JPH08149193A - Silent telephone system - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To provide a small sized voiceless telephone system at a low cost with excellent operability by providing a sentence read out means and a voice signal conversion means to a private branch of exchange and using the functions by plural telephone sets in common. CONSTITUTION: A voiceless private branch of exchange (PBX) 400A is made up of an exchange section 70 and a voice conversion section 80, the voice conversion section 80 is made up of a data MODEM 81, a data processing section 82 and a voice signal control means 85 and the data processing section 82 is provided with a communication cotrol means 83 and a sentence read out means 84. Then the set text information is received by the data MODEN 81 of the voiceless private branch of exchange 400A and taken over by a sentence read out means 84 via the communication control section 83. The sentence read out means 84 checkes a sentence structure or the like and a voice signal conversion means 85 takes over the check. Thus, the sentence read out means 84 and the voice signal conversion means 85 are provided to the PBX 400 and used in common by the plural telephone terminals 100A. Thus, the number of circuits is much reduced in comparison with the case that the telephone terminals 100A are provided with them.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to communication between a telephone terminal having a means for inputting a handwritten message and a normal telephone terminal. It is useful for talking to users of telephones.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In conventional communication via a telephone network, it is common for terminals of the same type of media to communicate with each other, such as telephones for telephones and faxes for faxes. In communication in which one of the communication is a computer, for example, image information of a facsimile may be displayed on a display or text data may be converted into voice and transmitted to a telephone. I did not communicate using the media. Therefore, the inventors of the present invention previously proposed a silent telephone terminal capable of converting a handwritten input character into a voice and transmitting the voice by adding a display with a handwriting input, a handwritten character recognition means, and a text / voice conversion means.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing an example of the silent telephone terminal previously proposed by the present inventors. In FIG. 3, 100 is a silent telephone terminal, 200 is a telephone network, and 300 is a telephone. The silent telephone terminal 100 includes a common control unit 1
0, a display with handwriting input 20, a voice signal converting means 30, a network interface control circuit 40, and a receiving circuit 50. The common control unit 10 includes a display control unit 11, a handwritten character recognition unit 12, a service control unit 13, and a sentence reading unit 14. The telephone network 200 is connected to the silent telephone terminal 100 via a line 201 and to the telephone 300 via a line 202.

Further, the reference numerals in parentheses attached to the respective parts in the drawing indicate the order of signals, and the contents thereof are described in (41) to (53) on the right side of FIG. It is as follows.

The previously proposed silent telephone terminal of FIG. 3 operates as follows. In the following description, each signal indicated by () in the figure is quoted. First, the common control unit 1
When the power is turned on, the service control unit 13 requests the display control unit 11 to display a message entry screen (4
1), the display control means 11 is a display 2 with handwriting input
A message input screen is displayed at 0 (42). Next, when a message is entered by handwriting input (43), the handwritten character recognition means 12 recognizes this and the text of the recognition result is handed over to the service control means 13 (44), and the service control means 13 stores the text. The display control means 11 is also taken over (45), the recognition result is displayed on the display 20 with handwriting input (46), and the correction in the case where there is an erroneous recognition is possible.

After writing a sentence of an appropriate length, the text information is handed over to the sentence reading unit 14 by some transmission instruction. Next, the network interface control circuit 40 is operated to make a call, the destination number is transmitted (47), and the telephone 300 of the other party is connected (48) (49). It is natural that the transmission instruction is displayed on the display 20 with handwriting input and is instructed with a pen, but it is also possible to automatically transmit the punctuation marks. The sentence reading unit 14 performs sentence structure analysis, word semantic analysis, etc., and outputs coded speech with appropriate intonation and segmentation (50). Normally, the output of the sentence reading unit 14 is encoded voice such as LSP that expresses intonation and break of voice, and is not a signal that can be directly received and reproduced by a general telephone. Therefore, the output of the sentence reading unit 15 is further input to the voice signal converting unit 30 and converted into a signal of the voice waveform itself (51). Of course, in the case of a digital telephone, it is conceivable to use PCM, or use compression encoding such as ADPCM with the mutual understanding of the terminals, but these are all within the range of voice signal conversion. The voice signal is transmitted via the network interface control circuit 40 to the partner terminal (the telephone 30 in FIG. 3).
(52), (53).

As described above, when the silent telephone terminal 100 of the present invention previously proposed by the present inventors is used, the handwritten input character information is converted into voice and transmitted. , Even a person who cannot speak can instantly communicate with a person who has an ordinary telephone terminal.

[0008]

However, in the previously proposed invention, since the transmitting terminal is provided with the voice signal converting means 30, there is a drawback that the terminal is large and the cost is high. The high cost is an obstacle to the spread of such terminals. In addition, the large size is a factor that impairs portability when implementing such a terminal as a mobile terminal.

An object of the present invention is to provide a small-sized, low-cost and easy-to-use silent telephone system.

[0010]

According to the present invention, the handwritten character recognition means is provided in a telephone terminal on the premise that the terminal is accommodated in a private branch exchange (PBX), but the sentence reading means and the voice signal conversion means are provided in the PBX. It is carried by multiple telephone terminals. It is conceivable that the PBX also has a handwritten character recognition means, but since the display with handwriting input is directly operated by the user, it is unavoidable to have it in the telephone terminal. In that case, the handwriting character recognition means is also provided in the telephone terminal. This is advantageous in that it can realize additional functions using it, for example, the function of inputting a name and automatically converting it into the number of the other terminal for making a call connection, or performing text communication between telephone terminals of the same type. .

Further, if the PBX is provided with the handwritten character recognition means, a complicated communication procedure is required between the terminal and the PBX for displaying and correcting the recognition result, resulting in a long processing time and a poor user interface. Become. Therefore, the PBX is provided with only the voice signal conversion means relating to the voice signal conversion after the final sentence is determined. The telephone terminal of the present invention cannot be used unless it is accommodated in the PBX of the present invention, but the partner terminal may be an ordinary telephone directly accommodated in the public telephone network or a terminal accommodated in any PBX.

The present invention uses wireless to connect the silent telephone terminal and the private branch converter.

[0013]

In the present invention, since the PBX is provided with the sentence reading means and the voice signal converting means, these functions can be shared by a plurality of telephone terminals. Since most communication is considered to be normal voice communication, the number of circuits (or processing capacity) of the sentence reading means and the voice signal converting means is much larger than that when the telephone terminal has these means individually. It can be small. As a result, the cost of the entire system can be reduced. Further, since the function of the terminal is reduced, it is easy to downsize the telephone terminal.

Further, according to the present invention, since the silent telephone terminal and the private branch exchange are connected by radio, so-called cordless operation is realized, and the operability is further improved.

[0015]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS FIG. 1 is a first embodiment of the present invention. The entire system consists of a silent telephone terminal 100A and a silent telephone PBX40.
It consists of 0A. The silent telephone terminal 100A includes the common control unit 1
0, display 20 with handwriting input, and data modem 60
And a network interface control circuit 40 and a receiving circuit 50. The common control unit 10 includes a display control unit 11, a handwritten character recognition unit 12, a service control unit 13, and a communication control unit 15.
Have. The silent telephone PBX400A includes a switching unit 70 and a voice converting unit 80, the voice converting unit 80 includes a data modem 81, a data processing unit 82, and a voice signal converting unit 85, and the data processing unit 82 includes a communication control unit 83 and a text. It has reading means 84. The voice conversion unit 80 can be provided with a plurality of circuits depending on the expected traffic. Further, the exchange unit 70 is a unit having a normal PBX exchange function itself, and the voice conversion unit 80 is positioned as a PBX call trunk. Telephone 300 is a silent telephone PBX40
It shows the state of being connected to 0A. Note that reference numerals (1) to (19) in FIG. 1 indicate the order of signals, and the contents thereof are as described on the right side of FIG.

The operation of the embodiment shown in FIG. 1 is as follows.
In addition, in the following description, each reference numeral shown in parentheses in the drawing is quoted. First, when the silent telephone terminal 100A is activated, the service control unit 13 requests the display control unit 11 to display a message entry screen (1), and the display control unit 11 causes the display 20 with handwriting input to display (2). . When the user fills in a message on the display 20 with handwriting input (3), it is recognized by the handwriting character recognition means 12, and the recognition result is handed over to the service control means 13 (4), and further passed to the display control means 11. The display control means 11 requests display on the display (5), displays the recognition result (6), and corrects it if necessary. The process up to this point is the same as that of the silent telephone terminal shown in FIG. Further, by the network interface control circuit 40,
It is the same as making a call request (7) and receiving a connection response with the partner terminal (8) (9). However, in the case shown in FIG. 3, a public telephone network or a PBX is used for communication with the partner terminal.
Is transparent, but the PBX of the present invention uses the voice conversion unit 80 instead of the call trunk as described later. When the user gives a message transmission instruction after the silent telephone terminal 100A receives the connection response, the service control means 13 detects this and requests the communication control means 15 to transmit the text information of the recognition result. (10), the communication control means 15 sends the transmission result to the data modem 60 to execute the transmission (11). The transmitted text information is received by the data modem 81 of the voice conversion unit 80 via the exchange unit 70 of the silent telephone PBX400A (12) to (1).
4) Further, it is taken over by the sentence reading unit 84 via the communication control unit 83 of the data processing unit 82 (15), (1).
6). The text reading means 84 checks the text structure and converts it into an audio signal by an intermediate code of an appropriate intonation, and transfers it to the audio signal converting means 85 (17). The voice signal converting means 85 converts the voice signal into a voice signal that can be received and reproduced by an ordinary telephone and transmits it (18), (19).

FIG. 2 shows a second embodiment of the present invention in which a cordless silent telephone terminal 100B and a cordless silent wireless telephone PBX are wirelessly connected. Therefore, a wireless module 90 is provided on the cordless silent telephone terminal 100B side instead of the data modem 60 and the network control interface control circuit 40 in the first embodiment of FIG. 1, and the cordless silent telephone PBX400B side is provided with a switching unit 70. The required number of wireless modules 90A are provided.
Wireless module 9 on the cordless silent telephone terminal 100B side
0 makes communication only with the wireless module 90A of the cordless silent telephone PBX400B, and the wireless module 90A of the cordless silent telephone PBX400B side communicates only with the wireless module 90 of the cordless silent telephone terminal 100B side. Further, the wireless module 90 on the cordless silent telephone terminal 100B side is unique as viewed from the cordless silent telephone PBX400B, but the wireless module 90A on the cordless silent telephone PBX400B side may communicate with any of a plurality of modules. In actuality, one telephone terminal communicates with one wireless module, and therefore the switching unit 70 selects one. Reference numeral 86 represents a digital data receiving circuit.

The operation of the second embodiment shown in FIG. 2 is basically the same as that of the first embodiment shown in FIG. 1, and the order of signals is changed by the reference numerals (21) to (39) shown in the figure. Show. The contents of each signal are as described on the right side of FIG. In this embodiment, the cordless silent telephone terminal 1
The difference is that the wireless modules 90 and 90A are used for transmitting text data between 00B and the cordless silent telephone PBX400B. Further, assuming that the common control unit 10 is to perform the operation management of the wireless modules 90 and 90A, the call request is made by, for example, selecting a menu on the display 20 with handwriting input or inputting a destination number.
3 is given information to cause the service control means 13 to transmit a calling signal to the wireless module via the communication control means 15. On the cordless silent telephone PBX400B side, the wireless module 90A detects a calling signal and reports it to the exchange section 70 to set a communication path with the partner terminal. The response signal is instructed from the exchange section 70 to the wireless module 90A on the cordless silent telephone PBX400B side to be transmitted, received by the wireless module 90 on the cordless silent telephone terminal 100B side, and sent to the service control means 13 via the communication control means 15. To report. Other message input and voice conversion are the same as those in the first embodiment. If the cordless silent telephone PBX400B is provided with an interface with the public telephone network, messages can be sent to ordinary telephones accommodated in the public telephone network and telephones accommodated in other PBXs connected to the public telephone network. It is possible to send.

[0019]

As described above, the silent telephone system of the present invention comprises the display with handwriting input, the handwriting character recognition means, the communication control means, the receiving circuit and the network interface control circuit, and the handwriting input is provided. A silent telephone terminal for recognizing the characters and transmitting them as text data; a voice signal conversion means for receiving the text data from the silent telephone terminal; and a sentence reading means for reading the text data into sentences and converting it into voice. Because it consists of a private branch exchange, it is possible to talk with people who can not speak such as a conference room environment where people cannot speak and people who can not speak due to illness, etc. The terminal is smaller than the proposed method, and the cost of the entire system can be reduced. In particular, for a mobile terminal that is desired to be miniaturized as much as possible, the silent telephone system according to the present invention in which a local converter has a function related to voice signal conversion is effective.

Further, according to the present invention, since the wireless connection is used for the connection between the silent telephone terminal and the private branch exchange, it becomes cordless and the operability can be further improved.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a first exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a second exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing the configuration of the previously proposed silent telephone system.

[Explanation of symbols]

 10 common control unit 11 display control unit 12 handwritten character recognition unit 13 service control unit 15 communication control unit 20 handwriting input display 40 network interface control circuit 50 reception circuit 60 data modem 70 conversion unit 80 voice conversion unit 81 data modem 82 data processing Part 83 Communication control means 84 Text reading means 85 Voice signal converting means 86 Digital data receiving circuit 90, 90A Wireless module 100A Silent telephone terminal 100B Cordless silent telephone terminal 200 Telephone network 300 Telephone 400A Silent telephone PBX 400B Cordless silent telephone PBX

 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (72) Inventor Kazuhiko Shinozawa 1-1-6 Uchisaiwaicho, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo Nihon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (72) Inventor Tadashi Uchiyama 1-6-6 Uchisaiwaicho, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo Nihon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (72) Inventor Tomio Kishimoto 1-6, Uchisaiwaicho, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo Nihon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (72) Inventor Kenichi Hananabe 1-14, Kichijojihoncho, Musashino-shi, Tokyo No. 5 Entities Electronics Technologie Co., Ltd. (72) Inventor Satoshi Tokioka 1-14-5 Honcho, Kichijoji Honcho, Musashino City, Tokyo No. 5 Entiti Electronics Technologie Co., Ltd. (72) Inventor Takaharu Nakamura Kichijoji, Musashino City, Tokyo 1-14-5 Hommachi NTT Electronics Technoro Over the Corporation

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A silent telephone terminal comprising a display with handwriting input, a handwriting character recognition means, a communication control means, a receiving circuit, and a network interface control circuit, for recognizing a handwritten input character and transmitting it as text data. And a private branch exchange having voice signal converting means for receiving text data from the silent telephone terminal and sentence reading means for reading the text data into sentences and converting the sentences into voice. . 2. A silent telephone terminal which includes a display with handwriting input, a handwritten character recognition means, a communication control means, and a receiving circuit, which recognizes a handwritten input character and transmits it as text data. A private branch exchange having voice signal conversion means for receiving text data from the text data and text reading means for reading the text data into sentences and converting the text data into voice; and a radio provided for each connection between the silent telephone terminal and the private branch exchange. Silent telephone system characterized by using wireless module.