REMOTE ACCESS SYSTEM AND METHOD AND INTELLIGENT AGENT THEREFOR

• US 20070130337A1
• Filed: 11/15/2006
• Published: 06/07/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 05/21/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Voice on The Go, Inc.
• Original Assignee: CablesEdge Software Inc.
• Inventors: ARNISON, Simon
• Granted Patent: US 7,869,577 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/225
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/32 using biometric data, e.g. fingerprints, iris scans or voiceprints
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/42 using separate channels for security data
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/16 Sound input; Sound output speech processing G10L
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/30 Distributed recognition, e.g. in client-server systems, for mobile phones or network applications
• 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
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/083 using passwords cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for entity authentication using a predetermined code H04L9/3226
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/10 for controlling access to devices or network resources
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/4938 comprising a voice browser which renders and interprets, e.g. VoiceXML

Abstract

The invention relates to remote access systems and methods using automatic speech recognition to access a computer system. The invention also relates to an intelligent agent resident on the computer system for facilitating remote access to, and receipt of, information on the computer system through speech recognition or text-to-speech read-back. The remote access systems and methods can be used by a user of the computer system while traveling. The user can dial into a server system which is configured to interact with the user by automatic speech recognition and text-to-speech conversion. The server system establishes a connection to an intelligent agent running on the user'"'"'s remotely located computer system by packet communication over a public network. The intelligent agent sources information on the user'"'"'s computer system or a network accessible to the computer system, processes the information and transmits it to the server system over the public network. The server system converts the information into speech signals and transmits the speech signals to a telephone operated by the user.

Claims

1. A method of providing remote access to a computer system over a public network, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving at a server system a voice call from a user of the computer system;

processing information received from the user during the voice call to generate identification information;

authenticating the user based on the identification information;

establishing a connection between the server system and the computer system based at least in part on the identification information;

receiving at the server system a speech command from the user;

generating first packet data based on said speech commands;

transmitting the first packet data over the public network to the agent on the computer system;

receiving second packet data at the server system from the agent in response to the first packet data; and

generating a speech signal to the user the voice call based on the second packet data.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the agent interprets the first packet data, interrogates application software installed on the personal computer and generates the second packet data based on the interrogation.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising receiving at the server system an IP address of the computer system from an agent resident on the computer system and wherein the step of establishing is based on the identification information and the IP address.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the IP address of the computer system is not fixed and the server system receives the IP address of the computer system from the agent periodically.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the second packet data corresponds to an object accessible to the computer system.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the second packet data comprises a summarized form of the object, and wherein the summarized form is generated by the agent based on the object.

8. Computer readable program storage having stored thereon computer program instructions which, when executed on a computer system, cause the computer system to perform the method of providing remote access of claim 1.

7. A system for providing remote access to a computer system over a network, the system comprising a server system connected to the network and to a telephone network, the server system having computer program code accessible thereto which, when executed by the server system, causes the server system to:

receive a voice call over the telephone network from a user of the personal computer and to receive information and speech commands from the user during the voice call;

determine an IP address of the personal computer based at least in part on the information received from the user;

generate first packet data based on the speech commands;

transmit the first packet data over the network to an agent running on the personal computer;

receive second packet data from the agent via the personal computer; and

generate and transmit speech signals to the user over the telephone network based on the second packet data.

9. A method of providing automatic notification to a user, comprising the steps of:

providing on a computer associated with the user, at least one rule for determining the occurrence of a notification event;

applying the at least one rule to determine the occurrence of the notification event;

generating notification data representative of the notification event;

transmitting the notification data over a network to a server system for communication of a notification, based on the notification event, to a telephone of the user;

generating speech signals corresponding to the notification;

establishing a telephone connection to the telephone of the user; and

transmitting the speech signals to the telephone of the user.

10. A system for remote access of a computer system over a public network, the system comprising:

a server system, the server system being in communication with a public telephone network for receiving voice calls from a telephone operated by a user and for transmitting automatically generated speech signals to the telephone and in communication with the public network; and

an agent resident on the computer system, the agent being in communication with the server system over the public network and programmed to access information accessible to the computer system and to transmit packet data representing the information to the server system over the public network in response to a predetermined event;

wherein, when the server system receives the information from the agent, the server system is programmed to automatically generate speech signals based on the packet data and to transmit the speech signals to a telephone associated with the user.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the computer system is separated from the server system by a firewall and wherein the agent is programmed to periodically transmit an IP address of the computer system to the server system.

12. The system of claim 10, wherein the computer system is a personal computer.

13. The system of claim 10, wherein the computer system comprises a remote server and the user has a user account on the remote server.

14. The system of claim 10, wherein the predetermined event is a notification event originating from the agent, the notification event being generated by the agent based on at least one user-defined rule.

15. The system of claim 10, wherein the server system comprises a speech server for communicating with the user over the public telephone network using automated speech recognition for received speech signals and automatic text-to-speech conversion for transmitted speech signals.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the server system further comprises a voice relay server in communication with the speech server and in communication with the agent for receiving the information from the agent and for transmitting command request data to the agent corresponding to a voice command received from the user at the speech server.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the server system comprises a user information datastore and the voice relay server compares user authentication information received from the user at the speech server to the user information data store to authenticate the user for access to the computer system.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the user authentication information is determined by the speech server based on an identification utterance received from the user over the public telephone network.

19. The system of claim 10, wherein the predetermined event is receipt of command data from the server system and the command data corresponds to a voice command received at the server system over the public telephone network.

20. The system of claim 13, wherein the remote server hosts a plurality of user accounts and the agent facilitates remote access to each of the user accounts via the server system.

21. A method of providing notification to a user, comprising:

receiving a connection request at a server system over a network from an agent on a computer system associated with the user;

establishing a connection between the agent and the server system;

receiving notification data over the network from the agent;

processing the notification data to generate a speech notification;

establishing a telephone connection to a telephone of the user based on the connection request; and

transmitting the speech notification to the telephone of the user over the telephone connection.

22. The method of claim 21, wherein the step of establishing comprises:

determining a user identifier from the connection request;

accessing a database to determine a telephone number of the user based on the user identifier; and

calling the telephone number.

23. The method of claim 21, wherein the notification data comprises packet data.

24. The method of claim 21, wherein the connection request and notification data are generated by the agent in response to determination of a notification event, the notification event being determined according to at least one pre-defined rule.