The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Feb. 13, 2001
Filed:
Sep. 02, 1998
Gary Robert Hanson, Palm Beach Gardens, FL (US);
International Business Machines Corp., Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
In a TTS system external to a TTS engine, a method for dynamically altering text-to-speech (TTS) attributes of a TTS engine not inherently capable of dynamic attribute alteration is disclosed. The method of the invention can include several steps beginning with the step of representing in the external system a resettable start word position value by a first variable. Second, a current word position offset value can be represented in the external system by a second variable. Third, the second variable can be updated in the external system each time a word of the specified text is played back. Fourth, the TTS playback can be stopped in response to a user request to alter the TTS attribute. Fifth, after stopping the TTS playback, the TTS engine attribute can be altered. Also, after stopping the TTS playback, the first variable can be replaced in the external system with a new start word position value corresponding to the next successive unplayed word of the specified text. Finally, playback of the text can be restarted in accordance with the new word start position value to play back the next successive unplayed word.