INFORMATION PROCESSING APPARATUS AND TEXT-TO-SPEECH METHOD

• US 20100174545A1
• Filed: 12/17/2009
• Published: 07/08/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 01/08/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Alpine Electronics Incorporated (Alps Alpine Co., Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Alpine Electronics Incorporated (Alps Alpine Co., Ltd.)
• Inventors: Otani, Michiaki
• Granted Patent: US 8,719,028 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 704/260
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 13/00 Speech synthesis; Text to speech systems
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/26 Speech to text systems G10L15/08 takes precedence

Abstract

An information processing apparatus for playing back data includes an oral reading unit, a storage unit storing text templates for responses to questions from a user and text template conversion rules, an input unit for inputting a question from a user, and a control unit for retrieving data and items of information associated with the data. The control unit analyzes a question about a data from a user, for example, a question about a tune, to select a text template for a response to the question and detects the characters in items of tune information of the tune. The characters are designated to replace replacement symbols included in the text template. The control unit also converts the text template based on whether the characters can be read aloud, generates a text to be read aloud using the converted text template, and causes the oral reading unit to read the text aloud.

Claims

1. An information processing apparatus in communication with an apparatus storing data, the information processing apparatus comprising:

an oral reading unit that converts text to speech data to output the speech data;

an input unit for inputting a question;

a storage unit that stores text templates for responses to the questions input by the input unit and stores text template conversion rules; and

a control unit that retrieves data and items of information associated with the data from the apparatus storing the data,

wherein the control unit analyzes a question about a from a user to select a text template for a response to the question, detects characters in items of information of the data where the characters replace replacement symbols included in the text template to convert the text template to a new text template based on whether the characters can be read aloud, generates a text to be read aloud using the converted new text template, and causes the oral reading unit to read the text aloud.

2. The information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the data is tune data and wherein the control unit selects the text template in a manner that depends on a genre of a tune that is a subject of the question.

3. The information processing apparatus according to claim 2, wherein, upon determining that one of the items of the tune information cannot be read aloud, the control unit generates a text using the text template, from which a modifier equivalent portion of the text template, including a replacement symbol to be replaced with the item of the tune information is removed, or generates a text using a new text template.

4. The information processing apparatus according to claim 3, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, an artist name cannot be read aloud, the control unit generates a text using the text template from which a modifier equivalent portion of the text template, including a replacement symbol to be replaced with the artist name, is removed.

5. The information processing apparatus according to claim 3, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, an album name cannot be read aloud, the control unit generates a text using the text template from which a modifier equivalent portion of the text template, including a replacement symbol to be replaced with the album name, is removed.

6. The information processing apparatus according to claim 3, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, a tune name cannot be read aloud, the control unit extracts, from the storage unit, a new text template including a replacement symbol to be replaced with an artist name of the tune as a first component and a new text template including a replacement symbol to be replaced with an album name of the tune as a second component and generates a text using the new text templates.

7. The information processing apparatus according to claim 3, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, only an artist name can be read aloud, the control unit extracts, from the storage unit, a new text template including a replacement symbol to be replaced with the artist name as a component and generates a text using the new text template.

8. The information processing apparatus according to claim 3, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, only an album name can be read aloud, the control unit extracts, from the storage unit, a new text template including a replacement symbol to be replaced with the album name as a component and generates a text using the new text template.

9. The information processing apparatus according to claim 3, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, only a tune name can be read aloud, the control unit generates a text using the text template, from which a modifier equivalent portion of the text template including a replacement symbol to be replaced with an artist name of the tune, and a modifier equivalent portion of the text template including a replacement symbol to be replaced with an album name of the tune are removed.

10. The information processing apparatus according to claim 9, wherein each of the modifier equivalent portions is a prepositional phrase equivalent portion including a replacement symbol to be replaced with a predetermined item of tune information and a preposition.

11. A text-to-speech method comprising the steps of:

a) analyzing a question received by an information processing apparatus about data stored in a storage unit, wherein the information processing apparatus is configured to convert text data to speech data;

b) extracting a text template corresponding to the question from predetermined text templates for responses to questions stored in the storage unit;

c) detecting characters in items of information associated with the data, the characters being designated to replace replacement symbols included in the template text;

d) converting the text template to a new text template based on whether the characters designated to replace the replacement symbols can be read aloud;

e) generating a text to be read aloud by replacing the replacement symbols in the converted new text template with the designated characters; and

f) converting the text to speech data for output of the speech data.

12. The text-to-speech method according to claim 11, wherein the data is tune data, and the text-to-speech method further comprises:

selecting candidates for the text template from the text templates for responses stored in the storage unit, wherein the candidates are selected for a response to the question,

detecting a genre of a tune that is a subject of the question by analyzing the tune information corresponding to the tune, and

selecting a text template corresponding to the genre from the candidates for the text template.

13. The text-to-speech method according to claim 12, further comprising:

g) determining whether any one of the items of the tune information corresponding to the tune cannot be read aloud, and

h) converting the text template to the new text template upon determining that one of the items of the tune information cannot be read aloud.

14. The text-to-speech method according to claim 13, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, an artist name, cannot be read aloud, the information processing apparatus converts the text template to the new text template by removing a modifier equivalent portion of the text template that includes a replacement symbol to be replaced with the artist name from the text template.

15. The text-to-speech method according to claim 13, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, an album name cannot be read aloud, the information processing apparatus converts the text template to the new text template by removing a modifier equivalent portion of the text template, including a replacement symbol to be replaced with the album name, from the text template.

16. The text-to-speech method according to claim 13, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, a tune name cannot be read aloud, the information processing apparatus extracts the new text template from the storage unit, wherein the new text template includes a replacement symbol to be replaced with an artist name of the tune as first component and a replacement symbol to be replaced with an album name of the tune as a second component.

17. The text-to-speech method according to claim 13, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, only an artist name can be read aloud, the information processing apparatus extracts the new text template including a replacement symbol to be replaced with the artist name as a component from the storage unit.

18. The text-to-speech method according to claim 13, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, only an album name can be read aloud, the information processing apparatus extracts a new text template including a replacement symbol to be replaced with the album name as a component from the storage unit.

19. The text-to-speech method according to claim 13, wherein, upon determining that, out of the items of the tune information, only a tune name can be read aloud, the information processing apparatus converts the text template to the new text template by removing a first modifier equivalent portion of the text template, including a replacement symbol to be replaced with an artist name of the tune, and a second modifier equivalent portion, including a replacement symbol to be replaced with an album name of the tune, from the text template.

20. The text-to-speech method according to claim 19, wherein each of the modifier equivalent portions is a prepositional phrase equivalent portion including a replacement symbol to be replaced with a predetermined item of tune information and a preposition.