Marshall Harrison - "the gotspeech guy"

Speech Server runtime now supported on Windows Server 2008

marshallharrison — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 17:32:00 GMT

Well some good news and some not-as-good news - Microsoft will support application deployments, Administrative tools and Data Processing Utilities like the MssLogToDatabase and MssLogToText tools. However Microsoft will not support installation and usage of the Development Tools that include Speech Server (2007) application development, call data analysis and grammar tuning running on Windows Server 2008.

I’m glad to see Windows Server 2008 supported for deployment. It would be nice to have support for the other stuff but I can wait a while……..

Forgot to include the link - http://communicationsserverteam.com/archive/2009/10/20/640.aspx

Consulting, Virtualization Server, Hyper-V, Training and other stuff

marshallharrison — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 16:55:52 GMT

Things have really changed for me since becoming an independent consultant. I’ve been busy with work the last two months but I’ve found that what makes up my work day has changed dramatically. For instance I now rely heavily on Twitter and I follow every OCS related tweet. I also have 10 blogs and 3 Microsoft OCS related forums that I follow in addition to the blogs on GotSpeech.net and GotUC.net. I also find that I’m using Office Communicator to keep in touch with the project team at Microsoft and other MVPs more than I have in the past. I do all of that just to stay on top of what is happening in the Unified Communications arena in addition to my consulting work

Virtualization Server

I finally got my Virtualization Server built this week. I met up with Andrew at his house and we wired everything up. I had installed all of the components so we only had to mount the memory, CPU and the heat sinks before connecting all the power and data cables. Other than a few cuts (motherboards and cases both will bite you) things went very well. Since my setup is the same as Andrew’s we opened up his case and compared connections and motherboard jumpers. After I got the server home the boring task of installing the OS started. I installed Windows Server 2008 and though it went smoothly I’ve found that once again I have to figure out a new OS. I’m learning to deal with “features” and “roles” so there has been a small learning curve.

Hyper-V

I installed Hyper-V on the server and then downloaded the the OCS vhds and installed them. The vhds were huge downloads and the install for the master vhd is a little flawed but overall things went fairly smooth. The VMs all work and can see each other on the virtual network but they don’t have internet access and I can’t see them from my other machines. I still don’t fully understand the concept of virtual versus real network (my server has 4 NICs) so I’ll be playing with that until I get it working. I would like to isolate network traffic to the VMs on a separate NIC from the normal traffic. It is really awesome to see 4 or 5 VMs running and the CPU not going over 20%. Having 2 Xeon Quad 4 CPUs and 32 gigs of memory really helps!

I installed Hyper-V Manger on my Vista box along with a Hyper-V Monitor gadget. That was no easy task as it would not connect. Luckily John Howard has lots of good stuff on Hyper- V and has even created HVRemote that automates the process. He even explains how it works in this blog post. Now I can manage my virtual environment without having to connect to my VM server.

New Laptop and Win7

The day before I was to speak at the recent Jacksonville Code Camp my laptop crashed. That created quite a panic at first as the prospect of rebuilding it wasn’t high on my list of things I wanted to do. The laptop was great for travel but with only a 12” screen and slow processer it just wasn’t cutting it as a presentation platform so I jumped on the Internet to check out my options for a new laptop. Since I needed to install all my Speech Server development environment and be ready for the code camp the next day I was limited to what was in stock at Best Buy or CompUSA. I settled on an HP ProBook 4710s with XP Pro and Vista Business. The XP Pro was just the ticket as it alleviated any development issues that Vista may have caused so after code camp kickoff party I was up until 1:00 AM installing, configuring and testing so that I would be ready to present.

The presentation went well so Saturday night after the code camp post party (code camps in Florida love to have parties) I was up until 1:00 AM again installing Vista Business. The install went smoothly but I lost my wireless connection. I ended up calling HP tech support and listening to hold music while working on the problem and watching NFL pre-season football. I finally got the wireless working literally 30 seconds before a live HP tech person answered the phone. I listened to hold music for 80 minutes and solved the problem myself.

Next on Sunday I decided to upgrade to Win7 and that went much smoother than the Vista install. It was quick and everything worked with no problems. I must say that I love Win7 and I’m happy with the performance.

Last night I installed Hyper-V Manager on my laptop but for Win7 it isn’t just a straight download of the utility. So I went back to John Howard’s blog and found a blog post stating that I needed to install Remote Server Administration Tools (RSAT). So I did that and then a quick run of HVRemote and I can now manage my VMs for my Win7 laptop – cool.

Other Stuff

Why is it that people think Speech Server and OCS development is cheap? There are literally thousands of ASP.Net and C# developers out there that can develop your web app or desktop app. But there is only a small handful of developers that can develop applications for OCS. There is no developer training available and there is only one book on the subject. Microsoft has one forum and there is GotUC.Net. That is basically it. There are very few guys that can do this stuff so they should be compensated for the work and not compared to to other developers. We work hard to decipher and learn an emerging technology and we don’t want to do it for free.

I’m working with another OCS MVP on an OCS developer training course. There is a lot of work to do to get the manuals and the labs ready so I can’t promise a delivery date but I’ll post more info as things progress.

Jacksonville Code Camp this Saturday

marshallharrison — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 00:54:24 GMT

Just a reminder that JAXDUG’s Jacksonville Code Camp will be this Saturday and it is looking like it will be the largest one in Florida.

By the Numbers:

Registered Attendees: 509

Sessions: 39

Speakers: 39

MVPs: 12

Plus several Microsoft employees and nationally know authors and speakers. I’m looking at the speaker list on the web site and then over at my book case and I’m amazed at how many speaker names I’m finding on the books I have.

This will be our largest code camp (our 5th one) and I’m looking forward to speaking (about Speech Server of course) and touching base with guys I haven't seen in a while. Not bad for a free event.

See you there.

New Development Box Project

marshallharrison — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 02:51:00 GMT

Since I work for myself now I’ve been giving more thought to my development platform and strategies for keep different client projects separate. I had lunch last week with fellow MVP Andrew Connell. AC described for me a custom virtualization server that he built for his SharePoint projects. The more I listened the better the idea seemed.

So I set out to build a machine like the one AC has. My goals were to create a machine that would allow me to run several virtual machines at once. Another goals is to be able to run the VHDs for OCS 2007 R2 so the machine has to support Windows Server 2008 and Hyper-V. I want to spend some time developing and IVR app with UCMA 2.0 so this will be my development platform for that. I also want to spin up each consulting client on a dedicated VM – this will allow me to keep client systems separate and cut down on conflicts. It also allows me to install client required software without impacting other clients or my base machine.

Like Andrew I have a dedicated room in my house for my office, my servers and my media gateways along with my network hardware. This machine has to be quiet as I will be working just a few feet away from the server. I make audio recordings for Speech Server Applications and I’ll be hosting web training so I need something that doesn’t sound like a jet airplane taking off.

What I decide on was to just follow AC’s blueprint as he has already done the legwork and worked out all of the kinks. He has been running his server for several months and is very happy with it. So taking his lead the machine will look like this -

Motherboard	ASUS DSEB-DG	manufacturer	store
CPUs	Intel Quad Core Xeon E5410 2.33Ghz (quantity 2)	manufacturer	store
CPU Heat Sinks	Thermalright HR-01-X	manufacturer	store
Memory	Crucial 8GB kit FBDIMM DDR2-800 (each kit = 2x 4GB modules; quantity 4 kits for 32GB)	manufacturer	store
Drives	Seagate 7200.11 1TB – 7200RPM 32MB SATA 3.0G (4 total)	manufacturer	store
Power Supply	Thermaltake Toughpower W0132RU 1000 watt	manufacturer	store
Case	Cooler Master Cosmos 1000	manufacturer	store
RAM Heat Sinks	Thermaliright HR-07-H and HR-07-L (4 ea.)	manufacturer	store

I have already obtained everything but the motherboard, CPUs and the heat sinks and I'll order them next week. Once all the parts get here I’ll start putting this baby together (with considerable help from Andrew). If you are curious as to what it looks like you can read more about AC’s project in his Creating a Custom Virtualization Rig with Microsoft’s Hyper–V article.

My goal is to retire some of the machines I already have in the office and do all of my work using the VMs. I’m still deciding on what tools I’ll install but I want to be able to easily clone and needed development platform. I’ll post more when I get further along on the project.

I’ll clean off my Vista box then upgrade to to Windows 7 and use it for email, MSS Office and things like browsing the Internet. I’ll also use it to RDP into the VMs running on the virtualization server. The Win 2003 Server I’m currently using will either get retired or become my production Speech Server platform

I’m excited about this project but I would like to hear about your development environment or any suggestions you may have for things that I should consider for this project.

I'm presenting at the Jacksonville Code Camp (Aug. 29th)

marshallharrison — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 03:06:00 GMT

I'll be presenting again this year at the JAXDUG Code Camp.

At the time I'm posting this we have 39 speakers and 283 people signed up to attend with 4 weeks to go.

My Session -

Announcing GotSpeech Consulting LLC

marshallharrison — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 15:15:00 GMT

As you may know I recently announced that I was unemployed and looking for consulting work. Well I have taken the next step - I have formed GotSpeech Consulting LLC.

GSC is a registered Florida corporation that I am using for my consulting work. I haven’t got the website up an running yet but that is coming soon – still working out the logo and site design.

GotSpeech Consulting will offer the following services to its client -

OCS 2007 Speech Server application development
MSS 2004 to MSS 2007 conversions
Speech Server training given locally or on-site
Project and code review/analysis for best practices for Speech Server development
Speech Server mentoring

It is my opinion that there is a market among small and medium size companies for Speech Server development. These smaller companies often don’t have the staff expertise for a Speech Server project. They may not have the manpower or time to take on IVR related projects so they are looking to augment their staff. GotSpeech Consulting can fill in those gaps.

I’m also looking for Speech Server developers interested in subcontracting for GotSpeech Consulting. I am handling all of the work at the present but I hope to grow the consulting business and I am looking for capable developers that can do some of the work. If you are interested please send me you resume and your availability.

Marshall Harrison, MVP Microsoft Office Communications Server
marshall@gotspeech.net | 904.342.6205

MVP again and other stuff

marshallharrison — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 18:54:00 GMT

I got this in my email today:

Dear Marshall Harrison,
Congratulations! We are pleased to present you with the 2009 Microsoft® MVP Award! This award is given to exceptional technical community leaders who actively share their high quality, real world expertise with others. We appreciate your outstanding contributions in Communications Server technical communities during the past year.

This is my 4th year and I am honored to be named MVP again.

Today was also my first day of being laid off. Or to put it another way – today is my first day as an independent OCS/Speech Server consultant.

I’m excited about the opportunities that being an independent consultant provides me. It gives me the freedom to work on things that I find interesting and it gives me the opportunity to pursue speaking and training assignments. I like the fact that I will get more interaction with other companies looking to take advantage of OCS and Speech Server. I truly like the role of evangelist for these technologies and I’m looking forward to experimenting more with Speech Server and UCMA 2.0. I’m also glad that this will give me more time to spend promoting/growing GotSpeech.Net and GotUC.Net. I have been so busy with other things that I haven’t been as active on my forums as I would like but that will be changing.

But this new venture also means that I have to round up my own business so if you know of anyone that needs training, mentoring, coding or other consulting work then just send them my way.

The GotSpeech Guy is looking for employment.

marshallharrison — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 01:09:00 GMT

Gold Systems is cutting back on their engineering staff so I will be unemployed as of 07/01.

So I’m looking for employment. Specifically I’m looking for Speech Server or OCS developer positions fulltime or consulting assignments. I can also do mentoring and training in Speech Server and I’m available for writing assignments. I would prefer to work remote but other arraingments can be made. My home office has a Speech Server development and a production environment and I also have a Dialogic media gateway for testing and development. Of course I have access to the GotUC.Net OCS sandbox but I will be setting up my own in my office so I will be fully self sufficient when I finish.

Marshall Harrison, MVP Microsoft Office Communications Server
marshall@gotspeech.net | 904.806.5418

Microsoft UC Developer Survey

marshallharrison — Wed, 27 May 2009 11:26:42 GMT

Microsoft is asking UC developers to take a quick survey to better get to know its developer audience, carried out by Frost and Sullivan.

For example, what applications have been developed, what other communications tools besides Microsoft’s unified communications products (like Microsoft Office Communications Server, Microsoft Office Communicator and Microsoft Exchange) you have been using, and most importantly, what Microsoft could do to better help the community?

In order to get a better insights Microsoft engaged Frost and Sullivan, an independent third party, to conduct a Unified Communications Developer survey.

If you are a developer of unified communications applications such as OCS and Communicator, please take 15 minutes and fill out this survey:

http://www.globaltestmarket.com/survey/s.phtml?sn=134581&lang=E&secid=9f8cbb

When you click the link you will be directed to a secured site hosted by Frost and Sullivan that will allow you to fill out the survey. It requires cookies to be enabled to work correctly.

Please note that Frost and Sullivan will keep all your individual responses confidential and anonymous.

Based on the data collected in the survey, Microsoft hopes to develop a set of activities to provide better assistance to you in building great enterprise solutions on the Microsoft Unified Communications platform.

Of course we will keep you posted on such activities via this blog.

Speech Server (2007) 64 bit April roll-up also available for download now!

marshallharrison — Wed, 27 May 2009 11:20:56 GMT

The x64 link for the April roll-up fixes for Speech Server 2007 is now included. So finally 64-bit developers can fix the red-crosses error, caused by the SP1 of .NET, or get back results from a VoiceXML subdialog. You can now set InterDigitTimeout on the DTMF recognizer for VoiceXML apps so you VXML developers should be happy. It also fixes a couple of other thigs but you can read about them yourself at the link below.

Go to http://support.microsoft.com/kb/963025/ for the download.

Enjoy!

Windows Speech Recognition Profile Tool

marshallharrison — Wed, 27 May 2009 02:08:16 GMT

Microsoft has a new Windows Speech Recognition Profile tool (WSR Profile tool) that enables a Windows Speech Recognition user to easily back up and restore his or her speech profile.

You can download it here - http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=1d60a5a6-85d4-4db2-a581-a41f66561a7d

Sign-up for the UC Developer Sandbox!

marshallharrison — Wed, 13 May 2009 13:30:07 GMT

I know many of you are interested in the future of Speech Development in OCS R2 and beyond.

I just posted this Sign-up for the UC Developer Sandbox! over at GotUC.Net and I thought you would be interested.

We are giving you a sandbox where you can learn how to develop speech applications using UCMA without the expense of setting up your own OCS environment. So come on over and join us.

Help Shape the Future of Speech Server

marshallharrison — Mon, 04 May 2009 12:16:42 GMT

As you might have noticed there are practically no speech tools yet in the UCMA 2.0 Speech SDK apart from some basic classes.

Currently Microsoft is prioritizing which tools to make available in the Wave ‘14’ release of OCS/UCMA, at which time the Speech Server functionality should become an integral part of the UC platform.

Microsoft would like to solicit the feedback from the GotSpeech.net Community on how to prioritize which tools to build and ship for Telephony Speech (for Desktop Speech, please check out the Windows Vista Dictation Resource Kit)

This is specifically about the speech recognition and speech synthesis tools and not about the dialog languages, like VoiceXML and Windows Workflow. UCMA 2.0 shipped with basic UC Workflow Activities including speech, and currently the Speech Server (2007) VoiceXML 2.1 browser is ported to the UCMA API and this browser will be released in the future.

Using the comment tool, could you please distribute $100 in value across the following tools we are considering to build/release, with $0 being not important at all, and any value above $0 giving it a relative value increasing with importance. You can just copy the table below into a comment or if you prefer you can just copy and email it to me – I’ll see that it gets to the right parties.

Tool	Relative value to you out of $100 total	Comments
Grammar Static Analyzer		Syntax checking
Grammar Static Analyzer		Grammar cop like in Speech Server (2007) (detecting OOV utterances)
Grammar Dynamic Analyzer		Simulator to measure grammar changes effect on the basis of existing log files
Custom Pronunciation Tool (text)		Create custom pronunciations
Custom Pronunciation Tool (audio)		Generate pronunciations from audio
Lexicon Editing Tool (app)		Tool to edit custom application lexicon
Lexicon Editing Tool (master)		Ability to edit the Microsoft provided master lexicon
Prompt Editor		Edit and align prompts in prompt database for prompt engine
Prompt Database		Store prompts, ability to check missing prompts and do version control
Prompt Engine		Concatenative prompt engine
Speech Synthesis Prompt Sculpting		Tool to edit TTS pronunciations
Custom TTS Voice Tool		Tool to create your custom TTS voice
Visual Grammar Editor		Visual SRGS grammar editor
Statistical Grammar compiler		Tool to import transcriptions and create a statistical language model from those
Conversational Grammar Engine		Conversational grammar engine like in Speech Server (2007)
Conversational Grammar Builder		Conversational grammar builder like Speech Server (2007)
Transcription Tool		Tool to transcribe and annotate the logs in a consistent manner
Log Analysis Tools		Analyze log files to see hit rates and success metrics for dialog states like in Speech Server (2007)
Offline Recognition Tool		Ability to read wave files and measure recognition rates
ASR Analysis tools		Measures word error rates, sentence error rates, etc.
Other – please specify

As per Microsoft’s default policy, this posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

Many thanks in advance for your feedback.

New Speech Site

marshallharrison — Sat, 02 May 2009 02:06:00 GMT

Microsoft has launched the Microsoft Speech Technologies Development Center.

Lots of good stuff there as well as links to Speech Team Blogs and even a link to GotSpeech.

Be sure you check out the consolidated downloads page - its one of the tabs at the top of the page.

There is another speech site coming soon and I’ll blog about it when it goes live.

Plus look for some great news coming out of GotUC.Net in the next couple of weeks. Its huge and I don’t think there has ever been a developer community effort like this before.

Check it out and let me know what you think.

Exchange 2010 Beta

marshallharrison — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 16:19:13 GMT

Not exactly Speech Server related but as Speech Server, OCS, Exchange and Microsoft Office grow and collaborate more there is good news here for the Speech Server developer. As the other pieces of the pie grow we should see new opportunities for us. I’m especially excited about Exchange 2010.

Reviews

· Microsoft Exchange 2010 Beta Looks Solid from Core to Cloud (and related slideshow Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 Includes Welcome Improvements) – eWeek

· First look: Exchange 2010 beta shines – InfoWorld

News

· Broader Office 14 testing coming by fall – CNet

· Next Exchange features e-mail 'mute' button - CNet

· Microsoft Brands Office 2010, Releases Exchange Beta – PC World / IDG

· Microsoft fends off Google with Web browser-friendly Exchange 2010 - Computerworld

· Microsoft to release Exchange 2010 beta on April 15 - ZDNet

· Microsoft Exchange 2010 to address annoyances & mobility – Seattle PI

· Next version of Microsoft Office coming in 2010 - AP

· It's Office 2010: First technical previews due in Q3 - BetaNews