Speech Synthesis Markup Language
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Speech Synthesis Markup Language (SSML) is an
XML Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing arbitrary data. It defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable ...
-based
markup language Markup language refers to a text-encoding system consisting of a set of symbols inserted in a text document to control its structure, formatting, or the relationship between its parts. Markup is often used to control the display of the document ...
for
speech synthesis Speech synthesis is the artificial production of human speech. A computer system used for this purpose is called a speech synthesizer, and can be implemented in software or hardware products. A text-to-speech (TTS) system converts normal languag ...
applications. It is a recommendation of the
W3C The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is the main international standards organization for the World Wide Web. Founded in 1994 and led by Tim Berners-Lee, the consortium is made up of member organizations that maintain full-time staff working to ...
's
Voice Browser A voice browser is a software application that presents an interactive voice user interface to the user in a manner analogous to the functioning of a web browser interpreting Hypertext Markup Language (HTML). Dialog documents interpreted by voice br ...
Working Group. SSML is often embedded in
VoiceXML VoiceXML (VXML) is a digital document standard for specifying interactive media and voice dialogs between humans and computers. It is used for developing audio and voice response applications, such as banking systems and automated customer service ...
scripts to drive interactive telephony systems. However, it also may be used alone, such as for creating audio books. For desktop applications, other markup languages are popular, including Apple's embedded speech commands, and
Microsoft's Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation, multinational technology company, technology corporation producing Software, computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at th ...
SAPI
Text to speech Speech synthesis is the artificial production of human speech. A computer system used for this purpose is called a speech synthesizer, and can be implemented in software or hardware products. A text-to-speech (TTS) system converts normal languag ...
(TTS) markup, also an XML language. It is also used to produce sounds via Azure Cognitive Services' Text to Speech API or when writing third-party skills for
Google Assistant Google Assistant is a virtual assistant software application developed by Google that is primarily available on mobile and home automation devices. Based on artificial intelligence, Google Assistant can engage in two-way conversations, unlike t ...
or
Amazon Alexa Amazon Alexa, also known simply as Alexa, is a virtual assistant technology largely based on a Polish speech synthesiser named Ivona, bought by Amazon in 2013. It was first used in the Amazon Echo smart speaker and the Echo Dot, Echo Studio and ...
. SSML is based on the
Java Speech Markup Language {{unreferenced, date=July 2008 Java Speech API Markup Language (JSML) is an XML-based markup language for annotating text input to speech synthesizers. JSML is used within the Java Speech API. JSML is an XML application and conforms to the requir ...
(JSML) developed by
Sun Microsystems Sun Microsystems, Inc. (Sun for short) was an American technology company that sold computers, computer components, software, and information technology services and created the Java programming language, the Solaris operating system, ZFS, the ...
, although the current recommendation was developed mostly by speech synthesis vendors. It covers virtually all aspects of synthesis, although some areas have been left unspecified, so each vendor accepts a different variant of the language. Also, in the absence of markup, the synthesizer is expected to do its own interpretation of the text.


Example

Here is an example of an SSML document: Telephone Menu: Level 1

For English, press one. Para espaƱol, oprima el dos.


Features

SSML specifies a fair amount of markup for prosody, which is not apparent in the above example. This includes markup for * pitch * contour * pitch range * rate * duration * volume


See also

* Pronunciation Lexicon Specification (PLS) * Speech Recognition Grammar Specification (SRGS) * Semantic Interpretation for Speech Recognition (SISR) *
SABLE The sable (''Martes zibellina'') is a species of marten, a small omnivorous mammal primarily inhabiting the forest environments of Russia, from the Ural Mountains throughout Siberia, and northern Mongolia. Its habitat also borders eastern Kaza ...
speech synthesis markup language, intended to combine SSML, STML, and JSML


References


External links


W3C SSML 1.1 Recommendation

W3C SSML 1.0 Recommendation


{{Speech synthesis Speech synthesis XML-based standards World Wide Web Consortium standards Markup languages 2004 introductions