Converting wav file for IVR prompt

[olakayode]

Pls can someone suggest a software I can use in converting my recorded prompt to the standard IVR 8khz, 8k bit rate mono wav file. The best I could do was 64kbps bit rate instead of 8kbps required by IP IVR.

Your responses will be well appreciated.

Thanks,

Kayode

[m.pratt]

We use Sound Forge by Sonic Foundry though you I am sure there are less expensive solutions out there.

[bullett]

Audacity for editing the files (google for it its freeware and very handy)

And Sound recorder which is included in windows to save the file into 8bit u-law.

Easy and free!

[olakayode]

Thanks guys. I already have a pre-recorded prompt that I want to convert to the CCITT u-law with 8k bit rate. I tried out audacity and it did the conversion but bit rate was 64kbps instead of 8k.

Anyother suggestions will be appreciated.

Regards,

Kayode

[pbrognon5]

hello :)

We had the same problem and found a nice software to do the job.

By the way, I think that you may be interrested to know the complete software processing we are using, because we got really good results from those tools.

1) TTS - Text To Speach

If you need to generate Text to Speech message files, a real good product is Acapela.

It is certainly not a free tool, but the quality of the audio output is really good.

You can try it online here : http://demo.acapela-group.com/

2) Audio Editing

If you need to edit your message for some reason, Audacity could be your solution.

It is a free SourceForge project.

You can record, replay, edit the sound (cut, copy, paste), split a sound file, merge multiple messages into a single file, add effects, work in multi-tracks mode, export to wav, mp3, ogg vorbis, choose the sampling frequency ...

All of this in a nice, user friendly graphical interface.

The home page of the Audacity project is here : http://sourceforge.net/projects/audacity/

3) Converting the sampling frequency

We first used the Windows Sound Recorder to convert our files into the IVR format, but the quality was not always at the top. Depending on the source file audio content, some nasty distortion was introduced by the conversion process.

Well, Microsoft never pretended that the Sound Recorder was designed to be a "Pro" audio tool !

Then, we used SoX (Sound eXchange) with far better results.

SoX is also a sourceforge project : http://sox.sourceforge.net/

It is a command-line tool (no Graphical User Interface) that can do a lot of audio operations.

Some details may be neccessary here ...

Sox has three different tools to perform a sampling frequency conversion.

The best results are obtained with the "polyphase" tool.

It takes more time than the others, needs more memory, but the results are better.

Basically, SoX converts an input file into an output file (wonderful ! :), with options and audio effects.

Some audio file formats have a header that contains a description of the digital characteristics of audio data in the file (sampling frequency, number of channels, etc.). For those files, SoX doesn't need a description. It takes it from the header.

If there is no header in the input file, SoX needs options to describe the input audio data.

As you want to convert the file, SoX needs options to know what to do with the file.

So the general SoX command line is ...

sox [general options] [input file options] input file [output file options] output file [effect [effect options]]

If you need to convert a wav file to a 8KHz mono mu-law wav file ...

a) Wav files (as far as I know) have a header.

So you don't need the input options. SoX will find them in the input file header.

b) You have to tell SoX what you want as output : sample rate, number of channels, sample length, audio encoding.

The output options will be :

-r 8000 (rate)

-c 1 (channels)

-U (mu-law)

Uppercase U !

lowercase u has another meaning !

-b (samples are 8 bits long (one byte))

c) the complete SoX command will be :

sox.exe -V -r 8000 -c 1 -U -b

polyphase

-V is a general options and means "verbose". SoX will give you more information about what it is doing.

Example : sox.exe -V OurWelcomeMessage.wav -r 8000 -c 1 -U -b OurWelcomeMessageMu8KHz.wav polyphase

All of this is explained in the documentation of SoX.

Hope this helps

P. Brognon

[olakayode]

Thanks Brognon. I was able to convert my recorded wav file in a kool way. While searching the forum archives, I stumbled on a similar post which refered to dumping the file in the MOH folder on the CCM. I did that and it worked like magic.

Thanks to everyone that took time to suggest a solution.

Regards,

Kayode

[manoj_anantha]

You could have used windows sound recorder(Start->Programs->Accessories->Entertainment->Sound recorder), open the wav file->File menu-> Properties -> Click Convert now-> select CCITT u-law. And save the file.

[olakayode]

Manoj,

Thanks but I tried that out earlier and it didn't work. Its because my IPCC is running g729 codec.

Cheers,

Kayode

[aalvarado]

To convert WAV (PCM, CCITT u-law) files to G729 (G.729) codec for IPCC using CallManager (CCM), do the following:

1. Drop the calls in C:\Program Files\Cisco\MOH\DropMOHFilesHere of the MOH CallManager.

2. The files will be converted automatically. Once they are converted, they will be deleted from the directory.

3. Copy the files from:

C:\Program Files\Cisco\TFTPPath\MOH

They are the files with the same filename you uploaded but have a g729.wav at the end.

Just for completeness as I ran across this and it helped, but it didn't walk you through it. Nothing bugs the heck out of me more than: "I saw this on another post" but not putting in a link! ;)

[msmalley]

Another easy was to create g729 prompts is to use the Sound Recorder.

Here is the trick... On your unity server look for sl_g729a_setup.exe Run this on your workstation. It will install the g729 codec on your PC. You can then save your files in g729.

Please rate helpful posts.

[jtndavis111]

To record prompts, I created a script with a recording step and write document step. I then dial in and record my prompt.

[BarryMcLellan72678]

jtndavais111, Sorry, not to change direction in this thread, but how did you do the following "To record prompts, I created a script with a recording step and write document step. I then dial in and record my prompt."

Thanks!

Barry

[msmalley]

Take a look at the record_write script in this script repository.

http://www.cisco.com/application/x-zip-compressed/en/us/guest/products/ps1846/c1028/cdccont_0900aecd80179234.zip

[BarryMcLellan72678]

Thanks!!!

[Imran Khan R]

Hi,

You can use the software called audacity to perform the required conversion.

Thanks.