[Balabolka's Substitute] How I Use Reader View to Enjoy Microsoft Edge's Read Aloud in Linux

Introduction

Earlier this year I wrote Bimodal Reading in Balabolka, Microsoft Edge’s Read Aloud, and Audible’s Immersion Reading. For my brief introduction please see Microsoft Edge’s Read Aloud.

Ever since I switched to Linux, I’d been searching for a Balabolka substitute for a long time. The search was over for me. In terms of convenience, it was just as good as my old F7_SuperMemo_to_Balabolka.ahk, but Microsoft’s AI-generated voices is phenomenal. This guide is for Linux users who would like to do Bimodal Reading as convenient as possible.

Requirements

1. ydotool

It’s a command-line automation tool. If you’re on Xorg, use xdotool.

2. pandoc

We use pandoc to convert markdown to html.

3. Microsoft Edge version 98.0.1108.62

The latest Edge version in Linux doesn’t have Read Aloud. Read Aloud is only available on version 98.0.1108.62. We need this exact version. If you’re on Arch Linux:

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git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/microsoft-edge-stable-bin.git
cd microsoft-edge-stable-bin
git checkout fbccfd8fd911193c20bd4a19679133c182e64cf7
makepkg -si

Update: reader-view version 0.6.9 broke on Edge 98.0.1108.62. I’d to upgrade Edge to version 108.0.1462.54 and reader-view works again in Edge.

4. Reader View

Please use the below setting. If not, change it as you see fit and change the clipboard-to-html.sh script as well.

Setup

1. Global shortcut

In my ~/.config/sway/config.d/default, I have the following keybinding:

bindsym $mod+e exec /home/username/.local/bin/clipboard-to-html.sh

Whenever I press Super+e, it executes the clipboard-to-html script.

2. Create the following directories and files

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cd ~/Documents/books/clipboard/
touch clipboard.md index.html

3. Create clipboard-to-html.sh

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#!/bin/bash

# Available key names
# See /usr/include/linux/input-event-codes.h

src="/home/username/Documents/books/clipboard/clipboard.md"
output="/home/username/Documents/books/clipboard/index.html"

# 1. clipboard content to file
wl-paste >$src

# 2. pandoc convert md to html
pandoc -s -f markdown -t html5 -o $output $src -c style.css --wrap=none

# 3. get rid of smart quotes
sed -i -e "s/[$(echo -ne '\u2018\u2019')]/\'/g" -e "s/[$(echo -ne '\u201C\u201D')]/\"/g" $output

# 4. focus Edge
swaymsg "[app_id=\"microsoft-edge\"] focus"

# Esc twice to exit reader-view
ydotool key 1:1 1:0
sleep 0.1
ydotool key 1:1 1:0
sleep 0.5
# Alt-2 to focus tab
ydotool key 56:1 3:1 3:0 56:0
sleep 0.5
# Ctrl-r to reload the browser
ydotool key 29:1 19:1 19:0 29:0
sleep 0.5
# Ctrl-e to start `reader-view`
ydotool key 29:1 18:1 18:0 29:0
sleep 0.5
# `a` to start voice
ydotool key 30:1 30:0

Try to run clipboard-to-html.sh in the terminal to see if it works.

4. Start a local server

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cd ~/Documents/books/clipboard/
python3 -m http.server 8000

We use python to start a local server. Visit http://0.0.0.0:8000/ to see if you can connect to it.

5. Now try it! Copy something to the clipboard with C-c, then press Super+e to trigger the script.

From the video, I only press C-c to copy the content I want, then press Super+e to trigger the global script. The rest is automated from the script.

This also works for local epub.

1. Use Calibre to convert epub to html.
2. Go to the output folder and start another python server with a different port (e.g., python3 -m http.server 8001).
3. Visit http://0.0.0.0:8001/ to enjoy reading

Conclusion

I hope this is helpful. Feel free to comment and start a disucssion below.