Speech Server 2007 En Route

Speech Server 2007, the latest version of Microsoft’s product for building interactive voice response (IVR) applications, will include support for VoiceXML, a widely used markup language for IVR applications, as well as improved integration with Visual Studio and the .NET Framework and support for Voice over IP (VoIP). A beta of the product will be available in May 2006.

Speech Server is a platform for building IVR applications, which allow users to make choices by speaking or pressing numbers on a telephone keypad and retrieve information in the form of prerecorded messages and prompts or computer-generated speech. IVR applications are particularly valuable in automating customer service call centers.

VoiceXML, .NET, and VoIP Support

Current versions of Speech Server allow developers to create ASP.NET Web pages that use the Speech Application Language Tags (SALT) to identify how a user interacts with the application via voice. For example, a field for the customer’s account number could be marked with a set of <prompt> and <listen> tags that define the voice prompts provided by the application (such as “Please state your account number”), list valid inputs it accepts, and specify how tones from the telephone keypad should be interpreted. By using ASP.NET, Speech Server also helps developers build applications that can be accessed by voice, by Web, or by a combination of the two (so-called multimodal applications).