Abstract: A method for performing conditional maximum entropy modeling includes constructing a conditional maximum entropy model, and incorporating an observation confidence score into the model to reduce an effect due to an uncertain observation.

Abstract: Embodiments of a dialog system that utilizes grammar-based labeling scheme to generate labeled sentences for use in training statistical models. During the process of training data development, a grammar is constructed manually based on the application domain or adapted from a general grammar rule. An annotation schema is created accordingly based on the application requirements, such as syntactic and semantic information. Such information is then included in the grammar specification. After the labeled grammar is constructed, a generation algorithm is then used to generate sentences for training various statistical models.

Abstract: In a system and method for fulfilling a service query for a user, a processor may parse the query into a set of operations, identify a set of service providers that each provides functionality for performing at least one respective operation of the set of operations, and, for each of the set of operations, select a respective one of the set of service providers to perform the operation, and interface with the service provider selected for the operation to cause the service provider to perform the operation.

Abstract: Embodiments of a dialog system that utilizes contextual information to perform recognition of proper names are described. Unlike present name recognition methods on large name lists that generally focus strictly on the static aspect of the names, embodiments of the present system take into account of the temporal, recency and context effect when names are used, and formulates new questions to further constrain the search space or grammar for recognition of the past and current utterances.

Abstract: Embodiments of an interface system that enables a call center agent to access and intervene in an interaction between an automated call center system and a caller whenever necessary for complex application tasks is described. The system includes a user interface that presents the agent with one or more categories of information, including the conversation flow, obtained semantic information, the recognized utterances, and access to the utterance waveforms. This information is cross-linked and attached with a confidence level for better access and navigation within the dialog system for the generation of appropriate responses to the caller.

Abstract: A method and system of providing an interactive manual, including a speech engine to receive and process speech from a user, convert the speech into a word sequence, and identify meaning structures from the word sequence, a structured manual including information related to an operation of a device, a visual model to relate visual representation of the information, a dialog management arrangement to interpret the meaning structures in a context and to extract pertinent information and the visual representation from the structured manual and the visual model, and an output arrangement to output the information and visual representation.

Abstract: A system and method to interactively converse with a cognitively overloaded user of a device, includes maintaining a knowledge base of information regarding the device and a domain, organizing the information in at least one of a relational manner and an ontological manner, receiving speech from the user, converting the speech into a word sequence, recognizing a partial proper name in the word sequence, identifying meaning structures from the word sequence using a model of the domain information, adjusting a boundary of the partial proper names to enhance an accuracy of the meaning structures, interpreting the meaning structures in a context of the conversation with the cognitively overloaded user using the knowledge base, selecting a content for a response to the cognitively overloaded user, generating the response based on the selected content, the context of the conversation, and grammatical rules, and synthesizing speech wave forms for the response.

Abstract: Embodiments of a dialog system that employs a corpus-based approach to generate responses based on a given number of semantic constraint-value pairs are described. The system makes full use of the data from the user input to produce dialog system responses in combination with a template generator. The system primarily utilizes constraint values in order to realize efficiencies based on the more frequent tasks performed in real dialog systems although rhetorical or discourse aspects of the dialog could also be included in a similar way, that is, labeling the data with such information and performing a training process. The benefits of this system include higher quality user-aligned responses, broader coverage, faster response time, and shorter development cycles.

Abstract: Embodiments of a method and system for detecting repeated patterns in dialog systems are described. The system includes a dynamic time warping (DTW) based pattern comparison algorithm that is used to find the best matching parts between a correction utterance and an original utterance. Reference patterns are generated from the correction utterance by an unsupervised segmentation scheme. No significant information about the position of the repeated parts in the correction utterance is assumed, as each reference pattern is compared with the original utterance from the beginning of the utterance to the end. A pattern comparison process with DTW is executed without knowledge of fixed end-points. A recursive DTW computation is executed to find the best matching parts that are considered as the repeated parts as well as the end-points of the utterance.

Abstract: Embodiments of an automated dialog system testing method and component are described. This automated testing method and system supplements real human-based testing with simulated user input and incorporates a set of evaluation measures that focus on three basic aspects of task-oriented dialog systems, namely, understanding ability, efficiency, and the appropriateness of system actions. These measures are first applied on a corpus generated between a dialog system and a group of human users to demonstrate the validity of these measures with the human users' satisfaction levels. Results generally show that these measures are significantly correlated with these satisfaction levels. A regression model is then built to predict the user satisfaction scores using these evaluation measures.

Abstract: Embodiments of an ontological determination method for use in natural language processing applications are described. In one embodiment, shallow lexico-syntactic patterns are applied to identify relations by extracting term features to distinguish relation terms from non-relation terms, identifying coordinate relations for every adjacent terms; identifying short-distance ontological (e.g., hypernym or part-whole relations) for other adjacent terms based on term features and lexico-syntactic patterns; and then inferring long-distance hypernym and part-whole relations based on the identified coordinate relations and the short-distance relations.

Abstract: In a system and method for fulfilling a service query for a user, a processor may parse the query into a set of operations, identify a set of service providers that each provides functionality for performing at least one respective operation of the set of operations, and, for each of the set of operations, select a respective one of the set of service providers to perform the operation, and interface with the service provider selected for the operation to cause the service provider to perform the operation.

Abstract: A dialog system and method may generate and maintain in parallel multiple dialog sessions, determine to which dialog session a user speech input applies, selectively provide control to one of the dialog sessions, at any one time, to output data to the user, synchronize multiple dialog sessions, and support user interruptions at any time during the dialog sessions.

Abstract: Systems and methods are described that automatically control modules of dialog systems. The systems and methods include a dialog module that receives and processes utterances from a speaker and outputs data used to generate synthetic speech outputs as responses to the utterances. A controller is coupled to the dialog module, and the controller detects an abnormal output of the dialog module when the dialog module is processing in an automatic mode. The controller comprises a mode control for an agent to control the dialog module by correcting the abnormal output and transferring a corrected output to a downstream dialog module that follows, in a processing path, the dialog module. The corrected output is used in further processing the utterances.

Abstract: Systems and methods are described that automatically generate interactive systems configured for collecting dialog data of human-machine interactions in dialog systems. The systems and methods comprise receiving a task flow that describes operations of a dialog system. A formal description of the task flow is generated, and an interactive system comprising a graphical user interface (GUI) is automatically generated from the formal description. The GUI consists of templates for control of the dialog system and real-time collection and annotating of dialog data during a live dialog between only the dialog system and callers to the dialog system. The dialog data consists of data of the live dialog.

Abstract: An optimal selection or decision strategy is described through an example that includes use in dialog systems. The selection strategy or method includes receiving multiple predictions and multiple probabilities. The received predictions predict the content of a received input and each of the probabilities corresponds to one of the predictions. In an example dialog system, the received input includes an utterance. The selection method includes dynamically selecting a set of predictions from the received predictions by generating ranked predictions. The ranked predictions are generated by ordering the plurality of predictions according to descending probability.

Abstract: An optimal selection or decision strategy is described through an example that includes use in dialog systems. The selection strategy or method includes receiving multiple predictions and multiple probabilities. The received predictions predict the content of a received input and each of the probabilities corresponds to one of the predictions. In an example dialog system, the received input includes an utterance. The selection method includes dynamically selecting a set of predictions from the received predictions by generating ranked predictions. The ranked predictions are generated by ordering the plurality of predictions according to descending probability.

Abstract: In a confidence computing method and system, a processor may interpret speech signals as a text string or directly receive a text string as input, generate a syntactical parse tree representing the interpreted string and including a plurality of sub-trees which each represents a corresponding section of the interpreted text string, determine for each sub-tree whether the sub-tree is accurate, obtain replacement speech signals for each sub-tree determined to be inaccurate, and provide output based on corresponding text string sections of at least one sub-tree determined to be accurate.

Abstract: A method and system are described to adapt instructions for performing a task by a user, which includes receiving generalized instructions for the task, selecting a content of the generalized instructions based on user-specific knowledge regarding the task, constructing utterances using the selected content, and conveying the utterances to the user.

Abstract: A method for performing conditional maximum entropy modeling includes constructing a conditional maximum entropy model, and incorporating an observation confidence score into the model to reduce an effect due to an uncertain observation