Consider alternative phonetic transcription tools (if/when needed)

[bansp]

I've just noticed this thread at Corpora-L: "IPA conversion tool" https://mailman.uib.no/public/corpora/2019-April/030032.html

People mention:

• https://github.com/bootphon/phonemizer
• http://espeak.sourceforge.net/
• https://github.com/dmort27/epitran

So I thought I'd make a note of that here, just in case.

[humenda]

Hi

- http://espeak.sourceforge.net/

Espeak is dead and espeak-ng is its successor that we already use. It would be interesting to see a proper comparison from the other tools that you mention against espeak-ng from somebody who can read IPA (I cannot). The huge advantage with espeak-ng is that it is used by thousands of blind people around the world for their daily work, so that it has a large user base reporting pronunciation errors.

[humenda]

Hi Thanks for bringing this up.

- https://github.com/bootphon/phonemizer

This is just a wrapper around espeak/espeak-ng, see below.

- http://espeak.sourceforge.net/

As Espeak is unmaintained for a while and Espeak-ng is its successor, we decided to use this for the IPA conversion. Michael's script does all the XML and Espeak-processing work, so using your first option would only add another abstraction layer without any benefit. From our perspective, 1) and 2) are equivalent.

- https://github.com/dmort27/epitran

I am not sure about this. Its wording suggests that people with a more lexicographic background are involved. However, I bet that Espeak supports more languages and given that it's pronunciation is very accurate and its used for everyday-use in many [screen readers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screen_reader), I am convinced that it is the superior tool. More contributors, more users, more corrections. I would vote to close this issue, if you do not have any objections.

[bansp]

Thanks for looking at the issue, Sebastian -- I only meant to share a couple of links that came up in a mailing list conversation as recommendations. No problem about closing this ticket.