MULTI-COMMAND SINGLE UTTERANCE INPUT METHOD

• US 20150348551A1
• Filed: 05/28/2015
• Published: 12/03/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 05/30/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: GRUBER, Thomas R., SADDLER, Harry J., BELLEGARDA, Jerome Rene, NYEGGEN, Bryce H., SABATELLI, Alessandro
• Granted Patent: US 9,966,065 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/205 Parsing
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/1815 Semantic context, e.g. disambiguation of the recognition hypotheses based on word meaning
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/1822 Parsing for meaning understanding
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/26 Speech to text systems G10L15/08 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/28 Constructional details of speech recognition systems
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/088 Word spotting
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/221 Announcement of recognition results
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/223 Execution procedure of a spoken command
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/225 Feedback of the input speech
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/228 of application context
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2203/355 Interactive dialogue design tools, features or methods
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/4936 Speech interaction details speech recognition per se G10L15/00

Abstract

Systems and processes are disclosed for handling a multi-part voice command for a virtual assistant. Speech input can be received from a user that includes multiple actionable commands within a single utterance. A text string can be generated from the speech input using a speech transcription process. The text string can be parsed into multiple candidate substrings based on domain keywords, imperative verbs, predetermined substring lengths, or the like. For each candidate substring, a probability can be determined indicating whether the candidate substring corresponds to an actionable command. Such probabilities can be determined based on semantic coherence, similarity to user request templates, querying services to determine manageability, or the like. If the probabilities exceed a threshold, the user intent of each substring can be determined, processes associated with the user intents can be executed, and an acknowledgment can be provided to the user.

Claims

1. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium storing one or more programs, the one or more programs comprising instructions, which when executed by one or more processors of an electronic device, cause the electronic device to:

receive speech input from a user, wherein the speech input comprises a single utterance having one or more actionable commands;

generate a text string based on the speech input using a speech transcription process;

parse the text string into at least a first candidate substring and a second candidate substring;

determine a first probability that the first candidate substring corresponds to a first actionable command and a second probability that the second candidate substring corresponds to a second actionable command;

in response to the first probability and the second probability exceeding a threshold, determine a first intent associated with the first candidate substring and a second intent associated with the second candidate substring;

execute a first process associated with the first intent and a second process associated with the second intent; and

provide to the user an acknowledgment associated with the first intent and the second intent.

2. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein parsing the text string into at least the first candidate substring and the second candidate substring comprises:

identifying a first keyword in the text string that corresponds to a first domain to determine the first candidate substring; and

identifying a second keyword in the text string that corresponds to a second domain to determine the second candidate substring.

3. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein parsing the text string into at least the first candidate substring and the second candidate substring comprises:

identifying a first imperative verb in the text string to determine the first candidate substring; and

identifying a second imperative verb in the text string to determine the second candidate substring.

4. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein determining the first probability that the first candidate substring corresponds to the first actionable command and the second probability that the second candidate substring corresponds to the second actionable command comprises:

determining a first semantic coherence of the first candidate substring and a second semantic coherence of the second candidate substring; and

determining the first probability and the second probability based on the first semantic coherence and the second semantic coherence.

5. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein determining the first probability that the first candidate substring corresponds to the first actionable command and the second probability that the second candidate substring corresponds to the second actionable command comprises:

comparing the first candidate substring and the second candidate substring to one or more user request templates; and

determining the first probability and the second probability based on the comparison.

6. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein determining the first probability that the first candidate substring corresponds to the first actionable command and the second probability that the second candidate substring corresponds to the second actionable command comprises:

submitting the first candidate substring and the second candidate substring to at least a first service and a second service;

receiving a first likelihood that the first service can resolve the first actionable command and a second likelihood that the second service can resolve the second actionable command; and

determining the first probability and the second probability based on the first likelihood and the second likelihood.

7. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein determining the first intent associated with the first candidate substring and the second intent associated with the second candidate substring comprises:

determining the second intent based on at least one word in the first candidate substring.

8. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein determining the first intent associated with the first candidate substring and the second intent associated with the second candidate substring comprises:

determining the first intent or the second intent based on information displayed on a display associated with the electronic device.

9. The computer readable storage medium of claim 8, wherein the information comprises a list;

and

wherein determining the first intent associated with the first candidate substring and the second intent associated with the second candidate substring comprises;

determining the first intent or the second intent based on an ordinal descriptor in the first candidate substring or the second candidate substring, wherein the ordinal descriptor is associated with one or more items in the list.

10. The computer readable storage medium of claim 8, wherein the information comprises one or more notifications.

11. The computer readable storage medium of claim 8, wherein the information comprises one or more emails.

12. The computer readable storage medium of claim 8, wherein determining the first intent associated with the first candidate substring and the second intent associated with the second candidate substring comprises:

determining one or more potential user requests based on the information displayed on the display; and

determining the first intent or the second intent based on the one or more potential user requests.

13. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the acknowledgment comprises an audible confirmation.

14. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the acknowledgment comprises haptic feedback.

15. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein providing to the user the acknowledgment associated with the first intent and the second intent comprises:

providing a first task associated with the first intent and a second task associated with the second intent.

16. The computer readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein providing the first task associated with the first intent and the second task associated with the second intent comprises:

displaying the first task and the second task.

17. The computer readable storage medium of claim 15, further comprising:

in response to completing the first process, providing a first indicator associated with the first task; and

in response to completing the second process, providing a second indicator associated with the second task.

18. The computer readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein providing the first indicator associated with the first task comprises displaying the first indicator;

and

wherein providing the second indicator associated with the second task comprises displaying the second indicator.

19. The computer readable storage medium of claim 17, further comprising:

before completing the first process, providing a first processing status indicator associated with the first task; and

before completing the second process, providing a second processing status indicator associated with the second task.

20. The computer readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein providing the first processing status indicator associated with the first task comprises displaying the first processing status indicator;

and

wherein providing the second processing status indicator associated with the second task comprises displaying the second processing status indicator.

21. The computer readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the first indicator and the second indicator comprise a checkmark.

22. The computer readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the first processing status indicator and the second processing status indicator comprise one or more of an hourglass, an animation, or a status bar.

23. The computer readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein providing to the user the acknowledgment associated with the first intent and the second intent comprises:

displaying the first candidate substring using a first emphasis and displaying the second candidate substring using a second emphasis that is different than the first emphasis.

24. The computer readable storage medium of claim 23, wherein the first emphasis and the second emphasis comprise one or more of bold text, italic text, underlined text, circled text, outlined text, colored text, and clustered text.

25. An electronic device, comprising:

one or more processors;

a memory; and

one or more programs, wherein the one or more programs are stored in the memory and configured to be executed by the one or more processors, the one or more programs including instructions for;

receiving speech input from a user, wherein the speech input comprises a single utterance having one or more actionable commands;

generating a text string based on the speech input using a speech transcription process;

parsing the text string into at least a first candidate substring and a second candidate substring;

determining a first probability that the first candidate substring corresponds to a first actionable command and a second probability that the second candidate substring corresponds to a second actionable command;

in response to the first probability and the second probability exceeding a threshold, determining a first intent associated with the first candidate substring and a second intent associated with the second candidate substring;

executing a first process associated with the first intent and a second process associated with the second intent; and

providing to the user an acknowledgment associated with the first intent and the second intent.

26. A method for processing a multi-part voice command, the method comprising:

at an electronic device;

receiving speech input from a user, wherein the speech input comprises a single utterance having one or more actionable commands;

generating a text string based on the speech input using a speech transcription process;

parsing the text string into at least a first candidate substring and a second candidate substring;

determining a first probability that the first candidate substring corresponds to a first actionable command and a second probability that the second candidate substring corresponds to a second actionable command;

in response to the first probability and the second probability exceeding a threshold, determining a first intent associated with the first candidate substring and a second intent associated with the second candidate substring;

executing a first process associated with the first intent and a second process associated with the second intent; and

providing to the user an acknowledgment associated with the first intent and the second intent.