Nuance Communications, Inc.

Synchronoss Technologies, Inc

Speechcycle, Inc.

AT&T Intellectual Property I, LP

At+t Corp.

Roberto Pieraccini

Krishna Dayanidhi

David Suendermann

Jackson Liscombe

Juan Manuel Huerta

Esther Levin

David Crawford Gibbon

Behzad Shahraray

Andrea Basso

Mehmet Reha Civanlar

Sasha P Caskey

Maria Elena Smith

Raimo Bakis

Ellen Marie Eide

Qian Huang

Ilija Zeljkovic

Jie Z Zeng

Zor Gorelov

Keelan Evanini

Shrikanth Sambasivan Narayanan

Stephen Michael Marcus

Edward Dennis Haszto

Jonathan Bloom

Grace Li

Phillip Hunter

Eric Woudenberg

Alan Pan

A system and method for localizing a spoken dialog system is disclosed. Source data from a source language spoken dialog system is accessed, including semantic annotations and transcriptions of a plurality of utterances. The transcriptions are machine-translated into a target language. Semantic classifiers are trained on the machine translated transcriptions and the source language semantic annotations.

System and method for the localization of statistical classifiers based on machine translation

A method includes steps of indexing a media collection, searching an indexed library and browsing a set of candidate program segments. The step of indexing a media collection creates the indexed library based on a content of the media collection. The step of searching the indexed library identifies the set of candidate program segments based on a search criteria. The step of browsing the set of candidate program segments selects a segment for viewing.

Browsing and retrieval of full broadcast-quality video

An embodiment of the invention is a software tool used to convert text, speech synthesis markup language (SSML), and/or extended SSML to synthesized audio. Provisions are provided to create, view, play, and edit the synthesized speech, including editing pitch and duration targets, speaking type, paralinguistic events, and prosody. Prosody can be provided by way of a sample recording. Users can interact with the software tool by way of a graphical user interface (GUI). The software tool can produce synthesized audio file output in many file formats.

System for tuning synthesized speech

A dialog manager for a spoken dialog system. A decision module selects a path from a plurality of alternative paths for a given call, wherein each path implements one of a plurality of strategies for a call flow. A weighting module weights the path selection decision and is connected to a probability estimator for estimating the probability value that a given one of the plurality of paths is the best-performing path.

System and method for optimizing call flows of a spoken dialog system

A system and a method to generate statistical utterance classifiers optimized for the individual states of a spoken dialog system is disclosed. The system and method make use of large databases of transcribed and annotated utterances from calls collected in a dialog system in production and log data reporting the association between the state of the system at the moment when the utterances were recorded and the utterance. From the system state, being a vector of multiple system variables, subsets of these variables, certain variable ranges, quantized variable values, etc. can be extracted to produce a multitude of distinct utterance subsets matching every possible system state. For each of these subset and variable combinations, statistical classifiers can be trained, tuned, and tested, and the classifiers can be stored together with the performance results and the state subset and variable combination. Once the set of classifiers and stored results have been put into a production system, for a given system state, the classifiers resulting in optimum performance can be selected from the result list and used to perform utterance classification.

System and method for building optimal state-dependent statistical utterance classifiers in spoken dialog systems

A method and apparatus for continuously improving the performance of semantic classifiers in the scope of spoken dialog systems are disclosed. Rule-based or statistical classifiers are replaced with better performing rule-based or statistical classifiers and/or certain parameters of existing classifiers are modified. The replacement classifiers or new parameters are trained and tested on a collection of transcriptions and annotations of utterances which are generated manually or in a partially automated fashion. Automated quality assurance leads to more accurate training and testing data, higher classification performance, and feedback into the design of the spoken dialog system by suggesting changes to improve system behavior.

System and method for improving performance of semantic classifiers in spoken dialog systems

A single, subjective numerical rating to evaluate the performance of a telephone-based spoken dialog system. This CE rating is provided by expert human listeners who have knowledge of the design of the dialog system. Different human raters can be trained to achieve a satisfactory level of agreement. Furthermore, a classifier trained on ratings by human experts can reproduce the human ratings with the same degree of consistency. More calls can be given a CE rating than would be possible with limited human resources. More information can be provided about individual calls, e.g., to help decide between two disparate ratings by different human experts.

System and method for robust evaluation of the user experience in automated spoken dialog systems

An embodiment of the invention is a software tool used to convert text, speech synthesis markup language (SSML), and or extended SSML to synthesized audio. Provisions are provided to create, view, play, and edit the synthesized speech including editing pitch and duration targets, speaking type, paralinguistic events, and prosody. Prosody can be provided by way of a sample recording. Users can interact with the software tool by way of a graphical user interface (GUI). The software tool can produce synthesized audio file output in many file formats.

A method for multiple value confirmation and correction in spoken dialog systems. A user is allowed to correct errors in values captured by the spoken dialog system, such that the interaction necessary for error correction between the system and the user is reduced. When the spoken dialog system collects a set of values from a user, the system provides a spoken confirmation of the set of values to the user. The spoken confirmation comprises the set of values and possibly pause associated with each value. Upon hearing an incorrect value, the user may react and barge-in the spoken confirmation and provide a corrected value. Responsive to detecting the user interruption during the pause or after the system speaking of a value, the system halts the spoken confirmation and collects the corrected value. The system then provides a new spoken confirmation to the user, wherein the new spoken confirmation includes the corrected value.

Method and apparatus for multiple value confirmation and correction in spoken dialog system

A method for variable resolution and error control in spoken language understanding (SLU) allows arranging the categories of the SLU into a hierarchy of different levels of specificity. The pre-determined hierarchy is used to identify different types of errors such as high-cost errors and low-cost errors and trade, if necessary, high cost errors for low cost errors.

Method for variable resolution and error control in spoken language understanding

An interactive voice response (IVR) system which allows a caller to barge-in on all prompts, yet still allows the caller to receive important information contained in the prompts. When a caller barges-in on a prompt that contains important information, the IVR system interrupts the prompt to play a short announcement with the goal of re-enforcing the importance of listening to the entire prompt. The IVR system then resumes playback of the prompt, from the beginning or of a modified version.

Methods and apparatus for enforcing caller listening behavior on interactive voice response applications

A one-step correction mechanism for voice interaction is provided. Correction of a previous state is enabled simultaneously with recognition in a current or subsequent state. An application is decomposed into a set of tasks. Each task is associated with the collection of one piece of information. Each task may be in a different state. At any point during the interaction, while a task/state pair is active, the dialog manager may enable multiple other task/state pairs to be active in latent fashion. The application developer may then use those facilities or resources to the active task/state and the latent task/state pairs depending on contextual condition of the interaction state of the application.

Method, apparatus, and computer program product for one-step correction of voice interaction

An interactive voice response (IVR) system which assists in identifying repeat callers, understanding whether they are calling for the same reason as one of their previous calls, and properly disposing of the call. If the repeat caller is calling for the same reason, information from the previous call (or the previous calls) is retrieved and an action based on a defined business logic for repeat callers may then be executed for the current call.

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Peekskill, NY, United States of America

Roberto Pieraccini