Any label type associated with a level in the hierarchy can be defined to be derived from an external label file generated, for example, by the Emu labeller or by XWAVES. These files contain the labels and either segment start/end times or event times. The timing information will be integrated into the hierarchy and will propagate to higher level segments where possible. You may specify as many kinds of labels to be derived from external files as you wish. The labfile statement defines the type of file which contains the labels and times and how these should be interpreted.
The syntax of the labfile statement is:
labfile labelname (keyword value)*
Where the last (bracketed) term denotes a sequence of keyword value pairs. Each keyword begins with a colon and specifies a particular option for this file. Each option has a default value which is assumed if the keyword is not present. The possible keywords are:
:format specifies the format of the label file. Currently only one format is recognised: ESPS which corresponds to that produced by Waves (and which is also generated by the Emu labeller). Support for additional formats is easily added if needed.
:type differentiates segment labels, which are associated with a start and end time, and event labels which are associated with a single time point. Possible values are EVENT and SEGMENT (the default value is SEGMENT).
:mark is used for segment type labels which are associated with a start and end time. Since the ESPS label file format only records a single time with each label this time can be interpreted as either the start or end time of each segment. If it is interpreted as the end time (a common usage), then a dummy start label must be inserted for the first segment (Emu ignores the label associated with this time point). If segment start times are being marked, a dummy final label must be inserted to mark the end time of the final segment. Possible values are START and END (the default is END).
The :time keyword specifies a multiplier to apply to the times in the label file to convert to millisecond units used internally by Emu. There is no default value.
:extension specifies the extension to use when searching for these label files. Emu adds this extension to the basename of the current utterance. If no file with the given extension is found, no labels/times will be added to the utterance (no error is signalled).
Example:
labfile Phonetic :extension lab :time-factor 1000 |