Amazon.com: The Voice in the Machine: Building Computers That Understand Speech (The MIT Press) (9780262533294): Roberto Pieracc
阿新 • • 發佈：2019-01-13
I enjoyed reading this book! It is a comprehensive description of the evolution of the speech technologies focused on the major results of research and the changes of directions that the technology had in the last decades. The last chapter is about the advent of Siri and what will happen in the next future. Reading the book you will encounters many and many protagonists with their anecdotes, ideas and achievements.
I see two main categories of people that might gain great advantage by reading this book. The first are those not involved in the evolution of speech technologies, the second are the insiders, who were involved either in research or at any level, even non technical, in the speech industry. For the former the book explains how a complex technology evolves in reality with all the roadblocks, turns, and steep paths while the author puts all his effort in explaining very complex engineering problems without formulas or technicalities, but using simple and enlightening analogies and examples. The book will help them to understand what is behind Siri, Google Voice, or every other speaking machine. For the latter, the professionals of the voice science and industry, it is very interesting to see how the author assembles a map of the past and current technology, the motivations and the forces behind it, and shows how all the pieces fit together in a technological landscape of the area in which they are currently engaged. For them it is like stepping out for a minute to gain a vantage point perspective and different points of view.
I belong to the second category because I spent 20 years in R&D in the research lab in Italy where Roberto Pieraccini moves his first steps and then I was deep involved in the newborn speech industry.
A last little advice is for the readers who would like to move from the author's examples to more technical readings. I found the Notes section very interesting, like a book inside the book. You might read it from the top to the bottom and you will find there some formulas, pointers to literature and complementary thoughts.
Now, I'll eagerly wait a continuation from Roberto Pieraccini to look forward instead of backward, but I strongly suggest to read this marvelous book now.
I see two main categories of people that might gain great advantage by reading this book. The first are those not involved in the evolution of speech technologies, the second are the insiders, who were involved either in research or at any level, even non technical, in the speech industry. For the former the book explains how a complex technology evolves in reality with all the roadblocks, turns, and steep paths while the author puts all his effort in explaining very complex engineering problems without formulas or technicalities, but using simple and enlightening analogies and examples. The book will help them to understand what is behind Siri, Google Voice, or every other speaking machine. For the latter, the professionals of the voice science and industry, it is very interesting to see how the author assembles a map of the past and current technology, the motivations and the forces behind it, and shows how all the pieces fit together in a technological landscape of the area in which they are currently engaged. For them it is like stepping out for a minute to gain a vantage point perspective and different points of view.
I belong to the second category because I spent 20 years in R&D in the research lab in Italy where Roberto Pieraccini moves his first steps and then I was deep involved in the newborn speech industry.
A last little advice is for the readers who would like to move from the author's examples to more technical readings. I found the Notes section very interesting, like a book inside the book. You might read it from the top to the bottom and you will find there some formulas, pointers to literature and complementary thoughts.
Now, I'll eagerly wait a continuation from Roberto Pieraccini to look forward instead of backward, but I strongly suggest to read this marvelous book now.