University of Helsinki
Finnish dialects create a lot of trouble when interacting with computers, since it is impossible to speak a language without speaking in a dialect of some sort. Mika Hämäläinen, Niko Partanen, Khalid Alnajjar and Jack Rueter from our language technology team have created software that can automatically detect, normalize and generate Finnish dialects. Their research made it to the news on our university website.
Donate spoken language data in Finnish and Swedish
The Language Bank of Finland and the Swedish Literary Society in Finland are collecting Finland-Swedish speech data (https://doneraprat.fi) (see YLE article with video: Vill du att röststyrning ska fungera på finlandssvenska? Kom med och donera prat [Do you want voice control to work in Finland-Swedish? Come and donate speech]). Note that the campaign for collecting spoken Finnish also continues (https://lahjoitapuhetta.fi/).
If you wish to know how the database may affect everyday life and how it can be used in research, listen to the YLE podcast “Second Last Word” (YLE pod: Så här lär sig din dammsugare finlandssvensk dialekt [How your vacuum cleaner learns Finnish-Swedish dialect] and YLE article: Pratande kylskåp och smarta glasögon hjälper dig handla mat – det här är den röststyrda framtiden [Talking refrigerators and smart glasses help you buy food – this is the voice-controlled future]).
