Jeremy Johnstone

I recently released a new extension I created into PECL (pecl.php.net). This extension is called FliteTTS and it’s claim to fame is the fact it generates wave files based on strings you supply to it (aka a voice synthesis extension). I came up with the idea to make the extension after overhearing a conversation about audio capthas and the lack of solutions pre-existing for the task in PHP. The extension wraps the library from Carnegie Mellon University called Flite (http://www.speech.cs.cmu.edu/flite/) and the output quality is rather decent albeit a bit close sounding to the old school Dr. Sbaitso. I had previous experience with the Flite library from my work porting Hotscripts.com to PHP a couple years back, but Hotscripts uses a shell exec (aka bad performance) to generate the wave file from the app which is provided with the library. The extension version on the other hand is extremely fast and has a very tiny memory footprint. The API and functionality is still a bit in flux (thus the lack of an official PECL release), but the code is in CVS and is very useable. Flite can be a bit of a pain to get compiled, but once you do the extension is really simple to get compiled and you can be up and running moments later. Check the provided test cases for examples of how to work with it. If you have any questions, please feel free to leave a comment or shoot me an email.

PECL Package Page: http://pecl.php.net/package/flitetts
CVSweb Link: http://cvs.php.net/viewcvs.cgi/pecl/flitetts/

The morning started off with everyone meeting downstairs for breakfast. I was utterly amazed with the hotel’s wide selection of things to choose from. I doubt anyone could not find something there to eat and best of all it was free. After finishing up eating, the workshops began at 9am. As there was three all day workshops going on at once, I decided to float between them so I could share a bit on each one. You can find photos from throughout the day here: IPC Sunday Workshops or you can see photos from the entire conference here: IPC Fall Edition 2005.

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Well if you do, come find me at the International PHP Conference - Fall Edition 2005 (http://www.phpconference.com) and I will let you know what you have to do to get some!

Photos of what I brought are here: Yahoo! swag photos

Friday at noon I took off for Frankfurt, Germany to speak at the Fall Edition of the International PHP Conference (http://www.phpconference.com). The flight from San Jose to Chicago was decent and I spent most of the time talking about the state of the airline industry (more leaning towards security) with a friendly AA employee (think a pilot, but not sure) who was dead heading on the flight. Arriving into Chicago a half hour early (after leaving 15 minutes late), I had a decent layover so I used the time charging my laptop battery and to check email (interesting stuff going on at work on the mailing lists). Departing out of Chicago was when the trouble began. (more…)

Just a reminder to everyone, the International PHP Conference fall edition is only 3 weeks away. I will be there presenting on the following topics:

GUI Development in PHP-GTK2
PHP and AJAX
PHP and Java in the Enterprise

Make sure and register now before it’s too late. Look me up at the event and mention you saw this blog post and I will buy you a drink or something.