Aural style sheets use a combination of speech synthesis and sound effects to make the user listen to information, instead of reading information.
The aural presentation converts the document to plain text and feed this to a
screen reader (a program that reads all the characters on the screen).
The example above will make the speech synthesizer play a sound, then speak the headers in a very rich male voice.
The "CSS" column indicates in which CSS version the property is defined (CSS1 or CSS2).
| Property |
Description |
Values |
CSS |
| azimuth |
Sets where the sound should come from |
angle
left-side
far-left
left
center-left
center
center-right
right
far-right
right-side
behind
leftwards
rightwards |
2 |
| cue |
Sets the cue properties
in one declaration |
cue-before
cue-after |
2 |
| cue-after |
Specifies a sound to be played after speaking an element's
content |
none
url |
2 |
| cue-before |
Specifies a sound to be played before speaking an element's
content |
none
url |
2 |
| elevation |
Sets where the sound should come from |
angle
below
level
above
higher
lower |
2 |
| pause |
Sets the pause properties
in one declaration |
pause-before
pause-after |
2 |
| pause-after |
Specifies a pause after speaking an element's content |
time
% |
2 |
| pause-before |
Specifies a pause before speaking an element's content |
time
% |
2 |
| pitch |
Specifies the speaking voice |
frequency
x-low
low
medium
high
x-high |
2 |
| pitch-range |
Specifies the variation in the speaking voice. (Monotone
voice or animated voice?) |
number |
2 |
| play-during |
Specifies a sound to be played while speaking an element's
content |
auto
none
url
mix
repeat |
2 |
| richness |
Specifies the richness of the speaking voice. (Rich voice
or thin voice?) |
number |
2 |
| speak |
Specifies whether content will render aurally |
normal
none
spell-out |
2 |
| speak-header |
Specifies how to handle table headers. Should the headers
be spoken before every cell, or only before a cell with a different header
than the previous cell |
always
once
|
2 |
| speak-numeral |
Specifies how to speak numbers |
digits
continuous |
2 |
| speak-punctuation |
Specifies how to speak punctuation characters |
none
code |
2 |
| speech-rate |
Specifies the speed of the speaking |
number
x-slow
slow
medium
fast
x-fast
faster
slower |
2 |
| stress |
Specifies the "stress" in the speaking voice |
number |
2 |
| voice-family |
Specifies the voice family of the speaking |
specific-voice
generic-voice |
2 |
| volume |
Specifies the volume of the speaking |
number
%
silent
x-soft
soft
medium
loud
x-loud |
2 |
