- RolandWerner.MidobSentences.210-1200.glossed.pdf [0.5MB, pdf]
This is illustrated best with an example: When searching for "bitter" (this can be done inside the uploaded pdf as well), the first two occurrences vary in consonant length: kə̀ddìyâm (394) vs. kə̀dìyâm (729). I can now check the Original Notes, the word list of the book and Audio to see if there is a clear tendency towards one of them. If I see/hear that, I will correct the transcription accordingly. In the above example I would tend to use the single "d" (this is the spelling from book word list, the audio is not clear enough for my ears).
There are two more occurrences of "bitter": sáasíyâm (1199) and sáasònùm (1200), a different stem (sáas). Interestingly the meaning varies from English "bitter": Milk usually does not become bitter but sour. A Lemon usually is sour. Another sentence (2485) uses the same word for the taste of sweat (salty) - and the word list in the book of Roland Werner lists all three meanings: sour/bitter/salty. It's hard to pin down the basic meaning (and range) of such words without asking the Midob people.
There is enough room for error on my side: First, my ears are not used to hear the differences clearly. Second, the recordings might sometimes not represent typical speech (for many words I have only a small set of recordings). Third, pronunciation quality varies widely: Some sentences are spoken very fast, some with no recognizable tonal difference while others are very clear and easy to recognize.