This section describes in detail the procedure used to specify phonetic strings to the narrator speech synthesizer. No previous experience with phonetics is required. The only thing you may need is a good pronunciation dictionary for those times when you doubt your own ears. You do not have to learn a foreign language or computer language. You are just going to learn how to write down the English that comes out of your own mouth. In writing phonetically you do not have to know how a word is spelled, just how it is said. TABLE OF PHONEMES Vowels Phoneme Example Phoneme Example ------- ------- ------- -------- IY beet, eat IH bit, in EH bet, end AE bat, ad AA bottle, on AH but, up AO ball, awl UH book, soot ER bird, early OH border AX* about, calibrate IX* solid, infinite * AX and IX should never be used in stressed syllables. Diphthongs Phoneme Example Phoneme Example ------- ------- ------- -------- EY bay,aid AY bide,I OY boy,oil AW bound,owl OW boat,own UW brew,boolean Consonants Phoneme Example Phoneme Example ------- ------- ------- ------- R red L long W wag Y yellow,comp(Y)uter M men N no NX sing SH shy S soon TH thin F fed ZH pleasure Z has,zoo DH then V very WH when CH check J judge /H hole /C loch B but P put D dog T toy K keg,copy G guest Special Symbol Phoneme Example Explanation ------- ------- ----------- DX pity tongue flap Q kitt(Q)en glottal stop QX silent vowel Contractions (see text) UL = AXL IL = IXL UM = AXM IM = IXM UN = AXN IN = IXN Digits and Punctuation Digits 1-9 Syllabic stress, ranging from secondary through emphatic . Period - sentence final character. ? Question mark - sentence final character - Dash - phrase delimiter , Comma - clause delimiter () Parentheses - noun phrase delimiters (see text) The narrator device works on utterances at the sentence level. Even if you want to say only one word, it will treat it as a complete sentence. Therefore, narrator wants one of two punctuation marks to appear at the end of every sentence - a period or a question mark. The period is used for almost all utterances and will cause a final fall in pitch to occur at the end of a sentence. The question mark is used at the end of yes/no questions only, and results in a final rise in pitch. For example, the question, Do you enjoy using your Amiga? would take a question mark at the end, while the question, What is your favorite color? should be followed (in the phonetic transcription) with a period. If no punctuation appears at the end of a string, narrator will append a dash to it, which will result in a short pause. Narrator recognizes other punctuation marks as well, but these are left for later discussion. Phonetic Spelling Hints For Intelligibility Stress And Intonation Example Of English And Phonetic Texts Punctuation Concluding Remarks
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