[gnuspeech-contact] Re: GnuSpeech Text-To-Speech Server

[Dalmazio Brisinda]

Hi David,

Just an update. I've temporarily resolved the punctuation issues. The  
issue was that the TTSParser class in the GnuSpeech framework was not  
quite finished as there are still a few clearly marked TODO's in the  
source documentation. Until these can be looked at more closely, I've  
just added a quick fix to provide more flexible handling of  
punctuation so that all punctuation-ladden text will now render  
instead of resulting in a "bzzzzt" synthesis error embedded within the  
speech from pronunciation lookup failure. I've clearly marked those  
minor changes to indicate it is only a temporary fix.

Clearly, someone has a sense of humor... ;)

Best,
dalmazio



On 6-Jan-09, at 2:10 AM, Dalmazio Brisinda wrote:

> Hi David,
>
> Some good news. We've got a basic text-to-speech server operational.  
> I've extracted the required bits from Monet and placed them in their  
> own server process using the Distributed Objects architecture, and  
> created this server as an OS X LaunchDaemon (the recommended way).  
> So there is now a simple Distributed Objects interface and an  
> example client application that shows how to invoke the speech  
> synthesis functionality programmatically. Will fill out the  
> functionality on the server shortly though, currently only the  
> "speak text" functionality is operational.
>
> Also, I've created a Service for the speech synthesis functionality,  
> so it can be accessed from any application on OS X. Just select the  
> text in the application in question, go into the application's main  
> menu and click Services->GnuSpeech->Speak Text. (Incidentally,  
> Apple's own speech service is available at Services->Speech->Start  
> Speaking Text).
>
> Now, I haven't done any work on the actual parser. I noticed that  
> whenever there is punctuation in the string adjacent to the word, it  
> treats it as a single word, and there is no entry for such a word 
> +punctuation. It looks like this portion of the parser/filter was  
> temporarily  turned-off due to some complexity/incompatibility in  
> the way codes were inserted into strings. I'll see if I can have a  
> closer look at this shortly.
>
> I've committed everything so far to the repository including  
> installation instructions (README.txt) for the time being, as  
> installation of the GNU text-to-speech server and service are not  
> especially transparent. That is, until an automated installation  
> process can be fashioned.
>
> Best,
> Dalmazio
> >