Application user interface

• US 5,805,775 A
• Filed: 02/02/1996
• Issued: 09/08/1998
• Est. Priority Date: 02/02/1996
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. (HP Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Digital Equipment Corporation (HP Inc.)
• Inventors: Eberman, Brian Scott, Glickman, Oren David
• Primary Examiner(s): Downs, Robert W.
• Application Number:
  US08/596,531
• Time in Patent Office: 949 Days
• Field of Search: 395/12, 395/53, 395/2.79, 395/2.84, 395/155, 395/161, 395/759, 704/257
• US Class Current: 706/11
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/038 Control and interface arrangements therefor, e.g. drivers or device-embedded control circuitry
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/205 Parsing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/279 Recognition of textual entities
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45512 Command shells

Abstract

In a computer system, a user interacts with a plurality of applications using natural language text provided by an input device. In order to enable the applications for user interaction, rules are registered on a blackboard of an arbiter. The arbiter can be localized, or distributed. Each rule is identified with a particular application, and can include a callback procedure. Each rule includes a left-hand side symbol and a right-hand side string which is a translation of the symbol. A parser parses a natural language input text string using the register rules to generate an evaluation tree. The evaluation tree is expressed in the form of an interpretive language. The evaluation tree is interpreted to produce at least one application request. The application request is generated by the callback procedure associated with a specific one of the rules applied during the parsing of the input text. The request is transmitted to the application identified with the applied rule.

Claims

1. A computer implemented method for interacting with a plurality of applications of a computer system using natural language text provided by an input device, comprising the steps of:

registering a plurality of rules on a blackboard, each rule identified with a particular application by use of an identifier, each rule including a left-hand side symbol and a right-hand side string which is a translation of the symbol,

parsing a natural language input text string by applying the registered rules to generate an evaluation tree expressed in the form of an interpretive language; and

interpreting the evaluation tree, and generating a request by a callback procedure associated with a specific one of the rules used to generate the evaluation tree;

transmitting the request to a specific one of the applications associated with the specific one of the rules.

2. A computer implemented method for interacting with a plurality of applications of a computer system using natural language text provided by an input device, comprising the steps of:

registering a plurality of rules on a blackboard, each rule identified with a particular application, each rule including a left-hand side symbol and a right-hand side string which is a translation of the symbol;

declaring the symbol as a private symbol or as a shared symbol, the shared symbol being included in the rules of more than one of the applications, and the private symbol included in the rules of exactly one application;

parsing a natural language input text string by applying the registered rules to generate an evaluation tree expressed in the form of an interpretive language; and

interpreting the evaluation tree, and generating a request by a callback procedure associated with a specific one of the rules and used to generate the evaluation tree;

transmitting the request to a specific one of the applications associated with the specific one of the rules.

3. The method of claim 2 further comprising:

deriving the natural language input text from speech using a speech recognition engine.

4. The method of claim 2 where the rules are expressed in a context-free grammar.

5. The method of claim 2 wherein the left-hand side symbol is a non-terminal symbol or a non-terminal symbol associated with an expression, and the right-hand side string includes a plurality of sub-strings, each sub-string expressed as a terminal symbol, the non-terminal symbol, or the non-terminal symbol associated with a variable or an expression.

6. The method of claim 5 further comprising:

expressing the non-terminal symbol using uppercase characters; and

expressing the terminal symbol using lowercase characters.

7. The method of claim 2 wherein the blackboard includes an index and further comprising:

maintaining states of the rules registered on the blackboard by the plurality of applications using the index to entirely distribute context states of user interactions as expressed in the natural language input text string across the plurality of applications.

8. The method of claim 2 further comprising:

distributing the applications over a plurality of client computers, and registering the rules with the blackboard of an arbiter of a server computer connected to the client computers by a network.

9. The method of claim 2 further comprising:

communicating the rules to the blackboard using communication protocols.

10. An apparatus for interacting with a plurality of applications of a computer system using natural language text provided by an input device, comprising:

a blackboard for registering a plurality of rules, each rule identified with a particular application by use of an identifier, each rule including a left-hand side symbol and a right-hand side string which is a translation of the symbol;

a parser for parsing a natural language input text string by applying the registered rules to generate an evaluation tree expressed in the form of an interpretive language; and

an evaluator for generating a request to one of the applications, the evaluator including a callback procedure associated with a specific one of the rules applied during the parsing, the request to direct a specific one of the applications associated with the specific one of the rules to perform a desired action.

11. An apparatus for interacting with a plurality of applications of a computer system using natural language text provided by an input device, comprising:

a blackboard for registering a plurality of rules, each rule identified with a particular application, each rule including a left-hand side symbol and a right-hand side string which is a translation of the symbol;

a parser for parsing a natural language input text string by applying the registered rules to generate an evaluation tree expressed in the form of an interpretive language;

an evaluator for generating a request to one of the applications, the evaluator including a callback procedure associated with a specific one of the rules applied during the parsing, the request to direct a specific one of the applications associated with the specific one of the rules to perform a desired action; and

means for declaring the symbol as a private symbol or as a shared symbol, the shared symbol being included in the rules of more than one of the applications, and the private symbol included in the rules of exactly one application.

12. The apparatus of claim 11 further comprising:

speech recognition means for deriving the natural language input text.

13. The apparatus of claim 11 further comprising:

an index for maintaining states of the rules registered on the blackboard.

14. The apparatus of claim 11 wherein the plurality of applications are distributed over a plurality of client computers, and the blackboard, parser, and evaluator are maintained by a server computer connected to the plurality of client computers by a network.

15. A computer implemented method for interacting with a plurality of applications of a computer system using natural language text provided by an input device, comprising the steps of:

registering a plurality of rules on a blackboard, each rule identified with a particular application, each rule including a left-hand side symbol and a right-hand side string which is a translation of the symbol and a unique identifier for each particular application;

parsing a natural language input text string by applying the registered rules to generate an evaluation tree expressed in the form of an interpretive language; and

interpreting the evaluation tree;

transmitting the request to a specific one of the applications associated with the specific one of the rules in response to said unique identifier associated with each particular application.

16. An apparatus for interacting with a plurality of applications of a computer system using natural language text provided by an input device, comprising:

a blackboard for registering a plurality of rules, each rule identified with a particular application by use of a unique identifier, each rule including a left-hand side symbol and a right-hand side string which is a translation of the symbol;

a parser for parsing a natural language input text string by applying the registered rules to generate an evaluation tree expressed in the form of an interpretive language; and

an evaluator for generating a request to one of the applications the request to direct a specific one of the is applications associated with the specific one of the rules to perform a desired action in response to the unique identifier of the specific on of the rules.