Translating Text-To-Speech Prompts

In addition to pre-recorded prompts, some voice applications use text-to-speech (TTS) prompts. These prompts appear as English text in VoiceXML code within <prompt> statements. For example:

<prompt>Please say yes or no</prompt>

TTS prompts can also be used in conjunction with pre-recorded prompts:

<prompt><audio src="you_have.wav"/> 5 <audio src="unread_messages.wav"/> </prompt>

In this example, TTS is used for the word five in the phrase you have five unread messages.

Finally, VoiceXML variables can be used in TTS prompts:

<prompt><value expr="num_messages"/></prompt>

In this example, the digit 5 and the variable num_messages are spoken using TTS. No localization work is required because the TTS engine for the new locale automatically speaks the number in the new language. However, variables can also be assigned values that correspond to English words or phrases that the TTS engine will not translate. In such cases you must identify any place in the VoiceXML code where English language strings are assigned to variables. Look for <assign> tags such as:

<assign name="prompt" expr="’OK, got it!’"/>

You must change any embedded English language words that would be spoken using TTS. The easiest way to identify these prompts is to search for <prompt> tags.