A voice engine is a software subsystem for bidirectional audio communication, typically used as part of a telecommunications system to simulate a telephone

Telephone

The telephone , colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that transmits and receives sounds, usually the human voice. Telephones are a point-to-point communication system whose most basic function is to allow two people separated by large distances to talk to each other...

. It functions like a data pump for audio data, specifically voice data. The voice engine is typically used in an embedded system

Embedded system

An embedded system is a computer system designed for specific control functions within a larger system. often with real-time computing constraints. It is embedded as part of a complete device often including hardware and mechanical parts. By contrast, a general-purpose computer, such as a personal...

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The term became popularized after 2000 with the proliferation of voice over internet protocol technology in software DSP

Digital signal processing

Digital signal processing is concerned with the representation of discrete time signals by a sequence of numbers or symbols and the processing of these signals. Digital signal processing and analog signal processing are subfields of signal processing...

 systems. Voice engines handle the voice processing for an IP Phone

IP Phone

A VoIP phone uses voice over IP technologies allowing telephone calls to be made over an IP network such as the Internet instead of the ordinary PSTN system. Calls can traverse the Internet, or a private IP network such as that of a company...

 system on a standard processor, compared to prior generations of systems which required dedicated, math-optimized digital signal processor

Digital signal processor

A digital signal processor is a specialized microprocessor with an architecture optimized for the fast operational needs of digital signal processing.-Typical characteristics:...

 chips.

Voice engines are highly optimized software subsystems due to the mathematically complex signal processing required for voice filtering and speech coding

Speech coding

Speech coding is the application of data compression of digital audio signals containing speech. Speech coding uses speech-specific parameter estimation using audio signal processing techniques to model the speech signal, combined with generic data compression algorithms to represent the resulting...

. The filter stages and coding elements within a voice engine are designed to work in conjunction with a larger telecommunications system, including only a specific and limited range of processing to minimize the voice engine's memory size and processor usage. Compared to software desktop applications which might employ plugins to continually add flexibility or extensibility, a voice engine is designed to meet specific industry standards for interoperability

Interoperability

Interoperability is a property referring to the ability of diverse systems and organizations to work together . The term is often used in a technical systems engineering sense, or alternatively in a broad sense, taking into account social, political, and organizational factors that impact system to...

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