Re:

Hi Gary, Okular the KDE pdf reader has the option in the right click 
context menu for reading the selected text. I do not use that though, it 
is not as flexible, so what I do is this
1 install jovie, it requires speech-dispatcher so install that too if is 
not installed and needed languages,
you will probably need to install espeack, others use festival but 
espeack is good enough for me I do not need natural voices since I use 
them on fast speed anyway
2 configure jovie by creating a voice, in my case I create an English 
and a Romanian voice, chose your preferred speed level I prefer them 
very fast.

3 start jovie, open the pdf or other cocument select and copy the text 
to clipboard, then right click jovie Icon in the tray and select "Speack 
Clipboard contents"
4 if you are using KDE you can assign keyboard shortcuts for jovie 
actions, so I assign some of the extra multimedia keys on my keyboard to 
jovie actions.
If you are not using KDE you can still control jovie via DBUS, so if 
your DE can run commands  you can use (with jovie running in background)
qdbus org.kde.KSpeech /KSpeech sayClipboard

I hope I remembered all the steps needed to set things up,


On 13.05.2018 08:14, Gary Kline wrote:
> =====
> Organization: Thought Unlimited.  Public service Unix since 1986.
> Of_Interest: With Thirty+ years  of service  to the  Unix  community.
>
> Folks,
>
> Excuse me if this too off-topic, but I have a slowish laptop and
> would like to know if there are any PDF utilizes that read text.
>
> [ I have had it for about two years; It has a camera.  But not
> everything compiles.  It's a Ubuntu 16.04.
>
> Thanks for  any help.
>
> gary
>