Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

Francis Zhou

Xiao Tu

David Walker Duhon

David Abzarian

Silvano Bonacina

Derek Martin Liddell

Cheng-Yi Yen

Moshe Randall Lutz

Yibo Sun

A digital assistant supported on devices such as smartphones, tablets, personal computers, game consoles, etc. includes an extensibility client that exposes an interface and service that enables third party applications to be integrated with the digital assistant so the application user experiences are rendered using the native voice of the digital assistant. Specific voice inputs associated with a given application may be registered by developers using a manifest that is loaded when the application is launched on the device so that voice inputs from the device user can be mapped by the digital assistant extensibility client to the appropriate application as input events for consumption. In typical implementations, the manifest is arranged as a declarative document that streamlines application development and provides a seamless user experience by enabling customization of third party applications to integrate the digital assistant's voice and behaviors within the user experience of the application's domain.

Digital assistant voice input integration

A facility enabling a user to operate visual user interface controls with ink commands is described. The facility causes to be displayed a control operable with mouse input, and receives an ink command directed to the displayed control. In response, the facility operates the displayed control in accordance with the received ink command.

Operating visual user interface controls with ink commands

A computing device includes a digital input system that allows freehand digital inputs to be received (e.g., via movement of a pen, stylus, finger, etc.). The digital input system provides functionality allowing applications to receive digital inputs from a user and control the display of data based on the digital inputs. The digital input system receives digital input from a user and analyzes the digital input to collect input data for the digital input. As the digital input is received, the input data is made available to an application, allowing the application to operate on the input data (e.g., modify the input data and/or generate additional input data) and provide the operated-on input data to the digital input system. The digital input system then proceeds to control the display of data based on the operated-on input data.

Controlling digital input

A computing device includes a digital ink system that provides digital ink support to applications on the computing device. Digital ink inputs are received by the digital ink system, which provides ink stroke data for the digital ink inputs to the application for storage in a manner and format the application desires. The digital ink system also generates a digital ink container associated with the digital ink input, and communicates the digital ink container to a digital ink repository. The digital ink repository stores digital ink containers for multiple applications, and can be searched from a computing device to identify digital ink input to an application regardless of which application the digital ink was input to.

Cross application digital ink repository

A computing device includes a digital input system that provides digital input functionality for the computing device. The digital input system receives both a first input and a second input. The first input is typically an input with the user's dominant hand (e.g., using a pen, stylus, finger, etc.), and the second input is typically an input with the user's non-dominant hand. The digital input system determines whether a second input is received simultaneously with the first input, and selects one of multiple behaviors for the first input based on whether the second input is received simultaneously with the first input. Various different behaviors for the first input can be selected from, such as freehand or freeform input, constraining digital input corresponding to the first input to be along an edge of a stencil, and so forth.

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Francis Zhou