Memories of Magic Wand Speaking Reader (Speak and Learn)

[+FarmerPotato]

Thread to talk about Magic Wand Speaking Reader. My personal memories of my dad, who worked on it in 1981. I’ll share what I know about its history, implementation, on collecting the books, and other uses for it like interfacing to the 4A and its use as assistive technology. 

 

 

Joerg has already compiled a fantastic amount of information on datamath.org.  Read that for background. 

 

I found many TI internal documents in my dad’s papers. He worked on the MWSR in 1981 and kept supporting it.  Even trying to license  it from TI (two of his business plan memos within TI.) Years later, he said it was the career experience he most treasured. 
 

Here is a  pocket guide listing the MWSR books. I had never seen the starred releases, except one in pre-print. I started watching for the later books. 

 

 

There are longer descriptions in the 12-page booklet on datamath.org

 

One title, Wings Wheels and Waves, I see in a Phrase Library listing in the users guide for Texas Tech’s  990 speech lab.

 

That phrase library looks like  sample data from all over.  including coding tables, chirp, later some Moon Mine phrases (“Monstruo Destruido!”) The user  manual was written by my dad and installed on a 990 at Texas Tech for class work. Probably contained the same software as TI’s speech lab. 

Texas Tech is in Lubbock TX, where TI had a large semiconductor plant, and where consumer products engineering was based. I suppose the speech lab was part of a course.
 

In the Texas Tech library, I once saw shelves full of books on speech technology. (University of North Texas near Dallas has even more.) 

 

Curiously, I found a business card of Granville Ott. He was an early advocate for the Home Computer in TI’s Office of Strategic Something. The OSS in Richardson TX headquarters. 
 

The back of the card says “Al Olson will deliver the guest lecture in my place.” Directions to ENGR classroom in Petroleum Building, I guess at  Texas Tech.

 

Also, Texas Tech library had a room full of TI-99/4As. About  25 fully expanded systems with 10” color monitor. That was where I first attended the Lubbock Users Group in 1983 and saw Zork 1.  
 

Here are two photos of later Magic Wand books which I bought:

[ti99iuc]

I really like the Magic Wand too! 

I was surprised to listen the sound effects and not only the sentences of the books.

 

Few years ago I also purchased this official TI Poster now on the wall of my small TI Room.

 

 

 

[jbdigriz]

Pretty cool. I guess they must still be popular with small children, judging by the number of readers and books on Ebay for non-trivial prices. I don't think TI still sells them (or do they?)  but is there anything comparable being sold today?

 

I'd hate to be the grinch who did a teardown on one, so do you have any details or photos of the innards?

[jbdigriz]

Ah, looked at the datamath site and it is discontinued. I guess they must hold up to wear and tear pretty well, though.

 

[JB]

How nostalgic! I had one of these as a small kid. Think my parents still have it and the books. (They better not have thrown my Magic Wand Reader out!)

 

I recall being quite fond of The Noisy Number Robots. 

[JB]

We DO still have my Magic Wand Reader.

...

I do not remember some of these books at all.

 

I think I recognize that guy on Picture Pages from the news!

[+FarmerPotato]

@JB I'm glad you enjoyed the books back then! 

 

My favorite, for some reason, was the Sprites' Adventures on Earth (I was 10 years old.) And.. the Sprites' sound effects. 

 

 

[+Ksarul]

On 10/19/2022 at 4:26 PM, JB said:

I think I recognize that guy on Picture Pages from the news!

 

The fascination with Popsicle-like objects was a dead giveaway. . .although it just cemented the identification here.

[Appeelicious]

It's cool that you guys mentioned this. We just found one of these and a ton of books in my MIL's storage closet. The thing was diligently complete in box, with plastic and a bigger box to protect everything. I wonder if it used the same speech chip

[Nick99]

Is there a way to create own barcodes to be used with the Magic Wand?

I see that this guy has done his own barcodes and reader:

https://yurisuzuki.com/archive/works/barcode-book/

[+FarmerPotato]

I discovered all the documentation to "Barcode Factory", a licensed TI turnkey solution on a 990 with custom speech card. However, none of the software. My dad documented and supported this package at TI. 
 

Magic Wand also requires magnetic ink (check printing.)  Factory lists 5 contemporary printers who could do it (part of the 990 software does page layout for prepress--outputs troff format!)

 

Anyhow, it documents the barcode format (thoroughly?) It's basically allophone numbers from the MW ROM.

In a printed barcode, words are divided by thick bars. The first "word" is inflection and control bytes.  Following words are all allophones.
 

You can scan words, skipping the control data, and it will speak as monotone.

 

Separately, there was  a utility for the 4A which sent data to the MW for testing. 

[Nick99]

Thanks!

So it's like making speech with TE-2 to make it sound more natural and with different pitch?

 

Anyway, magnetic ink seem to be the hard part and maybe that is why this japanese guy has built another barcode reader. 

[+FarmerPotato]

On 7/20/2023 at 3:01 AM, Nick99 said:

Thanks!

So it's like making speech with TE-2 to make it sound more natural and with different pitch?

Yes.  

Now I wonder how the text-to-speech software came about: was it initially for the Magic Wand Speaking Reader, or the home computer? Or was it first a pure research project? Gotta get the dates and facts organized. 

What I have not checked is whether the allophone set and numbering scheme was identical. Between TE2 and MWSR ROM. 

Anecdotally, the accomplishment of a TTS software removed the need for home computer speech synth expansion modules. 

Text to speech (TTS) software was done by Linguist Kathleen M. Goudie working with programmer Klaus Schuurman(?) (known for home computer disk DSR etc.)   KMG was with the speech lab from early on: she is co-author on TI publications in IEEE Transactions along with Gene Frantz and Larry Brantingham. (The two inventors of TI's speech business.) 
 

Since I found the TTS backup 8" floppies in my dad's study, and he worked on Magic Wand Speaking Reader, I supposed that's why he had them. The Barcode Factory package for MWSR would have required it. 

BTW, so far failed to recover anything from a floppy. SuperCard is unable to make sense if it. My guess is that the floppy has been de-Gaussed. I took out only the oldest floppy so far, perhaps the others are better. 
 

 

[+Ksarul]

There was also the standalone TI hardware device for generating allophone speech. ISTR that @Stuart had access to one for a while and described how it worked.