IraqComm and FlexTrans: A Speech Translation System and Flexible Framework

Abstract

Abstract-SRI International's IraqComm system performs bidirectional speech-to-speech machine translation between English and Iraqi Arabic in the domains of force protection, municipal and medical services, and training. The system was developed primarily under DARPA's TRANSTAC Program and includes: speech recognition components using SRI's Dynaspeak engine; MT components using SRI's Gemini and SRInterp; and speech synthesis from Cepstral, LLC. The communication between these components is coordinated by SRI's Flexible Translation (FlexTrans) Framework, which has an intuitive easy-to-use graphical user interface and an eyes-free hands-free mode, and is highly configurable and adaptable to user needs. It runs on a variety of standard portable hardware platforms and was designed to make it as easy as possible to build systems for other languages, as shown by the rapid development of an analogous system in English/Malay.

Speech and Translation Technologies

“…al. (2000); for BABYLON, seeWaibel et al (2003); for TRANSTAC, seeFrandsen et al (2008); and for GALE, seeCohen (2007) andOlive et al (2011). Concerning Project BOLT, see "Broad Operational Language Translation (BOLT) (Archived)."…”