Tutorial for spoken Mail.app notifications
Inspired by the tips on creating sound files at celsius1414 
, Carla has written an excellent step-by-step tutorial on setting up spoken notifications in Mail.app using one of Mac OS X’s built-in speech capabilities.
She walks through creating the aiff files using the say command, where to store them and how to attach them to rules to pick out the emails that you especially need to know about.
For her it’s all about staying attentive to the important things at work:
I need to be hyperaware of instant activity in Jabber, email, and in many different web locations. If I’m not, I’m not helping our customers to their full due, nor immediately attentive of co-workers’ needs and questions.
The main issue is email — I need to know when email’s work-related, and when such email is from supervisors.
Check out the tutorial on her web site or on MacGeekery .
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October 3rd, 2006 at 5:32 am
I have my mail.app configured similarily, however I use aiff files generated from AT&T Natural Voices instead. They have a free website that lets you generate the files, and the voices sound much better than what is built into Mac OS X, as they are generated from bits of real voices cut up and pasted back together.
Try it here: http://www.naturalvoices.att.com/demos/
October 5th, 2006 at 5:59 am
Thanks for the pointer to my tutorial, and thanks, Nathan, for the alternative. Until Vicki came along, I never would have used an installed voice. But she sounds (the me, at any rate), pretty clear–and pleasant,