This article is for amateur radio operators interested in the voice prompt feature in Wouxun KG-UVD1P series handheld transceivers. These radios are a popular choice for blind and vision-impaired hams. This review is about the function and usefulness of the speech synthesizer that is a standard feature in Wouxun radios. Integrated voice response is an increasingly accessible option for businesses to automate the most common client interaction processes. Callers can interact with business systems via touch-tone or voice entry. For a successful IVR deployment, having engine prompts that are professionally recorded and managed is essential.

1. Voice Prompt Examples
2. Voice Prompt Recording
3. Voice Prompts Google Maps
4. Free Voice Prompts
5. Funny Voice Prompts

A 'prompt' is a request to input some kind of data, either through speech or through DTMF (the audible tones that correspond to pressing a key on your dial pad). A voice prompt is a recorded message that is played by auto-attendants, interactive voice response (IVRAutomated phone menu that allows callers to interact through voice commands, key inputs, or both, to obtain information, route an inbound voice call, or both.) systems, and other voice processing tools. For example, if you hear a menu with options to 'press 1 for Sales or 2 for Support', you are hearing a prompt that is asking you to input a value.

Voice Prompt Examples

Voice Prompt Recording

You can record custom prompts with your own voice. You can also create a prompt by using a default automated voice in Studio to synthesize text, numbers, dates, and so forth, and 'speak' it for you. You can specifically play a number sequence, date, time, letters, or amount of money using the American English female voice, or you can use the Synthesize Text function to speak non-English languages, formatting of the text, and so forth.

Voice Prompts Google Maps

In Studio, only a few select actions have options to add a voice prompt, such as Menu, Play, Whisper, and Asrmenu. When you drag any of these actions to the canvas, you can double-click the action to open the Play Properties window. Though this window shows Play Properties in the title bar, it is most commonly referred to as the Prompt Manager.

Use Text to Speech (TTS)

Studio can synthesize text in the following languages: (language availability depends on your organization's cluster location).

Instead of recording a voice prompt, Studio can synthesize and 'speak' the text for you using one of the default automated voices, which is particularly helpful for repeating dynamic variables, or content in a non-English language such as dates or numbers.

1. Add a Voiceparams action to your script somewhere before the action that will synthesize text to speech. If the properties set by this action will be passed to other scripts, you may want to also place a Voiceparams action in the sub-scripts to ensure that the properties are not ignored.
2. In the properties of the Voiceparams action (right-click or open the Properties tab with the action selected), click the drop-down in the TTSVoice field and select the automated voice that you want to speak. You can set a different language in this field.
3. Double-click the action that you want to play a text-synthesized prompt to open the Prompt Manager.
4. Click Synthesize Text in the column of buttons on the left. A new sequence and sequence value will appear with the default text The little brown fox. This text will be highlighted and ready to edit in the Sequence Value field.
5. Begin typing the text that you want to synthesize. Notice that as you edit the text in the Sequence Value field, the edits are also copied in the Sequence field. This text will appear in the Sequence field in the properties box. Consider the following tips & tricks when creating the text to be spoken:
   • When If you want the voice to speak individual characters, you can use the <spell> tag. For example, <spell>[CBNum}</spell>. If this is correct, press 1, otherwise press 2.
   • Some cultures format dates different than others, which may affect functionality when using a specific language. The format of a date might be dd/mm/yyyy or mm/dd/yyyy.
   • You can insert a pause between text with a WAV file of silence. An example sequence would be: <TTS1>, <silence.wav>, <TTS2>. You can also accomplish a pause by playing the first segment of text with 1 Play action, adding a Wait action for the pause, then continuing with the next segment of text with a 2nd Play action.
6. You can enter the text to be spoken in the Phrase field without formatting to more clearly view the text to speak. This may be useful if the text you want to synthesize contains formatting like variables or tags that make the text more difficult to read.
7. Press OK.

Record Prompts in Studio

1. Double-click the action icon to open the Prompt Manager (must be an action that supports voice prompts).

2. Click Play a Wave File and select New.

3. When you see a new sequence that appears in the Sequence Value field, type over the default value with a new name for the .wavFile format used to store audio bitstreams such as call recordings. file. Note that when you change the name of the file in the Sequence Value field, the name also changes in the list of sequences as well.

4. Click the Connect Prompt Manager icon in the toolbar (indicated by the yellow telephone) to open the Prompt Manager Login window. You will record the prompt by receiving a phone call from the Prompt Manager and recording the prompt — similar to leaving a voicemail message.

5. Type the phone number of the phone that you want to use to record the prompt.

6. Click Connect to receive a call from the recording service.

7. Answer the phone call. You will see certain icons in the Prompt Manager toolbar become enabled. Additionally, a notification indicates that you that the Prompt Manager is ready to record.

8. Click the Record icon (indicated by a red circle) to begin recording your prompt.

9. When you hear a beep from the call, clearly speak your voice prompt.

10. When you are done recording, click the Stop icon (indicated by a blue square).

11. To review your recording, without hanging up the phone, click the Play icon.

12. If the voice prompt is acceptable, hang up the phone. If it is not acceptable, click the Record icon to record the prompt again.

When you view the properties for an action that can play a prompt, the name of the prompt displays in the Sequence field. You can change this sequence value to select another prompt at any time. After recording a prompt, the new prompt displays in this field.

Free Voice Prompts

Edit Prompts in Studio

The Wave Editor allows you to trim unwanted audio from the beginning and end of a WAV file.

1. Double-click an action that supports prompts. The prompt manager may already be open if you just recorded a prompt.
2. Click the Edit Wave icon in the toolbar to launch the Wave Editor.
3. Select the WAV file that you want to edit from the Prompts column.
4. Click the left mouse button to highlight the beginning of the prompt that you want to trim out.
5. Click the right mouse button to highlight the end of the prompt that you want to trim out.
6. You can check that you've trimmed the appropriate amounts of audio by clicking the green Play icon to play the prompt with the highlighted sections you want to remove.
7. Click Edit>Trim to remove the highlighted sections of the WAV file.
8. Save the file (File>Save).
9. Close the Wave Editor.

Download and Upload Prompts

Directly in Studio, you can download or upload audio files that you created.

Supported audio file types:

• WAV (Uncompressed)
  • Bit Rate — 64 kbps
  • Audio sample size — 8 bit
  • Channels — 1 (mono)
  • Audio sample rate — 8 kHz
  • Audio format — CCITT μ-Law

Funny Voice Prompts

1. Click the Files tab in Studio. Note, this is the Files tab, not the File drop-down in the main menu.

2. Expand the Prompts folder to display any existing prompts.

3. To download a prompt, drag the prompt file from the Studio file browser to your desktop or a folder on your local machine.

4. To upload a prompt, drag the prompt file from the file browser on your local machine to the Files window in Studio. Click the Refresh icon and verify the prompt's Date Modified field has been updated.