Using strong data types to express speech recognition grammars in software programs

• US 20060293894A1
• Filed: 06/23/2005
• Published: 12/28/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 06/23/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Peyroux, Jean-François
• Granted Patent: US 7,460,996 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 704/257
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/253 Grammatical analysis; Style critique
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/30 Semantic analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/1815 Semantic context, e.g. disambiguation of the recognition hypotheses based on word meaning
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/183 using context dependencies, e.g. language models
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/228 of application context

Abstract

In one embodiment, a system for interpretation of natural language inputs to natural language enabled applications has a grammar, a source file, and a speech recognizer. The grammar has a set of data types and semantic code defining rules about the set of data types. The source file includes computer readable code adapted to access the grammar by instantiating selected data types of the set of data types. The speech recognizer is adapted to receive natural language input and to map the natural language input to the selected data types.

Claims

1. A system for interpretation of natural language inputs to natural language enabled applications comprising:

a grammar comprising a set of data types and semantic code defining rules about the set of data types;

a source file comprised of computer readable code adapted to access the grammar by instantiating selected data types of the set of data types; and

a speech recognizer adapted to receive natural language input and to map the natural language input to the selected data types.

2. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

a grammar compiler adapted to receive the grammar and to separate the set of data types from the semantic code, the grammar compiler adapted to generate an output from the grammar.

3. The system of claim 2 wherein the output comprises a state machine.

4. The system of claim 1 wherein the selected data types are instantiated with parameters at runtime.

5. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

a code compiler adapted to receive the source code and the source file and to compile the source code and the source file into an intermediate language code.

6. The system of claim 5 wherein the intermediate language code comprises computer readable code and associated debug information.

7. A system for natural language input recognition comprising:

an input device adapted to receive a natural language input;

a strongly typed grammar defining a set of types representative of elements of a natural language input;

a recognition component adapted to convert the natural language input into text using the strongly typed grammar and to generate a recognition output based on the text; and

an interpretation component adapted to identify semantics of the natural language input based on the recognition output.

8. The system of claim 7 further comprising:

semantic code defining meaning of types within the grammar.

9. The system of claim 8 wherein the interpretation component utilizes the semantic code to identify semantics of the natural language input based on the grammar.

10. The system of claim 7 wherein the recognition component is adapted to convert the natural language input into text specified in the grammar.

11. The system of claim 7 wherein the interpretation component comprises one or more interpretation components, each interpretation component adapted to generate a possible interpretation of the natural language input, the system further comprising:

an integration component adapted to integrate a respective one or more possible interpretations of the natural language input generated by the one or more interpretation components.

12. The system of claim 7 wherein the natural language input comprises speech.

13. The system of claim 7 wherein the natural language input comprises hand-writing.

14. The system of claim 7 further comprising:

application code defined within a grammar file containing the strongly typed grammar and within one or more dedicated source code files.

15. A method for accessing grammars for natural language applications comprising:

providing one or more grammars, each grammar comprising a set of types representative of a natural language;

defining an processes for operating on a natural language input in one or more source code files; and

instantiating selected types of the set of types from the one or more grammars at runtime, the selected types corresponding to a natural language input.

16. The method of claim 15 wherein the step of instantiating further comprises:

placing parameters on at least one instantiated type of the selected types.

17. The method of claim 15 wherein the step of instantiating further comprises:

creating one class for each public grammar rule within the one or more grammars using a grammar compiler.

18. The method of claim 15 wherein each grammar further comprises semantic code associated with the set of types.

19. The method of claim 15 wherein the selected types inherit properties from the grammar based on a type definition.

20. The method of claim 15 further comprising:

compiling the grammar into a state machine using a grammar compiler; and

providing the state machine and semantic code associated with the selected types to a speech recognizer.