REAL-TIME SPEECH-TO-TEXT CONVERSION IN AN AUDIO CONFERENCE SESSION

• US 20110270609A1
• Filed: 04/30/2010
• Published: 11/03/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 04/30/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: American Teleconferencing Services Limited (Premiere Global Services Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: American Teleconferencing Services Limited (Premiere Global Services Incorporated)
• Inventors: Martin, J. Douglas, Schaefer, Laurence, Jones, Boland T., Guthrie, David Michael
• Granted Patent: US 9,560,206 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 704/235
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/26 Speech to text systems G10L15/08 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/088 Word spotting
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2201/38 Displays
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2201/40 using speech recognition
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2203/2038 Call context notifications
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2203/655 Combination of telephone service and social networking
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/56 Arrangements for connecting several subscribers to a common circuit, i.e. affording conference facilities video conference systems H04N7/15
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/562 where the conference facilities are distributed
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/565 relating to time schedule aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 7/0027 Collaboration services where a computer is used for data transfer and the telephone is used for telephonic communication

Abstract

Various embodiments of systems, methods, and computer programs are disclosed for providing real-time resources to participants in an audio conference session. One embodiment is a method for providing real-time resources to participants in an audio conference session via a communication network. One such method comprises: a conferencing system establishing an audio conference session between a plurality of computing devices via a communication network, each computing device generating a corresponding audio stream comprising a speech signal; and in real-time during the audio conference session, a server: receiving and processing the audio streams to determine the speech signals; extracting words from the speech signals; analyzing the extracted words to determine a relevant keyword being discussed in the audio conference session; identifying a resource related to the relevant keyword; and providing the resource to one or more of the computing devices.

Claims

1. A computer system for providing real-time resources to participants in an audio conference session, the computer system comprising:

a conference system for establishing an audio conference session between a plurality of computing devices connected via a communication network; and

a server configured to communicate with the conference system and the plurality of computing devices via the communication network, the server comprising;

a processor and a memory;

a pre-processing engine stored in the memory and executed by the processor, the pre-processing engine comprising logic configured to;

receive an audio stream associated with one or more of the computing devices, the audio stream comprising a speech signal; and

extract the speech signal from the audio stream;

a speech-to-text conversion engine stored in the memory and executed by the processor, the speech-to-text conversion engine comprising logic configured to extract words from the speech signal; and

a relevance engine stored in the memory and executed by the processor, the relevance engine comprising logic configured to;

receive the extracted words from the speech-to-text conversion engine; and

determine a relevant keyword or topic being discussed in the audio conference session; and

a resources engine stored in the memory and executed by the processor, the resources engine comprising logic configured to;

identify a resource related to the relevant keyword or topic; and

provide, via a graphical user interface, the resource to the one or more computing devices.

2. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the conference system and server are remotely located.

3. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the logic configured to determine the relevant keyword or topic comprises:

logic configured to determine a relevance score for one or more of the extracted words.

4. The computer system of claim 3, wherein the logic configured to determine the relevance score comprises logic configured to:

identify a current instance of the extracted word;

generate a timestamp for the current instance of the extracted word; and

calculate the relevance score for the extracted word based one the timestamp.

5. The computer system of claim 3, wherein the relevance score is based on a usage density associated with the one or more extracted words.

6. The computer system of claim 4, wherein the relevance engine further comprises logic configured to determine an identity of a participant associated with the current instance of the extracted word, and wherein the relevance score is at least partially based on the identity of the participant.

7. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the logic configured to identify the resource related to the relevant keyword or topic comprises:

logic configured to query a database.

8. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the logic configured to identify the resource related to the relevant keyword or topic comprises logic configured to:

generate a search query comprising the relevant keyword or topic;

send the search query to a search engine; and

receive a response to the search query, the response including the resource.

9. The computer system of claim 8, wherein the response is provided to the one or more computing devices.

10. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the graphical user interface comprises a a virtual conference location based on a predefined simulated location view.

11. The computer system of claim 10, wherein the virtual conference location comprises:

a first graphical representation of a conference location according to the predefined simulated location view; and

a second graphical representation of each of a plurality of participants with corresponding contact information displayed in the conference location.

12. A method for providing real-time resources to participants in an audio conference session via a communication network, the method comprising:

a conferencing system establishing an audio conference session between a plurality of computing devices via a communication network, each computing device generating a corresponding audio stream comprising a speech signal; and

in real-time during the audio conference session, a server;

receiving and processing the audio streams to determine the speech signals;

extracting words from the speech signals;

analyzing the extracted words to determine a relevant keyword being discussed in the audio conference session;

identifying a resource related to the relevant keyword; and

providing the resource to one or more of the computing devices.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the conferencing system and the server comprise an integrated computer system.

14. The method of claim 12, wherein the analyzing the extracted words comprises determining a topic of interest being discussed in the audio conference session.

15. The method of claim 12, wherein the analyzing the extracted words comprises calculating a relevance score for one or more of the extracted words.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the calculating the relevance score comprises determining a usage density associated with the one or more of the extracted words.

17. The method of claim 12, further comprising determining an identity of a participant from which one of the extracted words originated, and wherein the analyzing the extracted words comprises determining the relevant keyword based on the identity of the participant.

18. The method of claim 12, wherein the identifying the resource related to the relevant keyword comprises querying a search engine.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the providing the resource comprises providing results of the search engine query to the computing device.

20. The method of claim 12, wherein the identifying the resource related to the relevant keyword comprises determining a URL associated with the resource, and the providing the resource to the computing device comprises providing the URL to a browser associated with the computing device.

21. The method of claim 12, wherein the resource comprises a hypertext link.

22. The method of claim 12, wherein the providing the resource to the computing device comprises providing the resource within a virtual conference location.

23. The method of claim 22, wherein the resource is displayed in resources pane in the virtual conference location.