Vlingo on OG Droid

Have you heard of Vlingo? It's an application that works with Android, iPhone, Blackberry, and Nokia and allows you to transcribe emails, text messages and make phone calls with using your voice. It can also read your e-mails and your text messages to you using SafeReader, a setting within Vlingo.

Some people have been having trouble with getting Vlingo to read text messages or e-mail on Android. Here's how to do it.

1. Download Vlingo from the Android Market Place.
2. Open Vlingo
3. Tap your phone's menu button
4. Tap "Settings"
5. Under "Behavior", tap "SafeReader settings"
6. Ensure "Play texts" is selected.
7. Tap "Play email" to put a check mark on it.
8. Tap "Email accounts" to add an email account.
You can add a GMail, Windows Live Hotmail, Yahooo! Mail, AOL/AIM Mail, or "Other" email account. If you click "Other" you have to manually specify your account settings. It supports IMAP, and POP3. IMAP and POP both support SSL and TLS and allow you to change the port. You can add more than one email account.
9. After you've setup your account, go back to the Vlingo main page. At the top left of the screen you'll see a speaker. If it has an "x", that means SafeReader is turned off. Click on the speaker to turn on SafeReader (it should now have sound waves next to it, and you should hear a voice that says, "SafeReader is now turned on").
10. Vlingo should now read back your texts AND emails. It will read both texts and emails to you in regular mode, and InCar mode as well.

It seems that it will not read back to you over Bluetooth. It will respond to you over speakerphone.

If you have a BlueAnt Q2 it reads EVERYTHING back to you over the Bluetooth headset. I just got mine, tested and it works!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As far as I can tell after a couple of hours of searching, this is the only app in the Android Market Place that "reads" back your emails to you. It seems to read my work emails OK.

As of December 2011, Nuance is moving to acquire Vlingo. I'm optimistic that this is going to improve Vlingo (my hope is that they will be able to get Vlingo to speak through Bluetooth).

Test it out, and let me know what you think, or if you have found a better app on Android.