Intelligent Dialogue Amongst Competitive User Applications

• US 20130198761A1
• Filed: 02/01/2012
• Published: 08/01/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 02/01/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Basson, Sara H., Caskey, Sasha P., Jiang, Dan Ning, Kanevsky, Dimitri, Sainath, Tara N.
• Granted Patent: US 8,825,533 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 719/313
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0281 Customer communication at a business location, e.g. providing product or service information, consulting

Abstract

A method, an apparatus and an article of manufacture for enabling communication between at least two computer applications that is observable to a user. The method includes obtaining a description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications, comparing the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications, generating a dialog between the at least two applications based on the comparing of the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications, and making the dialog available to a user.

Claims

1. A method for enabling communication between at least two computer applications that is observable to a user, wherein the method comprises:

obtaining a description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications;

comparing the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications;

generating a dialog between the at least two applications based on the comparing of the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications; and

making the dialog available to a user;

wherein at least one of the steps is carried out by a computer device.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the dialog is generated in a natural language.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein comparing the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications comprises extracting at least one description from a user document for each function of the at least two computer applications.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

clustering two or more similar functions across the at least two computer applications.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

summarizing the clustered functions; and

generating a function table.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein generating a dialog between the at least two applications based on the comparing of the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications comprises:

determining a function difference between the at least two computer applications according to the description of functions; and

outputting the function difference to a natural language generation module to produce a sentence for one of the at least two computer applications.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein producing a sentence for one of the at least two computer applications is based on the determined function difference.

8. The method of claim 6, wherein producing a sentence for one of the at least two computer applications is based on a previously generated sentence for a different one of the at least two computer applications.

9. The method of claim 6, wherein producing a sentence for one of the at least two computer applications is based on a user input.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein a user input comprises data pertaining to a physical parameter of the user perceived by a sensor.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein a user input comprises data pertaining to a non-physical parameter of the user perceived by a sensor.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

updating the description of functions according to a dialogue.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein making the dialog available to a user comprises generating a dialog summary.

14. The method of claim 1 wherein making the dialog available to a user comprises rendering the dialog in a user-discernible format.

15. The method of claim 1, further comprising augmenting the dialog with metadata.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein obtaining a description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications comprises inferring the description from available metadata pertaining to an application.

17. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

enabling a user to select one of the at least two computer applications based on the dialog.

18. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

displaying application preference information to a user.

19. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least two computer applications reside on different machines.

20. An article of manufacture comprising a computer readable storage medium having computer readable instructions tangibly embodied thereon which, when implemented, cause a computer to carry out a plurality of method steps comprising:

obtaining a description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications;

comparing the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications;

generating a dialog between the at least two applications based on the comparing of the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications; and

making the dialog available to a user.

21. The article of manufacture of claim 20, wherein generating a dialog between the at least two applications based on the comparing of the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications comprises:

determining a function difference between the at least two computer applications according to the description of functions; and

outputting the function difference to a natural language generation module to produce a sentence for one of the at least two computer applications.

22. The article of manufacture of claim 20, wherein making the dialog available to a user comprises rendering the dialog in a user-discernible format.

23. A system for enabling communication between at least two computer applications that is observable to a user, comprising:

at least one distinct software module, each distinct software module being embodied on a tangible computer-readable medium;

a memory; and

at least one processor coupled to the memory and operative for;

obtaining a description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications;

comparing the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications;

generating a dialog between the at least two applications based on the comparing of the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications; and

making the dialog available to a user.

24. The system of claim 23, wherein the system is networked.

25. The system of claim 23, wherein the at least one processor coupled to the memory operative for generating a dialog between the at least two applications based on the comparing of the description of functions for each of the at least two computer applications is further operative for:

determining a function difference between the at least two computer applications according to the description of functions; and

outputting the function difference to a natural language generation module to produce a sentence for one of the at least two computer applications.