AUDIO OUTPUT OF A DOCUMENT FROM MOBILE DEVICE

• US 20100153114A1
• Filed: 12/12/2008
• Published: 06/17/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 12/12/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Wang, Chih-Chung, Shih, Sheng-Yao, Kung, Yun-Chiang, Che, Chiwei
• Granted Patent: US 8,121,842 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 704/260
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/106 Display of layout of documents; Previewing
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 13/00 Speech synthesis; Text to speech systems
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 13/02 Methods for producing synthetic speech; Speech synthesisers

Abstract

Architecture for playing a document converted into an audio format to a user of an audio-output capable device. The user can interact with the device to control play of the audio document such as pause, rewind, forward, etc. In more robust implementation, the audio-output capable device is a mobile device (e.g., cell phone) having a microphone for processing voice input. Voice commands can then be input to control play (“reading”) of the document audio file to pause, rewind, read paragraph, read next chapter, fast forward, etc. A communications server (e.g., email, attachments to email, etc.) transcodes text-based document content into an audio format by leveraging a text-to-speech (TTS) engine. The transcoded audio files are then transferred to mobile devices through viable transmission channels. Users can then play the audio-formatted document while freeing hand and eye usage for other tasks.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented data presentation system, comprising:

a transcoding component for converting text of a document into audio signals;

a communications component for communicating the audio signals to a mobile client for audio presentation; and

a control component for controlling the presentation of the audio signals based on received commands.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the transcoding component includes a text-to-speech engine for converting the text into the audio signals, which are voice signals.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the text of the document includes text of a word processing document, a spreadsheet document, a presentation document, email content, email header information, email related information, or email attachment.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the communications component streams the audio signals to the mobile client.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the received commands originate from a vehicle-based client.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the received commands are generated from speech input to the mobile client.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the received commands are generated based on tactile interaction with the mobile client.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the communications component receives the commands and communicates the audio signals to the mobile client via at least one of a cellular carrier or an IP-based communications technology.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the transcoding component converts the text of the document into the audio signals in response to selection of document information on the mobile client.

10. A computer-implemented data presentation system, comprising:

a transcoding component for converting text of a document into a speech file in response to request of the document by a mobile client;

a communications component for receiving the request and communicating the speech file to the mobile client for audio output; and

a control component for controlling the presentation of the speech file based on commands received from the mobile client.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the text of the document includes text of a word processing document, a spreadsheet document, a presentation document, email content, email header information, email related information, or email attachment, which are converted into the speech file for audio output at the mobile client.

12. The system of claim 10, wherein the communications component streams the speech to the mobile client over an IP-based communications channel in response to commands originated from speech input to the mobile client, the commands facilitate navigation of the document text via navigation of the speech file relative to a starting point and an ending point of the speech file.

13. The system of claim 10, wherein the control component receives and processes commands that facilitate navigation of the document text by character, word, sentence, paragraph, page, data type, and document type.

14. The system of claim 10, wherein the control component receives a request in response to selection of document information on the mobile client, the transcoding component converts the text of the document into speech in response to the request, and the communications component streams the speech to the mobile client for audio output.

15. A computer-implemented method of presenting data, comprising:

receiving a request for data from a mobile client;

converting the data into a speech file in response to the request;

communicating speech data of the speech file to the mobile client; and

controlling presentation of the speech data based on commands received from the mobile client.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising streaming the speech file to the mobile client over an IP-based communications channel or a cellular carrier to the mobile client.

17. The method of claim 15, further comprising:

retrieving the data from a data source; and

processing commands that facilitate navigation of the data by at least one of character, word, sentence, paragraph, page, data type, or document type.

18. The method of claim 15, wherein the commands are input via speech signals to the mobile client.

19. The method of claim 15, further comprising converting the data using a test-to-speech engine.

20. The method of claim 15, further comprising navigating through the data, which is a document, via voice commends to the mobile client.