To overcome the subjectivity in the existing face to face conversation proficiency testing, and to evaluate conversation proficiency of many testers objectively within the limited time, it is necessary to develop an automatic testing system which evaluates listening comprehension and correctness, fluency and grammaticality of speech via the WWW (World Wide Web). This paper describes some hardware and software design criteria and progress of the automatic testing system for Chinese conversation proficiency. The hardware system of the automatic testing system for Chinese conversation proficiency consists of a server computer which performs speech analysis and automatic evaluation, and a client computer into which a user can input some speech. The two computers have to be connected via the Internet, and a microphone has been equipped in the client computer to record the user's speech. The software system consists of some modules for the server computer and some modules for the client computer. The modules for the client computer record user's speech and transmit it to the server computer. The modules in the server computer analyze and evaluate the speech which is transferred from the client computer. We showed some criteria in developing the automatic testing system and some feasibility for implementing the system.

To overcome the subjectivity in the existing face to face conversation proficiency testing, and to evaluate conversation proficiency of many testers objectively within the limited time, it is necessary to develop an automatic testing system which evaluates listening comprehension and correctness, fluency and grammaticality of speech via the WWW (World Wide Web). This paper describes some hardware and software design criteria and progress of the automatic testing system for Chinese conversation proficiency. The hardware system of the automatic testing system for Chinese conversation proficiency consists of a server computer which performs speech analysis and automatic evaluation, and a client computer into which a user can input some speech. The two computers have to be connected via the Internet, and a microphone has been equipped in the client computer to record the user's speech. The software system consists of some modules for the server computer and some modules for the client computer. The modules for the client computer record user's speech and transmit it to the server computer. The modules in the server computer analyze and evaluate the speech which is transferred from the client computer. We showed some criteria in developing the automatic testing system and some feasibility for implementing the system.

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