A prototype Greek text to Greek Sign Language conversion system
Dimitris Kouremenos, Stavroula–Evita Fotinea, Eleni Efthimiou, Klimis Ntalianis · Behaviour and Information Technology · 2010
In this article, a prototype Greek text to Greek Sign Language (GSL) conversion system is presented. The system is integrated into an educational platform that addresses the needs of teaching GSL grammar and was developed within the SYNENNOESE project (Efthimiou et al. 2004a Efthimiou, E. 2004a. “Developing an e-learning platform for the Greek sign language”. In Computer helping people with special needs, Lecture Notes in Computer Science Edited by: Miesenberger, K., Klaus, J. and Zagler, W. Vol. 3118, 1107–1113. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]. Developing an e-learning platform for the Greek sign language. In: K. Miesenberger, J. Klaus, and W. Zagler, eds. Computer helping people with special needs, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer-Verlag, vol. 3118, 1107–1113). The detailed implementation of the language-processing component of a Greek text to GSL conversion system is provided, focusing upon the inherent problems of knowledge elicitation of sign language (SL) grammar and its implementation within a parser framework. It is based on an SL dictionary (Efthimiou et al. 2004a Efthimiou, E. 2004a. “Developing an e-learning platform for the Greek sign language”. In Computer helping people with special needs, Lecture Notes in Computer Science Edited by: Miesenberger, K., Klaus, J. and Zagler, W. Vol. 3118, 1107–1113. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) database of coded GSL knowledge. The proposed system has been designed and implemented after considering most state-of-the-art SL machine translation or Conversion systems, such as Vsigns (Papadogiorgaki et al. 2004 Papadogiorgaki, M. VSigns – a virtual sign synthesis web tool. Proceedings of Sixth COST 276 Workshop on Information and Knowledge Management for Integrated Media Communication. May2004, Thessaloniki, Greece. [Google Scholar]. VSigns – a virtual sign synthesis web tool. In: Proceedings of Sixth COST 276 Workshop on Information and Knowledge Management for Integrated Media Communication, May 2004, Thessaloniki, Greece), ZARDOZ (Veale et al. 1998 Veale, T., Conway, A. and Collins, B. 1998. The challenges of cross-modal translation: English to sign language translation in the ZARDOZ system. Machine Translation, 13: 81–106. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]. The challenges of cross-modal translation: English to sign language translation in the ZARDOZ system. Machine Translation, 13, 81–106) and SignSynth (Angus 2001 Angus, G. S.B. 2001. “SignSynth: a sign language synthesis application using Web3D and Perl”. In Gesture and Sign Language in Human–Computer Interaction, London, , UK: International Gesture Workshop. [Google Scholar]. SignSynth: a sign language synthesis application using Web3D and Perl. In: Gesture and Sign Lanauage in Human–Computer Interaction. London, UK: International Gesture Workshop), and taking into account their advantages and disadvantages. The overall architecture is innovative since other existing systems either do not consider the GSL or they cannot be effectively applied on sentences but just on single words. The system is demonstrable on any conventional PC.