Abstract: A method and system for language selection and synchronization in a vehicle are provided. The method includes receiving an audio representative of sounds captured within a vehicle, recognizing a language category for propagating information to a user of the vehicle according to the received audio, selecting the language category of the vehicle system according to the recognized language category in response to receiving a user acknowledgment, synchronizing the language category among a plurality of vehicle systems, and propagating information to the user of the vehicle using the synchronized language category.

Abstract: A sound processing method includes a step of applying a nonlinear filter to a temporal sequence of spectral envelope of an acoustic signal, wherein the nonlinear filter smooths a fine temporal perturbation of the spectral envelope without smoothing out a large temporal change. A sound processing apparatus includes a smoothing processor configured to apply a nonlinear filter to a temporal sequence of spectral envelope of an acoustic signal, wherein the nonlinear filter smooths a fine temporal perturbation of the spectral envelope without smoothing out a large temporal change.

Abstract: System and method embodiments are provided for very short pitch detection and coding for speech or audio signals. The system and method include detecting whether there is a very short pitch lag in a speech or audio signal that is shorter than a conventional minimum pitch limitation using a combination of time domain and frequency domain pitch detection techniques. The pitch detection techniques include using pitch correlations in time domain and detecting a lack of low frequency energy in the speech or audio signal in frequency domain. The detected very short pitch lag is coded using a pitch range from a predetermined minimum very short pitch limitation that is smaller than the conventional minimum pitch limitation.

Abstract: This disclosure describes, in part, context-driven device arbitration techniques to select a speech interface device from multiple speech interface devices to provide a response to a command included in a speech utterance of a user. In some examples, the context-driven arbitration techniques may include executing multiple pipeline instances to analyze audio signals and device metadata received from each of the multiple speech interface devices which detected the speech utterance. A remote speech processing service may execute the multiple pipeline instances and analyze the audio signals and/or metadata, at various stages of the pipeline instances, to determine which speech interface device is to respond to the speech utterance.

Abstract: Aspects create a multimedia presentation wherein processors are configured to calculate a time it would take to narrate a plurality of words in a document at a specified speech speed in response to determining that the time it would take to narrate the plurality of words in the document at the specified speech speed exceeds a specified maximum time, generate a long summary of the document as a subset of the plurality of words, generate audio content for a first portion of the plurality of words of the long summary by applying a text-to-speech processing mechanism to the portion of the long summary at the desired speech speed, and create a multimedia slide of a multimedia presentation by adding the generated audio content to a presentation of text from a remainder portion of the plurality of words of the long summary.

Abstract: Disclosed is an apparatus for processing an input signal, having a perceptual weighter and a quantizer. The perceptual weighter has a model provider and a model applicator. The model provider provides a perceptual weighted model based on the input signal. The model applicator provides a perceptually weighted spectrum by applying the perceptual weighted model to a spectrum based on the input signal. The quantizer is configured to quantize the perceptually weighted spectrum and for providing a bitstream. The quantizer has a random matrix applicator and a sign function calculator. The random matrix applicator is configured for applying a random matrix to the perceptually weighted spectrum in order to provide a transformed spectrum. The sign function calculator is configured for calculating a sign function of components of the transformed spectrum in order to provide the bitstream. The invention further refers to an apparatus for processing an encoded signal and to corresponding methods.

Abstract: A method for natural language interaction includes recording speech provided by a human user. The recorded speech is translated into a machine-readable natural language input relating to an interaction topic. An interaction timer is maintained that tracks a length of time since a last machine-readable natural language input referring to the interaction topic was translated. Based on a current value of the interaction timer being greater than an interaction engagement threshold, a message relating to the interaction topic is delivered with a first natural language phrasing that includes an interaction topic reminder. Based on the current value of the interaction timer being less than the interaction engagement threshold, the message relating to the interaction topic is delivered with a second natural language phrasing that lacks the interaction topic reminder.

Abstract: Technologies are provided for determining deficiencies in narrative textual data that may impact decision-making in a decisional context. A candidate text document and a reference corpus of text may be utilized to generate one or more topic models and document-term matrices, and then to determine a corresponding statistical perplexity and probabilistic coherence. The reference corpus may be known or normatively deemed to be epistemically persuasive and adequate with respect to a particular context. Statistical determinations of a degree to which the candidate deviates from the reference normative corpus are determined, in terms of the statistical perplexity and probabilistic coherence of the candidate as compared to the reference.

Abstract: Disclosed herein is a system, method, and computer program product for filtering data in an audio stream. Incoming audio is converted into text and analyzed for information of a first type. Based on the detection of information of the first type from a source, a recipient is blocked from receiving the audible information.

Abstract: Methods, systems, and apparatus for obtaining a resource, identifying a first portion of text of the resource that is characterized as a question, and a second part of text of the resource that is characterized as an answer to the question, identifying an entity that is referenced by one or more terms of the text that is characterized as the question, a relationship type that is referenced by one or more other terms of the text that is characterized as the question, and an entity that is referenced by the text that is characterized as the answer to the question, and adjusting a score for a relationship of the relationship type for the entity that is referenced by the one or more terms of the text that is characterized as the question and the entity that is referenced by the text that is characterized as the answer to the question.

Abstract: Sentence polarity determination is used to assess whether a sentence is an affirmative expression or a negative expression, and is applied for reputation analysis, etc. Polarity determination determines whether an input sentence is affirmative or negative. When some subject is being talked about, it is sometimes desired to determine whether what is being referred to in the sentence is affirmative or negative, rather than the polarity of the sentence per se. The present invention provides a method for determining the polarity of the sentence by applying a recursive polarity rule based on a dependency structure of the sentence, taking into consideration the portion of the sentence that is being referred to. Use of a recursive rule makes it possible to prevent the number of rules from becoming huge, and thereby to perform efficient polarity determination in terms of memory amount and calculation amount. The length of the dependency needed for polarity determination can also be efficiently controlled.

Abstract: The invention provides a method for identifying a sequence of events associated with a condition in a process plant using a control system. The method comprises recording process data, which is timestamped, and recording audio input from each personnel of a plurality of personnel of the process plant. The audio input is synchronized according to time with the process data. A keyword is identified from the temporally synchronized content of each audio input, and compared with the process information of one or more of an event and an equipment, for identifying at least one of a new process information and a supplementary process information related to the condition. One or more of the new process information and the supplementary process information identified for each keyword, and the plurality of events identified from the process data, are used for identifying the sequence of events associated with the condition.

Abstract: A downscaled version of an audio decoding procedure may more effectively and/or at improved compliance maintenance be achieved if the synthesis window used for downscaled audio decoding is a downsampled version of a reference synthesis window involved in the non-downscaled audio decoding procedure by downsampling by the downsampling factor by which the downsampled sampling rate and the original sampling rate deviate, and downsampled using a segmental interpolation in segments of ¼ of the frame length.

Abstract: An apparatus and method for encoding and decoding a signal for high frequency bandwidth extension are provided. An encoding apparatus may down-sample a time domain input signal, may core-encode the down-sampled time domain input signal, may transform the core-encoded time domain input signal to a frequency domain input signal, and may perform bandwidth extension encoding using a basic signal of the frequency domain input signal.

Abstract: A method for determining a personality profile of an online user is disclosed. Social speech content data associated with an online user is stored. A machine learning model is used to determine a first personality profile of the online user based at least in part on the social speech content data associated with the online user. A second personality profile of the online user is determined based on the social speech content data using a scientific personality model encoded in an ontology, wherein the ontology encodes statistical relationships between a plurality of words and a plurality of personality traits based on one or more scientific research studies. An ensemble model is applied to determine a third personality profile of the online user based at least in part on the first personality profile and the second personality profile.

Abstract: A lamp device for inputting or outputting a voice signal and a method of driving the same. The method of driving a lamp device includes receiving an audio signal; performing voice recognition of a first audio signal among the received audio signals; generating an activation signal based on the voice recognition result; transmitting the activation signal to the external device; receiving a first control signal from the external device; and transmitting a second audio signal among the received audio signals to the external device in response to the first control signal. Alternatively, various exemplary embodiment may be further included.

Abstract: A system for detecting and capturing voice commands, the system comprising a voice-activity detector (VAD) configured to receive a VAD-received digital-audio signal; determine the amplitude of the VAD-received digital-audio signal; compare the amplitude of the VAD-received digital-audio signal to a first threshold and to a second threshold; withhold a VAD interrupt signal when the amplitude of the VAD-received digital-audio signal does not exceed the first threshold or the second threshold; generate the VAD interrupt signal when the amplitude of the VAD-received digital-audio signal exceeds the first threshold and the second threshold; and perform spectral analysis of the VAD-received digital-audio signal when the amplitude of the VAD-received digital-audio signal is between the first threshold and the second threshold.

Abstract: The disclosed methods and apparatus allow a lay person to easily and intuitively define virtual scenes using natural language commands and natural gestures. Natural language commands include statements that a person would naturally (e.g., spontaneously, simply, easily, intuitively, etc.) speak without any or little training. Example natural language commands include “put a cat on the box,” or “put a ball in front of the red box.” Natural gestures include gestures that a person would naturally do, perform or carry out (e.g., spontaneously, simply, easily, intuitively, etc.) without any or little training. Example natural gestures include pointing, a distance between hands, gazing, head tilt, kicking, etc. The person can simply speak and gesture how it naturally occurs to them.

Abstract: A software agent, that is used to assist in providing a service, receives communications from a set of users that are attempting to use the software agent. The communications include communications that are interacting with the software agent, and communications that are not interacting with the software agent. The software agent performs natural language processing on all communications to identify such things as user sentiment, user concerns or other items in the content of the messages, and also to identify actions taken by the users in order to obtain a measure of user satisfaction with the software agent. One or more action signals are then generated based upon the identified user satisfaction with the software agent.

Abstract: Systems and processes for operating an intelligent automated assistant to perform text-to-speech conversion are provided. An example method includes, at an electronic device having one or more processors, receiving a text corpus comprising unstructured natural language text. The method further includes generating a sequence of normalized text based on the received text corpus; and generating a pronunciation sequence representing the sequence of the normalized text. The method further includes causing an audio output to be provided to the user based on the pronunciation sequence. At least one of the sequence of normalized text and the pronunciation sequence is generated based on a data-driven learning network.