Embedded Cantonese TTS for multi-device access to web content

This paper describes the development of an embedded Cantonese text-to-speech synthesizer to enable multi-device access to Chinese Web content. Advancements in wireless communication is driving Web visitors from using desktop PCs to mobile handheld devices. Significant reduction in the form factors of the client devices tends to shift information delivery from the visual to the aural modality. This calls for synthesizers that can run on relatively stringent computational and storage resources of handheld devices. We report on the migration of our Cantonese synthesizer, CU VOCAL, from the desktop to the embedded platform. Migration preserves the support for speech synthesis markups (SSML), ensures code compatibility and lowers the storage requirements of the syllable inventory. Results from listening tests indicate no signification deterioration in synthesis quality of embedded CU VOCAL when compared to its desktop counterpart.