Speech dialog method and device

• US 20070055524A1
• Filed: 09/08/2005
• Published: 03/08/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 09/08/2005
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Motorola, Inc. (Motorola Solutions, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Motorola, Inc. (Motorola Solutions, Inc.)
• Inventors: Huang, Jian-Cheng, Cao, Zhen-Hai, Zu, Yi-Qing
• Application Number:
  US11/222,215
• Publication Number:
  US 20070055524A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 704/257
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 13/04 Details of speech synthesis systems, e.g. synthesiser structure or memory management
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/22 Procedures used during a speech recognition process, e.g. man-machine dialogue

Abstract

An electronic device (200) for speech dialog includes functions that receive (205, 105) an utterance that includes an instantiated variable (215), perform voice recognition (210, 115, 120) of the instantiated variable to determine a most likely set of acoustic states (220) and a corresponding sequence of phonemes with stress information (215), determine prosodic characteristics (272, 274, 276, 130) for a synthesized value of the instantiated variable (236) from the sequence of phonemes with stress information and a set of stored prosody models. The electronic device generates (335, 140) a synthesized value of the instantiated variable using the most likely set of acoustic states and the prosodic characteristics of the instantiated variable.

Claims

1. A method for speech dialog, comprising:

receiving an utterance that includes an instantiated variable;

performing voice recognition of the instantiated variable to determine a most likely set of acoustic states and a corresponding sequence of phonemes with stress information;

determining prosodic characteristics for a synthesized value of the instantiated variable from the corresponding sequence of phonemes with stress information and a set of stored prosody models; and

generating a synthesized value of the instantiated variable using the most likely set of acoustic states and the prosodic characteristics.

2. The method for speech dialog according to claim 1, wherein the set of stored prosody models includes speech unit models for pitch, energy, and duration.

3. The method for speech dialog according to claim 1, wherein the performing of the voice recognition of the instantiated variable comprises:

determining acoustic characteristics of the instantiated variable; and

using a mathematical model of stored values and the acoustic characteristics to determine the most likely set of acoustic states and the corresponding sequence of phonemes.

4. The method for speech dialog according to claim 3, wherein the mathematical model of stored lookup values is a hidden Markov model.

5. An electronic device for speech dialog, comprising:

means for receiving an utterance that includes an instantiated variable;

means for performing voice recognition of the instantiated variable to determine a most likely set of acoustic states and a corresponding sequence of phonemes with stress information;

means for determining prosodic characteristics for a synthesized value of the instantiated variable from the corresponding sequence of phonemes with stress information and a set of stored prosody models; and

means for generating a synthesized value of the instantiated variable using the most likely set of acoustic states and the prosodic characteristics.

6. The electronic device for speech dialog according to claim 5, wherein the set of stored prosody models includes speech unit models for pitch, energy, and duration.

7. The electronic device for speech dialog according to claim 5, wherein the means for performing voice recognition of the instantiated variable comprises:

means for determining acoustic characteristics of the instantiated variable; and

means for using a stored model of acoustic states and the acoustic characteristics to determine the most likely set of acoustic states and the corresponding sequence of phonemes.

8. The electronic device for speech dialog according to claim 5, wherein generating the synthesized value of the instantiated variable is performed when a metric of the most likely set of acoustic states meets a criterion, and further comprising:

means for presenting an acoustically stored out-of-vocabulary response phrase when the metric of the most likely set of acoustic states fails to meet the criterion.

9. A media that includes a stored set of program instructions, comprising:

a function for receiving an utterance that includes an instantiated variable;

a function for performing voice recognition of the instantiated variable to determine a most likely set of acoustic states and a corresponding sequence of phonemes with stress information;

a function for determining prosodic characteristics for a synthesized value of the instantiated variable from the sequence of phonemes with stress information and a set of stored prosody models; and

a function for generating a synthesized value of the instantiated variable using the most likely set of acoustic states and the prosodic characteristics.

10. The media according to claim 9, wherein the set of stored prosody models includes speech unit models for pitch, energy, and duration.

11. The media according to claim 9, wherein the function for performing the voice recognition of the instantiated variable comprises:

a function for determining acoustic characteristics of the instantiated variable; and

a function for using a mathematical model of stored lookup values and the acoustic characteristics to determine the most likely set of acoustic states and the corresponding sequence of phonemes.

12. The method for speech dialog according to claim 9, wherein the mathematical model of stored lookup values is a hidden Markov model.

13. The media according to claim 9, wherein the function of generating the synthesized value of the instantiated variable is performed when a metric of the most likely set of acoustic states meets a criterion, and further comprising:

a function for presenting an acoustically stored out-of-vocabulary response phrase when the metric of the most likely set of acoustic states fails to meet the criterion.