Patent ID: 7542897
Filing Date: 2009-06-02
Classification: G10L

Abstract:
1. A method performed by a communication device, comprising the steps of: receiving a speech sequence at a microphone of the communication device, the speech sequence comprising bursts of speech and periods without speech comprising background noise; encoding the speech sequence at a vocoder of the communication device to produce a series of encoded voice frames representative of the speech sequence, wherein each frame of the series of encoded voice frames corresponding to the bursts of speech comprises a speech frame representing speech and wherein each frame of the series of encoded voice frames corresponding to the periods without speech comprises a pause frame representing a pause; identifying the pause frames in the series of encoded voice frames; excluding at least some of the identified pause frames corresponding to a respective period without speech as represented by the series of encoded voice frames while retaining a minimum pause length corresponding to the respective period without speech and while retaining at least one of the identified pause frames having the background noise in the respective period without speech to thereby produce a pause-shortened series of encoded voice frames, wherein a playback time of the respective period without speech as represented by the shortened series of encoded voice frames is reduced; and storing at least one of the series of encoded voice frames or the pause-shortened series of encoded voice frames in a memory.