A Practical Handbook of Speech Coders helps developers and programmers to find digital speech coders suitable for their applications. The book also shows engineers how to tailor existing speech coders and create new coders by providing building blocks used as a foundation. Topics include: history of speech coders o background information o modern speech coding algorithms o measuring the quality of speech coders o inventing new coders o analysis of the benefits and limitations of new coders. This will be the first book to discuss how to craft a code to one's own specific needs.