testing simon

This example explains two phonetic errors of the <phoneme> element laɪ̯tʔʊngsvɛʀbɪndʊŋən that you can find in Ralf's German dictionary 0.1.9:

<lexeme role="Substantiv">
<grapheme>Leitungsverbindungen</grapheme>
<phoneme>laɪ̯tʔʊngsvɛʀbɪndʊŋən</phoneme>
</lexeme>

What is wrong? There are two errors:

1. The “Knacklaut” ʔ should be omitted in this specific context. Obviously, simon always omits the Knacklaut ʔ when I import Ralf's German dictionary into simon:

So simon omits the “Knacklaut” ʔ, and the result is correct for this specific word. In my opinion, simon shouldn’t omit the “Knacklaut” because I think that the recognition results would be better for other words. Let’s take a look into the Wiktionary:

Glottale Plosive ([ʔ], sog. Knacklaute) werden nur wortintern geschrieben, z. B. Theater [...eʔaː...], aufatmen [ˈaʊ̯fˌʔaːtmən].

And now take a look into Ralf's German dictionary:

<lexeme role="Substantiv">
<grapheme>Theaterstücken</grapheme>
<phoneme>teːatɐʃtykən</phoneme>
<phoneme>teːatɐʃtykŋ̩</phoneme>
</lexeme>

There isn’t a “Knacklaut” in teːatɐʃtykən, but this <phoneme> element could have one: teːʔatɐʃtykən. And it would be nice if simon wouldn’t omit the Knacklaut when the dictionary offers one. Of course, I don’t know whether the recognition results would be better, but I believe that the “Knacklaut” should be part of the imported dictionary.

2. I will have to fix another error: The phoneme v should be replaced by the phoneme f. The result will be: laɪ̯tʊngsfɛʀbɪndʊŋən or laɪ̯tʊngsfɐbɪndʊŋən.

Why am I writing these things? Because I believe that it is important. The dictionary has to catch every phoneme. And the “Knacklaut” is a phoneme, too. There are errors (e.g. laɪ̯tʔʊngsvɛʀbɪndʊŋən is wrong; laɪ̯tʊngsfɛʀbɪndʊŋən is correct). And there are small things that are tolerable (e.g. laɪ̯tʊngsfɛʀbɪndʊŋən is tolerable; laɪ̯tʊngsfɐbɪndʊŋən is better). Another example: teːatɐʃtykən is tolerable; teːʔatɐʃtykən is better.

I would suggest that a future version of simon should catch the “Knacklaut” ʔ during the import of the dictionary.

Tags: Knacklaut, node16, ʔ

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 6th, 2010 at 6:03 pm and is filed under dictionary. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.