At+t Corp.

Lucent Technologies Inc.

John Arthur Karpicke

Donald Marion Keen

Michael P Zambelli

Reuben Klein

Thomas Anthony Stahl

Brian Albert Wittman

Alan L Glasser

Paul J Straub

Anthony D Franks

David A Reid

Donald R Means

Paul Wesley Cohrs

Chaim M Ackerman

Harold D Bales

Theodore O Burger

Barry L Lively

A method for automatically confirming verbal commands issued by a user and received by an automatic speech recognition system. Each verbal command is associated with a command operator set in which one or more command operators are stored. After the user vocalizes a recognized verbal command, the automatic speech recognition system awaits vocalization of a valid command operator from an associated stored command operator set for a pre-determined period of time. During this waiting period a non-intrusive indicator such as a light or a low volume tone notifies the user that the automatic speech recognition system is awaiting or ready to receive an appropriate command operator. If the user vocalizes a valid and recognized command operator during the waiting period, then the automatic speech recognition system executes the verbal command using the command operator and issues a confirmation to the user that the verbal command has been executed. Otherwise, the automatic speech recognition system returns to its idle state awaiting a further verbal command.

Method of implicit confirmation for automatic speech recognition

A terminal device, such as a computer, workstation or smart phone, incorporates a memory structure which simplifies and facilitates communications between a host computer and the terminal device. The host computer and the terminal device exchange application interface information via a communications protocol in which the host computer associates different types of objects with respective identifiers and then transmits an object type and its associated identifier to the terminal device. The terminal device, in turn, displays the object in a form determined solely by the terminal device but in accordance with respective predefined policies determined by the memory structure. If a user manipulates a displayed object type, then data representative of such manipulation is generated and transmitted with the associated object identifier to the host processor. Accordingly, terminal devices with different operating characteristics may successfully communicate with the host computer using the same protocol even though these devices may, have different screen sizes or capabilities.

Memory structure for configuring a terminal device

A caller-ID telephone station having a caller-ID based directory of telephone numbers automatically adapts its directory to compensate for a change to the area code in which the telephone station is located. The caller-ID telephone station stores the area code for all incoming caller-ID telephone numbers along with each telephone number received. The telephone station also stores its home area code. This home area code is inputted by a user during an initialization step when the telephone station is first installed, moved to a different area code or the station's locale is changed to a different area code. In response to a request from the user for dialing a telephone number entered into the directory, the telephone station compares the stored area code received as part of the caller-ID telephone number with the stored home area code and determines from this comparison whether to include or omit the received area code as part of the dialed telephone number. In one disclosed embodiment, the received area code is included in the dialed telephone number only if the received area code and the home area code are different.

Apparatus and method for accessing and maintaining a caller-ID based

Personal information center telephone set

Telephone line status indication is improved by making measurements of the differential voltage across the Tip-Ring terminals of a telephone set. The telephone set is connected to a telephone line which is shared with other parallel-connected sets. The measurement of differential line voltage is made time the set changes state (i.e., between on-hook and off-hook). The maximum magnitude of one of the last three measurements is stored to represent the state, and is arithmetically averaged with the maximum magnitude of one or the last three stored for the oil-hook state to create a reference voltage. The reference voltage is updated each time the telephone set changes state and is continually compared with the present differential line voltage to determine which one is larger A light-emitting-diode on the telephone set indicates that the telephone line is in use whenever the reference voltage exceeds the measured differential line voltage.

Apparatus and method for detecting telephone line status

Growing community of inventors

Indianapolis, IN, United States of America

John Arthur Karpicke