text:
|Publication number
|Publication type
|Application number
|Publication date
|Mar 20, 2012
|Filing date
|Jan 4, 2007
|Priority date
|Jan 4, 2007
|Fee status
|Also published as
|Publication number
|Dimitri Kanevsky, Mahesh Viswanathan, David Nahamoo, Roberto Sicconi
|Original Assignee
|International Business Machines Corporation
|Export Citation
|BiBTeX, EndNote, RefMan
|Patent Citations (30), Non-Patent Citations (4), Referenced by (4), Classifications (9), Legal Events (5)
|External Links: USPTO, USPTO Assignment, Espacenet
The present invention relates generally to systems and methods to support intelligent control of microphones and, in particular, to intelligent microphone control systems and methods that are employed in speech processing applications to capture, record and preprocess audio input in a way that optimizes decoding accuracy of spoken input.
Technological innovations in speech processing applications have led to widespread development of speech-based automated systems and applications using automated speech recognition (ASR) and/or natural language understanding techniques. For example, speech recognition systems are being implemented to support hands-free command and control of various functions within a car environment. Moreover, speech recognition systems may be implemented for dictation/transcription applications to record and recognized spoken input from one or more persons and automatically generate a textual transcription that is stored and subsequently used for various applications (archiving, indexing, etc.).
There are various factors that can negatively affect the decoding accuracy of spoken input by ASR systems. For instance, in ASR applications, speech decoding accuracy can vary depending on the type of microphone system that is used to capture spoken input, the manner in which a person uses the microphone system and/or the varying environmental conditions that may exists at different times during capture and recordation of audio input by the microphone system. For instance, when a person uses a microphone having a manual talk switch (to manually turn on/off the microphone), the manual operation of the talk switch may lead to poor synchronisation between the time at which the talk switch button is pressed and the user begins speaking. For example, it a user simultaneously presses the talk switch button and begins to speak, the first spoken utterance may be chopped-off, or if the user begins speaking too late, environmental noise may be added to the audio input, leading to decreased decoding accuracy.
In other circumstances, the decoding accuracy of an ASR system can be adversely affected when the distance between the speaker's mouth and the microphone is varied during a speech session. For instance, for lip microphone devices, the distance between the lip microphone and the persons' mouth can change during a session resulting in possible degradation in decoding accuracy. Similar problems exists when using fixed microphones (e.g., in a car) which are sensitive to how a person is positioned near the microphone and the direction that the person faces when speaking.
Other causes of decreased decoding accuracy in ASR systems due to microphones that the ASR applications typically require the microphone parameters to be adapted and adjusted to the ASR system, as well as adapted and adjusted based on the speaker. For example, some conventional speech applications require the microphones to be set and re-adapted to the speech recognition system each time a new person begins a new dictation session. If certain adjustments and adaptations are not made for each new person using the speech recognition system, the error rate of the speech recognition can significantly increase.
For example, an ASR system may require various steps for adjusting the microphone system so as to optimize the speech recognition decoding accuracy. First, the ASR system determines an average level of static environmental noise in a given environment (no speech). Next, the system, may request spoken input by a person in the given environment, which allows the system to determine the volume of the speaker's voice relative to the static environmental noise, which is then used to adjust the sensitivity and volume of the microphone input. Typically, after the system adjusts the volume input level, other additional parameters in the ASR system may be adapted to an individual speaker when reading a particular prepared passage. In particular, each new user may be required to read a prepared passage after the volume has been, adjusted so as to adjust an array of parameters to fine tune adjust the microphone and better adapt the ASR system to the current user.
These microphone adjustment procedures of the ASR system may be problematic and impractical in certain applications. For example, when an ASR system is used for transcription of conferences, these microphone adjustment procedures may be too burdensome and thus not followed. In particular, at conferences and meetings, a microphone and ASR system is typically located on the podium or in the middle of a meeting table. In some instance, the microphone is head-mountable and located at the speaker's lips for accurate input. When speaking at a conference, each speaker may have time to activate his/her user-specific (pre-trained) speech model that was previously trained and stored in the ASR system, but there is typically no time for each speaker to perform a microphone adjustment process (as described above), which may foe needed to adjust the parameters of the ASR system to the speaker's personal speech patterns to obtain an optimal transcription.
The decoding accuracy of an ASR system can also foe affected depending on the type of microphone that was used when training the ASR system or when using the ASR system. For example, decoding accuracy can be decreased when the type of microphone used by a person to train the ASR system is different from the type of microphone used by that person when giving a lecture during a transcription or dictation session. By way of specific example, a person will typically train an ASR system by providing speech training data using a wired microphone connected to the ASR system, while the same speaker may actually use a wireless microphone when using the ASR system during a lecture, meeting, conference, which can lead to decreased decoding accuracy.
In general, exemplary embodiments of the invention include systems and methods to support intelligent control of microphones. More specifically, exemplary embodiments of the invention include intelligent microphone control systems and methods that are employed in speech processing applications to capture, record and preprocess audio input in a way that optimizes decoding accuracy of spoken input.
In one exemplary embodiment, an audio processing system, includes a microphone control system, a speech activity detection system and an acoustic quality control system. The microphone control system controls capturing of audio input to a microphone system and selectively outputs speech segments within captured audio to a speech decoding system. The speech activity detection system detects the timing of speech activity events which indicate timing of speech input to the microphone system. The timing of speech activity events are used to determine the speech segments within captured audio.
The speech activity events include events such as (i) microphone switch button actions, (ii) speech intent events that indicate a user's intention to speak into the microphone, which are derived from biometric feature data of the user, (iii) speech intent events that indicate a user's intention to speak into the microphone, which are derived from data acquired from tracking behavioral characteristics of the user, and/or detection of speech in captured audio.
The acoustic quality control system detects conditions regarding capturing of audio input to the microphone system, which can result in captured audio with acoustic characteristics that adversely affect a decoding accuracy of the captured audio. In one embodiment, the acoustic quality control system provides feedback to a user regarding a detected condition having an adverse affect on an acoustic quality of audio input. In another embodiment, the acoustic quality control system automatically adjusts one or more system parameters to compensate for degraded acoustic characteristics of the captured audio.
For example, the acoustic quality control system can detect a change in an environmental static noise level and automatically adjust a microphone volume sensitivity parameter. The acoustic quality control system, can detect a distance between a microphone and a speaker's mouth, and automatically adjusts a microphone volume parameter and microphone volume sensitivity parameter based on the detected distance. In other embodiments, the acoustic quality control system can detect a condition in which a speaker uses a microphone that is different from a microphone used by the speaker for training the speech decoding system, and automatically modulate the captured audio input to substantially match an audio signal of the training microphone.
These and other exemplary embodiments, features and advantages of the present invention will be described or become apparent from the following detailed description of exemplary embodiments, which is to be read in connection with the accompanying drawings.
In particular, the microphone control system (15) implements automated functions to control the activation and deactivation of microphone(s) for capturing and recording audio input to the microphone system (11) and to control the inputting of segments of captured audio having relevant speech data to the speech decoding system (13). As explained belong the microphone control system (15) operates in conjunction with the speech activity detection system (14) and/or the acoustic quality control system (16) to control the processing and routing of captured audio with speech data so as to enhance the speech decoding performance by the speech decoding system (13).
For example, in one exemplary embodiment of the invention, the microphone control system (15) may operate in conjunction with the speech activity detection system (14) to identify and selectively input segments of captured audio having relevant speech data. More specifically, the speech activity detection system (14) implements functions to detect one or more types of speech activity events during audio capturing, which serve as indicators of speech input to the microphone system (11). In various embodiments of the invention, speech activity events include user interactions with microphone switch buttons, speech intent events that indicate a user's intention to speak into the microphone (as determined based on processing of biometric feature data of the user and/or from data acquired from tracking behavioral characteristics of the user, etc.), and other types of speech activity events, as will be discussed in further detail below.
The detection of speech activity events provides information that enables determination of timing of speech input of a user, e.g., speech onset, speech offset, ongoing speech, etc. The detection and timing of speech activity events enables the microphone control system (15) to control microphone activation for capturing/recording audio with speech input. Moreover, the timing of speech activity events can be used to determine segments within captured audio having useful speech data. Indeed, the boundaries of speech segments within captured audio can be robustly and accurately determined/estimated based on combined timing information for multiple speech activity events, allowing the microphone control system (15) to capture ail relevant speech input by a user and selectively input to the speech decoding system (13) those segments of the captured audio having speech data without noise.
In another exemplary embodiment of the invention, the microphone control system (15) may operate in conjunction with the acoustic quality control system (16) to control capturing of audio by the microphone system in a way that enhances the acoustic quality of captured audio. More specifically, the acoustic quality control system (16) can implement functions to detect conditions under which capturing of audio input to the microphone could result in the capture of audio with degraded acoustic characteristics, thereby adversely affecting the decoding accuracy of the captured audio. For instance, as explained in further detail below, the acoustic quality control system (16) can implement functions to detect changes in environmental static noise levels and/or detect the distance between a microphone and a speaker's mouth, and automatically adjust microphone parameters such as volume sensitivity and volume or decoding system parameters, as appropriate so to ensure the acoustic quality of the captured audio and thus, improve the decoding accuracy of speech data. The acoustic quality control system (16) may be configured to provide feedback to a user regarding a detected condition having an adverse affect on an acoustic quality of audio input allowing the user to make manual adjustments or take appropriate measures to ensure the acoustic quality of the captured audio.
It is to be understood that
The microphone system (101) comprises a plurality of microphones (102) and a microphone activation/selection controller (103). The microphone manager system (110) may implement various intelligent microphone control methods using multi modal input from the sensor devices to control audio capture by the microphone system (101), determine speech segments within captured audio for input to the ASR system (120), and/or control acoustic quality of captured audio. The ASR system (120) comprises one or more speech decoding engines (121) for processing speech data using trained speech models, language models, vocabularies, etc., which are maintained in a persistence storage system (122). The ASR system (120) can be used to transcribe spoken utterances for dictation applications. Text transcriptions (123) can be persistently stored and indexed along with spoken utterances. The ASR system (120) can be used to provide support for a speech interface for command and control and conversational interaction with speech-enabled application. Depending on the application, the speech decoding engines (121) may include ASR engines, NLU (natural language understanding) engines, speaker identification engines, etc.
The microphone manager (110) comprises an I/O manager (111), a microphone interaction control system (112), an environment interpretation system (113), a feedback generation system (114), a user behavior interpretation system (115), an audio data processing system (116) and a local storage system (117). The I/O manager module (111) performs various functions such as managing the I/O data that is input and output to the various components (101, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108) and otherwise providing an API for communication of messages and data between the microphone manager (110) the external systems/components.
The microphone interaction control system (112) controls activation and selection of the one or more microphones (102) of the microphone system (101) via the activation control module (103) to capture audio input from one or more microphones (102) under different modes of operation, and to store the captured audio input in the remote/external storage device (107) and/or as recorded audio data (117 b) in the local storage system (117). The microphone interaction control system (112) controls the input of audio segments to the ASR system (120) to ensure that only those audio segments having relevant speech data are input to the ASR system (120) for decoding. The microphone interaction control system (112) uses timing of speech activity events to control the capturing and recording of audio input from the microphone system (101) and to determine the boundaries of speech segments within captured audio for input to the ASR system (120).
The user behavior interpretation system (115) and audio data processing system (116) implement methods to support speech activity detection. For example, the user behavior interpretation system (115) implements methods for collecting and processing multimodal input from various sensors (104, 105, 106 a, 106 b) as a user interacts with the system to determine speech activity events and otherwise determine speech intent and timing of speech activity (speech onset/offset, etc.). The audio data processing system (116) may implement known audio-based techniques for processing the audio input to detect onset of speech (e.g., audio processing techniques that allow determination when the speech energy in audio input crosses a predetermined threshold).
The microphone interaction control system (112) can detect the timing of speech onset based on a combination of the timing of various events such as talk switch depression, audio detection of speech onset, etc., to more accurately detect speech onset and speech segment boundaries within captured audio, and thereby route the audio input (with speech data) to the speech recognition system (120).
For instance, the microphone control sensor (106) can be a microphone button (talk switch button) that a speaker can actuate to turn on/off the microphone. The timing of user actuation of the talk switch button is one indicator of speech onset. However, to avoid problems associated with poor synchronisation between user actuation of microphone talk switch buttons (106) and user speech input, one or more sensors can be used that can capture moments before a user touches a talk-switch button to activate a microphone and record audio input. For instance, the talk switch button (106) can implement the tactile sensor (106 a) and/or the remote tactile sensor (106 b). The tactile sensor (106 a) can be a supersensitive pressure sensor that can detect a light touch of a finger on a button prior to the user actually applying the required pressure to actuate (turn on/off) the control button. The remote tactile sensor (106 b) can be utilized to sense when a person's finger is in proximity to the control button and thus detect the user's speech intent moments before the speaker actually touches the control button.
For example, a close distance "remote touch" sensor can be incorporated in a talk switch button to "feel" when a person's finger is in proximity to the talk switch button before the finger actually touches the button (e.g. using infra ray detection). In this regard, the microphone can be activated when a finger is close to a button as detected by a "remote touch" sensor (rather then when a finger is already on the button). The touch sensor embodiments enable the system to detect speech intent prior to switch activation allowing useful speech to be captured when a person actually begins speaking just before the talk switch button is actually depressed to turn on the microphone. Speech onset and speech activity can be detected based on the timing of tactile sensor events and actual detection of speech in the audio signal.
In another embodiment, the visual sensor (104) may be a video sensor (camera) that is used to capture image data that is processed to provide visual clues that are indicative of speech intent. For example, the image data may be processed to track hand movement and detect when the user's finger is about to touch the control button, which is an indicator of onset of speech activity. This visual clue can be used to turn on a mike when a finger is close to a button (rather then when a finger is already on the button).
Moreover, the video camera (104) may be used to capture images of a person's face. The user behavior interpretation system (115) may implement methods for processing the image data to extract facial features such as lips mouth pose and other body data to detect speech activity events such as speech onset to activate capturing and recording of audio input based on visual speech clues, using those techniques such as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,754,373 to de Cuetos, et al., entitled "System and Method for Microphone Activation using Visual Speech Clues", which is commonly assigned and fully incorporated herein by reference. The user behavior interpretation system (115) may implement methods for interpreting user behavior patterns using multimodal sensor data input to identify a user's intent to provide speech input to a microphone prior to user actuation of the talk switch button (106). In other words, the user behavior recognition system (115) can process multimodal sensor data from a plurality of biometric, tactile sensors, etc., to automatically recognize user synchronized behavior patterns that precede user activation of a talk switch button for purposes of estimating the onset speech input (e.g., spoken command) and therefore start to record audio input for the command before the user actually presses the switch button (106). For example, the system may learn that a given user will typically look directly at a control button before actuation of a talk switch button when the user is planning to utter a command, whereby suitable sensors (104) or (105) may be used to track eye movement toward the location of the microphone talk switch button.
In another exemplary embodiment, the audio input can be continually recorded and stored as recorded audio data (117 b) in a local memory (117) or in a remote memory (107), and such audio input can be input to the audio processing system (116) to detect the onset of the useful speech. By recording the audio input, the microphone interaction control system (112) can retrieve additional audio segments from memory that are determined to have speech data, but were inadvertently missed due to error (e.g., the speaker began speaking before pressing the talk switch button and/or speech activity in audio input not properly detected, etc.).
In other exemplary embodiments of the invention, the microphone manager (110) includes acoustic quality control functions for processing sensor data and/or captured audio input to detect certain conditions that could potentially reduce the decoding accuracy (by the ASR system (120)) of speech input. Based on the detected conditions, the microphone manager (110) can provide user feedback so as to allow a user to make any corrections or adjustments that may be necessary and/or automatically and seamlessly making corrections or adjustments that may be desired for capturing and/or pre-processing audio input to enhance speech decoding accuracy. These acoustic quality control functions are supported by system modules such as the environment interpretation system (113) and feedback generation system (114).
In particular, the environment interpretation system (113) can implement methods for processing sensor data and environmental static noise to detect conditions that could possibly have an adverse affect on the decoding accuracy of speech data and then automatically adjust microphone and/or decoding parameters to adapt to different speakers and/or changes in environmental noise levels. For instance, the environment interpretation system (113) can determine or otherwise detect the static environmental noise in an audio signal received via a user microphone or a microphone specifically implemented as a detector of the non-speech environment and generate and update models/parameters of the environmental noise (117 c), which are stored in local memory (117). The noise models (117 c) can be used to automatically make adjustments to microphone and/or decoding parameters for different speakers and/or changing environmental noise levels by transforming a speaker's voice by adapting microphone volume sensitivity depending on environmental input received from the detector of non-speech environment and input from voice sampling (117 a) that is locally stored in memory (117) for a given speaker. Moreover, the environmental interpretation system (113) can process sensor data detect location and distance between a microphone and a speaker's mouth and either adjust the lip microphone position or compensates degradation of audio input because of incorrect position of a microphone.
In this regard, the microphone system (101) may comprise a plurality of different microphones (102) that are implemented for different tasks. For example, different types/classes of microphones may be provided in embodiments where the microphone manager (110) implements methods to selectively activate a particular one of the microphones (102) for capturing speech input from a speaker, which is determined to foe the same or similar to a microphone used by the speaker for training the ASR system (120). Moreover, one or more microphones (102) can serve to capture speech input from speakers, and one or more of the microphones (102) may foe used to monitor/capture environmental audio data, which is used to track changes in environmental noise levels.
The feedback generation system (114) may implement methods to provide feedback to a user about different parameters/conditions affecting the quality of captured audio due to inefficient microphone use or sub-optimal decoding parameters, etc., which could not be fixed automatically. The feedback generation system (114) may implement methods for processing and rendering feedback data output from the environment interpretation system (113), which is presented to a user via the feedback output device (108) (e.g., display or spoken output).
For example, the system can provide feedback to a user to indicate SNR (signal to noise ratio, recognition confidence measures, sentence-level confidence measures, and partial playback of the recognized text as text on the screen or synthesized voice. Further, the feedback generation system (114) may track the input volume which a user speaks into a microphone and provide some form of feedback that informs the user whether the user's speech volume is too loud or too low (which can reduce decoding accuracy) or at an optimal level for decoding. By way of specific example, the system can display a colored bar that shows the voice volume, green/yellow/red to show normal signal, borderline, too loud, etc., and where the system can provide an indication to the user that the system is listening and capturing the speech input when a length of brightness of a lighted bar quickly tracks the user's voice activity.
In other embodiments, a camera can be used to detect abnormal situations such as when a user is talking to a decoding system while the microphone is deactivated. In other embodiments, the feedback generation system (114) can be used to playback the user's voice or even just the ambient noise without noise, allowing the user to have some idea as to whether the system is having difficulty in decoding the speech input.
It is to be understood that the system of
The microphone manager (101) operates in speech detection mode until a speech activity event is detected (step 201). In particular, when the microphone is in a "deactivated" state, microphone manager (110) will operate to detect a speech activity event that is indicative of the onset of speech activity or user intent to speak. For example, in the exemplary system of
In addition, speech activity events indicative of speech onset can be events that are indicative of user intent to speak (e.g., utter a command) as determined from sensor data obtained using visual sensors (104) or biometric sensors (105). For example, visual or biometric sensors can be used to detect whether a user is looking at a microphone button with the intention to turn the microphone on and/or sensors that detect other types of user actions or conditions adding some context that increase the probability that the user intends to speak or otherwise utter a command.
In another embodiment, a speech activity event may be based on detection of audio input into the user microphone (i.e., the microphone that is intended for use in capturing speech, as opposed to a microphone that is implemented for capturing non-speech environment). If the speech activity event is based on the detection of audio input into the microphone (affirmative determination in step 202), a determination is then made as to whether the audio input includes speech (step 203). If the audio input is determined to foe noise or external audio (i.e. an audio outside of a car, or from radio etc.), the microphone will not be activated (negative determination in step 203).
When a speech activity event is detected (in step 201) and speech input is detected (affirmative determination in step (203), the microphone will foe activated (step 204). When the microphone is activated (step 204), the audio input is captured and recorded while the speech activity continues. During audio capture, the system may detect the existence of one or more conditions that can lead to degraded acoustic quality of the captured audio. The system may implement acoustic quality control methods to automatically make certain adjustments, if necessary, to compensate for the degraded acoustic characteristics of the captured audio (step 205). Exemplary acoustic quality control methods will be discussed in further detail below with reference to
While the microphone is activated and audio input to the microphone is captured and recorded, the system will determine the boundaries of speech segments within the captured audio (step 206) based on the timing of speech activity events (e.g., timing of speech onset events, speech offset events, etc.). If the system determines that an audio segment having speech data was lost (step 207), the missing segment can be obtained from an audio buffer, if available, and processed and added to the speech data applied to the speech recognition system (step 208).
By way of example, there may be a situation where actual speech onset occurs prior to the time at which speech onset events are detected by the system. In such instance, the initial speech data input will be "lost" in the sense that recording of audio input may begin at the time of detection of speech onset. If the system, is configured to actually begin capturing and recording of audio input upon speech onset detection, the beginning speech data segment may not be recoverable. However, the system can be configured to temporarily buffer blocks of audio input to ensure that segments of actual speech onset are recoverable, while temporarily buffered audio segments can be safely discarded after some period of time when it is assumed that such segment does not or would not contain speech data corresponding to speech onset activity. In other embodiments, as noted above, the system may be configured to record and persistently maintain all audio input in a local or remote buffer (black box, etc.) prior to detection of speech onset and microphone activation. The recorded audio input can be used by the microphone manager under circumstances were a "lost" audio segment with useful speech data can be extracted from the buffer and added to the complete the captured speech segments.
Thereafter, the speech segments within the captured audio will be input to the speech decoding system (step 209) and processed accordingly based on the given application. In this manner, the input to the speech decoding system will be limited to segments of the captured audio input having useful speech, while preventing the input of non-speech segments with noise from being input to the speech decoding system so as to enhance the decoding accuracy of the speech data.
In particular, in one exemplary embodiment illustrated in
In this regard, the microphone system (101) in
The system can adjust microphone volume sensitivity for a given user to adapt to changes in environmental static noise level. The system can obtain a stored voice sample of the user which provides information regarding volume of the speaker's voice. The system can use the voice and environmental noise samples to adjust the sensitivity and volume of the microphone input (step 302) using known processing techniques. The speech data is transformed or otherwise adapted based on the adjusted microphone parameters (step 303). The adapted speech data is then applied to the speech decoding system (step 304). By automatically adjusting the microphone parameters, the system may be better adapted to the speaker under changing noise levels to thereby enhance the quality of the captured speech data.
It is to foe appreciated that the exemplary method can be applied in various applications to make automatic adjustment of microphone parameters while eliminating the burden on the speaker to make such adjustments. For instance, this process is particularly useful for transcription applications where a microphone system used by different speakers must be adapted or adjusted to a speech recognition system for each speaker during a lecture. The first speaker will usually have trained the system prior to the lecture for his/her own voice and will have adjusted the microphone system accordingly. When the microphone system initially adjusts to the static environmental noise in a lecture center or conference room, the system may assume that this environment will be preserved with little changes in noise levels.
When new speakers approach the podium to speak, the system will use the initial environmental setting and apply it to the new speaker. Instead of the new speaker saying a phrase to allow the microphone system to adjust to the new sensitivity level, the system may automatically adjust the microphone parameters using a stored sample of the phrase and the environmental noise level sample using the method of
In another exemplary embodiment of the invention, acoustic quality control methods are implemented to adjust microphone parameters based on changes in distance between a microphone and a speaker's mouth. For example, as illustrated in
In other exemplary embodiments of the invention, acoustic quality control can be implemented by adapting captured audio containing speech data of a given speaker according to characteristics of the microphone that the speaker used to train the speech decoding system. This may foe implemented in various ways. For example, in one embodiment, a hybrid system of microphones can be used that would contain different microphones equivalent to those that may be used to train the speech decoding system. When a person begins to speak into the ASR system, the system can determine the type of microphone that the person used when training the ASR system, and then activate a corresponding microphone within the hybrid system to capture the speech input. This would allow the speaker to speak through a microphone that is equivalent to the microphone that was used to train the system. In another exemplary embodiment, the hybrid system may adapt the electromagnetic sensor to match the structure and characteristics of the microphone used by the speaker at the time of training.
In yet another embodiment, the system may implement an algorithm that changes the signal from one microphone to another. In other words, if the speaker were speaking into a microphone that was not similar to the one used for training, the system could modulate the audio signal received from the speaker's current microphone to match the signal of the training microphone.
It should be noted that the acoustic quality control systems and methods as described herein according to exemplary embodiments of the invention may be implemented using any one or more of known speech/audio processing techniques that are suitable for microphone/speech processing applications to effectively compensate for mismatch conditions between training and real-time conditions as a result of speaker variability, changes in acoustic environmental noise, and changes in acoustic channels. In this regard, various techniques failing within general categories of feature processing techniques and model adaptation techniques may be implemented by the acoustic quality control system to prevent degradation in speech decoding accuracy due to such mismatch conditions. With these schemes, mismatch is reduced through the transformation or modification of features or model parameters according to some criterion.
For instance, methods for transforming speech data according to exemplary embodiments of the invention may be implemented using known feature transformation techniques to adapt acoustic speech data and compensate for mismatches in acoustic channel including, for example, those techniques disclosed in the article by J. Pelecanos, et al, entitled "Addressing Channel Mismatch through Speaker Discriminative Transforms", Speaker and Language Recognition Workshop, 2006, IEEE Odyssey 2006, which is incorporated herein by reference. In general, Pelecanos, et al., discloses a feature transformation scheme which performs a direct mapping of features from one channel type to an assumed undistorted target channel, wherein the direct transformation of features is performed using a discriminative criterion. The process performs a transformation dependent upon the channel type of a test recording and the desired target channel type to which the features are to be mapped. With this scheme, the adaptation of speech data does not require changes to speaker models, but rather the acoustic input (speech) is transformed to adapt to the speech data according to the different types of acoustic channels or changes in an accuse be channel.
In the context of the claimed inventions, this and other speech adaptation schemes may be applied to "acoustic channels" within the microphone environment, where changes in "acoustic channels" include changes in the distance between the speaker's lips and the microphone, changes in the microphone configuration or parameters by speakers, etc. The underlying techniques for transforming/adapting speech data can be applied to various types of acoustic channels.
Moreover, various model adaptation techniques may foe implemented in which speech, channel and background noise model parameters are adapted to account for mismatches. For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 6,383,393 to Gong, entitled "Method of Adapting Speech Recognition Models for Speaker, Microphone and Noisy Environment", which is incorporated herein by reference, discloses a two-stage model adaptation scheme based on maximum-likelihood linear regression (MLLR). More specifically, Gong discloses a two-stage model adaptation scheme wherein the first stage adapts a speaker-independent HMM (Hidden Markov Model) seed model set to a speaker/microphone-dependent model set and a second stage wherein the speaker/microphone-dependent model set is adapted to a speaker/microphone/noise-dependent model set that is used for speech recognition.
It is to be understood that exemplary systems and methods described herein may be implemented in various forms of hardware, software, firmware, special purpose processors, or a combination thereof. For example, the microphone manager (110) and speech recognition system (120) can foe implemented as applications comprising program instructions that are tangibly embodied on one or more program storage devices (e.g., hard disk, magnetic floppy disk, RAM, CD ROM, ROM and Flash memory) and executable by any device or machine comprising suitable architecture. It is to be further understood that since the constituent system modules and method steps depicted in the accompanying Figures may be implemented in software, the actual connections between the system components (or the flow of the process steps) may differ depending upon the manner in which the present invention is programmed. Given the teachings herein, one of ordinary skill in the related art will be able to contemplate these and similar implementations or configurations of the present invention.
Although exemplary embodiments of the present invention have been described herein with reference to the accompanying drawings, it is to be understood that the invention is not limited to the exemplary embodiments, and that various other changes and modifications may be affected therein by one skilled in the art without departing from the scope or spirit of the invention. All such changes and modifications are intended to be included within the scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.
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|Mar 20, 2003
|Balan Radu Victor
|Multi-channel speech enhancement system and method based on psychoacoustic masking effects
|Feb 4, 2002
|Aug 7, 2003
|Doran Oster
|Microphone emulation
|Nov 13, 2002
|May 13, 2004
|Hardwick John C
|Interoperable vocoder
|Dec 10, 2002
|Jun 10, 2004
|Zangi Kambiz C.
|Method and apparatus for noise reduction
|Dec 10, 2003
|Jul 1, 2004
|Thomas Kemp
|Method for processing speech using absolute loudness
|Dec 30, 2003
|Jul 7, 2005
|Little Alexander H.
|Self-identifying microphone
|Aug 31, 2004
|Mar 2, 2006
|International Business Machines Corporation
|Touch gesture based interface for motor vehicle
|May 30, 2006
|Nov 16, 2006
|Barzilay Ziv
|A system and a method for verifying identity using voice and fingerprint biometrics
|Aug 9, 2006
|Feb 15, 2007
|Erik Visser
|Separation of target acoustic signals in a multi-transducer arrangement
|Mar 29, 2006
|Oct 11, 2007
|Jiri Navratil
|System and method for addressing channel mismatch through class specific transforms
|Mar 31, 2006
|Oct 11, 2007
|Igor Zlokarnik
|Speech recognition using channel verification
|Jun 27, 2006
|Dec 27, 2007
|Sbc Knowledge Ventures, Lp
|Biometric and speech recognition system and method
|Mar 13, 2008
|Oct 16, 2008
|Grover Noel J
|Voice print identification portal
|Jul 2, 2008
|Jan 8, 2009
|Texas Instruments Incorporated
|Adaptive Noise Cancellation
|Oct 18, 2007
|Apr 23, 2009
|Motorola, Inc.
|Robust two microphone noise suppression system
|Title not available
|Anastasios Anastasakos, et al., "Adaptation of New Microphones Using Tied-Mixture Normalization," Proceedings of ICASSP '94. IEEE International Conference on Acoustics Speech and Signal Processing, Apr. 22, 1994 pp. 1/433-1/436, XP002474905 Adelaide, SA, Australia ISBN: 07803-1775-0.
|Anastasios Anastasakos, et al., "Adaptation of New Microphones Using Tied-Mixture Normalization," Proceedings of ICASSP '94. IEEE International Conference on Acoustics Speech and Signal Processing, vol. 1, Apr. 19, 1994-Apr. 22, 1994 pp. 1/433-1/436, XP002474905 Adelaide, SA, Australia ISBN: 07803-1775-0.
|International Search Report from United Kingdom.
|Pelecanos et al., "Addressing Channel Mismatch through Speaker Discriminative Transforms", Speaker and Language Recognition Workshop, 2006, IEEE Odyssey 2006.
|Citing Patent
|Filing date
|Publication date
|Oct 4, 2011
|Dec 25, 2012
|Theodore Alfred Rosenberger
|Interactive speech recognition device and system for hands-free building control
|Mar 15, 2013
|Nov 8, 2016
|Sri International
|Method and apparatus for acoustic signal characterization
|Jun 24, 2015
|Dec 27, 2016
|Microsoft Technology Licensing, Llc
|Filtering sounds for conferencing applications
|Mar 15, 2013
|Sep 18, 2014
|Sri International
|Method and apparatus for audio characterization
|U.S. Classification
|704/226, 704/233
|International Classification
|Cooperative Classification
|European Classification
|Jan 4, 2007
Owner name: INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION, NEW Y
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Owner name: INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORTATION, NEW
Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST;ASSIGNORS:KANEVSKY, DIMITRI;VISWANATHAN, MAHESH;NAHAMOO, DAVID;ANDOTHERS;SIGNING DATES FROM 20071119 TO 20071127;REEL/FRAME:021811/0071
|Oct 30, 2015
|Maintenance fee reminder mailed
|Mar 20, 2016
|Lapse for failure to pay maintenance fees
|May 10, 2016
|Expired due to failure to pay maintenance fee
Effective date: 20160320


text:
Guess it just reopened under new owners. Mex-American bar-and-grill with real promise, seems to me, though I just had a bite (details on my blog, address in profile, etc.).
Burgers/tacos/quesadillas seem to be the mainstay; they also have a fair number of tequilas accompanied by sangrita (yay), pink grapefruit juice (more yay), or salt & lime. Crowd was big early.
Looking forward to returning. If anyone else has checked it out yet, would love your impressions.

subset: commoncrawl


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Urgot Build Guide by MXT2
Not Updated For Current Season
This guide has not yet been updated for the current season. Please keep this in mind while reading. You can see the most recently updated guides on the browse guides page.
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Urgot Build
Ability Sequence
Not Updated For Current Season
The masteries shown here are not yet updated for the current season, the guide author needs to set up the new masteries. As such, they will be different than the masteries you see in-game.
This is not a detailed guide. This will simple be my guide for Urgot. Most people build Urgot with cool down reduction. I don't really understand why one would. His Q has a 2 second cool down and I think that is fast enough.
My build focuses around the auto attack. His base damage I believe is not that high making less of a focus for most people as they try to decrease the cool down for his Q.
I believe, I need to explain some of the items I choose.
Manamuna is standard for Urgot because of his ability spamming.
I buy Mercury Treads over Ionian Boots of Lucidity because I am more worried about getting caught by crowd control abilities from other champs. It also gives you a little magic resists which this build does not give you a lot of.
I get Black Cleaver because it shreds their armor which is the main thing that makes Urgot seem weak late game. People say he just scales off, but if you shred the armor you can do more damage.
I get Stark's Fervor because it helps the whole team, and it also gives you life steal. The life steal helps you duke it out with other champs face to face, continues the dropping armor tread, and gives you a attack speed. The attack speed helps to keep your passive on your opponent. So if you get into a situation where you are duking it out face to face they do less damage.
I get Spirit Vesage mostly for the increase in health regen, but the extra health and magic resists are good too. I just feel it is a solid item that allows you to live longer, and there for dish out more DSP.
The finally item, Atma's Impaler, I get for the armor and to turn is above average health into damage.
At the end of the build you have close to 300 AD, with Black Cleavers, and a attack speed of 1.4 means you literal cut through people.
Summoner Spells
Most people would get Ignite instead of Ghost because it helps secure kills, and that is why I have Ghost. A homing Acid Hunter has huge range, and sometimes you just can't catch up even with your slow. So I punch my Ghost and chase them down, and put the last couple of holes in them.
Flash is because it is Flash, and a good escape tool.
Ganks / Kills
I find Urgot is good at shutting down carries. If you focus solo the carries and try to disrupt or kill them as often as possible you will keep them down pretty hard. This is clearly something you should do anyways but Urgot excels at this through the mid point of the game. To disrupt the enemy carries try to ult them into your team, or your tower, or when they are trying to get away.
Urgots E, the grenade lobe should be the first thing you hit your target with. This also you also hit your target with Acid Hunter. Do get Acid Hunter you home in on the target you have to have the mouse on them. I find an easy way to do this is to kill them over and over like you are trying to attack them. Not only do you got all your hits with Acid Hunter you also put hole in them with your auto attack. This drops their armor and your acid hunter cuts right through them. But, BEFORE you fire the first acid hunter make sure to throw up your shield it will slow them making it easier for you to keep up with them.


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English, , 401kb
This paper focuses on the capacity requirements and price development for telecommunication infrastructure for business-to-business electronic commerce.
OECD Workshop on Defining and Measuring Electronic Commerce - 21 April 1999 What do we mean by e-commerce? What we want to measure and why? What can be measured? What are the policy needs and what type of indicators are needed? Which of the exi...
The development of an information society is expected to stimulate economic growth and productivity, create new economic activities as well as jobs.
This book represents one of the first analyses of the role of e-commerce in the broader economy, and addresses such issues as the impact of e-commerce on employment and on society as a whole, as well as its contribution to economic growth and efficiency.
English, , 11kb
This Declaration was made by OECD Ministers at the conference, "A Borderless World: Realising the Potential of Global Electronic Commerce" in Ottawa, Canada on 7-9 October 1998 and serves as the basis for OECD privacy protection work since 1998.
The paper draws on empirical studies to identify differences between quality-adjusted and unadjusted price changes of several ICT products.
English, , 232kb
The Conference addressed broad areas through a format that permitted business representatives to identify problems, governments to discuss how they hope to deal with the problem and international organisations to suggest how they can help to implement the solution internationally.
English, , 112kb
This paper provides an initial analysis of the main issues in network-based production and delivery of music and audio-visual services content, providing a more comprehensive comparative analysis of new network-based services by main content-producing information and entertainment industries.
This report aims to outline the issues associated with measuring electronic commerce, propose an initial framework and begin to compare some of the disparate data so as to form a mosaic which gives a clearer quantitative picture of the current status and future direction of electronic commerce.
English, , 150kb
Electronic commerce is creating a new mode of delivering new types of products in a global market in which geographical boundaries and location lose their meaning.


text:
Bobby "G" Gleason, Master Mixologist for Jim Beam, doesn't exactly work at too many average bars or restaurants… Yet he still has to deal with fruit flies on a regular basis – proof that these pests can and do get everywhere! Thankfully for him and his customers, Bobby found FlyPunch! and doesn't have to deal with fruit flies anymore. As he says
You want to get it behind your bar!
Thanks G!


text:
Contact us for all of your Keith Washington tickets. We stock tickets in all locations for every Keith Washington event!
Go to the Source!!!! Ticketsource.com
Ticketsource.com is an independent ticket brokerage engaged in buying and selling Dallas Cowboys tickets, Cowboys Stadium tickets and Dallas Mavericks tickets at a premium. Ticketsource.com is not affiliated with any box office or TicketMaster


text:
We have heard that visitors to our landing pages and websites spend only one to three seconds before they decide to stick around and maybe (if we're fortunate) scroll down the page. Or if we're even more fortunate, click around our site to other pages.
It's easy to ignore this reality and get caught up in flashy, exciting web presentations. It's like going shopping for a cool outfit, finding one and ordering it without giving due consideration to whether or not it will actually look good on us.
Good clothing fit just not always top-of-mind, is it? Well, neither is page load speed. It's geeky and boring and we just want to see our lovely website up and running.
The harsh reality is that visitors will click away if our pages take too long to load, especially on their tablets and phones. That's a fact. We have to deliver our personal branding in 1 - 3 seconds or they'll be gone.
Robin Geuens posted great suggestions for landing page design on the Firepole Marketing blog, and I followed up on his advice for my website.
These are his main points and my new benchmarks for landing page and website loading speed success:
- Make your site load as fast as possible.
- Use color to highlight the right things.
- Use call to actions that complete the sentence "I want to ______".
- Watch how many links you put on your landing page. Keep them focused on your message.
- Keep your mobile customers and leads in mind.


text:
BALTIMORE (WJZ)– "CBS This Morning" co-host Charlie Rose is recovering after undergoing successful surgery to replace a heart valve Thursday.
"Almost 15 years ago skilled surgeons replaced my aorta valve with a new replacement valve. It has served me well enabling me to live the vigorous, full, complete life you are all so familiar with. No one loves life more than I do," Rose said.
"To continue to live this amazing life so full of challenges and friends, including so many of you in the audience, I have chosen to replace the valve with a new one. The timing is my choice."
Rose said he's excited to get back to work soon.
Follow @CBSBaltimore on Twitter and like WJZ-TV | CBS Baltimore on Facebook


text:
R&B duo P-Square, P Square and brother, Jude Okoye, in an interview with BBC London, cleared the air on the issue between them and Akinmayokun Awodumila, popularly known as May D.
P-Square was in London to perform at the HMV Hammersmith Apollo, London for the Love Afrobeat Festival, visited BBC Africa's studios, just before the concert.
Responding to questions sent by Facebook, Twitter and Google+ followers; CEO, Northside Ent. Ltd/Square Records, Jude Okoye said, "We did not sack May D. We just let him go."
It was reported last week that Square Records released a press statement announcing the end of their business relationship with the only other artist on their label, Mr May D.
According to the statement, the split is due to the irreconcilable differences between the two parties. The Okoyes further wished May D all the best in his career.
Reacting to the statement, May D said "I do not know what they are talking about. You know I don't stay in their house so how am I meant to know this?"
May D was signed by the label some months ago and has released few hit tracks under the label including 'Ile Ijo', 'Soundtrack', and the remix he did with Akon and P-Square.
They also sang a cappella one of their latest hits, Beautiful Onyinye, which they recently recorded with American superstar rapper, Rick Ross.
The Love Afrobeats Festival, a cultural celebration of African music, was organised by African promoters, Cokobar, SMADE and Phoenix Global Media.
The festival took over the 5000 capacity venue with performances from the biggest music forces including, Wande Coal, and Ghana's finest E.L and Azonto sensation Fuse ODG, as well as two promising upcoming UK-based Afrobeat artists, DL and Ezi Emela.
Source: Entertainment.naija.ng


text:
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Item description for Quiet Moments With God by Lloyd John Ogilvie...Overview
Rich with encouragement and wisdom, "Quiet Moments with God" is filled with prayers that nurture intimacy with God. Readers can experience God's blessed assurance as they are comforted by His promises to provide guidance in moments of need, give strength in times of weakness, and surround them with His boundless love.
Publishers Description
Rich with encouragement and wisdom, "Quiet Moments with God "is filled with prayers that nurture intimacy with God. Readers will truly experience God's blessed assurance as they are comforted by God's promises to: provide guidance in moments of needgive strength in times of weaknesssurround them with His boundless love
Readers will also experience the joy of knowing God cares and watches over them. (Formerly "One Quiet Moment.")
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text:
The role will see Morris head the legal team for the energy giant's entire 'downstream' operation, which is distinct from the company's 'upstream' exploration and production division.
Morris spent two years as general counsel at Centrica-owned British Gas, the downstream part of the business, having come across from parent company Centrica in 2007. He joined Centrica in 2002 as the company's corporate centre legal head before his team merged with the British Gas legal department.
Morris, who also sits on the executive management committee of BP's refining and marketing arm, is one of two associate general counsel who sit beneath global group general counsel Rupert Bondy.
Bondy was a 2008 capture from GlaxoSmith-Kline (GSK) following the retirement of previous head of legal Peter Bevan.
A BP lifer, Bevan spent nearly 40 years in the company's legal team, having joined in 1970. He became group general counsel in 1992 and was appointed executive vice-president in 1998.
In turn, British Gas has appointed Melanie Rowlands as its new general counsel. She will take up the role on 8 February.
Rowlands joins from Edwards Vacuum, where she was group director of legal, compliance and HR. Previously she was general counsel for Europe, the Middle East and Africa
at gases and engineering company Linde Group.
Adam Ramsey has been named as the new legal director at Edwards Vacuum.


text:
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Thread: How do i secure MS Access 2010
05-12-12, 05:19 #1Registered User
- Join Date
- May 2012
- Posts
- 1
Unanswered: How do i secure MS Access 2010
I am developing a database using MS Access 2010. How can i hide all the menu bars, ribbons and navigation panes etc. so that users are locked out from seeing any designs or objects except to use the forms and reports that i want them to see by using the menu form that i create?
I can do this in access 2003 but no idea how to about this in access 2010. Any help would be much appreciated.


text:
Join All Fine Girls! Download full-length 17min 36sec movie now!
She's so sweet and that angelic body matches her pretty face. Meet Natasha, a beauty that wants to take off her clothes for us. She remains completely naked and plays with her pussy. Want to see what else she knows to do with that tight, shaved cunt? It's sweet and and something big and hard will look great inside it
- amadeus
- : 4min 55sec
- : 25 Jun 2013
- Exclusive video


text:
In United Kingdom (UK), education is one of the areas in which power is devolved to the governments of England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland.
In England: At the end of June, 2007, the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) became the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) and the BIS (Business, Innovation and Skills) . The mission of BIS is building a dynamic and competitive UK economy by creating the conditions for business success, promoting innovation, enterprise and science, and giving everyone the skills and opportunities to succeed. Furthermore, BIS creates the policy critical to grow the economy, from higher education, skills and science to innovation, enterprise and business.
In Wales: In the Welsh Assembly, the Department for Children, Education, Lifelong Learning and Skills is the responsible body most relevant to VET .
In Northern Ireland: the Department for the Economy is responsible for developing and implementing policies relating to further education and training programmes.
For more information on the context of the VET system in Northern Ireland please click here
Please click here
In Scotland: The Minister for Education and Young People and the Minister for Enterprise, Transport, and Lifelong Learning are responsible for education and training in Scotland Education and training policy is overseen by the Scottish Executive Education Department (SEED) and the Scottish Executive Enterprise and Lifelong learning Department (SEELLD).
For more information on the context of the VET system in Scotland please click here
Some of the recent policy highlights are as following:
Northern Ireland:
School is compulsory for pupils between the ages of 5 to 16 (4 to 16 in Northern Ireland). All publicly funded schools must provide the National Curriculum. There are various initiatives which allow young people below 16 to sample vocational education . At age 16 most pupils sit for public examination. In England, Wales and Northern Ireland the exam is the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) in Scotland it is the Standard Grade. From 16 a classroom-based education (in secondary schools and further education colleges) and work-based training is available, sometimes in combination. In this respect, the Young Apprenticeship Programme is relevant in England as it allows pupils to study for vocational qualifications, through a combination of classroom work-based training. Functional Skills are a key element to reforms in this area. The qualifications beyond the age of 16 include the National Vocational Qualifications (NVQs) in England, Wales and Northern Ireland and Scottish Vocational Qualifications (SVQs) in Scotland.
Continuing vocational education and training (CVET) in the UK covers a very wide range. One main purpose of CVET is to provide second chance opportunities for adults to gain initial vocational qualifications or to change directions of their careers. Adults can gain qualifications either through courses aimed specifically at adults and in courses which are open to young people. The main focus in relation to CVET, however, is to up-skill the existing workforce, as part of a recognition that the skills levels of today's workers must be raised if the economies across the UK are to develop effectively.
CVET is provided through three main categories:
Again there are differences between the countries in terms of delivery and programmes. One example provided here is the programme "Train to Gain" in England set up order to improve the efficiency of the "market" in education and training a new structure is being put in place to improve information and advice for employers and individuals. The service aims to encourage all employers to realise the benefits that learning and skills can bring whilst recognising that different sized businesses or businesses from different sectors face different challenges. The service therefore recognises this and is tailored to meet these needs. For example, those employers with 5,000 or more employees will receive advice from a specific service that advises national employers- the National Employer Service. A brokerage service, "Train to Gain", has recently been created to assist employers to identify and source appropriate training to meet their particular business needs (and to subsidise such training when it meets broader Government priorities). Train to Gain is to be accompanied with a Learner Account programme, to give individuals greater choice and control over their own learning.
Due to the devolution of responsibility in the UK, the area of quality assurance In the UK, the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) was created in June 2007, replacing the formal Department of Education and Skills. DCSF's role can be described as "leading the whole network of people who work with or for children and young people". DCSF wants to "do more to ensure that every child gets a world-class education". With these descriptions, it is reasonable to assume DCSF is the main governmental body for the quality assurance of VET system in England . Other bodies are also relevant for example, as of October 2008 the Centre for Excellence in Leadership (CEL) and the Quality Improvement Agency (QIA) in England became the Learning and Skills Improvement Service (LSIS), a sector lead organization and combines the role and activities of the two previous organizations including programmes and services designed to raise the quality of education and training in the learning and skills sector at further education level. In the context of quality assurance the Framework for Excellence: Raising Standards and Informing Choice has been developed to emphasize the importance of further education. This framework was developed in 2007. Some aspects are to be tested as pilots until 2009. In this framework, several indicators are used to produce overall performance ratings . A testing of the Case for Contextualization within the Framework for Excellence found for 2009, that there are changes needed in the Qualification Success Rates - QSR (there is an inverse relationship between QSR and some key socio-demographic indicators), in Resource Efficiency (users of Framework outputs will need to be alerted to the strong correlation with QSR, as Resource Efficiency uses QSR's in this formula, as well as strong links between the distribution of grades and provider type, and an inverse link to the proportion of adult learners).
In Wales, the National Council for Education and Training for Wales is responsible for quality assurance . In this context, the Quality and Effectiveness Framework (QEF) for post-16 learning in Wales is relevant . The QEF will use a small number of indicators that will build on those used in provider performance review developed in 2007. It is not possible to detail the whole approach in this document. For further information the reader is referred to the document referenced. The QEF will be implemented using a phased approach During 2009/10 the focus will be on learner outcomes (success in completing and achieving learning activities and programmes) and include pilot measures for responsiveness to learners and employers. In 2010/2011 the pilot measures will be introduce across the sector.
In Northern Ireland, the quality assurance system in the further education and training sectors is set out in Success through Excellence, the quality improvement strategy for these sectors. All publicly-funded courses are subject to inspection, and providers must adhere to the Education and Training Inspectorate's Improving Quality :Raising Standards guidelines, which include a strong focus on the importance of self-evaluation. The Department for the Economy also supports a range of programmes dedicated to improving quality in the sector which are accountable to the NI Assembly.
In Scotland, "the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) is the national body responsible for the design, development, accreditation, verification, quality assurance and certification of vocational education. It works in partnership with practitioners in education and training, industry, commerce and government to develop new qualifications and to manage the portfolio of existing qualifications" .
It is also important to mention the role of Ofqual as the new regulator of qualifications, exams and tests in England .
Since the UK consists of four different countries, some other agencies are important to mention in terms of quality assurance process:
In addition to inspection, the following two sections explain other issues related to quality assurance, both in IVET and CVET in more detail:
In IVET, several policies are in place for VET courses, VET providers, benchmarking statistics and good practice:
In CVET, there are also several strands existing for quality assurance :
The attached pdf summarises the situation with regard to the ten indicators created by CQAF in the UK. Due to the devolved status of education and the multitude of organizations involved in the quality assurance process in the four countries, the organizations column has not been filled. There are currently some important new policies regarding quality assurance as described above and further investigation will be necessary with various stakeholder organizations to clarify the exact status of the implementation of the indicators in each country. The column "organizations" points out the name of the entity or entities that are monitoring the indicator. The "Observations" column is used when more description is required: UK Indicators
© European Quality Assurance in Vocational Education and Training
This project has been funded with support from the European Commission.
This Website reflects only the views of EQAVET and the Commission cannot be held responsible
for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.


text:
Feng Shui is the ancient Chinese practice of creating harmonious surroundings that enhance the balance of yin and yang energies and the flow of life energy named Qi. Feng Shui has been around for thousands of years and is closely related to the wisdom of Tao. So what is it precisely that this ancient wisdom tries to achieve?
Feng Shui in a nutshell
Feng Shui focuses on positioning furniture, buildings and lay out of rooms in such a way that it achieves maximum harmony between the flow of Qi of the environment and that of the user.
This ultimate harmony is believed to bring good fortune in all aspects of life. Feng Shui is based on the idea that our homes are a reflection of our inner worlds. So your own energy and that of your home should be ideally aligned to fulfill your needs and to get where you want to go in life.
It is therefore important to realize which energy you bring in. Pay attention to how you arrange the rooms, the furniture, the decoration and surround yourself with beauty. Everything contains and radiates energy, even objects and with Feng shui you can guide that energy in a positive way and let it flow undisturbed through your home.
How to make this happen?
You could do this in the traditional but more intricate way with the aid of a special feng shui compass and astrology for example, but that would be better left to professionals. To make things less complicated we will focus on the western approach of Feng Shui (Black Hat Feng Shui) decoration for now.
The most important thing to start with is to declutter and clean your home. Clutter has a negative influence on Qi, so before you start make sure the rooms in your house look and feel tidy.
Step 2 is to find the center of your home. This is the Yin Yang point and this center is very important for directing the right energy into the spaces of your house.
Find the center of your home
You will need the floor plan of your house and a bagua map like the one you see in the photo below. Divide the floor plan of your house into 9 squares like the bagua. Make sure you exclude any extensions, because these should be mapped individually.
In the western version you place the lower side of the bagua map at your entrance. This should be the door the builder initially intended as your front door even when you use a different entrance more often. Your door should either fall into knowledge, career or travel.
Find the corresponding fields of the bagua map in your floor plan to get an idea which rooms hold which energy, and use this as a guide to improve a positive flow in the desired areas. In these areas you should use the colours mentioned in the bagua map and make sure you include a few objects that help that specific goal.
Object examples:
ABUNDANCE: Plants, sailing ships
FAME: Awards, animals
RELATIONSHIPS: Paired items (in two's)
FAMILY: Plants, family photos
TRAVEL HELPFUL PEOPLE: Religious items travel souvenirs
SELF KNOWLEDGE: Books, computers
CAREER: Mirrors, fountains
HEALTH: Pottery, stone objects
CHILDREN, CREATIVITY: Artwork, Children's photos
Feng Shui not only works with placement and specific objects to improve Qi. Colours are very important as well. And don't be fooled to think you should apply soft and soothing shades only. It is a balance of Yin and Yang energies, so if your living room is grey you need colour accents to establish perfect harmony.
If you have ample space, you might want to consider reserving a room for your personal me-time. A place where you can unwind and relax and that helps both body and mind to calm down. If you simply don't have that space, try a corner of the living room or your bedroom to accommodate those needs.
Basic rules for the living room
A sofa is best positioned against a solid wall and in a perfect world, against the wall farthest from the entry so you'll have a clear view of the door. Leave a bit of breathing room between the sofa and the wall.
If you don't have a wall to put the sofa against, put a console behind it, topped with tall lamps to create more security. And place a mirror directly opposite of our seating arrangement to make sure you can see behind you.
By all means avoid an awkward seating plan that is counter productive in terms of conversation. There are no set rules for distances but when there is 3 meters between the sofa and the next available chair or when it is too cramped to feel comfortable, it will have a negative effect because it becomes a less welcoming area. Something you will want to avoid.
Also arrange some small furniture to place books or drinks to create a more inviting atmosphere. The flow should be open. you don't want to bump into furniture and all walkways to other areas should be clear. In terms of furniture shape, circular and oval are recommended for a coffee table for it allows the flow of energy to move around better. Which doesn't mean you can't have square or rectangular shapes. With Feng Shui it is all about balance so there should be equal parts of each. For a colour scheme refer to you bagua map and make sure you allow accent pieces in those colours if the walls are in a solid colour.
An example; if you want to increase wealth and abundance you might want to place four purple plants (orchids) in that designated area.
Rules for the bedroom
Bedrooms are the most Yin rooms of your home and places where you calm down and unwind.To create chi balance, you must first rid your bedroom of all clutter and work-related equipment. Dirt and dust create stagnant chi which can result in such things as illness, disharmony within your relationships. It should be a nourishing place to maintain healthy and loving relationships and soothing for your senses. Choose calming colours; blues are very good for the bedroom.
What not to do
-Never place the bed opposite the door (with your feet pointing towards the door) This is called the coffin position, needless to say where it gets is name from and why you should avoid it.
-Also do not position your bed in front of or underneath a window: Qi energy enters and leaves a room through the windows. If your bed is in this pathway, the Qi energy will flow over you as you sleep, causing a restless sleep.
-Avoid placing the mattress directly on the floor because you would be blocking the main pathway of Qi.
-Avoid mirrors or paintings opposite or over the bed as they are considered intrusions by third parties into the relationship.
-Never place your bed on a wall shared by the bathroom.
-Don't hang pictures of water or sailing in your bedroom because water is very Yang and interferes with the Yin quality too much.
What to do
Place candles (always in pairs for the partner relationship) or fragrance sticks to help with a calming scent. Pink and red accents to improve passion and love and rose quartz ducks to aid relationships
Make it visually soothing and place furniture in such a way that energy can flow around undisturbed.
Get started
With this blog post we realize that we only briefly scratch the surface of Feng Shui for your home to create a more positive living environment. If you wish to know more about the ancient wisdom of Feng Shui decoration we advise you to contact a specialist or purchase a good book on the topic.
We hope we have given you an inspiring glimpse into this ancient art from China. Maybe it helps you improve certain areas of your life. We hope so. One thing is for sure: you will only ever find out if you try it first. Good luck!
This post is also available in: Engelska Nederländska Spanska Franska Tyska


text:
QCT: Taking the work out of '9 to 5''
Mon, 08 Jul 2013 15:46:54 GMT —
Quincy Community Theatre opens the show '9 to 5' Thursday.
While the actors and actresses on stage have been working for months to bring you a successful performance, it's the people behind the scenes that make it all possible.
Believe it or not - work to create productions like '9 to 5' begin six months in advance as directors meet to create concepts for the show.
Lenny Bart is the Director of the Quincy Community Theatre. He says from those meetings come the creation of sets like these - that seem to be effortlessly wheeled in or dropped from the ceiling. Click here to here more about how those set changes happen.
"We do so much to make sure no one notices, so the magic just happens," Bart said.
As you can imagine space on stage is at a premium. Here at the set of '9 to 5' there are 13 different scene changes. All that movement makes the action backstage nothing short of constant.
This production requires 12 people to run the pulleys, curtains, sound and lights and that's not counting the actors who work double duty to move sets and props on and off the stage at any given time. It's enough to make your head spin.
Jobs backstage take coordination and a little imagination. Crews build pulley systems to lift actors. Click here to watch KHQA's Melissa Shriver flail in the pulley.
There's also a prop in this musical that has bells and whistles all its own! Click here to watch video from the special Xerox machine brought in from Chicago just for the occasion.
"On opening night everything comes together," said Paul Denckla, Technical Director at the Quincy Community Theatre.
Click here to watch the behind the scene's story.
'9 to 5' opens this Thursday, July 11 and runs through July 21st.
Tickets are still available online at www.1qct.org/â?? and at the box office at the Oakley Lindsay Center in Quincy.


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TOKYO, Nov 2 (Reuters) - Japanese stocks slipped on Monday after twin manufacturing surveys showed that China's economy remains shaky despite a raft of stimulus measures which hit businesses exposed to the Asian giant.
The Nikkei share average tumbled 2.1 percent to 18,683.24.
Japan's iron and steel sector, which has significant exposure to China, tumbled 4.4 percent.
The sector was weighed down heavily by Kobe Steel Ltd , which shed 6.5 percent after announcing on Friday that it would cut its production estimates amid falling export prices and slower-than-expected domestic demand. Rivals JFE Holdings and Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal made similar announcements on Thursday and extended their losses, plunging 5.6 percent and 5.5 percent respectively.
Trading was also influenced by corporate earnings related news and by profit taking after last week's gains. Nitto Denko Corp gained 5.4 percent after announcing strong April-September earnings and a mid-year dividend.
The broader Topix shed 2 percent to close at 1,526.97 with all of its 33 subindexes in negative territory.
The JPX-Nikkei Index 400 fell 2.1 percent to 13,702.71. (Reporting by Joshua Hunt and Ayai Tomisawa; Editing by Shri Navaratnam)


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Recent Photos!!
New Zealand Day 11
This was a fun filled, long day in the sun! Definitely the best weather we had the entire trip, so we had to take full advantage!
Mark and his dad went golfing in the morning, so I walked with the 3 kids to the local playground where they played for almost 2 hours. We walked back home for Cole's nap and a little down time, before heading back out to the beach! We walked about haldf a mile down so we could go where the river meets the ocean, which was fun for the kids :) They all LOVE the ocean and the beach so so much.
We even got grandad in the ocean! Although he got suuuuuper sunburnt with that sleeveless shirt!!
Cole liked to run into the wave and try to jump over it just as it hit, and the stomp and splash repeatedly.
Jack spotted the seagulls and is about to go run after them :)
Again with the seagull chase, this time by Cole.
Once the kids had had enough of the ocean we walked a few minutes over to this playground where it was finally warm enough to play in the splash pad! Take note of Riley about to get dunked in the 3rd picture below:
After all that excitement, we got the kids cleaned up, ate dinner, and then I forced everyone to go on a mini hike so that I could get a couple of pictures at our favorite hiking spot. What a mission! The kids were so exhausted but yet energized at the same time after a long day of fun in the sun.
Gettig photos of the three of them together was.... challenging.
Coley's face in most of these photos is priceless. I love that little two year old so much :)
Apparently daddy was being SO FUNNY right behind me. Or at least Cole thought so.
WINNER. Thanks Nana for snapping this one! Then two seconds later Mark smushed Jack's foot and it was all downhill and tears from there. Oh well!
Quick stop down at the beach for a quick photo with Nana!
And that's it! Tomorrow is the last half day of our vacation, and we will be headed to the airport for a long flight, then back to the US we will be!!
New Zealand Day 10
We got some good afternoon weather today!! Nana took the big kids to the beach while Cole slept, this photo below is right behind our house, I'm standing basically in the backyard at the gate down to the beach to take this picture.
Riley and jack and Nana made a little river and a volcano, and I kept catching jacky dancing around like a crazy person. Kid likes like the beach!
Wind blown cutie!
Me: "Jackson, smile!"............. fine, I'll take what I can get.
Soooo pretty today. Can't beat the beach on a nice (ish) day!
We had our New Zealand Christmas celebration today with Nana and Grandad. Since we won't get to see them for actual Christmas, we put up the tree and celebrated and opened gifts today instead.
Mmmmmmm dessert! New Zealand pavlova, my FAVORITE.
And Cole's favorite- green jello with sprinkles. Ha.
New Zealand Day 9
Don't think I took any pictures yesterday, as it was a fairly uneventful day. Well, that's not entirely true, it just wasn't very picturesque. We went shopping in the morning, then relaxed inside a bit and had a generally low key day. And actually, I wanted to share some iphone pictures we've taken since we've been here, totally forgot about some of those :) So these are from day 1-9.
Nana stocked up her house with all kinds of new and cool toys. Cole approves.
See that big slide Riley is on top of?? She only fell off it once. I wasn't there to witness, thankfully, but you can see the lovely bruise she got a few photos down. OUCH.
A FLUFFY!!! Basically just steamed/frothed milk, which Cole refused to even try, and just ate the marshmallows.
The place we are staying has a little two wheel bike, which is actually pretty small for Riley, but Mark took her on a run/bike ride and she actually made it for 3 miles and was pretty great! She loved it :)
We were worried that Nana was only seeing the mischeivous/troublemaker side of Jackson, so we had them spend some one on one time together so she could see the sweet and amazing kid he can be. All was great, they made a cake, and then we made the mistake of letting Riley join at the end so they could decorate the Christmas tree together. And there went the angelic Jackson. :(
The place we are staying! The view from the back/sunroom.
When they aren't fighting, sometimes they are really sweet together.
Riley loves her fluffy. And Christmas time at the mall is always fun. Until Cole starts destroying all the ornaments on display....
Below right: aftermath of falling off the slide and rolling down the hill.
These crazy kids.
New Zealand Day 8
Short and sweet- started the morning off with a little river walk! The goal was to walk to the beach and then build sand castles, but it was SOOO windy, that by the time we got to the beach, the kids were getting pelted with sand, and it was getting in everyone's eyes, so we just turned around and walked back.
Luckily there was a playground close to where we parked, so the outing wasn't a total bust as far as the kids were concerned. They are certainly getting their fair share of playground time, they got to spend nearly 2 hours at another playground this afternoon meeting up with some distant family members for a little playdate as well!
New Zealand Day 7
Today we went to Reikorangi farm to see the animals! Cole was SO EXCITED. I literally should just follow him around with a video camera at all times because he is just so funny and so so cute all the tiiiiime.
Jackson had a handful of food in his hands so allllll the birds followed him around everywhere he went.
There were two peacocks and they are seriously the most beautiful creatures. And they make the most obnoxious noises.
Riley really wanted a picture of her next to the peacock but the bird wouldn't cooperate lol.
The ram.
The ugliest kune kune pig. So big and hairy and bald at the same time lol.
The pony kept trying to eat Riley's jacket, which she thought was pretty funny.
Mark was like, "Come take a picture of this, Jack is surrounded!" and not two seconds later he comes running over in tears because a goose bit him!
Cole says NAUGHTY GOOSE! Or pretty sure he was saying "hi goose" over and over and over. :)
Ugliest bird of the day below:
On the way home we stopped at a playground, and Riley has decided that NZ playgrounds are way WAY better than US ones.
Up they goooooo.....
She made it to the top!
Meanwhile Cole hung out here. The whole time. His favorite thing of the day by FAR!!
New Zealand Day 6!!
This morning Cole and I slept in (!!!) and Mark took the big kids out to a local Christmas parade. And since I wasn't there- no pictures. Once they got home we hopped in the car and met Mark's parents at the bowling alley! By then it had started to rain so it was perfect timing. I think Riley had only been bowling once, and I'm not sure the boys had ever been, so it was fun for all the kids.
Coley was so cute, he'd hit the pins and get so excited and do this little dance and clap routine.
Surprisingly it stopped raining in the afternoon, so while Cole napped, I went out for 2 hours of solo time, trying to shop a bit and explore. So nice and peaceful!! Then when I got back we tried to take advantage of the break in the rain and head to the playground, which was really a cool playground, but it was SOOO windy!! We only stayed for about 30 or so minutes before we decided enough was enough. But look at the slide! That was Jackson's favorite part of the playground.
Can you find Riley at the top of the slide??
They had this cool little zip line as well, which Riley loved.
Aaaaaand monkey see, monkey do. Cole was certainly not about to be left out of the fun!
Other exciting things from today: Found a dead hedgehog in the pool (sad), made significant progress on the legos the kids are building, discovered Mark loves riding kid's scooters, and that's about it! Let's see what tomorrow brings (hopefully not rain)!
New Zealand Day 5
Rainy day meant a little bit of indoor mall shopping, followed by some lego building, and then some indoor pool action. The kids LOVED it. The water was super warm, there was a huge water slide, and it was just a perfect rainy day activity.
The waterslide! It was 2 stories tall, and Riley went down with daddy the first time just to see what it was like, and when she discovered it was super fun, she went down all by herself. Over, and over, and over again!
Coley was a bit hesitant to get in the big pool at first, but once he got in he was unstoppable. A jumping machine! He would jump in over, and over, and over again.
And then when we got home, we got a break in the rain so we kicked the kids out of the house to go play. And what do ya know, Jacky asked to learn how to ride a bike with no training wheels, so....
HE DID IT!! He was so proud of himself, and of course we were proud of him too :) The house we are staying at has so many fun toys and things for the kids to do, it's pretty awesome.
Then down to the beach we went, although it was high tide so we couldn't go past the rocks, but that's alright. The kids collected 578968 shells so they were happy.
And then this because it was pretty. ;)
New Zealand Day 4
The rain officially came today, which worked out fine because we had planned to spend the morning at Te Papa, the country's National Museum, which is all indoors! Perfectly planned, if I do say so myself. Kids got to see lots about the history of New Zealand, although they mostly just liked the animals and volcanoes.
We were there just in time for this cool little kids' story time adventure, which was pretty fun. They read a couple of New Zealand Maori stories, sang a few songs, then got to play in this indoor playground area for a bit.
And lucky for us, the rain stopped and the sun came out here and there in the afternoon, so we headed out to the beach behind where we are staying. In case you are wondering if the ocean looks particularly brown- yes, yes it does. Basically super brown waves, not making it the most picturesque beach, but still plenty of fun.
That's Kapiti Island right behind Riley, you can see it clear as day!
Jackson leaving his usual love notes in the sand. In case you can't read it, it says: NO RILEY.
Aren't they all so precious sitting there on that rock when you can't hear them complaining or see their little faces?? Adorable.
Then we turn 'em around and get smiley, stone cold straight faced, and silly. I guess 1 out of 3 ain't bad.
April 2017


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"Fuck!" Say I
Because nobody rules over my thoughts. Live with it.
To My Dear Departed...
Posted by The Bitch on 5/31/2009 01:50:00 AMI woke in my pyjamas, few minutes after midnight tonight. I cursed the hot stuffy air, empty boxes of cigarettes, my menstrual cramp, and him. One bastard who still lingered in my mind. Freely, absentmindedly. Only God knows how I wanted to shake him up and fished the answers from his mouth, from his mind, from his heart. The answers I desperately seek for the past few months, fruitlessly.
Yes, I bore this wrath, the fury that soon will be unleashed, demolishing everything in its path like a wounded beast with red eyes and blurry sight. I wanted revenge. I wanted blood. Him or mine.
This insatiable thirst was first took its shape after one quick, full-contact combat between an angel and a demon within me. No one lost, as nothing was won. They both went to their corners with head hung low, shoulders down, and eyes casted on the ground, counting the steps as a red herring from their bleeding injuries.
I watched them with anguish that I did not know why. Perhaps—just a little maybe that slightly whispering from the remotest, God-forsaken part of myself—I wanted the angel to triumph like the stories my mother once told me before drifting to sleep when I was a child. Or it might be the demon I longed as a victor because I had enough with 'happily ever after'.
I woke in my pyjamas, few minutes after midnight tonight. Alone, abandoned, hurt. Red blood oozed from the fresh cut I made with my own knife. After so long, it felt relieving. I greeted that long lost friend from the past. He was and is still my closest friend. People called him Misery. I named him Buddy.
I asked him to sit by me, to have nostalgic conversations over two cups of coffee right on the porch, enjoying the breeze and formless voices that sometimes heard hours before dawn.
He used to pat my head, embraced me into his brotherly bear-hug yet deadly. He wanted the same now, as we silently sipped the coffee filled with memories and grieves. He looked me in the eyes, trying to persuade me in his hypnotizing glare from a pair of fathomless black seas on his face. I just smiled. I reached for his left cheek and gently stroke the cold, ragged skin under my palm. I asked him to wait a little longer before he crushed me peacefully. It will come soon before you finish saying 'fuck', said I. He closed his eyes and disappeared, leaving me bleeding solitarily.
I woke in my pyjamas, few minutes after midnight tonight. And I felt naked to the core. I was exposed, used, beaten, and neglected after all I had done. To myself, for the most part. I pasted the gentlest feathers onto the frame of one pair of wings I made. I pressed them hard, using the stickiest Superglue I had ever found in a convenience store. I wanted to fly against the moon tomorrow night when she appeared in full throttle, lurking phototactic animals to bathe in her light and turned them into helpless prey for their predators.
I shackled the moon, brought her down and put her into seclusion. I made her starve; I made her cry for help to the wolves as the wolves were once howling at her without response. Smarter than Icarus I was. I left at sunset. Yet, there was gravity. A jealous act of a mother that kept everything she loved to be close to her heavy bosom. An act of love, they said. And here I was: broken.
I woke in my pyjamas, few minutes after midnight tonight. I felt myself weightless. Light as the mist roved ashore from the ancient ports of England. Bodiless as the smoke rose from a fireplace in one cold winter night. Tired of my journey, I greeted the first dewdrops on the tip of every leaf. I was unable to see my own reflection, blinded by their crystal clarity. Humbly, they offered me to take the ride, sliding down the bamboo trees together and up again under the wings of a dragonfly.
I wanted to pick up the pieces of broken mother pearl, said I to one of the dewdrops. They were shouting 'no' in unison with face full of fright. I wanted to row the boat after I get the shreds. Again, they were shouting their refusal with more ashes on their face. I never knew why, because the sun abruptly took them away. I guess I did not have to know the answers either.
I woke in my pyjamas, few minutes after midnight. I got up and went outside my room only to see the blue sky shared the same color with my pants. I saw two moons swarmed with starlight. A confused wolf was howling from afar, neither to both. There were Andromeda and Milky Way in this tropical azimuth, while Sagittarius and Cancer constellations shone brightly in August hours of darkness. And I heard myself asking, "What the fuck is 'awaking', after all? Is it reality?"
Since then, I never sleep.
[ah, damn! I haven't lost my touch!]
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