Interface for a voice-activated connection system

• US 6,138,100 A
• Filed: 04/14/1998
• Issued: 10/24/2000
• Est. Priority Date: 04/14/1998
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Nuance Communications, Inc. (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Corporation (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Dutton, Dawn L., Zeljkovic, Ilija, Narayanan, Shrikanth Sambasivan
• Primary Examiner(s): Dorvil, Richemond
• Assistant Examiner(s): Nolan, Daniel A.
• Application Number:
  US09/059,912
• Time in Patent Office: 924 Days
• Field of Search: 704/231, 704/251, 704/275, 704/9, 704/257, 704/270, 707/1, 707/2, 707/513, 379/220, 379/127, 379/201, 379/221, 379/213, 379/216
• US Class Current: 704/275
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/1822 Parsing for meaning understanding
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/22 Procedures used during a speech recognition process, e.g. man-machine dialogue
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/0631 Creating reference templates; Clustering
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/223 Execution procedure of a spoken command
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99932 Access augmentation or optimizing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99934 Query formulation, input preparation, or translation
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access

Abstract

A method and apparatus for defining an interface for a system using voice commands to connect a first user to a second user over a network. The interface receives a request to define the interface for a particular user. The interface receives a first information item, and searches at least one database for a second information item indexed by the first information item. Another search is performed for a third information item indexed by the second information item. This process is continued until the interface has gathered sufficient information items to construct a natural language grammar for use by the interface. The interface uses the natural language grammar to parse commands given by the user for future communications connections.

Claims

1. A method for creating a data structure for use in a Voice-Activated Connection system, said method comprising the steps of:

a) receiving a request to create said data structure, said request including a first information item;

b) querying at least one pre-defined database using said first information item as a search key to retrieve additional information; and

c) creating said data structure using said first information and said additional information as data elements,

wherein said data structure associates said retrieved additional information with said first information item.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein said data elements form a grammar used by said voice-activated connection system to parse commands received from a user.

3. A method for defining an interface for a system to receive voice commands to connect a first user to a second user over a network, comprising the steps of:

a) receiving a request to define said interface;

b) receiving a first information item;

c) searching at least one database for a second information item indexed by said first information item; and

d) constructing a grammar for said interface using said first and second information items.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising the step of searching at least one database for a third information item based on said second information item.

5. The method of claim 3, further comprising the steps of:

receiving a voice command for connecting said first user to said second user;

parsing said request using said interface; and

connecting said first user to said second user based on said parsed request.

6. The method of claim 3, wherein said database stores at least one of a group comprising electronic white pages, electronic yellow pages, HTML documents, calling service profiles and electronic user profiles.

7. The method of claim 3, wherein steps c) and d) are repeated until said search is complete.

8. The method of claim 3, wherein said grammar is used by a natural language interface.

9. The method of claim 3, wherein said database is accessed using a transmission control protocol/internet protocol.

10. The method of claim 3, wherein said database is accessed using a hypertext transfer protocol.

11. An apparatus for defining an interface for a system to receive voice commands to connect a first user to a second user over a network, comprising:

means for receiving a request to define said interface;

means for receiving a first information item;

means for searching at least one database for a second information item indexed by said first information item; and

means for constructing a grammar for said interface using said first and second information items.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, further comprising means for searching at least one database for a third information item based on said second information item.

13. The apparatus of claim 11, further comprising the steps of:

receiving a voice command for connecting said first user to said second user;

parsing said request using said interface; and

connecting said first user to said second user based on said parsed request.

14. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein said database stores at least one of a group comprising electronic white pages, electronic yellow pages, employee files, HTML documents, calling service profiles and electronic user profiles.

15. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein said means for searching searches until a search ending condition is reached.

16. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein said grammar is for a natural language interface.

17. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein said database is accessed using a transmission control protocol/internet protocol.

18. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein said database is accessed using a hypertext transfer protocol.

19. A voice-activated connection system, comprising:

a voice-activated connection module receiving a first information item, said voice-activated connection module generating a search request;

a database in communication with said voice-activated connection module, said database receiving said search request and sending a search result to said voice-activated connection module; and

a natural language interface module coupled to said voice-activated connection module receiving said search result and constructing a natural language grammar based on said search results.

20. A computer for performing voice-activated connections, comprising:

a memory containing;

a voice-activated connection program having functions for searching for information items;

a natural language interface program having functions for building a natural language grammar; and

a processor for running the voice-activated connection program and the natural language interface program.

21. A computer-readable medium whose contents cause a computer system to perform voice-activated connections, the computer system having a voice-activated connection program and a natural language interface program, by performing the steps of:

receiving a request to define said interface by the voice-activated connection program;

receiving a first information item by the voice-activated connection program;

searching at least one database for a second information item indexed by said first information item by the voice-activated connection program; and

constructing a grammar for said interface using said first and second information items by the natural language interface program.