[nvda] just sharing an experience, NVDA , SAPI 5 and thinstall VS

Hello,

Found about the commercial software Thinstall VS some weeks back.
It's a software that allow to create a virtual host environment so that one can create self-executable applications to execute on USB keys , without affecting the PC taht execute the software in anyway, so it do not change the registry, etc.etc.
basically, thinstall inspect your system before and after software installation, and compile the changes into an .exe file 
with many possible advanced options.
Don't want to promote piracy in any way here, but it's for example possible to make a portable, version of such software as Nero Burning Rom, MS Office, and so on.
so I thought, since many french NVDA users are unhappy with the default Espeak personally I like it a lot, but I guess I'm in the minority LOL. so I wanted to package an installed NVDA with a light Nuance SAPI 5 french voice
well. it took me many hours of testing, about 5 to 6 hours actually, because the Thinstall people recommand to virtualize a software from a very clean Windows XP, so basically, a brand new windows install.
so I had to install and eventually re-install Win XP afew times. My goodness, I can haave an automated CD to do this.... 

Well now, the result are not so surprizing,
but if one don't try, one can't be sure.
so basically, the packaged NVDA + SAPI 5 voice do execute on another machine 
it's even surprisingly fast to execute à 30 MB nvda.exe file.
, the speech start, the NVDA interface do show up, but basically, due probably to the virtualisation technic, NVDA is very slow to respond to command and navigation in Windows, 
worse, it's not possible to interrupt speech.
This is not due to the SAPI 5 speech, cause the internal Espeak won't do better in this case.
it's not very surprizing, because the screen reader probably don't have direct access to the OS api, it passes true the virtual system or similar.... but I wanted to make sure this was not possible, because I promized some people to try it....
nevertheless, navigation in the NVDA interface screen with jfw for example works flowlessly, 
so it's not an interface issue here.

anyway,
wanted to share this little experience with you, before some other mad people like me spend many hours doing this....
and btw, Have a happy new year 2008. seems that NVDA devs are working quite fast these past weeks... 


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