Data processing: speech signal processing – linguistics – language – Linguistics – Translation machine
Reexamination Certificate
2001-09-06
2004-03-09
McFadden, Susan (Department: 2655)
Data processing: speech signal processing, linguistics, language
Linguistics
Translation machine
C704S004000, C704S009000, C704S270000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06704699
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to hand-held scanning dictionaries, and in particular, to a scanning dictionary that is optimized for teaching languages.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
While dictionaries provide multiple meanings to words or word stems, a dictionary user requires the meaning in context and is to sort and shift for himself from the plurality of meanings suggested to him. To students of a foreign language, this is not an easy task. Often, the meaning depends on the part of speech a word plays, but to analyze a sentence for its parts of speech, one must understand it sufficiently. For example, when confronted with, “Name two reasons for the strength of the present economy,” many students of English as a Foreign Language will gaze at what, in their view, is a sentence with no verb. Since student rarely look up words they believe they know, they are unlikely to look up “name” for a possible unfamiliar meaning.
An additional difficulty with using a dictionary is that often, a dictionary provides only the word stem, which may be, for example, a verb, and not the word as it appears in the sentence, which may be, for example, an adjective. For example, the meaning in context, for the phrase “augmented costs” may not be found in a dictionary.
An old-fashioned language teaching method, known in Aramaic as “Shnaiim Mikra Ve'ahad Targum,” or, “read, translate, read” is designed to provide the meaning in context, averting the problems associated with independent study with a dictionary. However, it requires a teacher, close at hand.
Another problem that students of a foreign language encounter is pronunciation. When a person who was raised in a specific system of sounds and vowels moves into a different system, his difficulty is twofold: not only can he not pronounce the new sounds and vowels, but often, he does not hear their distinguishing features. A person whose mother tongue has a single “e” sound, may not hear the difference between “it” and “eat”. Yet, being able to hear this difference is a prerequisite to producing it.
Furthermore, written languages rarely provide unequivocal information with regard to pronunciation. In English, for example, there is “home,” and “dome,” but “come,” and “some.” There is “weight,” and there is “height”. The word “misled” is not pronounced like the word “fiddled,” and the word “ear” is not pronounced like the word “bear.” There are silent letters like “g” in “paradigm” or “c” in scintillation. For students of a foreign language, pronouncing what they read may involve considerable guesswork.
SURVEY OF PRIOR ART
Optical scanners are known. They convert objects such as pictures, barcodes, or portions of text to machine-readable data signals. Typically, the data signals are read by a user's computer to reproduce an image of the scanned object on a display device, such as a CRT, a display screen or a printer.
A hand-held optical scanner is manipulated by hand across the object that is being scanned. The hand-held scanner may be connected directly to the user's computer by a data cable, and may transfer image data to the computer as he data are collected. Alternatively, the hand-scanner may be a stand-alone unit and may include a data storage component for storing the image data. The data may be downloaded to a separate computer after the scanning operation is complete.
A hand-held optical scanner generally includes an illumination system, for illuminating the region to be scanned, an optical system, for collecting and focusing light reflected by the illuminated, scanned region, a photosensitive detector, for detecting the light collected and focused thereon by the optical system, an analog amplifier, for amplifying the signals produced by the photosensitive detector, and an analog-to-digital converter, for converting the amplified signals to digitized machine-readable data signals. The illumination system may be, for example, a fluorescent or incandescent lamp or an array of light emitting diodes (LEDs). The optical system may include a lens or a lens-and-mirror assembly.
The photosensitive detector is generally a Charge-Coupled Device (CCD). A CCD includes an array of photosensitive cells, or pixels, each pixel collecting an electrical charge responsive to the light that falls upon it. Thus, a CCD may be used to detect light and dark spots of a scanned object. The charge from each pixel is converted to an analog voltage by an analog amplifier, and the analog voltage is digitized by an Analog-to-Digital Converter (ADC). The digitized signals are the machine-readable data signals, which can be stored or processed by the user on a computer or a similar device.
Sometimes, a Contact Image Sensor (CIS) is used in place of the CCD. In a CIS scanner, the array of photosensitive cells is arranged in close proximity to the object to be scanned, so as to catch the reflected light directly; an optical system is not necessary.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,996,895 to Heiman, et al, incorporated herein by reference, describes a scanning system with adjustable light output and/or scanning angle.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,033,086 to Bohn, incorporated herein by reference, describes a compact illumination system for a hand-held scanner.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,841,121 to Koenck, incorporated herein by reference, describes a hand-held optical scanners, having automatic focus control, for operation over a range of distances.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,019,699 to Koenck, incorporated herein by reference, describes a hand-held optical scanner, which includes a lens system having circular symmetry. The lens system focuses the full width of the object onto an array of photosensitive cells, with a single flash of a ring-type xenon flash tube, which surrounds the lens system and is symmetrically arranged relative to the optical axis. In this way, the object can be scanned at any angle relative to the array of photosensitive cells, and the scanned image, stored in digital form, can be electronically rotated to a desired orientation, before it is decoded.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,834,749 to Durbin, incorporated herein by reference, describes a hand-held scanner for reading images at oblique angles, in order for the scanning unit not interfere with the user's view of the scanned image. The distortion to an obliquely scanned image, arising from the oblique scanning, can be corrected by any of several correction techniques, as follows:
1. a ratio of vertical to horizontal line densities of the array of photosensitive cells can be chosen to compensate for the vertical foreshortening of the scanned image;
2. the array of photosensitive cells can be oriented at an oblique angle with respect to the optical axis, to compensates for the distortion inherent in the oblique scanning;
3. a lens system can be configured to provide varying degrees of magnification along its surface; and
4. as taught by U.S. Pat. No. 5,019,699, to Koenck, described hereinabove, processing techniques can electronically re-orient the scanned image after storing it in the scanner's memory.
Hand-held, stand-alone, optical scanners that produce audio output are known. U.S. Pat. No. 5,945,656 to Lemelson, et al, incorporated herein by reference, describes a pen-like stand-alone scanner for transuding coded data into pre-coded pieces of speech or music. Generally, a scanning guide is attached to a book, arranged for guiding the pen-like scanner vertically along an edge of the book, which contains coded information. Aided by the guide, children may scan the coded data and produce the sounds associated with them.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,767,494 to Matsueda, et al., incorporated herein by reference, describes a system for reproducing multimedia information, recorded with an optically readable code. The code is a dot-code format described in U.S. Ser. No. 08/407,018 (PCT Publication No. WO 94/08314), and includes two-dimensional patterns that convey multimedia information, for example, audio information like speech and music, image information obtained from a camera or a video device, and digital code data obtaine
McFadden Susan
Nir Einat
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