JPH05196752A - Device for generating sound announcement indicating angular position of rotary shaft - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To effect indicating of the position of rotation by voice by providing a means to generate an electrical signal indicating the angle position of a rotating shaft and an electronic voice synthesizer capable of generating a vocal notice in response to the electrical signal. CONSTITUTION: An electric circuit 21 is constituted of a minute hand shaft 2, a hour hand shaft 11 and an analog time measuring collar 9. As a hand shaft 2 and a minute hand turn, voltage at a minute contact 7 varies linearly to 0 volt from Vcc with the angle of rotation of the hand shaft 2. Likewise, as the hour hand turns, the voltage at a hour contact 17 also varies. In other words, in an embodiment ideal for measuring the positions of the hour hand and the minute hand, four lines for the Vcc, return, the minute contact 7 and the hour contact 17 are arranged between the movement and an electronic device of an analog timepiece. The voltage at the contact 7 gives the position of the minute hand and the voltage at the hour contact the position of the hour hand. These voltages are restored by an electronic circuit for supplying the electronic data pertaining to time to a voice synthesizer. The voice synthesization circuit tells time by an audible sound.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

FIELD OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to methods and apparatus for interfacing mechanical and electrical components of electro-mechanical devices to produce meaningful audio output, and more particularly. For example, it relates to a method of generating an audio message which can be activated by closing a switch, an analog signal, a digital signal or a timer output and which is dependent on the rotation of the shaft.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In the following description, U.S. Pat. No. 4,214,125 owned by the applicant of the present application, "METHOD AND APPARATUS.
FOR SPECIAL SYNTHESIZIN
G) ". With advancing large-scale integrated (LSI) circuit technology and devices in audio signal compression and synthesis, advertising devices that speak advertising messages, laughter, cry, dolls that make a throating sound, speaking books that read aloud, A toy train, truck, or fire truck that makes a sound like a real thing, an answering machine with a time notification synthesized in an incoming message, and a caller can record a message to the called party who is absent Voice messaging devices, computer software and games that produce voice, music and sound effects to enhance the user interface, speaking greeting cards that allow the user to enter his own message, learning by speaking to the user. Educational equipment to assist, digital clock that tells the time when the button is pressed (hour Electronic voice synthesizer to products such as without a needle clock showing the number) of which indicates it has become normal to be seen.

Speech and synthesizers that meet these needs have been developed as LSI chips and are available from many companies. For example, the Hayward electronic audio system of California, produces approximately six different chips that meet various portions of this market demand. The techniques of voice compression and voice synthesis in these products are described in US Pat. No. 4,214,125.

Despite the widespread use of speech synthesis in commercial products, there are several applications not traditionally realized commercially. For those applications, a device having a visual indicator coupled to the axis of rotation, and more particularly, such that the information required by the synthesizer (to help announce the correct information) is the angle of rotation of the axis Equipment is included. Examples of such devices include analog clocks in which the position of the hands visually indicates the time of day, television and radio receivers in which the dial controls and indicates the station or frequency to be tuned, and the knobs of temperature. It includes a natural heat for adjusting and directing. Providing an audible notification of the setting or position of a rotatable indicator included in such a device may, for example, interfere with visual perception of the time or setting, or may be too dark or too far away. This is highly desirable in situations where the instructions cannot be read or the device is out of line of sight. In the following description, an analog movement timepiece described as an example of application of the present invention is specifically targeted, but the present invention is not limited thereto.

Analog movement watches are usually devices which have a gear wheel which is connected by an axis to the hour and minute hands.
The time of day is given by the position of their hands. Digital watches, in contrast, are usually all-electronic devices, in which the time is read as a series of numbers on a digital display. It is relatively easy to combine the electronic device of a digital timepiece with a voice synthesizer that announces the time. The reason is that the time is kept as a digital quantity maintained and updated by the electronic device. Therefore, the electronic timepiece circuit can be easily associated with an electronic voice synthesizer that obtains the current time to announce the current time when requested. Therefore, the digital watch can have an all-electronic interface to the voice synthesizer.

[0006]

In contrast to this, it is not possible to interface an analog movement clock to a voice synthesizer in order to be able to announce the current time when a voice indication of the time is required. Much more difficult. Because the interface between the clock and the speech synthesizer is necessarily electro-mechanical, and
Time is usually not stored in an analog timepiece in an electrical or digital electronic manner. That is, the position of the timepiece and the position of the minute hand in the analog movement must be sent to the electronic device of the speech synthesizer before it has the information it needs to announce. Since this problem has not been solved in the prior art in a reliable and cost effective manner, speaking analog movement watches are not commercially available.

Another problem associated with devices that have a visual indicator generally attached to the axis of rotation, and especially analog-speaking timepieces, is from the walls of the room or the bed where the person who wants to know the time is sleeping. These devices and clocks are often installed away from the person who wants to hear the time and other announcements, such as being away. In that case, it is inconvenient to go to the place where the clock is placed and press the button in order to hear the notification of the time. Therefore, the method of remotely triggering time announcements is a desirable feature of useful talking analog movement watches. This problem has not been solved in the past.

[0008]

These and other problems are solved by the present invention. In general, the apparatus of the present invention produces an electronic voice synthesizer and an analog voltage signal for each rotary axis whose position is to be announced or whose position is to be included in the announcement generated by the voice synthesizer. And one or more mechanisms. The analog voltage signals are generated so that the magnitude of each analog voltage signal corresponds to the angular position of the corresponding axis of rotation. This device determines the angular position of each axis suitable for input to the speech synthesizer to select the audio information stored in the electronic speech synthesizer that corresponds to the angular position of the rotatable axis. Also included is a circuit for converting the analog voltage signal into a digital signal encoded for representation. The method of the present invention includes the step of generating an analog voltage signal having a magnitude corresponding to the angular position of one or more axes of rotation. The analog voltage signals are converted into digital signals suitable for selecting speech information from the speech synthesizer such that the audible output of the speech synthesizer announces information related to the angular position of the axis of rotation.

In one embodiment of the present invention, the angular position of a dial, knob, or other visual indicator (such as a pointer) mounted on the rotating shaft is proportional to the angular position of the visual indicator. Convert to voltage. The analog voltage is converted by a speech synthesizer into a series of phenomena, words, etc., into a digital signal suitable for announcing the position of the axis. By properly selecting the phenomena, words, etc. stored in the memory of the speech synthesizer, the temperature (for example, if the dial or knob is a temperature control knob on the fire), the channel or the frequency (the dial is a television or radio). Audible output can be selected to announce the time (if the dial is the dial of an analog clock), etc.

In another embodiment of the present invention, the angular position of two (or more) dials or knobs attached to the rotary shaft results in the same number of analog voltage signals proportional to the rotary shaft position. To be converted. The two or more axes of rotation are rotationally spaced apart in parallel. Separated but not parallel. Alternatively, in the case of three or more rotating shafts, any combination thereof can be used. The analog voltage signal is then converted to a digital signal suitable for generating a series of phenomena, words, etc., which announce the combined position of the plurality of visual indicators. For example, analog voltage signals that are proportional to the angular positions of the hour and minute hands of an analog watch can be converted to announce a single time. As another example, an analog voltage signal that is proportional to the temperature control knob of the natural heat and the knobs for the selected heating coil and other heating modes is converted to a voice saying "Bake at 350 degrees", "Mushiyaki at 550 degrees". You can make the synthesizer speak. Another example of this second embodiment of the present invention is a talking analog timepiece that produces a time corresponding to the angular position of the hour and minute hands.

In another embodiment of the present invention, not only for voicing the angular position of the associated visual indicator, but
One of the analog voltage signals can be detected in order to check the accuracy of the vocalized position of the second visual indicator. For example, the exact time to be signaled by the watch varies within a relatively small range of movement of the hour hand of the watch and thus within a correspondingly small range of change in the magnitude of the analog voltage signal. However, the correct time can be uttered by detecting the analog voltage signal corresponding to the angular position of the minute hand of the clock, so the uttered time depends on the position of the hour hand and the position of the minute hand.

Various embodiments of the present invention in accordance with another aspect of the present invention activate a speech synthesizer circuit to produce an audible announcement of the position of the axis of rotation and thus the position of the visual indicator or dial. It also includes one or more actuators as a whole. These actuators can be used to cause the speech synthesizer to periodically generate, for example, a time, temperature or channel at a given time, when a given event occurs, or on demand. These actuators respond to visible light signals, infrared light signals or invisible light signals, timers such as alarm timers on watches, or mechanisms that aid in their occurrence in response to stimuli such as changes in the position of a rotating shaft, closing of switches. A sensor or a sensor that detects a specific sequence of audible or ultrasonic waves such as applause or the like can be included.

[0013]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT As an example of the general problem of linking mechanically configured speech synthesizer electronics with the rotation angle of a shaft, a talking analog movement timepiece is described. One way to make such a tie is to electronically control the position of the hands of a watch. That is, the time setting is entered into the electronic device in the same manner as it is done with a digital timepiece, i.e. via a push button that supplies an electrical signal to the electronic device. Changing the time in this manner causes the electronic device to move the needle to the correct position using a motor that controls the position of the needle.
This approach is relatively expensive, and the needle may be manually moved to a new position, resulting in a loss of correlation between the actual position of the needle and the electrical signal used to move the needle. , Unreliable.

The second way is to detect the position of the needle and use its position information to determine the electrical neologism needed to make the audible announcement of the time. For example, a switch for each movement of the minute hand or hour hand can be closed. The reason is that the contacts on each hand make contact with the contacts on the face of the watch. The closure of the switch is electronically monitored. In its simplest form, this approach requires 60 switches for the minute hand and 12 switches for the hour hand, so it is handled mechanically and electrically. Hateful. An improvement on this approach is to make contact between the second hand and each of the minute and hour hands. Then, the required number of contacts is three, that is, the contact between the second hand and the minute hand, the contact between the second hand and the hour hand, and the contact between the second hand and the face of the clock. The contact point between the second hand and the face of the clock detects when the second hand is at a known position, such as the 12 o'clock position. In such a configuration, the time can be electronically determined from the time delay between the second hand pointing straight up and the second hand in contact with the minute and hour hands. While this approach reduces the number of contacts to an acceptable level, it complicates the electronic device by requiring the time delay between contacts to be measured, stored, and translated into useful information. Also, since the time cannot be known to the minute after the time is changed, the audible notification of the time may be erroneous. In addition, this approach requires a second hand, which is missing in many analog movement watches.

A variation on this approach is to detect the position of the gear in the gear mechanism that rotates the needle. In addition to all of the above problems, this modification has the problem of complicating the already complicated gear mechanism.

For these reasons, this way of determining the position of the needle fixes the needle with respect to the axes that connect the needle to the wheel mechanism and the angle of rotation of those axes. An example of this approach is shown in FIG. FIG. 1 shows an exploded perspective view of a shaft assembly 1 according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention. The shaft assembly 1 has a minute hand shaft 2, an hour hand shaft 11, and an analog time measuring collar 9. A pinion 3 is attached to one end of the minute hand shaft 2. This pinion meshes with the gear mechanism (not shown) of the timepiece. A minute hand (not shown) is attached to the other end of the minute hand shaft 2. The minute hand shaft 2 also includes a minute hand wiper 5 and a minute contact 7. The minute hand wiper 5 is electrically conductive, has flexibility, and is attached so as to protrude from the outer peripheral portion of the minute hand shaft 2. The minute contact 7 is also electrically conductive and is fixedly mounted with respect to the timepiece and is positioned so as to make a sliding electrical contact with the minute hand shaft 2. It is convenient to make the sliding electrical contact in the region of the pinion 3. The minute hand shaft 2 is preferably made of metal so that the minute hand wiper 5 electrically contacts the minute contact 7. Other configurations and other materials that maintain electrical contact between the minute wiper 5 and the minute contact 7 will be apparent to those skilled in the art.

The minute hand shaft 2 is fitted concentrically inside the analog time measuring collar 9. The time measuring collar is made of an insulating material and does not rotate with the minute hand shaft 2 and the hour hand shaft 11.

The hour hand 11 is fitted concentrically on the outside of the analog measuring collar 9. The hour hand shaft 11 is preferably made of metal so as to be electrically conductive, and has a gear 13 attached to one end and an hour hand (not shown) attached to the other end. An hour wiper 15 is attached to the inside of the hour hand shaft 11, and the wiper makes electrical contact with the hour contact 17 at that time. Gear 13 meshes with the rest of the gear mechanism (not shown) of the watch. The hour contact 17 is attached to the other part of the timepiece so as to make electrical contact with the gear 13 and the hour wiper 15 while sliding.

The analog time measuring collar 9 is an adjusting arm 1.
It includes 0 and two resistance elements 19 and 20. The resistance element 19 contacts the minute wiper 5, and the resistance element 20 contacts the hour wiper 15. The resistive elements 19, 20 are uniformly resistive,
It is made of a conductive material, and electrically contacts the minute wiper 5 and the hour wiper 15 as shown in FIG. Both terminals of each resistance element 19, 20 are connected to an external power supply (not shown) by two wires exiting the analog timing collar 9 along the adjusting arm 10. The external power source is conveniently, but not necessarily, the power source used to power the speech synthesizer and its associated circuitry.

The electric circuit 21 shown in FIG.
It is composed of an hour hand shaft 11 and an analog time measuring collar 9. As the minute hand shaft 2 and the minute hand rotate, the voltage at the minute contact 7 linearly changes from Vcc to 0 volt with the rotation angle of the minute hand shaft 2. Therefore, this voltage provides instantaneous information about the position of the minute hand. Similarly, as the hour hand rotates, the voltage at the hour contact 17 changes from Vcc to 0 volts in proportion to the position of the hour hand.

In summary, the preferred embodiment for measuring the position of the hour and minute hands has four wires between the movement of the analog timepiece and the electronics (Vcc, return, minute contact 7, hour contact 17). Have. The voltage at the minute contact 7 gives the position of the minute hand and the voltage at the hour contact gives the position of the hour hand.
These voltages are decoded by an electronic circuit (described below) which supplies electronic data with respect to time to the speech synthesizer. The voice synthesis circuit announces the time with an audible sound.

Block Diagram A preferred block diagram of the electronic device is shown in FIG. The electronic devices are activated to produce a time announcement sound in four ways. The first method is by a signal at the analog input terminal 23. The input signal can be, for example, from a clapping, whistling, or other microphone responsive to audible or ultrasonic signals, an infrared sensor responsive to a remote controller, an optical sensor responsive to an external optical signal, or an external Can be provided from a radio frequency signal responsive to a radio signal external to the. Suitable sensors for use at the analog input terminal 23 for each of those types of signals generated externally and remotely are known to those skilled in the art. The additional mode for activating the audible time announcement will be described in detail later. In any case, the data at the analog input terminal 23 is an amplitude-modulated signal or a time-coded signal, which is detected by the electronic circuit of FIG.

To save power consumption, power consumption in most of the electronic circuits can be reduced during quiescent mode waiting for an external signal at the analog input terminal 23 or requiring time announcement. Analog input terminal 2
The first pulse of the signal at 3 passes through the amplifier and peak detector 25, producing a signal above the threshold voltage at the input to the analog voltage activator 27. The threshold level determines whether the signal appearing at this point is set by a fixed or variable resistor 29. When the analog voltage activator 27 receives the input signal, it applies a voltage via line 31 to power the rest of the circuit. Then, the output signal from the amplifier and peak detector 25 passes through the analog multiplexer 33 and is applied to the 7-bit analog-digital converter 35, whereby it is converted into a digital signal. The pattern of the amplitude variation of this digital signal is analyzed by the analog signal decoder 37 to determine if it is a valid request for time announcement. For example, suppose an analog input signal is provided by a microphone and the desired signal is three clapping hands within 2 seconds. The first sound causes the analog voltage activator 27 to power the rest of the circuit, which causes the analog signal decoder 37 to leave two more than the threshold.
It is determined whether each signal occurs within 2 seconds.

If so, the output of analog signal decoder 37 is activated to place a signal at the input terminal of programmable logic array (PLA) 43. This produces an output which supplies a voltage Vcc to the POT voltage 45 to the resistance elements 19, 20 in the analog time measuring collar 9 of the figure and FIG. 1b. Then, the voltage at the minute contact 7 and the voltage at the time contact 17 are sent via the analog multiplexer 33 to the 7-bit analog-digital converter 35, where they are converted into digital signals. These digital signals are analyzed by the time decoder 39 and become electronic data representing the current time. The time decoder 39 can convert a digital voltage signal representing the position of the hands of the clock into a signal representing hours and minutes, for example. One suitable table that can be stored in the temporal decoder 39 as a look-up table to perform that conversion is described below. This digital information is sent to PLA 43, where it is converted into a set of command signals. Those command signals are sent to the voice synthesizer 47.
The speech synthesizer produces a time announcement, converts it into an analog signal and causes the speaker 49 to speak. The oscillation frequency of the voice synthesizer 47, and thus the digital data rate, is controlled by the external RC circuit 51.

In order to obtain the correct value of the minute hand position, the analog output at the minute contact 7 must be decoded with a degree of accuracy higher than 1/60. For this reason, we have chosen to use a 7-bit analog-to-digital converter 35 with a precision of 1/128. In other applications of the invention, higher or lower precision analog-to-digital converters can be used.

There are at least three other ways shown in FIG. 2 to trigger the time announcement. One of them is to close the switch at the time notification input terminal 53. The second way is every hour or 15
Activating what is called a chime announcement (by setting an alarm) at a predetermined time or at regular time intervals, such as every minute. The notification is activated by turning on the alarm / chime through the ground input terminal 55 and waiting until the alarm / chime time is reached. Alarm / chime time switch 5 at that time
7 is closed. The signals from the two input terminals are analyzed by the alarm / chime decoder 41. The alarm / chime decoder 41 PLA signals when two events occur.
Send to 43. A third way to trigger the time announcement is a "drowsiness" control, similar to that found on many alarm clocks. In this manner, when the alarm / chime decoder 41 is activated and the snooze input 59 is turned on, the snooze decoder 63 waits for a certain amount of time (eg, 5 minutes) after the alarm is turned off, and Chime switch 5
If 5 is not turned off, the input at the input terminal is PLA
43 is supplied. Then, the PLA 43 triggers the time announcement. This action is performed by the alarm / chime switch 55.
Will continue for a certain time interval until it is opened. The doze decoder 63 receives its timing information from the oscillator and countdown circuit 61. An oscillator and countdown circuit 61 can also be used to generate timing pulses at exactly one second intervals to advance the gears in the analog timepiece. Each of these three ways of triggering time announcements is done with the rest of the electronic device in a similar manner to that described above for analog input signals.

In one embodiment of the present invention, the voice synthesizer is operated to convert the digital signal into the general-purpose input terminal 6.
By adding to 1, it is possible to generate other than the time announcement. As shown in FIG. 2, PLA 43 also produces output QO65. This output is, in one embodiment of the invention,
It can be used to control external functions (such as mouth movements) in synchronization with audio output.

DETAILS OF ELECTRONIC DEVICE PLA 43 comprises 5 inputs, 48 terms, and information sent to voice synthesizer 47 and POT voltage 45.
Output. Each output bit is an OR expression of any combination of terms, and each term is an AND expression of any combination of inputs or complementary inputs. The term is true only if all inputs are in the specified condition of "high,""low," or "don't care." Programming the PLA causes the speech synthesizer to give the correct time announcement. Also, by programming the PLA, those announcements can be made flexible and variable.
For example, sometimes it is possible to announce "7:22" or "time is 7:22". Appropriate circuitry and programming for PLA 43 will be apparent to those skilled in the art.

The voice synthesizer 47 stores a memory for storing the compressed voice data, a decoder for restoring the compression of the stored data and producing a digital output, and a pulse for converting the digital output into an analog signal. It includes a width modulator and an amplifier that excites the speaker. Compress audio data,
The method of synthesizing is disclosed in US Pat. No. 4,214,125, and the description is omitted here. The rest of the circuitry of voice synthesizer 47 is conventional and well known.

In the preferred embodiment of the present invention, the time decoder 39 operates such that the announced time depends not only on the position of the hour hand, but also on the positions of the hour and minute hands. To be selected. This is done for the following reasons. The movement of the hour hand between 1:59 and 2:01 can be ignored, so if you do not take any measures beforehand
There is a risk of erroneously announcing the time as 59 minutes or 2:01 as 1:01. The solution to this problem in the preferred embodiment is to make the time of day announcements dependent on the positions of the minute and hour hands. For example, in the above example, if the minute hand is between 0 and 30, the time notification is 2
It should be the hour, and if the minute hand is between 30.5 and 59.5, the time announcement should be 2:00.

[Table I] ─────────────────────────────────── Minute hand Time range 0-11.5 12- 23.5 24-35.5 35-47.5 48-59.5 Notification ─────────────────────────────────── 58-2.5 59 -3.5 0 -4.5 1-5.5 2-6.5 12 3-7.5 4-8.5 5 -9.5 6-10.5 7-11.5 1 8-12.5 9-13.5 10-14.5 11-15.5 12-16.5 2 13-17.5 14-18.5 15-19.5 16-20.5 17-21.5 3 Hour hand 18-22.5 19-23.5 20-24.5 21-25.5 22-26.5 4 Range 23-27.5 24-28.5 25-29.5 26-30.5 27-31.5 5 28-32.5 29-33.5 30-34.5 31-35.5 32-36.5 6 33-37.5 34-38.5 35-39.5 36-40.5 37-41.5 7 38-42.5 39-43.5 40-14.5 41-45.5 42-46.5 8 43-47.5 44-48.5 45- 19.5 46-50.5 47-51.5 9 48-52.5 49-53.5 50-54.5 51-55.5 52-56.5 10 53-57.5 54-58.5 55-59.5 56-0.5 57-1.5 11

More specifically, the position of the hour hand around the dial is described in units of 0 to 60 with an accuracy of 0.5. Then, for example, the position of the hour hand between 15 and 20 is 3
Sometimes respond. In those units, Table I shows the preferred method of decoding the position of the hour hand depending on the position of the minute hand.

Other features of the electronic circuit construction that can be used in other embodiments of the invention, but are not required, are as follows.

If the analog input 23 is provided by a microphone, the functions of the microphone and the speaker can be performed by a single device. This is because the speech synthesizer 47 can generate a tri-state output. A pull-up resistor can be provided at the input terminal of the analog multiplexer 33 so that the analog-to-digital converter 35 has a predetermined value when the input contact 17 or the input split contact 7 is floating. Resistance elements 19 and 2
Since there is usually a gap between the two ends of 0,
The contacts can be floating. The combined time occurs at the minute indication 60, and the minute indication is associated with the voltage Vcc with or without a gap,
The gap does not cause an error in the combined time.

Both terminals of the resistance elements 19 and 20 are connected to the wiper 5,
The resistance elements 19, 20 and the wipers 5, 15 are preferably configured so as to minimize the possibility that the movement of the arms of 15 will short each other. This is done by physically making one end of each resistance element higher than the other end. The POT voltage 45 preferably has a finite impedance in order to protect the circuit and the battery in case each movement of the minute hand wiper 5 or the hour hand wiper 15 shorts the output of the POT voltage 45 back. For each signal, such as the voltage from hour contact 17 and minute contact 7, that needs to be converted for input to PLA 43, an analog-to-digital converter (to have the required resolution for the particular signal to be converted). Circuit) can be configured to eliminate the multiplexer 33. Figure 2
Since the rest of the electronic device shown in (1) is well known, the description thereof will be omitted.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an exploded perspective view (a) of an embodiment of a talking analog timepiece according to the present invention by a method of measuring an angular position of an hour hand and a minute hand of a timepiece, a detailed cross-sectional view of an analog timepiece in an assembled state (b). ) And an equivalent circuit diagram (c) of the analog timepiece.

2 is a block diagram of an electronic circuit combined with a talking analog movement timepiece, which decodes the positions of the hour hand and the minute hand from the voltage output of the mechanical device of FIG. 1 and announces the time.

[Explanation of symbols]

 25 Amplifier and Peak Detector 27 Analog Voltage Activator 33 Analog Multiplexer 35 Analog-Digital Converter 37 Analog Signal Decoder 39 Time Decoder 41 Alarm / Chime Decoder 47 Voice Synthesizer 61 Oscillator and Countdown Circuit

Front Page Continuation (71) Applicant 592107934 Fred Shu Lung Chan FRED SHIU LEUNG CHAN United States 94545 California Hayward Industrial Parkway West 2493 (72) Inventor Forest S Mosa United States 94545 California Hayward Industrial Parkway West 2493 (72) Inventor Fred Shu Rune Chan United States 94545 California Hayward Industrial Parkway West 2493

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. Means for generating at least one electrical signal each representing an angular position of at least one axis of rotation, and an electronic voice synthesizer capable of producing a voice announcement in response to the at least one electrical signal. Characterized in that,
A device for generating a voice announcement representative of the angular position of at least one axis of rotation. 2. A first rotating shaft having an hour hand attached thereto, a second rotating shaft having a minute hand attached thereto, a first signal representing an angular position of the first rotating shaft, and a second rotating shaft. Means for generating a second signal representative of the angular position of rotation, an electronic speech synthesizer, and a first electrical signal and a second electrical signal for producing an audible notification of the hour and minute in the speech synthesizer. And a means for causing a voice synthesizer to receive the analog clock.