This book is the first to provide a truly understandable, non-technical overview of all the major areas in the computer processing of human speech - speech recognition, speech synthesis, speaker recognition, language identification, lip synchronization, and co-channel separation. It takes a unique, nonmathematical approach in exploring the nature of human language and its impact on the science and methodologies of computer voice technology. In one, easy-to-read source, you gain a deeper understanding of the fundamentals, uses, and applications of the technology itself and of the strengths and weaknesses of various systems. A time-saving glossary of technical terms is included. The book's intuitive approach uses illustrations, analogies, and both historical and state-of-the-art descriptions to explain relatively profound concepts. Specifically, it helps you: Learn the professional jargon used in different areas of speech processing; Evaluate speech processing systems for specific applications; Understand how the various technologies of speech processing actually work; Identify practical applications for speech technology in the commercial world; Relate speech technology to actual spoken language. This book is written for a broad range of non-technical professionals who need a better understanding of topics such as speech compression, transmission and storage, speech recognition, speech synthesis, speaker verification and identification, and facial animation. These include everyone from managers, consultants, and marketing and sales personnel, to industrial engineers and military technologists, to speech and hearing specialists and healthcare professionals, to law enforcement officials and governmental policy makers, to human-computer interface practitioners, to academicians.
About SpeechIntroduction. How Speech Is Produced. Acoustic Phonetics. Phonemics. Articulatory Processes. Representing Speech in the Computer -Introduction. Microphones. Sampling. Speech Digitization. The Frequency Domain. Speech Recognition -Introduction. Speech Recognition: What It Is; What It Isn 't. Why Speech Recognition Is Easy for Us and Difficult for Our Computers. Brief History of Speech Recognition. Three Dimensions of Speech Recognition. Units of Speech Recognition. Representing the Units. Comparing the Units. Future Challenges I. Errors. Performance Evaluation of Speech Recognizers. Error Reduction. Error Detection and Correction. Future Challenges II. Speech Synthesis -Introduction and History. Parametric Coding. Concatenative Synthesis. Text-to-Speech Processing. Concept-to-Speech. Performance Evaluation. Future Challenges. Speaker Recognition, Language Identification, and Lip Synching -Introduction to Speech Classification Problems. Speaker Recognition versus Speech Recognition. Types of Speaker Recognition. Text Dependent, Text Independent, and Text Prompted Speaker Recognition. Voiceprints. Methods of Speaker Recognition. Performance Evaluation of Speaker Recognition Systems. Future Challenges I. Language Identification. Future Challenges II. Lip Synch. Future Challenges III. Applications in Speech Recognition - Criteria for a Good Application. Damping Enthusiasm: 2001 Won 't Be 2001. Human Factors. Application Areas. Applications in Speech Synthesis - At the Tone, the Time Will Be - When To Use Text-to-Speech; When To Use Digitized Speech. Application Areas. Applications of Speaker Recognition, Language Identification, and Lip Synching - Applications in Speaker Recognition. Applications in Language Identification. Applications in Lip Synching. Glossary.
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Robert D. Rodman
Robert D. Rodman is an associate professor of computer science at North Carolina State University. The author of two books and more than a dozen professional papers, he holds a Ph.D. in linguistics from UCLA.