lucas systems, inc. 1603 carmody court sewickley, pa 15143 phone724, 940. 7000 fax724. 940. 7001...
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Lucas Systems, Inc.1603 Carmody CourtSewickley, PA 15143
phone 724, 940. 7000fax 724. 940. 7001
sales@lucasware.comwww.lucasware.com
Today and the Future of Wearable Agents
Emmett CoinDirector of Speech Research and Development
SpeechTEK 2007 West, February 21, 2007
www.lucasware.com
what I will talk about
• Definition of a wearable voice agent
• Overview of voice-based agents in logistics
• the subsystems in a real world voice application
• Some of the more difficult issues
• Futures
• Summary
• Conclusion
www.lucasware.com
what is a “Wearable Voice Agent”?
• NOT just a voice app on a cell phone or PDA– Voice dialing
– Stock quote
– One shot use
• Rather it IS a partner that:– Complements the task (a teammate)
– Adds value (faster, more accurate, less injury etc.)
– Used for extended periods of time (maybe all day long)
– Requires no (or very little) hand/eye time
– Is as small as possible
– Becomes Invisible (forget that the device is there)
www.lucasware.com
some examples
• Currently
– Battlefield: Translation
– Inspection: Insurance, Q/C
– Logistics: Distribution Centers
– Consumer: GPS route computers
• Very Near Future
– Retail: Extend Distribution to the Sales Clerk
– Consumer: Organize lists and errands
– Industry: Process Control
www.lucasware.com
voice in logistics
• Distribution Centers
– The way we move the vast majority of products from manufacturer to consumer
– Moving from many homogeneous collections to many heterogeneous collections
• Many Suppliers (send product TO the Center)
• Many Stores (receive product FROM the Center)
• A massive repackaging task
• A sizable fraction of the cost retail products
– One of the biggest sectors of “wearable voice agents” to date
www.lucasware.com
a “Selector” talking to Jennifer
The agent tells the human:• where to go• what to “select”• how many to “select”• where to put the item(s)
The human tells the agent:•Location checkstring•Quantity selected•If the bin is empty
www.lucasware.com
some things that just happened
• Selector was directed to product
• Location was verified
• Some product had unique weights entered
• Others had expiration dates to verify
• Selector needed the agent to repeat
• Selector was lifting (80 lbs), walking, driving, reading, etc. while talking
www.lucasware.com
fast interaction
•Overlapped dialog•Look ahead•Independent use
•Eyes•Hands•Speech
•Natural corrections•Low cognitive load
www.lucasware.com
accommodation
• Linguistics
– Finishing each others sentences
• The classic “barge-in”
• The never (but maybe soon) seen “interruption”
• Expectation
– Predicting dialog flow
• When the response is marginal but expected
• Response is “legal” but how probable?
www.lucasware.com
accommodation example: agent side
• In conventional voice applications the prompts need to be clear and unambiguous.
• But for an agent “co-worker” this would be tedious.
– In the beginning a natural prompt speed is best for learning the routine.
– Later, however, “natural” will feel like “slow-mo” and must be “snappier”.
– Later still, the human and agent know each other well and just cut to the chase further shortening the prompt.
www.lucasware.com
components of a voice agent
• Small device
– Light weight, long battery life, rugged
• Speech Technologies
– Recognition,Text-to-Speech and recorded waves
– Multi-Modal fits in here too.
• Dialog Management
– A core system that controls the goals of the interaction
• Connectivity
– The “real” work usually involves information external to the agent
www.lucasware.com
simple view of a generic voice platform
• Most “PDA”-like platforms run some version of Windows CE or Windows Mobile
• They need full-duplex GOOD quality audio IO
• Enough “cycles” to do the ASR and TTS
• Low level control over “power management”
www.lucasware.com
would regular folks “talk” with a computer?
• Obviously Hands and Eyes free
– Grocery shopping
– Assembling a child’s toy
– Cooking a new recipe
• We think differently (freely? Innovatively?) when we talk
– Talking is a low (perceived) cognitive load
– People get “writers block” more often than “talkers block”
• To off load and manage the fussy details of our lives
www.lucasware.com
Futures
• The latest cell phones have the power to support a voice-based agent.
• They cost 1/10th of a present day industrial device
• It is just a matter of time before we talk TO our phone as well as ON it.
www.lucasware.com
Summary
• Wearable voice agents
– Have been here for a while
– Proven and make good business sense
– Declining in cost
– Expanding the range of worker multi-tasking
– Can be effortless to use
www.lucasware.com
Conclusions
• They are more places than you think
• They are REAL TOOLS not window dressing
• They are just in their infancy
• I am looking forward to my next new synthetic agent!
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