摘要:
A system and method for providing a natural language interface to a database or the Internet. The method provides a response from a database to a natural language query. The method comprises receiving a user query, extracting key data from the user query, submitting the extracted key data to a data base search engine to retrieve a top n pages from the data base, processing of the top n pages through a natural language dialog engine and providing a response based on processing the top n pages.
摘要:
Systems and methods for annotating speech data. The present invention reduces the time required to annotate speech data by selecting utterances for annotation that will be of greatest benefit. A selection module uses speech models, including speech recognition models and spoken language understanding models, to identify utterances that should be annotated based on criteria such as confidence scores generated by the models. These utterances are placed in an annotation list along with a type of annotation to be performed for the utterances and an order in which the annotation should proceed. The utterances in the annotation list can be annotated for speech recognition purposes, spoken language understanding purposes, labeling purposes, etc. The selection module can also select utterances for annotation based on previously annotated speech data and deficiencies in the various models.
摘要:
A method is disclosed for designing a labeling guide for use by a labeler in labeling data used for training a spoken language understanding (SLU) module for an application. The method comprises a labeling guide designer selecting domain-independent actions applicable to an application, selecting domain-dependent objects according to characteristics of the application, and generating a labeling guide using the selected domain-independent actions and selected domain-dependent objects. An advantage of the labeling guide generated in this manner is that the labeling guide designer can easily port the labeling guide to a new application by selecting a set of domain-independent action and then selecting the domain-dependent objects related to the new application.
摘要:
A voice-enabled help desk service is disclosed. The service comprises an automatic speech recognition module for recognizing speech from a user, a spoken language understanding module for understanding the output from the automatic speech recognition module, a dialog management module for generating a response to speech from the user, a natural voices text-to-speech synthesis module for synthesizing speech to generate the response to the user, and a frequently asked questions module. The frequently asked questions module handles frequently asked questions from the user by changing voices and providing predetermined prompts to answer the frequently asked question.
摘要:
A multiple confidence measures subsystem of an automated speech recognition system allows otherwise independent confidence measures to be integrated and used for both training and testing on a consistent basis. Speech to be recognized is input to a speech recognizer and a recognition verifier of the multiple confidence measures subsystem. The speech recognizer generates one or more confidence measures. The speech recognizer preferably generates a misclassification error (MCE) distance as one of the confidence measures. The recognized speech output by the speech recognizer is input to the recognition verifier, which outputs one or more confidence measures. The recognition verifier preferably outputs a misverification error (MVE) distance as one of the confidence measures. The confidence measures output by the speech recognizer and the recognition verifier are normalized and then input to an integrator. The integrator integrates the various confidence measures during both a training phase for the hidden Markov models implemented in the speech recognizer and the recognition verifier and during testing of the input speech. The integrator is preferably implemented using a multi-layer perceptron (MLP). The output of the integrator, rather than the recognition verifier, determines whether the recognized utterance hypothesis generated by the speech recognizer should be accepted or rejected.
摘要:
A speech recognition system which effectively recognizes unknown speech from multiple acoustic environments includes a set of secondary models, each associated with one or more particular acoustic environments, integrated with a base set of recognition models. The speech recognition system is trained by making a set of secondary models in a first stage of training, and integrating the set of secondary models with a base set of recognition models in a second stage of training.
摘要:
Hidden Markov models (HMMs) rely on high-dimensional feature vectors to summarize the short-time properties of speech correlations between features that can arise when the speech signal is non-stationary or corrupted by noise. These correlations are modeled using factor analysis, a statistical method for dimensionality reduction. Factor analysis is used to model acoustic correlation in automatic speech recognition by introducing a small number of parameters to model the covariance structure of a speech signal. The parameters are estimated by an Expectation Maximization (EM) technique that can be embedded in the training procedures for the HMMs, and then further adjusted using Minimum Classification Error (MCE) training, which demonstrates better discrimination and produces more accurate recognition models.
摘要:
A system and method for providing a natural language interface to a database or the Internet. The method provides a response from a database to a natural language query. The method comprises receiving a user query, extracting key data from the user query, submitting the extracted key data to a data base search engine to retrieve a top n pages from the data base, processing of the top n pages through a natural language dialog engine and providing a response based on processing the top n pages.
摘要:
The invention relates to a system and method for gathering data for use in a spoken dialog system. An aspect of the invention is generally referred to as an automated hidden human that performs data collection automatically at the beginning of a conversation with a user in a spoken dialog system. The method comprises presenting an initial prompt to a user, recognizing a received user utterance using an automatic speech recognition engine and classifying the recognized user utterance using a spoken language understanding module. If the recognized user utterance is not understood or classifiable to a predetermined acceptance threshold, then the method re-prompts the user. If the recognized user utterance is not classifiable to a predetermined rejection threshold, then the method transfers the user to a human as this may imply a task-specific utterance. The received and classified user utterance is then used for training the spoken dialog system.
摘要:
A spoken language understanding method and system are provided. The method includes classifying a set of labeled candidate utterances based on a previously trained classifier, generating classification types for each candidate utterance, receiving confidence scores for the classification types from the trained classifier, sorting the classified utterances based on an analysis of the confidence score of each candidate utterance compared to a respective label of the candidate utterance, and rechecking candidate utterances according to the analysis. The system includes modules configured to control a processor in the system to perform the steps of the method.