The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) on Wednesday took steps to advance voice applications over the Web, issuing a public draft of Speech Synthesis Markup Language (SSML) 1.1. Identified as the First Public Working Draft, the document incorporates features and feedback from SSML workshops held in China and Greece. A third workshop is planned for India this weekend. SSML is part of W3C’s Speech Interface Framework, a suite of specifications for building voice applications on the Web. The language is intended to increase the ability to listen to synthesized speech through mobile phones, desktop computers and other devices. Version 1.1 adds support for more conventions and practices of the world’s languages. Included is a feature to disambiguate “word boundaries” in languages that do not use whitespace as a word boundary, including Chinese, Thai and Japanese, W3C said.Also featured in version 1.1 is clarification between an author’s speaking voice and the language being spoken. Finer grained control is offered over lexicon activation and entry usage. Features to better integrate with existing and upcoming Speech Interface Framework specifications also are included.Ratification of the SSML 1.1 specification by W3C is not expected for another year to 18 months, however. Software Development