TGRadioBooks
TXT encoding for text to speech: keep your letters readable
To prepare a TXT file for text to speech, save a readable copy in UTF-8 and check it after reopening. First make sure the original is decoded correctly: saving garbled letters again will not restore the words. Encoding changes take place in an external text editor before you upload the file to TGRadio.
Keep the original and find the opening setting
Make a separate copy of the TXT and work with that copy. Use an editor that lets you specify the encoding when opening or reopening a file. Look for an action meaning “Open with encoding”, rather than only a setting for saving.
Inspect several sentences containing Cyrillic or other affected characters. Readable English alongside garbled Russian can indicate an encoding mismatch. For example, a Windows-1251 source may have been opened using another encoding. Confirm this from the resulting text, not the filename.
Get the original wording readable first
Reopen the unchanged copy using a suitable encoding. Test each choice against one familiar paragraph, then inspect another part of the book. Correct decoding should produce meaningful words throughout, rather than merely removing some unusual symbols.
Do not overwrite the source while the text remains garbled. If question marks or replacement characters have already been saved instead of letters, switching encodings may not recover the lost information. You may need an earlier copy or a fresh file from the sender.
Save a separate UTF-8 text file
Once the wording is correct, save with UTF-8 explicitly selected. Give the prepared copy a different name so you can distinguish it from the original. Keep it as plain text.
Renaming a file does not convert its contents. For example, changing a PDF filename to end in TXT leaves PDF data inside. Adding UTF-8 to a filename likewise changes no encoding. You need the editor’s actual save operation with UTF-8 selected.
Close and reopen the saved copy
Close the document and open the newly saved file, explicitly choosing UTF-8 if possible. Inspect its beginning, middle, and end. The editor could have displayed readable text before saving but written it with different settings.
Compare accented letters, Cyrillic “ё”, quotation marks, dashes, and several names. Check paragraph breaks too. For chapter divisions, put headings on separate lines, for example “Chapter 2. Return”. TGRadio recognizes separate Chapter, Part, Глава, and Часть lines with a number or title; arbitrary line breaks do not create chapters.
Check the prepared file by listening
Import the checked copy, select the book and voice, and press Play. Listen to a passage containing the words used in your encoding check. If you hear broken words or symbol names, reopen the uploaded file externally and inspect that passage.
TGRadio has no built-in text or pronunciation editor. Make corrections in the external copy, save it, and upload it again. Check the filename carefully so you do not select the original by mistake.