[vicsireland] Re: Copy of old mail on VICS list
- From: Mark Magennis <Mark.magennis@xxxxxxx>
- To: vicsireland@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 26 Mar 2012 14:02:10 +0100
Below is a copy of the complete mail. There wasn't an extra attachment.
NCBI have received the following request from a gentleman in the United States
who would like help in working on Irish text to speech. Can anyone give any
help, advice or encouragement?
From: Josh Kennedy <jkenn337@xxxxxxxxx>
Hi
I have started working on Irish Text to speech for blind people in
Ireland. I want to do this because Irish is part of my heritage even
though I live in the United States. I am very interested in the Irish
language. So I downloaded the free ESpeak sapi5 text to speech and in
collaboration with ESpeak's author we have a preliminary Phonemes table
for the Irish Gaelic language. Now we need help. Can someone in Ireland
please add rules for Irish numbers, glide vowels, consonants, sounds for
bh, th, dh, mh, and so on?
The phoneme data still has to be compiled. ESpeak is a formant speech
synthesizer. It is tied into NVDA
and there is also a sapi5 version. I will do testing of the Irish Gaelic
language using sapi5 ESpeak. The language code is GA. Also google
translate has Irish as one of its languages. After Irish is complete I
want to try and get ESpeak to read Hebrew and Arabic languages.
Also in the futyure I want to create an English
Irish dialect for ESpeak but lets get Irish Gaelic working first.
Below is a forwarded message containing the preliminary phonemes table for
Irish Gaelic.
From: Jonathan Duddington <jonsd@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: Josh Kennedy <jkenn337@xxxxxxxxx>
> Do I have to download the espeak source code in order to add Irish
> Gaelic?
No. If source code changes are needed, then I can make them.
> I don't think I'll be able to do this. I know about the basic
> pronunciation of Irish Gaelic language but I don't know anything
> about formants and all of these technical aspects that I'm reading
> about in the phonemes tables directions.
It's not difficult to learn what you need.
> I am not a linguist.
Neither an I.
It seems that you are interested in languages.
> I'll try espeak-edit again but last time I checked it was not
> useable with NVDA
You don't need espeakedit in order to make an initial attempt at a
language, except in order to re-compile the eSpeak phoneme data. That
should be accessible, because you only need to choose
Compile, Compile phoneme data
from the espeakedit menu-bar.
Here (attached) is a phoneme definition file, ph_irish, for you to
start with. Copy this into the phsource directory, and add these lines
at the end of the text file phsource/phonemes in order to include it:
phonemetable ga base
include ph_irish
You also need to make a voice file: espeak-data/voices/test/ga. This
should contain the 3 lines:
name irish-gaelic
language ga
stressrule 0
The ph_irish file contains definitions for:
Short vowels: @ I E a O U
Long vowels: i: e: A: o: u:
Diphthongs: @I @U i@ u@
The consonants should be available already available from eSpeak's
standard set of consonants. I don't understand the difference between
Irish "broad" and "slender" consonants, and no doubt that will need
more work later. Try adding the phoneme [;] (semicolon) after slender
consonants. This gives a short [j] sound.
Use the alveolar phonemes t and d for "slender" 't' and 'd' and dental
phonemes t[ and d[ for "broad" 't' and 'd'.
Consonant phonemes:
Stops:
p b
t[ d[ t d
c J k g
Fricatives:
f v s S C x Q h
Nasal:
m n n^ N
Others:
w j l
I'm not sure which is the best 'r' phoneme to use. Try: r R * **
Please ask specific questions for things which need more explanation.
> Attached is an mp3 file with a news person speaking the Irish language.
That is not useful. I don't know what the words are.
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