Technologies related to telecommunications are described herein, wherein such technologies are configured to assist users with hearing impairments. The technologies described herein cause transcriptions of spoken utterances directed to a telephone in a telephone conversation to be presented on a display of the telephone nearly simultaneously with the spoken utterances being audibly output by the telephone.

An electronic device, method, and computer program product enable limiting electromagnetic emissions from current between batteries. A first battery is positioned proximal to an earpiece speaker within the electronic device. At least one second battery is positioned at a different location within the electronic device that is not proximal to the earpiece speaker. A switch is coupled to a first battery proximal to the earpiece speaker among the plurality of batteries. The switch is selectively toggled to limit current drawn from the first battery while the earpiece speaker is operating, in order to reduce baseband electromagnetic emissions emanating from the first battery.

A captioning relay for captioning hearing user (HU) voice signals comprising a plurality of separate captioning resources and a captioning administrator module that receives HU voice signal segments corresponding to a plurality of separate ongoing calls between HUs and AUs and provides the voice signal segments in a first in, first out order to the captioning resources, the administrator module providing each voice signal segment from each call to any one of the captioning resources to be captioned without regard to which captioning resource captioned prior voice signal segments generated during the call and, the administrator module further receiving caption segments back from the captioning resources and providing those captioning segments to AU devices associated with the calls that generated corresponding HU voice signal segments, and wherein the number of captioning resources is less than the number of ongoing calls.

Providing, using a computer, personalized captioning in response to a user having difficulty in understanding another participant speaking. Detecting, at a computer, the user having difficulty in understanding another participant speaking, or alternatively, receiving, at the computer, a communication from a user indicating that the user requests assistance to understand speech of a particular participant in an electronic group meeting. The speech of the particular participant is identified, and a speech input is captured from the particular participant in the electronic group meeting. The captured speech of the particular participant is transcribed, and an audio assistance output is generated for communication to the user. The audio assistance output is communicated to a device of the user.

A method may include obtaining a first audio signal including first speech originating at a remote device during a communication session between the remote device and a communication device and obtaining a second audio signal including second speech originating at the communication device during the communication session between the remote device and the communication device. The method may also include obtaining a characteristic of the communication session from one or more of: the first audio signal, the second audio signal, and settings of the communication device and determining a hearing level of a user of the communication device using the characteristic of the communication session.

A system and method for use with an assisted user's communication device that includes a display. The method includes providing a user communication device including a processor that is programmed to perform the step of, upon disconnection of an emergency call to a hearing user in which a captioning service has provided text transcription of voice messages from the hearing user, maintaining a link to the captioning service for a predetermined period of time. The processor also is programmed to perform the step of recognizing the call as an emergency call upon placement of the call, and the captioning service is automatically initiated upon the processor performing that recognition.

A captioning relay for captioning hearing user (HU) voice signals comprising a plurality of separate captioning resources and a captioning administrator module that receives HU voice signal segments corresponding to a plurality of separate ongoing calls between HUs and AUs and provides the voice signal segments in a first in, first out order to the captioning resources, the administrator module providing each voice signal segment from each call to any one of the captioning resources to be captioned without regard to which captioning resource captioned prior voice signal segments generated during the call and, the administrator module further receiving caption segments back from the captioning resources and providing those captioning segments to AU devices associated with the calls that generated corresponding HU voice signal segments, and wherein the number of captioning resources is less than the number of ongoing calls.

A captioning relay for captioning hearing user (HU) voice signals comprising a plurality of separate captioning resources and a captioning administrator module that receives HU voice signal segments corresponding to a plurality of separate ongoing calls between HUs and AUs and provides the voice signal segments in a first in, first out order to the captioning resources, the administrator module providing each voice signal segment from each call to any one of the captioning resources to be captioned without regard to which captioning resource captioned prior voice signal segments generated during the call and, the administrator module further receiving caption segments back from the captioning resources and providing those captioning segments to AU devices associated with the calls that generated corresponding HU voice signal segments, and wherein the number of captioning resources is less than the number of ongoing calls.

An electronic device, method, and computer program product enable limiting electromagnetic emissions from current between batteries. A first battery is positioned proximal to an earpiece speaker within the electronic device. At least one second battery is positioned at a different location within the electronic device that is not proximal to the earpiece speaker. A switch is coupled to a first battery proximal to the earpiece speaker among the plurality of batteries. The switch is selectively toggled to limit current drawn from the first battery while the earpiece speaker is operating, in order to reduce baseband electromagnetic emissions emanating from the first battery.

A method may include obtaining a first audio signal including first speech originating at a remote device during a communication session between the remote device and a communication device and obtaining a second audio signal including second speech originating at the communication device during the communication session between the remote device and the communication device. The method may also include obtaining a characteristic of the communication session from one or more of: the first audio signal, the second audio signal, and settings of the communication device and determining a hearing level of a user of the communication device using the characteristic of the communication session.