System and method for creating a language grammar using a spreadsheet or table interface
First Claim
1. A method for creating a language grammar for use in an interactive voice response system, comprising the steps of:
- opening a main table, said main table comprising rows and columns of cells;
entering phrase data in said cells;
marking one of said cells as ending a valid utterance in said language grammar;
entering token data in a cell associated with said marked cell, where said token data represents the meaning of said valid utterance ended by said marked cell;
performing an enumeration traversal of said main table a first time to enumerate valid utterances found in said main table;
writing results of said enumeration traversal to a first output file;
analyzing said main table to extract a set of rules which define the valid utterances found in said main table; and
writing results of said analysis to a second output file.
11 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
The present invention is a computer software system that allows the developer of a speech-enabled system to create a grammar and corpus for use in the system. A table interface is used, and phrases in the grammar are entered into cells in the table. The table also includes token data which corresponds to each valid utterance. When the grammar is defined, the computer software system automatically traverses the table to enumerate all possible valid utterances in the grammar. This traversal generates a listing (corpus) of valid utterances and their respective tokens. This listing can then be used to interpret spoken utterances for a speech-enabled system. The computer software system also transcribes the grammar rules found in the table to a format compatible with a variety of supported commercially-available speech recognizers.
-
Citations
17 Claims
-
1. A method for creating a language grammar for use in an interactive voice response system, comprising the steps of:
-
opening a main table, said main table comprising rows and columns of cells; entering phrase data in said cells; marking one of said cells as ending a valid utterance in said language grammar; entering token data in a cell associated with said marked cell, where said token data represents the meaning of said valid utterance ended by said marked cell; performing an enumeration traversal of said main table a first time to enumerate valid utterances found in said main table; writing results of said enumeration traversal to a first output file; analyzing said main table to extract a set of rules which define the valid utterances found in said main table; and writing results of said analysis to a second output file. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
-
-
9. A computer system for creating a language grammar, said computer system comprising:
-
a main table of columns and rows of cells; terminal cells in said main table, where phrase data is entered in said terminal cells and are combined to form valid utterances in said language grammar; marked cells in said main table, where marked cells indicate the end of a valid utterance; token data in a plurality of said cells, where each said valid utterance is associated with said token data which represents the meaning of said valid utterance; means for performing an enumeration traversal of said main table, where said enumeration traversal automatically generates a list of valid utterances in said language grammar; and means for analyzing said main table and extracting a set of rules from the contents of said main table, where valid utterances in said language grammar follow said set of rules. - View Dependent Claims (10, 11, 12, 13, 14)
-
-
15. A method for creating a language grammar for use in an interactive voice response system, comprising the steps of:
-
opening a main table, said main table comprising rows and columns of cells; entering phrase data in said cells; creating a barrier in said main table that is not to be crossed during an enumeration traversal; identifying a cell as a non-terminal cell, where the contents of said non-terminal cell reference another table; further identifying a non-terminal cell as a variable cell, where the contents of said variable cell also reference an algorithm which will be performed when said interactive voice response system detects a variable in a spoken utterance; identifying a cell as an optional cell, where valid utterances that include said optional cell are valid both with and without contents of said optional cell; identifying a cell as an automatic speech recognition (ASR) system directive cell, where the contents of said ASR directive cell have special meaning to an ASR system; marking one of said cells as ending a valid utterance in said language grammar; entering token data in a cell associated with said marked cell, where said token data represents the meaning of said valid utterance ended by said marked cell; performing said enumeration traversal of said main table a first time to enumerate valid utterances found in said main table; writing results of said enumeration traversal to a first output file; analyzing said main table to extract a set of rules which define the valid utterances found in said main table; and writing results of said analysis to a second output file. - View Dependent Claims (16, 17)
-
Specification