uploading media (audio) without excel

[kraemder]

I love your app. I think it was the 1st app I bought when I got my ipod and I've bought tons of other paid apps for my language learning hobby and yours is the best and really cheap too. Awesome.

I'm trying to take my decks to the next level by adding audio but I don't have Excel. Well I have the viewer that's free to download but can't edit. I tried just making the 1st line of the text file I pasted into the website correspond to the Text 1 and Text 2 and Sound 1 etc. It failed utterly. Is Excel required to upload media? I've had no problems doing 3/4 sided cards with just notepad. Here's what I cut and pasted. I use tab as the deliminator. Any help appreciated.

Text 1 Text 2 Sound 1
dekiru to be done dekiru.mp3
okiru to get up okiru.mp3
akiru to lose interest akiru.mp3
ochiru to fall ochiru.mp3
oriru to get off oriru.mp3
mochiiru to use mochiiru.mp3
nasaru to do nasaru.mp3
neru to sleep neru.mp3
nugu to take off nugu.mp3
toru to take toru.mp3
kaku to write kaku.mp3
motsu to have motsu.mp3
shiru to know shiru.mp3
tanoshimu to enjoy tanoshimu.mp3
yobu to call yobu.mp3
susumu to adavance susumu.mp3
deru to come out deru.mp3
utsusu to copy utsusu.mp3
katsu to win katsu.mp3
mieru to be seen mieru.mp3
oboeru to memorize oboeru.mp3
aruku to walk aruku.mp3
hajimeru to begin hajimeru.mp3
owaru to finish owaru.mp3
asobu to play asobu.mp3
kiku to listen/hear kiku.mp3

[kraemder]

Well I solved my own problem (sort of). I got a free Spreadsheet program at download.com - openoffice.org
Not sure why using the spreadsheet would matter but it works.

And I love the audio!!!! I have TextAloud mp3 and a japanese voice and it's pretty easy to make it read a list of words to mp3 files. Not quite as good as a native speaker doing it for me but still really nice.

[Ernie]

You can also try Google Docs, which is an online spreadsheet. This will make it easy to import and export between the app and the spreadsheet.

You don't need to use a spreadsheet. Your text looks fine, so I really can't tell why it didn't work for you, or what exactly didn't work. If you want, you can attach your .txt file here or email me at et@orangeorapple.com and I can see what might be going on. Another think you can try... you are using my website to upload, right? After uploading, go to the Export page and download the text file it offers you and compare to what your text file looks like.

In a few weeks I might be offering Japanese TTS capability, where you can download the sound files from within the app. Check back in a couple weeks if you want to see if you can try it out. I'll be interested to hear how my Japanese sounds compare to other TTS software.

[kraemder]

I will definitely check back for TTS support within the app. That is really awesome. I am trying to add some really big decks from quizlet and I'm a little bummed that the media upload feature didn't like the Japanese characters in the media file names. Just gonna take a peek and see if others have discussed this. I like using the spreadsheet to format my files so I am not worried about troubleshooting the notepad method.

[kraemder]

Ok I just spent the better part of the afternoon setting up audio for this deck on quizlet... 752 cards. My 1st deck was 20 cards or so using romaji and that was so much simpler. This one uses the hirigana and katakana alphabets. I need to learn how to use spreadsheets better - I ended up doing a ton of repetitive tasks that I know the computer could have done for me ugh. But the deck is done thankfully and it seems to work great.

If anyone's good at spreadsheets here's what I'm trying to figure out how to do - make it so that it fills in the "Sound 1" column for me. My TextAloudmp3 program auto names files Deck_1, Deck_2, Deck_3 etc. So I was thinking entering a formula like "Deck_"#ROW()-1".mp3" would work and have openoffice fill column C without me having to type that formula in every cell. I am gonna work on this and if I figure it out I'll post here again. I don't know if this is something other people are dealing with. Unfortunately I don't know a thing about writing formulas yet and that one isn't working nor have I figured out how to make the spreadsheet fill up all the cells in my column without me manually pasting it.

[kraemder]

I got the spreadsheet to do what I wanted (thank god). It took a while. I found an old Excel for dummies book that had the info I needed. Youtube is great for general info on how to get into excel but for something specific I think you really need to break open a reference book. If anyone else is using TextAloud3 to make sound files and wants me to post it just reply here.

[Ernie]

Hey kraemder. Ok, glad you got it working. Getting familiar with a spreadsheet and it's formulas can really be beneficial (after you get through the learning process).