Abstract: The present universal wearable computing device relates to a hearing assistance system, device, method, and apparatus that provide a discreet approach to user hearing assistance, without relying on a conventional hearing aid. The hearing assistance system and the requisite electronics may be incorporated into frames that also function as eyeglasses with earphone(s) that may be connected to the frame to assist user hearing. An earphone may be configured with minimal electronics, such that a power source enable sound transmissions to the ear, is provided by a connection to the frame of the eyeglasses. In another example, the earphone is configured without any electronics and sound is transmitted to the user/listener's ear(s) via a psychoacoustic system. The sound quality of the transmissions to the earphones may be optimized using a tuning/equalizer application operating from a computing device, such as an app on a mobile device.

Abstract: The present universal wearable computing device relates to a hearing assistance system, device, method, and apparatus that provide a discreet approach to user hearing assistance, without relying on a conventional hearing aid. The hearing assistance system and the requisite electronics may be incorporated into frames that also function as eyeglasses with earphone(s) that may be connected to the frame to assist user hearing. An earphone may be configured with minimal electronics, such that a power source enable sound transmissions to the ear, is provided by a connection to the frame of the eyeglasses. In another example, the earphone is configured without any electronics and sound is transmitted to the user/listener's ear(s) via a psychoacoustic system. The sound quality of the transmissions to the earphones may be optimized using a tuning/equalizer application operating from a computing device, such as an app on a mobile device.

Abstract: The present universal wearable computing device relates to a hearing assistance system, device, method, and apparatus that provide a discreet approach to user hearing assistance, without relying on a conventional hearing aid. The hearing assistance system and the requisite electronics may be incorporated into frames that also function as eyeglasses with earphone(s) that may be connected to the frame to assist user hearing. An earphone may be configured with minimal electronics, such that a power source enable sound transmissions to the ear, is provided by a connection to the frame of the eyeglasses. In another example, the earphone is configured without any electronics and sound is transmitted to the user/listener's ear(s) via a psychoacoustic system. The sound quality of the transmissions to the earphones may be optimized using a tuning/equalizer application operating from a computing device, such as an app on a mobile device.

Abstract: In one aspect, the invention provides word recognition systems that operate to recognize an unrecognized or ambiguous word that occurs within a passage of words. The system can offer several words as choice words for inserting into the passage to replace the unrecognized word. The system can select the best choice word by using the choice word to extract from a reference source, sample passages of text that relate to the choice word. For example, the system can select the dictionary passage that defines the choice word. The system then compares the selected passage to the current passage, and generates a score that indicates the likelihood that the choice word would occur within that passage of text. The system can select the choice word with the best score to substitute into the passage. The passage of words being analyzed can be any word sequence including an utterance, a portion of handwritten text, a portion of typewritten text or other such sequence of words, numbers and characters.

Abstract: A method is provided for deriving acoustic word representations for use in speech recognition. Initial word models are created, each formed of a sequence of acoustic sub-models. The acoustic sub-models from a plurality of word models are clustered, so as to group acoustically similar sub-models from different words, using, for example, the Kullback-Leibler information as a metric of similarity. Then each word is represented by cluster spelling representing the clusters into which its acoustic sub-models were placed by the clustering. Speech recognition is performed by comparing sequences of frames from speech to be recognized against sequences of acoustic models associated with the clusters of the cluster spelling of individual word models.

Abstract: A speech recognition system is disclosed which employs a network of elementary local decision modules for matching an observed time-varying speech pattern against all possible time warpings of the stored prototype patterns. For each elementary speech segment, an elementary recognizer provides a score indicating the degree of correlation of the input speech segment with stored spectral patterns. Each local decision module receives the results of the elementary recognizer and, at the same time, receives an input from selected ones of the other local decision modules. Each local decision module specializes in a particular node in the network wherein each node matches the probability of how well the input segment of speech matches the particular sound segments in the sounds of the words spoken. Each local decision module takes the prior decisions of all preceding sound segments which are input from the other local decision modules and makes a selection of the locally optimum time warping to be permitted.