System apparatus circuit method and associated computer executable code for natural language understanding and semantic content discovery

• US 9,123,335 B2
• Filed: 02/20/2013
• Issued: 09/01/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 02/20/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Jinni Media Limited
• Original Assignee: Jinni Media Limited
• Inventors: Rimon, Mordechai Mori, Meshulam, Ram, Ben Zaken, Izhak
• Primary Examiner(s): BRYAR, JEREMIAH A
• Application Number:
  US13/771,705
• Publication Number:
  US 20140236572A1
• Time in Patent Office: 923 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G01L 17/00 Devices or apparatus for measuring tyre pressure or the pressure in other inflated bodies
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3329 Natural language query formulation or dialogue systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/211 Syntactic parsing, e.g. based on context-free grammar [CFG] or unification grammars
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/30 Semantic analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/18 using natural language modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/1815 Semantic context, e.g. disambiguation of the recognition hypotheses based on word meaning
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 17/00 Speaker identification or verification techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/227 of the speaker; Human-factor methodology
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 25/54 for retrieval

Abstract

Disclosed are systems, apparatuses, circuits and methods for extrapolating meaning from vocalized speech or otherwise obtained text. Speech of a speaking user is sampled and digitized, the digitized speech is converted into a text stream, the text stream derived from speech or otherwise obtained is analyzed syntactically and semantically, a knowledgebase in the specific context domain of the text stream is utilized to construct one or more semantic/syntactic domain specific query analysis constrains/rule-sets, and a “Domain Specific Knowledgebase Query” (DSKQ) or set of queries is built at least partially based on the domain specific query analysis constrains/rule-sets.

Claims

1. A language understanding system for extrapolating meaning from vocalized speech comprising:

a Speech Acquisition Block to sample vocalized speech of a speaking user and to generate a corresponding digitized speech data of the speaking user;

a Speech Analytics Block to analyze the digitized speech data so as to recognize a specific text stream;

a Domain Block to utilize a knowledgebase including grammar formally describing specific syntactic structures corresponding to a specific context domain of the vocalized speech, to construct a syntactic domain specific query analysis rule-set; and

a Natural Language Processing Block to build, at least partially based on the domain specific query analysis rule-set, a Domain Specific Knowledgebase Query (DSKQ) or set of queries.

2. The language understanding system of claim 1 wherein:

the Domain Block is further adapted to utilize a knowledgebase, in the context domain of the vocalized speech, to construct a semantic domain specific content discovery rule-set; and

wherein the system further comprises;

a Data Discovery Block to find and output content(s) at least partially based on;

(a) the DSKQ(s), or (b) the semantic domain specific discovery rule-set.

3. The language understanding system of claim 2 wherein:

the Speech Analytics Block further comprises a Voice Recognition Module to identify the speaking user by referencing a User Specific Data Block with digitized speech samples from the vocalized speech and relaying identification details of the identified speaking user to the Data Discovery Block, and wherein

said Data Discovery Block, as part of finding and outputting content(s), takes into consideration prior preferences of the speaking user by referencing said User Specific Data Block with the identification details of the identified speaking user.

4. The language understanding system of claim 2 wherein:

the Domain Block comprises multiple Domain Specific Knowledgebase Modules, based on a semantic taxonomy also referred to as Genome.

5. The language understanding system of claim 4 wherein:

one or more specific Domain Specific Knowledgebase Modules, out of the multiple Domain Specific Knowledgebase Modules in the Domain Block, are selected based on an explicit user request.

6. The language understanding system of claim 4 wherein:

a specific Domain Specific Knowledgebase Module, out of the multiple Domain Specific Knowledgebase Modules in the Domain Block, is derived from a general user request.

7. The language understanding system of claim 2 wherein:

the Data Discovery Block, upon reaching an equivocal query yielding a partial content discovery result, presents to the speaking user over a functionally associated computerized device, the partial content discovery result.

8. The language understanding system of claim 7 wherein:

the Data Discovery Block further presents to the speaking user providing the vocalized speech sampled, with a request to provide additional vocalized speech for sampling, and wherein content is selected based on both;

(a) analysis of the vocalized speech sampled, and (b) analysis of the additonal vocalized speech for sampling provided by the speaking user in response to the presented request and wherein at least some of the additional vocalized speech for sampling provides anaphoric references to terms introduced in priorly sampled vocalized speech.

9. The language understanding system of claim 1 wherein:

the natural language processing block is further adapted to express the grammar formally describing specific syntactic structures corresponding to the specific context domain of the vocalized speech as a domain specific rule set, utilizable by a parsing logic to parse language in that specific context domain; and

wherein said parsing logic is adapted for dynamic loading of lexical entries and metadata variables and recovery of partial structures from failed or incomplete parses.

10. A language understanding system for extrapolating meaning from natural language comprising:

a Domain Block to utilize a knowledgebase at least partially including grammar formally describing specific syntactic structures corresponding to a specific context domain of the natural language, to construct a semantic or syntactic domain specific query analysis rule-set; and

a Natural Language Processing Block to build, at least partially based on the domain specific query analysis rule-set, a Domain Specific Knowledgebase Query (DSKQ) or set of queries.

11. The language understanding system of claim 10 wherein:

the Domain Block is further adapted to utilize a knowledgebase, in the context domain of the natural language, to construct a semantic domain specific discovery rule-set; and

wherein the system further comprises;

a Data Discovery Block to find and output content(s) at least partially based on;

(a) the DSKQ(s), or (b) the semantic domain specific discovery rule-set.

12. The language understanding system of claim 11 wherein:

the Data Discovery Block, upon reaching an equivocal query yielding a partial content discovery result, presents to the speaking user over a functionally associated computerized device, the partial content discovery result.

13. The language understanding system of claim 12 wherein:

the Data Discovery Block further presents to the speaking user with request to provide by further speech further details about his sought after content.

14. The language understanding system of claim 10 wherein:

the Domain Block comprises multiple Domain Specific Knowledgebase Modules, based on a semantic taxonomy also referred to as Genome.

15. The language understanding system of claim 14 wherein:

one or more specific Domain Specific Knowledgebase Modules, out of the multiple Domain Specific Knowledgebase Modules in the Domain Block, are selected based on an explicit user request.

16. The language understanding system of claim 14 wherein:

a specific Domain Specific Knowledgebase Module, out of the multiple Domain Specific Knowledgebase Modules in the Domain Block, is derived from a general user request.

17. A method for language understanding and extrapolating meaning from natural language comprising:

utilizing a knowledgebase including grammar formally describing specific syntactic structures corresponding to a specific context domain of the natural language, to construct a semantic or syntactic domain specific query analysis rule-set; and

building, at least partially based on the domain specific query analysis rule-set, a Domain Specific Knowledgebase Query (DSKQ) or set of queries.

18. The method of claim 17 further comprising:

utilizing a knowledgebase, in the context domain of the natural language, to construct one or more semantic domain specific discovery rule-sets;

finding content(s) at least partially based on;

(a) the DSKQ(s), or (b) the semantic domain specific discovery/recommendation rule-sets; and

outputting the found content(s).

19. A language understanding system for extrapolating meaning from vocalized speech comprising:

a Speech Acquisition Block to sample vocalized speech of a speaking user and to generate a corresponding digitized speech data of the speaking user;

a Speech Analytics Block, including Tempo-Spectral Analysis capability to analyze the digitized speech data so as to recognize a specific text stream, derive Prosody information from the specific text stream, and embed metadata indicative of the derived Prosody information into the specific text stream; and

a Natural Language Processing Block to build, at least partially based on the metadata embedded specific text stream, a Domain Specific Knowledgebase Query (DSKQ) or set of queries.

20. The language understanding system of claim 19 further comprising:

a Domain Block to utilize a knowledgebase, in a specific context domain of the vocalized speech, to construct a semantic or syntactic domain specific query analysis rule-set; and

wherein the Natural Language Processing Block is further adapted to build the Domain Specific Knowledgebase Query (DSKQ) or set of queries, at least partially based on the domain specific query analysis rule-set.