Digital Computer Simulation for Speech Experiments
Edward E. David, M. V. Mathews, Henry S. McDonald · The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America · 1959
Speech research has been characterized by the need for building extensive experimental apparatus. As transmission systems using information theoretic codings and automatic recognition schemes have come under study, such apparatus has required large memory capacity and intricate logical structure. Simulation of equipment with digital computers results in reduction of the time and cost of experimentation, and more important, achieves a gross expansion of the ideas which can be considered. Whereas, previously instrumentation was an omnipresent limitation in all proposals, now the imagination of the researcher is the principal restriction. Digital simulation requires an input-output device to convert speech signals to series of numbers in a form acceptable to the computer and to translate the digital output of the computer to an audio signal. Such a device for sampling, quantizing, and recording speech-type signals on IBM 704 digital magnetic tape and for performing the inverse operation is described. Methods for grouping the data on the tape to meet the computer requirements are discussed. The computer speed and memory size to carry ont practical simulations are outlined. Simulation studies have been effectively applied to problems concerned both with coders for transmission systems and with phases of automatic recognition schemes.