SEARCH RESULT PREFETCHING OF VOICE QUERIES

• US 20170193111A1
• Filed: 01/06/2016
• Published: 07/06/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 01/06/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Rabinovitz, Ishai, Howard, Nathan David, Tandiono, Christopher Bo, Buchanan, Michael
• Granted Patent: US 10,133,821 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/243 Natural language query formulation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/248 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/26 Speech to text systems G10L15/08 takes precedence

Abstract

Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for receiving audio data encoding an utterance; obtaining an intermediate transcription of the utterance; before a final transcription of the utterance is obtained: i) determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with a previously received search query, ii) obtaining one or more results that are identified as responsive to the previously received search query, and iii) storing one or more of the results; obtaining the final transcription of the utterance; determining that the final transcription of the utterance is also associated with the previously received search query; and in response to determining that the final transcription of the utterance is also associated with the previously received search query, providing the stored one or more results for output.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

receiving audio data encoding an utterance;

obtaining an intermediate transcription of the utterance;

before a final transcription of the utterance is obtained;

i) determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with a previously received search query,

ii) obtaining one or more results that are identified as responsive to the previously received search query, and

iii) storing one or more of the results;

obtaining the final transcription of the utterance;

determining that the final transcription of the utterance is also associated with the previously received search query; and

in response to determining that the final transcription of the utterance is also associated with the previously received search query, providing the stored one or more results for output.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is of a threshold size, wherein the intermediate transcription of the utterance is determined to be associated with the previously received search query only after determining that the intermediate transcription is of the threshold size.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the intermediate transcription of the utterance is generated by a continuous speech recognizer, and wherein the one or more results are obtained from a search engine.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising after determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with the previously received search query, submitting the previously received search query for re-execution by a search engine.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with the previously received search query comprises determining that a location associated with the utterance is associated with a location associated with the previously received search query.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance comprises determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with a previously received search query that was submitted by a same user that is associated with the utterance.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance comprises determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with a previously received search query that was submitted by a different user than a user that is associated with the utterance.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the utterance is a voice command other than a voice query.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with a previously received search query further comprises determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is identical to a portion of the previously received search query.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with a previously received search query further comprises determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is within a threshold similarity to a portion of the previously received search query.

11. A system comprising:

one or more computers and one or more storage devices storing instructions that are operable, when executed by the one or more computers, to cause the one or more computers to perform operations comprising;

receiving audio data encoding an utterance;

obtaining an intermediate transcription of the utterance;

before a final transcription of the utterance is obtained;

i) determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with a previously received search query,

ii) obtaining one or more results that are identified as responsive to the previously received search query, and

iii) storing one or more of the results;

obtaining the final transcription of the utterance;

determining that the final transcription of the utterance is also associated with the previously received search query; and

in response to determining that the final transcription of the utterance is also associated with the previously received search query, providing the stored one or more results for output.

12. The system of claim 11, the operations further comprising determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is of a threshold size, wherein the intermediate transcription of the utterance is determined to be associated with the previously received search query only after determining that the intermediate transcription is of the threshold size.

13. The system of claim 11, wherein the intermediate transcription of the utterance is generated by a continuous speech recognizer, and wherein the one or more results are obtained from a search engine.

14. The system of claim 11, the operations further comprising after determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with the previously received search query, submitting the previously received search query for re-execution by a search engine.

15. The system of claim 11, wherein determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with the previously received search query comprises determining that a location associated with the utterance is associated with a location associated with the previously received search query.

16. The system of claim 11, wherein determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance comprises determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with a previously received search query that was submitted by a same user that is associated with the utterance.

17. A non-transitory computer-readable medium storing software comprising instructions executable by one or more computers which, upon such execution, cause the one or more computers to perform operations comprising:

receiving audio data encoding an utterance;

obtaining an intermediate transcription of the utterance;

before a final transcription of the utterance is obtained;

i) determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with a previously received search query,

ii) obtaining one or more results that are identified as responsive to the previously received search query, and

iii) storing one or more of the results;

obtaining the final transcription of the utterance;

determining that the final transcription of the utterance is also associated with the previously received search query; and

in response to determining that the final transcription of the utterance is also associated with the previously received search query, providing the stored one or more results for output.

18. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, the operations further comprising determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is of a threshold size, wherein the intermediate transcription of the utterance is determined to be associated with the previously received search query only after determining that the intermediate transcription is of the threshold size.

19. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, wherein the intermediate transcription of the utterance is generated by a continuous speech recognizer, and wherein the one or more results are obtained from a search engine.

20. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, the operations further comprising after determining that the intermediate transcription of the utterance is associated with the previously received search query, submitting the previously received search query for re-execution by a search engine.