System and method for providing a natural language interface to a database

• US 20060136375A1
• Filed: 12/16/2004
• Published: 06/22/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 12/16/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Bampton Technologies, LLC (Intellectual Ventures LLC)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Corporation (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Nadji, Behzad, Eslambolchi, Hossein, Rahim, Mazin G., Cox, Richard Vandervoort
• Granted Patent: US 7,921,091 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3331 Query processing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3334 Selection or weighting of terms from queries, including natural language queries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3344 using natural language analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9538 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 20/00 Machine learning
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/22 Procedures used during a speech recognition process, e.g. man-machine dialogue
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 21/06 Transformation of speech into a non-audible representation, e.g. speech visualisation or speech processing for tactile aids G10L15/26 takes precedence

Abstract

A system and method for providing a natural language interface to a database or the Internet. The method provides a response from a database to a natural language query. The method comprises receiving a user query, extracting key data from the user query, submitting the extracted key data to a data base search engine to retrieve a top n pages from the data base, processing of the top n pages through a natural language dialog engine and providing a response based on processing the top n pages.

Claims

1. A method for providing a response to a query, the method comprising:

receiving a user query;

extracting key data from the user query;

submitting the extracted key data to a data base search engine to retrieve a top n pages from the data base;

processing of the top n pages through a natural language dialog engine; and

providing a response based on processing the top n pages.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the user query is one of a natural language speech query or a text based query.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the key data is at least one of the key words and key phrases.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein submitting the extracted key data to a database search engine further comprises submitting at the extracted key data to a plurality of search engines.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the user can select one of:

a text input mode, a speech input mode or a dialog mode.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the user input is received via a large vocabulary speech recognizer.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the response is a natural language response provided via synthetic speech.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the response is a multimedia response.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the database is one of:

the World Wide Web, a multimedia data base, a corporate data base or personal data base.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the user query and response are provided in a dialog mode.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein a machine learning process continues to find related information to the user after the response is provided.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

presenting the user an option to view the related information separate from the provided response.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the user interacts with a virtual agent in a dialog mode.

14. The method of claim 1, further comprising, before providing the response, negotiating any restrictions to the top n pages.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein negotiating any restrictions to the top n pages comprises automatically entering user information to overcome any restriction.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein the negotiation further comprises automatically negotiating an access price to restricted information which may contain information for the response.

17. A system for providing a response to a query, the method comprising:

means for receiving a user query;

means for extracting key data from the user query;

means for submitting the extracted key data to a data base search engine to retrieve a top n pages from the data base;

means for processing of the top n pages through a natural language dialog engine; and

means for providing a response based on processing the top n pages.

18. A system for providing a response to a query, the method comprising:

a module configured to receive a user query;

a module configured to extract key data from the user query;

a module configured to submit the extracted key data to a data base search engine to retrieve a top n pages from the data base;

a module configured to process of the top n pages through a natural language dialog engine; and

a module configured to provide a response based on processing the top n pages.

19. The method of claim 18, further comprising:

a module configured to negotiate any restrictions to data within the database to provide the response.

20. A computer readable medium storing instructions for controlling a computing device to perform the steps:

receiving a user query;

extracting key data from the user query;

submitting the extracted key data to a data base search engine to retrieve a top n pages from the data base;

processing of the top n pages through a natural language dialog engine; and

providing a response based on processing the top n pages.