Subject: Re: [lojban] Lojban Text to Speech

From: "randl. nortmn." <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 4 Jan 2002 15:24:49 -0500

On Fri, Jan 04, 2002 at 02:57:17PM -0500, Bob LeChevalier (lojbab) wrote:
[...]
> So where is the software you guys are 
> talking about and if it isn't a download, about how much does it cost and 
> where do you get it.
[...]

Short answer: There's still work to be done before the system we're
talking about is usable, but when it's done, it will be freely
available and relatively easy to install. (Assuming all parties
release their bits into the public domain; this actually hasn't been
discussed explicitly.)

Long answer:

There are several free TTS programs available for download. This one
is the one we've been talking about (mostly): http://festvox.org/

However, it will not do Lojban TTS out of the box. Some programming
is necessary. The original poster in this thread (goes by buzzwyrd)
has already done the necessary programming, and recently posted the
results. The programming for this particular package must be done in
Scheme, no Java. (There are other Java TTS systems out there, but I'm
not familiar with any of them.)

This is good enough for a crude Lojban TTS system. What remains to be
done in order to have a nice, high-quality TTS system is to record a
lot (1000+) of samples of different Lojban phonemes, which is what our
comrades in Brussels are working on. When this is done, one of the
parties or another (myself if nobody else) will likely package the
whole thing up nicely so you can get it up and running on your machine
relatively easily.

HTH

mu'omi'e randl.