Text To Speech Using Xamarin Essentials

Xamarin.Essentials plugin provides 20+ cross-platform APIs for mobile application development. Xamarin.Essentials API works with all Xamarin.Forms, Xamarin.Android, Xamarin.iOS, or UWP applications that can be accessed from shared code. Now, Xamarin.Essentials has overcome the problem. The developers can access every native platform API using C#. This plugin provides many APIs so initially, there is no need of more plugins for Xamarin. Xamarin.Essentials plugin impacts your app's minimum size.

Platform Support

Xamarin.Essentials supports platforms and operating systems,

Platform	Version
Android	4.4 (API 19) or earlier
iOS	10.0 or higher
UWP	10.0.16299.0 or earlier

Prerequisites

• Visual Studio 2017(Windows or Mac)

Setting up a Xamarin.Forms Project

Start by creating a new Xamarin.Forms project. You’ll learn more by going through the steps yourself.

Choose the Xamarin.Forms App Project type, under Cross-platform/App in the New Project dialog.

 

Name your app, select “Use Portable Class Library” for shared code, and target both - Android and iOS.

 

You probably want your project and solution to use the same name as your app. Put it in your preferred folder for projects and click "Create".

 

You now have a basic Xamarin.Forms app. Click the Play button to try it out.

 

Setting up the User Interface

Go to MainPage.Xaml and write the following code.

MainPage.xaml

1. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>  
2. <ContentPage xmlns="http://xamarin.com/schemas/2014/forms"  
3.              xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2009/xaml"  
4.              xmlns:local="clr-namespace:XamarinEssentials"  
5.              x:Class="XamarinEssentials.MainPage">  
6.   
7.     <StackLayout>  
8.         <StackLayout HorizontalOptions="Center" VerticalOptions="Start">  
9.   
10.          <Image Margin="0,50,0,0" x:Name="imgBanner" Source="banner.png" ></Image>  
11.          <Image Margin="0,0,0,10" x:Name="imgXamarinEssential" Source="xamarinessential.png" ></Image>  
12.          <Label Margin="0,0,0,10" FontAttributes="Bold" FontSize="Large" TextColor="#CA6F1E" HorizontalTextAlignment="Center" Text="Text To Speech"></Label>  
13.          <Entry x:Name="txtInpout" Placeholder="Type what i should say"></Entry>  
14.          <Button x:Name="btnSpeak" Text="Speak" Clicked="btnSpeak_Clicked" />  
15.         </StackLayout>  
16.     </StackLayout>  
17.   
18. </ContentPage>  

Add Xamarin Essentials

In this step, add Xamarin.Essentials to your project. You can install Xamarin.Essentials via NuGet, or you can browse the source code on GitHub.

Go to Solution Explorer and select your solution. Right-click and select "Manage NuGet Packages for Solution". Search "Xamarin.Essentials" and add Package. Remember to install it for each project (PCL, Android, iO, and UWP).

Xamarin.Essentials requires platform-specific setup

Android

The following steps are necessary for Android.

1. Xamarin.Essentials supports a minimum Android version of 4.4
2. Target Android version for compiling must be 8.1, API level 27.

In the Android project's MainActivity that is launched Xamarin.Essentials must be initialized in the OnCreate method.

MainActivity.cs

1. Xamarin.Essentials.Platform.Init(this, bundle);  

Xamarin.Essentials must receive any OnRequestPermissionsResult. write the following code for runtime permission.

MainActivity.cs

1. public override void OnRequestPermissionsResult(int requestCode, string[] permissions, [GeneratedEnum] Android.Content.PM.Permission[] grantResults)  
2. {  
3.     Xamarin.Essentials.Platform.OnRequestPermissionsResult(requestCode, permissions, grantResults);  
4.   
5.     base.OnRequestPermissionsResult(requestCode, permissions, grantResults);  
6. }   

iOS

No additional setup required.

UWP

No additional setup required.

In this step, write the following code for Text to Speech.

MainPage.xaml.cs

1. using Xamarin.Essentials;  
2. namespace XamarinEssentials  
3. {  
4.     public partial class MainPage : ContentPage  
5.     {  
6.         public MainPage()  
7.         {  
8.             InitializeComponent();  
9.         }  
10.         protected override void OnAppearing()  
11.         {  
12.             base.OnAppearing();  
13.         }  
14.   
15.         async void btnSpeak_Clicked(object sender, System.EventArgs e)  
16.         {  
17.             await TextToSpeech.SpeakAsync(txtInpout.Text);  
18.         }  
19.     }  
20. }   

Click the play button to try it out.

SpeakMultiple

Now, write the following code for Multiple Speak

MainPage.xaml.cs

1. bool isBusy = false;  
2. public void SpeakMultiple()  
3. {  
4.     isBusy = true;  
5.     Task.Run(async () =>  
6.     {  
7.         await TextToSpeech.SpeakAsync("Hello World 1");  
8.         await TextToSpeech.SpeakAsync("Hello World 2");  
9.         await TextToSpeech.SpeakAsync("Hello World 3");  
10.         isBusy = false;  
11.     });  
12.   
13.       
14.     Task.WhenAll(  
15.         TextToSpeech.SpeakAsync("Hello World 1"),  
16.         TextToSpeech.SpeakAsync("Hello World 2"),  
17.         TextToSpeech.SpeakAsync("Hello World 3"))  
18.         .ContinueWith((t) => { isBusy = false; }, TaskScheduler.FromCurrentSynchronizationContext());  
19. }  

Click the play button to try it out.

Speech Settings

Now, write the following code for Speak Settings

MainPage.xaml.cs

1. public async Task SpeakNow()  
2. {  
3.     var settings = new SpeakSettings()  
4.         {  
5.             Volume = .50,  
6.             Pitch = 2.0  
7.         };  
8.   
9.     await TextToSpeech.SpeakAsync("Hello Xamarin", settings);  
10. }   

Click the play button to try it out.