Ricoh Company, Ltd.

Tetsuya Muroi

Yoshinaga Kato

Junichi Takami

Tetsuya Sakayori

Yoshifumi Sakuramata

Yuichi Kojima

Hiroo Kitagawa

Junichiroh Fujimoto

Takashi Ariyoshi

Jun-Ichiroh Fujimoto

Lu Bin

Iwao Saeki

Bin Lu

Seigou Yasuda

Toshiki Kawamoto

An image finish information generation unit included in an image-forming system is configured to generate an expected image finish and an input setting screen to be used for receiving setting inputs from an operator based on image data obtained by reading a document by a scanner or through a network, and to instruct a display unit to display the image finish and the setting screen before print processing. If the operator makes further setting inputs through the input setting screen, another expected image finish screen is generated and displayed, incorporating the setting inputs. Through a spatial item identification unit and a language item identification unit, spatial position information received by a touch panel is identified as a spatial setting item, and voice information through a microphone is recognized by the language item identification as a language setting item. In addition, related setting items are prepared and displayed in a hierarchy.

Image-forming system with improved workability by displaying image finish and setting items in course of processing

An operation condition inputting system employing a tree state hierarchical menu is formed by classifying various operation conditions of an apparatus by at least one function and segmentalizing the at least one function into menu items to be optionally selected by a visually-impaired person.

System, recording medium and program for inputting operation condition of instrument

An office information system having a device which provides a user with an operational message of the system is disclosed. In an embodiment of the office information system, a path record storage device stores a plurality of path records related to components of the system, each path record indicating a locating path needed to reach a location of a specific one of the components in the system when a failure related to the specific one of the components occurs. A failure location detecting device detects a location of a component in the system when a failure related to the component occurs. A reached location determining device reads a path record from the path record storage device when the location of the failure is detected, and determines a currently reached location in the system based on the path indicated by the path record. A message device generates, when the reached location is determined, an operational message needed for recovering the failure at a subsequent location in the path following the reached location.

Office information system having a device which provides an operational message of the system when a specific event occurs

In a speech segment detection method, a sequence of speech samples is provided from an input speech signal and a sequence of feature vectors is provided from the speech samples, the feature vectors having respective speech power levels. A minimum speech power among the speech power levels in the feature vector sequence is detected. Normalized speech power levels are computed based on the speech power levels and the minimum speech power. Each of the normalized speech power levels is compared with a predetermined threshold value to detect speech segments in the input speech signal. Further, a speech recognition system and method and a computer-readable medium, using the speech segment detection method, are also disclosed.

Speech segment detection and word recognition

A reference speech pattern is described as a time series of a fixed number of states. Each of states is described with one feature vector (centroid) which represents a feature quantity of a speech portion contained in the state, and a duration time of that state. Pattern matching is carried out between the time series of feature vectors of the input speech pattern and the time series of the states which describe the reference pattern. A weighting function modifies the pattern matching distance depending on differences in duration times between the input speech and the reference pattern.

Speech recognition method and apparatus

A voice or sound recognition system including a microphone for converting a voice into an electrical voice signal, a frequency analyzer for generating a voice pattern in the form of a time-frequency distribution, and a matching unit for matching the voice pattern with registered voice patterns. A voice pattern sometimes contains a bass bar section starting from the beginning of the voice pattern over a time period. In one form of the present invention, the bass bar section is detected and/or eliminated before processing the voice pattern for the purpose of registration or matching. The voice level is sometimes too strong or too weak for appropriate processing. In another form of the present invention, a voice recognition system including a voice input cancelling function is provided. In addition, a system for detecting a voice interval for use in voice data processing, including a device for determining a start point of the voice interval is provided.

Voice recognition system

A voice processing method and system using voice power is provided. A voice power signal is produced in analog format and this voice power signal is sampled at a predetermined time interval to determine its current envelope or amplitude, which is then compared with a predetermined number of voice power levels, whereby '1' is assigned to at least one of the predetermined number of voice power levels which corresponds in level to the amplitude thus determined and '0' is assigned to the rest of the predetermined number of voice power levels, thereby converting the analog voice power signal into a binary voice power pattern. In the preferred embodiment, the voice signal is also processed through a frequency analyzer including a plurality of band-pass filters different in frequency range and a binary converter to form a binary time-frequency voice distribution pattern which is then combined with the binary voice power pattern to form a combined voice pattern. As a modification, a voice power range is determined by multiplying a predetermined threshold to the amplitude, and the voice power pattern is compared with the predetermined number of voice power levels.

Voice recognition system using voice power patterns

A voice recognition system includes a microphone for converting a voice in the form of pressure waves into an electrical voice signal and a keyboard for inputting the phonetic spelling of the voice. A check mechanism is connected to the keyboard to determine whether or not the voice has a predetermined sound element, which is difficult to be detected, such as /u/, /i/, /n/ and explosives like /p/, /t/, /k/ and /b/, at or near the end thereof. If the check mechanism has determined the presence of such a predetermined sound element, then it checks the corresponding voice pattern to see whether the corresponding component is present in the pattern or not. If not, a warning may be issued to request reinputting of the voice, thereby insuring the fact that the voice pattern to be registered as a reference voice pattern is always accurate.

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Kanagawa, Japan

Tetsuya Muroi