak mailing list emacspeak@cs.vassar.edu by sending mail to the list request address emacspeak-request@cs.vassar.edu.

History

Emacspeak 23.0 -- AKA Retriever --- goes the extra mile in fetching full access. Emacspeak-22.0 -- AKA GuideDog -- helps users navigate the Web more effectively than ever before. Emacspeak 21.0 -- AKA PlayDog -- continues the Emacspeak tradition of relying on enhanced productivity to liberate users. Emacspeak-20.0 -- AKA LeapDog -- continues the long established GNU/Emacs tradition of integrated innovation to create a pleasurable computing environment for eyes-free interaction. Emacspeak-19 --AKA WorkDog-- was designed to enhance user productivity at work and leisure. Emacspeak-18.0 --code named GoodDog-- continues the Emacspeak tradition of enhancing user productivity and thereby reduces total cost of ownership. Emacspeak-17.0 --code named HappyDog-- enhances user productivity by exploiting today's evolving WWW standards. Emacspeak-16.0 --code named CleverDog-- was the follow-up to SmartDog --and continued the tradition of working better, faster, smarter. Emacspeak-15.0 --code named SmartDog--followed up on TopDog as the next in a continuing a series of award-winning audio desktop releases from Emacspeak Inc. Emacspeak-14.0 --code named TopDog--was the first release of this millennium. Emacspeak-13.0 --codenamed YellowLab-- was the closing release of the 20th. century. Emacspeak-12.0 --code named GoldenDog-- first leveraged the evolving semantic WWW to provide task-oriented speech access to electronic information on the Internet. Emacspeak-11.0 --code named Aster-- went the final step in making Linux a zero-cost Internet access solution for blind and visually impaired users. Emacspeak-10.0 --(AKA Emacspeak-2000) code named WonderDog-- was the last in a series of award-winning software releases designed to make eyes-free computing a productive and pleasurable experience. Emacspeak-9.0 --(AKA Emacspeak 99) code named BlackLab-- continued to innovate in the areas of speech interaction and interactive accessibility. Emacspeak-8.0 --(AKA Emacspeak-98++) code named BlackDog-- was a major upgrade to the speech output extension to Emacs.

Emacspeak-95 (code named Illinois) was released as OpenSource on the Internet in May 1995 as the first complete speech interface to UNIX workstations. The subsequent release, Emacspeak-96 (code named Egypt) made available in May 1996 provided significant enhancements to the interface. Emacspeak-97 (Tennessee) went further in providing a true audio desktop. Emacspeak-98 integrated Internetworking into all aspects of the audio desktop to provide the first fully interactive speech-enabled WebTop.

About Emacspeak

Originally based at Cornell (NY) --home to Auditory User Interfaces (AUI) on the WWW-- Emacspeak is now hosted at SourceForge and mirrored world-wide by an international network of software archives and bundled voluntarily with all major Linux distributions. On Monday, April 12, 1999, Emacspeak became part of the Smithsonian's Permanent Research Collection on Information Technology at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History.

The Emacspeak mailing list is archived at Vassar --the home of the Emacspeak mailing list-- thanks to Greg Priest-Dorman, and provides a valuable knowledge base for new users.

Press/Analyst Contact: Hubbell Labrador
Going forward, BubbleDog acknowledges her exclusive monopoly on setting the direction the the Emacspeak Audio desktop, and promises to exercise this freedom to innovate and her resulting power responsibly (as before) in the interest of all dogs.

About This Release

Windows-Free (WF) is a favorite battle-cry of The League Against Forced Fenestration (LAFF).
--see this overview of details on the ill-effects of Forced Fenestration.
CopyWrite )C( Aster and Hubbell Labrador. All Writes Reserved.
GoldenDog (DM), BlackDog (DM) etc. are Registered Dogmarks of Aster and Hubbell Labrador.
All other dogs belong to their respective owners.

Previous Release Notes

Here is a link to the release notes for the previous major release, Emacspeak-22.0
Email: raman@users.sf.net
Last modified: Mon Nov 18 19:02:15 2002