Personal home voice portal

• US 8,831,185 B2
• Filed: 06/29/2012
• Issued: 09/09/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 11/10/2003
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Nuance Communications, Inc. (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Gandhi, Shailesh B., Mansey, Pradeep P., Patel, Anilkumar B.
• Primary Examiner(s): Phan, Joseph T
• Application Number:
  US13/537,291
• Publication Number:
  US 20120263281A1
• Time in Patent Office: 802 Days
• Field of Search: 379/88.17
• US Class Current: 379/88.17
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/02 Banking, e.g. interest calculation or account maintenance credit or loans G06Q40/03
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0861 using biometrical features, e.g. fingerprint, retina-scan cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for entity authentication using biological data H04L9/3231
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2201/40 using speech recognition speech recognition per se G10L15/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/4938 comprising a voice browser which renders and interprets, e.g. VoiceXML
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/06 Authentication
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/12 Messaging; Mailboxes; Announcements

Abstract

A method of accessing voice services through a personal computing system can include receiving, in the personal computing system, a telephone call from a user registered with the personal computing system, wherein the user is remotely located from the personal computing system, receiving a user spoken utterance over the telephone call, and speech recognizing the user spoken utterance to determine a request for a voice service. The method further can include formatting an electronic message according to the request for a voice service and sending the electronic message over a communications network to a remote computing system in accordance with the request for a voice service. Also, the method can include processing and formatting a response received from the remote computing system and playing back audio to the user over the telephone call.

Claims

1. A method for remotely requesting information and/or services from at least one remote service server through a personal computer, the method comprising steps of:

receiving, at the personal computer, a telephone call from a user that is registered with the personal computer, wherein the telephone call is a call originating from a device remote from the personal computer;

receiving a user spoken utterance over the telephone call;

performing speech recognition on the user spoken utterance to determine a request for information and/or a service;

formatting an electronic message according to the request;

using one or more client software applications executing on the personal computer to send the electronic message over a communication network from the personal computer to the at least one remote service server and to receive content at the personal computer from the at least one remote service server;

converting the content to speech audio at the personal computer; and

playing the speech audio to the user over the telephone call.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein said formatting step comprises building an electronic message to be sent over the Internet.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the request comprises a request to send an electronic mail, wherein the one or more client software applications comprises an electronic mail client application, said method further comprising:

receiving at least one additional user spoken utterance; and

converting the at least one additional user spoken utterance to speech-recognized text, wherein said formatting step comprises building, via the electronic mail client application, an electronic mail to be sent from the personal computer to the at least one remote service server and including the speech-recognized text in the electronic mail.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the request comprises a request to send an instant message, wherein the one or more client software applications comprises an instant message client application, said method further comprising:

receiving at least one additional user spoken utterance; and

converting the at least one additional user spoken utterance to speech-recognized text, wherein said formatting step comprises building, via the instant message client application, an instant message to be sent from the personal computer to the at least one remote service server and including the speech-recognized text in the instant message.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the personal computer is in the user'"'"'s home.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the personal computer is owned by the user.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the personal computer comprises a portable computer.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the user pays no fee to an owner of the personal computer for access to the personal computer.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the telephone call from the user is received at the user'"'"'s home telephone number.

19. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more client software applications comprise an electronic mail client.

20. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more client software applications comprise a browser.

10. An article of manufacture comprising at least one computer readable medium encoded with instructions that, when executed by at least one computer, perform a method for remotely requesting information and/or services from at least one remote service server through a personal computer, the method comprising:

receiving, at the personal computer, a telephone call from a user that is registered with the personal computer, wherein the telephone call is a call originating from a device remote from the personal computer;

receiving a user spoken utterance over the telephone call;

performing speech recognition on the user spoken utterance to determine a request for information and/or a service;

formatting an electronic message according to the request;

using one or more client software applications executing on the personal computer to send the electronic message over a communication network from the personal computer to the at least one remote service server and to receive content at the personal computer from the at least one remote service server;

converting the content to speech audio at the personal computer; and

playing the speech audio to the user over the telephone call.

11. The article of manufacture of claim 10, wherein the personal computer is in the user'"'"'s home.

12. The article of manufacture of claim 10, wherein the personal computer is owned by the user.

13. The article of manufacture of claim 10, wherein the personal computer comprises a portable computer.

14. The article of manufacture of claim 10, wherein the user pays no fee to an owner of the personal computer for access to the personal computer.

15. The article of manufacture of claim 10, wherein the telephone call from the user is received at the user'"'"'s home telephone number.

16. A personal computer programmed to request information and/or services from at least one remote service server on behalf of a user that is registered with the personal computer, the personal computer comprising:

a telephone connection to receive a telephone call from the user at the personal computer, wherein the telephone call is a call originating from a device remote from the personal computer, wherein the telephone connection is capable of receiving a user spoken utterance over the telephone call;

a speech recognizer to recognize the user spoken utterance to determine a request for information and/or a service;

at least one client software application to format an electronic message according to the request and to send the electronic message from the personal computer over the communication network to the at least one remote service server and to receive content from the at least one remote service server at the personal computer; and

a text-to-speech synthesizer to convert the content to speech audio and play the speech audio to the user over the telephone call.

17. The personal computer of claim 16, wherein the personal computer comprises a portable computer.

18. The personal computer of claim 16, wherein the telephone connection receives the telephone call from the user at the user'"'"'s home telephone number.