International Business Machines Corporation

Catherine Gody Wolf

Wlodek Wlodzimierz Zadrozny

Stephen Eric Levy

Nandakishore Kambhatla

James R Rhyne

Nicos J Anthony

Dimitri Kanevsky

Kerry Alan Ortega

Bruce D Lucas

Maroun Touma

Huifang Wang

Ronald E Vanbuskirk

Yiming Ye

Tetsunosuke Fujisaki

Dragomir Radkov Radev

James Rush Rhyne, Ii

Joyce Yue Chai

Sunil Subramanyam Govindappa

This patent describes a novel system, method, and program product that are used in interactive natural language dialog. One or more presentation managers operating on a computer system present information from the computer system to one or more users over network interface(s) and accept queries from the users using one or more known input/output modalities (e.g. Speech, typed in text, pointing devices, etc.). A natural language parser parses one or more natural language phrases received over one or more of the network interfaces by one or more of the presentation managers into one or more logical forms (parsed user input), each logical form having a grammatical and structural organization. A dialog manager module maintains and directs interactive sessions between each of the users and the computer system. The dialog manager receives logical forms from one or more of the presentation managers and sends these to a taxonomical mapping process which matches the items of interest to the user against the content organization in the content database to match business categories and sends modified logical forms back to the dialog manager.

System, method and program product for interactive natural dialog

The invention is directed towards an automated system for extracting voice messages from a voice mail system and for providing unified access to voice mail and electronic mail or voice mail and the internet. For a given user, a voice mail remote access server connects to the user's voice mail system through a telephone or data network, and uses speech recognition and understanding to navigate through the prompts of the voice mail system and extract the user's voice mail. Depending upon the access mechanism preferred by the user, the voice messages are sent as e-mail messages with attachments (audio files) to the user or made accessible to the user's world wide web server or displayed to the user using a stand-alone voice mail player application.

System and method for accessing voice mail from a remote server

In a computer speech user interface, a method and computer apparatus for automatically adjusting the content of feedback in a responsive prompt based upon predicted recognition accuracy by a speech recognizer. The method includes the steps of receiving a user voice command from the speech recognizer; calculating present speech recognition accuracy based upon the received user voice command; predicting future recognition accuracy based upon the calculated present speech recognition accuracy; and, generating feedback in a responsive prompt responsive to the predicted recognition accuracy. For predicting future poor recognition accuracy based upon poor present recognition accuracy, the calculating step can include monitoring the received user voice command; detecting a reduced accuracy condition in the monitored user voice command; and, determining poor present recognition accuracy if the reduced accuracy condition is detected in the detecting step.

Method and system for automatically adjusting prompt feedback based on predicted recognition accuracy

A language recognition system, method and program product for recognizing language based input from computer users on a network of connected computers. Each computer includes at least one user based language model trained for a corresponding user for automatic speech recognition, handwriting recognition, machine translation, gesture recognition or other similar actions that require interpretation of user activities. Network computer users are clustered into classes of similar users according to user similarities such as, nationality, profession, sex, age, etc. User characteristics are collected by sensors and from databases and, then, distributed over the network during user activities. Language models with similarities among similar users on the network are identified. The language models include a language model domain, with similar language models being clustered according to their domains. Language models identified as similar are modified in response to user production activities. After modification of one language model, other identified similar language models are compared and adapted. Also, user data, including information about user activities and language model data, is transmitted over the network to other similar users. Language models are adapted only in response to similar user activities, when these activities are recorded and transmitted over the network. Language models are given a global context based on similar users that are connected together over the network.

Language model adaptation via network of similar users

An anti-aliased inking method and apparatus for pen computers is presented. The invention eliminates aliased imaging of pen strokes by a number of techniques, including a &ldquo;replace-if-darker&rdquo; method in the event of overlapping strokes, a &ldquo;multiplication&rdquo; method for strokes drawn against backgrounds of various intensities; and a combination of replace-if-darker and multiplication for strokes drawn against colored backgrounds.

Anti-aliased inking for pen computers

The invention relates to a computer program product for a stylus-based user interface for computers. The invention is a process for separating a stylus-based application program from the procedures used to implement stylus-based, user driven error correction processes. This separation allows error correction procedures to be used by many applications, providing consistency in the user interface and saving application development costs through reuse of these procedures.

Stylus-input recognition correction manager computer program product

The invention relates to a stylus-based user interface for computers. It describes a process for separating a stylus-based application program from the procedures used to implement stylus-based, user driven error correction processes. This separation allows error correction procedures to be used by many applications, providing consistency in the user interface and saving application development costs through reuse of these procedures.

Growing community of inventors

Katonah, NY, United States of America

Catherine Gody Wolf