Patent ID: 7831428
Filing Date: 2010-11-09
Classification: G06F,G10L

Abstract:
1. A computer-implemented method of searching a speech index comprising: accessing a speech index of a plurality of spoken documents each comprising a collection of speech signals using a processor, wherein the speech index comprises a plurality of word entries, each entry identifying a plurality of candidate positions for a word in the plurality of speech signals and a probability of the word appearing at each of the candidate positions given the corresponding speech signal; receiving a search query comprising a target word from a user using the processor; receiving a first threshold value from the user using the processor; searching the speech index for one of the word entries that matches the target word of the search query using the processor; retrieving from the matched entry the plurality of candidate positions for the target word and the probability of the word appearing at each of the candidate positions, using the processor; eliminating the candidate positions based on a comparison of the probability of the word appearing at a candidate position and the first threshold value; ranking the speech signals based on the probabilities of the remaining candidate positions relative to each other to form ranked speech signals using the processor; and returning search results to the user based on the ranked speech signals using the processor, the search results comprising an identification of one or more of the spoken documents.