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Performance Assessments of Two-Way, Free-Form, Speech-to-Speech Translation Systems for Tactical Use

Published

Author(s)

Brian A. Weiss, Craig I. Schlenoff

Abstract

A critical challenge for military personnel when operating in foreign countries is effective communication with the local population. To address this issue, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) created the Spoken Language Communication and Translation Systems for Tactical Use (TRANSTAC) program. The program's goal is to develop speech-tospeech translation technologies enabling English speakers to quickly communicate with the local population without an interpreter. DARPA has funded the National Institutes of Standards and Technology to lead the design and implementation of the TRANSTAC performance evaluations. This article presents these evaluations that enabled the collection of rich quantitative and qualitative metrics.
Citation
The ITEA Journal of Test and Evaluation
Volume
32(1)

Keywords

Automated speech recognition, English speakers, lab and field evaluations, machine translation, military–civilian communication, offline evaluation, Pashto speakers, text-to-speech, translation software

Citation

Weiss, B. and Schlenoff, C. (2011), Performance Assessments of Two-Way, Free-Form, Speech-to-Speech Translation Systems for Tactical Use, The ITEA Journal of Test and Evaluation, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=908374 (Accessed March 29, 2024)
Created June 3, 2011, Updated February 19, 2017