Contact Selection Disambiguation via Stored Preferences

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Solution Overview

Problem

Voice-controlled devices face ambiguities when multiple contacts share the same name, leading to failures in establishing the correct communication session, as users must repeatedly select the intended contact and communication mode.

Innovation Solution

Implement a system that uses automatic speech recognition and natural language understanding to disambiguate contact names, store user selections and contact characteristics, and adjust preferences based on usage and changing characteristics, allowing for automatic selection of preferred contacts in subsequent interactions.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Ease of operation

If the system stores user selections and contact characteristics to enable automatic contact selection, then the ease of operation improves, but the device complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvecontact selection processVSAvoidsystem architecture

Core Design Contradiction:

Ease of operationVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The system performs preliminary actions by storing user selections and contact characteristics in advance. When a contact selection is needed, the system retrieves pre-stored preferences rather than requiring users to make selections repeatedly, thereby simplifying operation while the initial setup complexity is accepted as a one-time cost.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The system enables self-service by automatically selecting contacts based on stored user preferences and contextual characteristics. The system serves itself by making intelligent decisions without requiring continuous user intervention, improving ease of operation while the complexity is embedded in the automated decision-making infrastructure.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #25Self-service

2Productivity

If the system automatically selects preferred contacts based on stored preferences, then productivity improves, but reliability may worsen due to potential selection errors

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvecommunication session establishmentVSAvoidcontact identification accuracy

Core Design Contradiction:

ProductivityVSReliability

Solution Approach 1:

The system implements feedback mechanisms to monitor and evaluate contact selection outcomes. By tracking user corrections and selection accuracy, the system continuously refines its preference storage and retrieval processes, ensuring that automated selections remain reliable while maintaining high productivity in establishing communication sessions.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #23Feedback

Data Source

PatentUS10841411B1Systems and methods for establishing a communications session

Publication Date: 2020.11.17 AMAZON TECH INC

AI summary

Systems, methods, and devices for establishing communications sessions with contacts are disclosed. In some embodiments, a first request may be received from a first device. The first request may be to communicate with a contact name. A user account associated with the first device may then be identified, and a contact list associated with the user account may be accessed to determine contacts associated with the contact name. Based on the contact list, a first contact and a second contact associated with the contact name may be identified. It may be determined, from memory, that the first contact is a first preferred contact. However, based on an intervening event, the second contact, rather than the preferred contact, may be selected for communicating with the contact.