Natural-language voice-activated personal assistant
First Claim
1. A handheld personal assistant operated by a user comprising:
- a categorizer configured to store a plurality of data items in a database organized by categories of information that are grouped into a calendar category, an address book category and a to-do-list category wherein each category of information includes one or more subcategories of information that are linked in a hierarchical structure;
a voice-recognizer configured to recognize the user'"'"'s voice and transform an expression input by the user into a different mode of information;
a context processor configured to determine the category of information corresponding to the expression input by the user, based on a first inferred context of the expression input and maintain the storage of the data items by the categorizer in the determined category of information until a new category of information is determined based upon a second inferred context; and
a natural-language processor configured to process the mode of information to extract a piece of information from the determined category of the database;
wherein if there is ambiguity with the mode of information to extract from a first category of information, the natural-language processor provides a first response to the user having a plurality of options, the natural-language processor then provides a second response based upon the user'"'"'s selection from the options.
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Abstract
A handheld personal assistant including a voice-recognizer and a natural-language processor is disclosed. The recognizer is configured to transform a verbal expression from a person into a different mode of information (e.g., text). The natural-language processor is configured to process the mode of information to extract, from a database, a piece of information that is personal to the person. In processing, the processor analyzes the expression grammatically and semantically to transform at least a part of the mode of operation into at least one instruction. This piece of information can be a to-do list, information in the person'"'"'s calendar or information from the person'"'"'s address book, such as a phone number. The processor can still extract the piece of information when the person declares the expression differently.
299 Citations
12 Claims
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1. A handheld personal assistant operated by a user comprising:
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a categorizer configured to store a plurality of data items in a database organized by categories of information that are grouped into a calendar category, an address book category and a to-do-list category wherein each category of information includes one or more subcategories of information that are linked in a hierarchical structure; a voice-recognizer configured to recognize the user'"'"'s voice and transform an expression input by the user into a different mode of information; a context processor configured to determine the category of information corresponding to the expression input by the user, based on a first inferred context of the expression input and maintain the storage of the data items by the categorizer in the determined category of information until a new category of information is determined based upon a second inferred context; and a natural-language processor configured to process the mode of information to extract a piece of information from the determined category of the database; wherein if there is ambiguity with the mode of information to extract from a first category of information, the natural-language processor provides a first response to the user having a plurality of options, the natural-language processor then provides a second response based upon the user'"'"'s selection from the options. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
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10. A method for obtaining information for a requestor interacting with a handheld computing device, said method comprising:
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storing a plurality of data items in a database organized categories of information that are grouped into a calendar category, an address book category and a to-do-list category wherein each category of information includes one or more subcategories of information that are linked together in a hierarchical structure; receiving an input voice expression from the requestor; converting the input voice expression into a text string; processing the text string using grammatical and semantic processing to determine a natural language meaning for the text string; determining a category of information corresponding to the input by the requestor based on a first inferred context based on the expression input; extracting a piece of information from the determined category of information based upon the input voice expression; determining if there is an ambiguity with information extracted from the category of information; transmitting a plurality of choices to the requestor if an ambiguity is determined; resolving the ambiguity based upon the requestor'"'"'s response to the plurality of choices and repeating the extracting step; maintaining the storing of the data items and the extracting of the piece of information in the determined category of information; and changing the category of information for storing the data items to a new category of information that is determined based upon a second inferred context. - View Dependent Claims (11, 12)
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Specification