Method and system for building/updating grammars in voice access systems

• US 7,149,694 B1
• Filed: 04/23/2002
• Issued: 12/12/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 02/13/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Oracle America, Inc. (Oracle Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Siebel Systems Inc. (Oracle Corporation)
• Inventors: George, David, Srinivasan, Jaya, Lee, Wen-Hsin, Haven, Chris, Harb, Joseph, Ferry, Dennis
• Primary Examiner(s): MCFADDEN, SUSAN IRIS
• Application Number:
  US10/131,369
• Time in Patent Office: 1,694 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 704/270.1
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/063 Training

Abstract

Method and System to update grammar information in a voice access system that provides access to a data system. A user interface (UI) is provided to enable an administrator to select UI object pertaining to a user interface provided by the data system to provide grammar update support for. The data system user interface corresponds to a UI that users would see if using computer client connection to the data system. XSLT style sheets are built based on the UI objects that are selected for grammar update. A grammar update request may then submitted that identifies a navigation context of the data system UI, a style sheet to apply, and an optional last update value. In response to receiving the request, the system retrieves data from the data system pertaining to the navigation context; and filters the data using the identified style sheet and the last update value and provides the filtered data back to the voice access system to update its grammar.

Claims

1. A computer-executable method to update grammar information in a voice access system that provides access to a data system, comprising:

identifying user interface (UI) objects to provide grammar update support for, said UI objects pertaining to a user interface that is provided by the data system to access data in the data system via a computer client; and

in response to receiving a grammar update request from the voice access system that identifies a navigation context of the user interface to update grammar information for,

retrieving data from the data system pertaining to the navigation context; and

filtering the data retrieved from the data system to provide data pertaining to grammar update-enabled UI objects according to the navigation context to the voice access system.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the grammar update request further includes information identifying a last update for the navigation context, further comprising filtering data that are retrieved from the data system such that only grammar data in accordance with the navigation context that have changed since the last update are provided to the voice access system.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the grammar update request is received as an XML (eXtended Markup Language) document.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the grammar update request includes commands to access the data system via an application program interface (API).

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the API comprises a Siebel Web Engine API.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the data are filtered by performing the operations of:

generating a source tree XML (extended markup language) document that includes an initial set of data retrieved from the data system in response to the grammar update request; and

applying an XSLT (extensible Style sheet Language transformation) style sheet to the source tree XML document to produce an result tree XML document containing a filtered set of data.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the UI objects to grammar update-enable are identified by performing the operations of:

presenting indicia pertaining to respective UI objects of the user interface for the data system to a user via a computer user interface;

enabling the user to select which UI objects to grammar update-enable via the computer user interface by marking the indicia corresponding to those UI objects.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the computer user interface comprises a graphical user interface (GUI) and the indicia pertaining to the respective UI objects are presented to the user as a hierarchical tree corresponding to a hierarchical relationship of the UI objects in the user interface of the data system.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein selected levels in the hierarchical tree may be expanded or collapsed in response to a user input.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein the GUI is generated by performing the operations of:

storing metadata corresponding to the user interface for the data system, said metadata comprising object definitions for the UI objects of the user interface including a hierarchical position of each UI object within the user interface;

processing the metadata to build an application representation comprising an internal representation of the user interface of the data system including data identifying the hierarchical position of each UI object; and

rendering a hierarchical tree to provide a visual representation of the application representation.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the application representation comprises an XML tree, further comprising:

sending the XML tree to a browser operating on a client machine that is linked in communication with the data system; and

rendering the hierarchical tree via the browser.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the UI objects include objects pertaining to screens, views, applets, columns, and fields in the user interface of the data system.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the filtered data are returned to the voice access system as an XML document.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein the grammar update request includes size indicia identifying a number of records to be returned to the voice access system at one time, and wherein additional records indicia is provided with the filtered data in an event in which a number of records for a given grammar update request exceeds the number of records specified in the size indicia.

15. The method of claim 1, wherein the data system provides a web interface having a URL address, and the grammar update request is received via a computer network using the HTTP (Hypertext Transport Protocol) or HTTPS (Hypertext Transport Protocol Secured) protocol.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein the grammar update request corresponds to a COM (component object model) interface provided by the data system.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the COM interface enables selected data to be retrieved from a database in which data for the data system are stored by referencing a business component that is used to access one or more database tables in which those data are stored.

18. The method of claim 1, wherein the data system comprises a Siebel Enterprise data system.

19. A computer program product comprising:

a computer readable medium on which a plurality of machine-executable instructions are stored wherein said machine-executable instructions are configured to direct a method for updating grammar information in a voice access system that provides access to a data system by performing the operations of;

enabling a user to identify user interface (UI) objects to provide grammar update support for, said UI objects pertaining to a user interface that is provided by the data system to access data in the data system via a computer client; and

in response to receiving a grammar update request from the voice access system that identifies a navigation context of the user interface to update grammar information for,

retrieving data from the data system pertaining to the navigation context; and

filtering the data retrieved from the data system to provide data pertaining to grammar update-enabled UI objects in accordance with the navigation context to the voice access system.

20. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein the grammar update request further includes information identifying a last update for the navigation context, an execution of the machine instructions further performs the operation of filtering data that are retrieved from the data system such that only grammar data in accordance with the navigation context that have changed since the last update are provided to the voice access system.

21. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein the grammar update request is received as an XML (eXtended Markup Language) document.

22. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein the grammar update request includes commands to access the data system via an application program interface (API).

23. The computer program product of claim 22, wherein the API comprises a Siebel Web Engine API.

24. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein execution of the machine instruction filters the data by performing the operations of:

generating a source tree XML (extended markup language) document that includes an initial set of data retrieved from the data system in response to the grammar update request; and

applying an XSLT (extensible Style sheet Language transformation) style sheet to the source tree XML document to produce an result tree XML document containing a filtered set of data.

25. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein execution of the machine instructions enable the UI objects to grammar update-enable to be identified by performing the operations of:

presenting indicia pertaining to respective UI objects of the user interface for the data system to a user via a computer user interface;

enabling the user to select which UI objects to grammar update-enable via the computer user interface by marking the indicia corresponding to those UI objects.

26. The computer program product of claim 25, wherein the computer user interface comprises a graphical user interface (GUI) and the indicia pertaining to the respective UI objects are presented to the user as a hierarchical tree corresponding to a hierarchical relationship of the UI objects in the user interface of the data system.

27. The computer program product of claim 26, wherein selected levels in the hierarchical tree may be expanded or collapsed in response to a user input.

28. The computer program product of claim 26, wherein execution of the machine instructions generates the GUI by performing the operations of:

retrieving metadata corresponding to the user interface for the data system, said metadata comprising object definitions for the UI objects of the user interface including a hierarchical position of each UI object within the user interface;

processing the metadata to build an application representation comprising an internal representation of the user interface of the data system including data identifying the hierarchical position of each UI object; and

rendering a hierarchical tree to provide a visual representation of the application representation.

29. The computer program product of claim 26, wherein the application representation comprises an XML tree, further comprising:

sending the XML tree to a browser operating on a client machine that is linked in communication with the data system to enable the hierarchical tree to be rendered by the browser.

30. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein the filtered data are returned to the voice access system as an XML document.

31. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein the grammar update request includes size indicia identifying a number of records to be returned to the voice access system at one time, and wherein additional records indicia is provided with the filtered data in an event in which a number of records for a given grammar update request exceeds the number of records specified in the size indicia.

32. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein the data system provides a web interface having a URL address, and the grammar update request is received via a computer network using the HTTP (Hypertext Transport Protocol) or HTTPS (Hypertext Transport Protocol Secured) protocol.

33. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein the grammar update request is sent via a COM (component object model) interface provided by the data system.

34. The computer program product of claim 33, wherein the COM interface enables selected data to be retrieved from a database in which data for the data system are stored by referencing a business component that is used to access one or more database tables in which those data are stored.