feat(tts): add streaming SSE endpoint and sentence splitter

- Add POST /stream SSE endpoint that splits text into sentences,
  synthesizes each individually, and streams base64 WAV via SSE events
- Add _split_sentences() helper for robust sentence boundary detection
- Enables progressive audio playback for lower time-to-first-audio

ray_serve/serve_tts.py

@@ -2,19 +2,22 @@
 Ray Serve deployment for Coqui TTS.
 Runs on: elminster (RTX 2070 8GB, CUDA)
 
-Provides two API styles:
+Provides three API styles:
   POST /tts          — JSON body → JSON response with base64 audio
+  POST /tts/stream   — JSON body → SSE with per-sentence base64 audio chunks
   GET  /tts/api/tts  — Coqui-compatible query params → raw WAV bytes
 """
 
 import base64
 import io
+import json
 import os
+import re
 import time
 from typing import Any
 
-from fastapi import FastAPI, Query
-from fastapi.responses import Response
+from fastapi import FastAPI, Query, Request
+from fastapi.responses import Response, StreamingResponse
 from ray import serve
 
 try:
@@ -24,6 +27,32 @@ except ImportError:
 
 _fastapi = FastAPI()
 
+# ── Sentence splitting for streaming ─────────────────────────────────────
+
+_SENTENCE_RE = re.compile(r"(?<=[.!?;])\s+|(?<=\n)\s*", re.MULTILINE)
+
+
+def _split_sentences(text: str, max_len: int = 200) -> list[str]:
+    """Split text into sentences suitable for per-sentence TTS streaming."""
+    text = re.sub(r"[ \t]+", " ", text).strip()
+    if not text:
+        return []
+
+    raw_parts = _SENTENCE_RE.split(text)
+    sentences: list[str] = []
+    for part in raw_parts:
+        part = part.strip()
+        if not part:
+            continue
+        if len(part) > max_len:
+            for sp in re.split(r"(?<=[,;:])\s+", part):
+                sp = sp.strip()
+                if sp:
+                    sentences.append(sp)
+        else:
+            sentences.append(part)
+    return sentences
+
 
 @serve.deployment(name="TTSDeployment", num_replicas=1)
 @serve.ingress(_fastapi)
@@ -154,6 +183,72 @@ class TTSDeployment:
         except Exception as e:
             return Response(content=str(e), status_code=500)
 
+    # ── POST /stream — SSE per-sentence streaming ──────────────────────
+
+    @_fastapi.post("/stream")
+    async def generate_stream(self, request: Request) -> StreamingResponse:
+        """Stream TTS audio as SSE events, one per sentence.
+
+        Request body:
+            {"text": "...", "language": "en", "speaker": null, "speed": 1.0}
+
+        Each SSE event is a JSON object:
+            data: {"text": "sentence", "audio": "<base64 WAV>", "index": 0,
+                   "sample_rate": 24000, "duration": 1.23, "done": false}
+
+        Final event:
+            data: {"text": "", "audio": "", "index": N, "done": true}
+        followed by:
+            data: [DONE]
+        """
+        body = await request.json()
+        text = body.get("text", "")
+        if not text:
+            async def _empty():
+                yield 'data: {"error": "No text provided"}\n\n'
+                yield "data: [DONE]\n\n"
+            return StreamingResponse(_empty(), media_type="text/event-stream")
+
+        speaker = body.get("speaker")
+        language = body.get("language")
+        speed = body.get("speed", 1.0)
+        sentences = _split_sentences(text)
+
+        async def _generate():
+            for idx, sentence in enumerate(sentences):
+                _start = time.time()
+                try:
+                    audio_bytes, sample_rate, duration = self._synthesize(
+                        sentence, speaker, language, speed
+                    )
+                    self._log(_start, duration, len(sentence))
+                    chunk = {
+                        "text": sentence,
+                        "audio": base64.b64encode(audio_bytes).decode("utf-8"),
+                        "index": idx,
+                        "sample_rate": sample_rate,
+                        "duration": duration,
+                        "done": False,
+                    }
+                except Exception as e:
+                    chunk = {
+                        "text": sentence,
+                        "audio": "",
+                        "index": idx,
+                        "error": str(e),
+                        "done": False,
+                    }
+                yield f"data: {json.dumps(chunk)}\n\n"
+
+            yield f'data: {json.dumps({"text": "", "audio": "", "index": len(sentences), "done": True})}\n\n'
+            yield "data: [DONE]\n\n"
+
+        return StreamingResponse(
+            _generate(),
+            media_type="text/event-stream",
+            headers={"X-Accel-Buffering": "no", "Cache-Control": "no-cache"},
+        )
+
     # ── GET /speakers — list available speakers ──────────────────────────
 
     @_fastapi.get("/speakers")