Speech Dialogue Interruption Control With Context Resumption

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Solution Overview

Problem

Existing speech dialogue systems do not effectively manage interruptions in voice commands, leading to lost information and the need for users to restart interactions when distracted, such as while driving.

Innovation Solution

A speech dialogue system with interrupt, continue, and cancel functions, using microphone and control key inputs to pause and resume conversations, and a memory unit to store commands for later retrieval, allowing users to resume interactions from the point of interruption.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Loss of energy

If the SDS shuts down the dialogue after a predetermined delay when the user delays replying, then the system can free up resources and prevent indefinite waiting, but the previously communicated information is lost and the user must start over

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvesystem resource usageVSAvoidpreviously communicated information

Core Design Contradiction:

Loss of energyVSLoss of information

Solution Approach 1:

The system performs preliminary action by storing the last transmitted information in memory before shutting down the dialogue. This allows the system to free resources while preserving the information for potential resumption, eliminating the need to start over.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The system discards the active dialogue state to free resources, but recovers the previously communicated information from memory storage. This enables resource management while preventing information loss through the shutdown mechanism.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #34Discarding and recovering

2Loss of information

If the SDS continuously waits for user input without interruption capability, then the dialogue remains active and information is preserved, but the user cannot attend to other tasks and must divert attention from driving

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvedialogue information preservationVSAvoiduser ability to multi-task

Core Design Contradiction:

Loss of informationVSEase of operation

Solution Approach 1:

The dialogue system is segmented into interruptible segments with clear pause and resume points. The system can suspend at any point, store the state, and later resume from that exact point, allowing users to interleave dialogue tasks with other activities like driving.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #1Segmentation

Solution Approach 2:

The dialogue system transitions from a static continuous-waiting state to a dynamic state that can be paused, suspended, and resumed. This flexibility allows the system to adapt to user needs for multi-tasking while preserving dialogue context.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #15Dynamics

3Reliability

If the SDS requires the user to restart the application from the beginning after shutdown, then the system ensures complete re-initialization, but the user experiences loss of time and frustration

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvedialogue re-initializationVSAvoidtime to restart dialogue

Core Design Contradiction:

ReliabilityVSLoss of time

Solution Approach 1:

The system performs preliminary action by storing dialogue state and transmitted information in memory before shutdown. When resumption is requested, the system retrieves this stored information and continues from the last point, eliminating the need to restart from the beginning.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

4Ease of operation

If the SDS allows interruption of ongoing speech dialogue, then the user can attend to other tasks, but the system complexity increases with interrupt handling and state management

Engineering Contradiction:

Improveuser ability to interrupt dialogueVSAvoidinterrupt handling mechanism

Core Design Contradiction:

Ease of operationVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The interrupt handling functionality is extracted as a separate, dedicated mechanism within the system. This modular approach manages complexity by isolating interrupt logic from the main dialogue processing, making the system easier to implement and maintain while providing robust interrupt capability.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #2Taking out (Extraction)

Data Source

PatentUS7454351B2Speech dialogue system for dialogue interruption and continuation control

Publication Date: 2008.11.18 CERENCE OPERATING CO

AI summary

A speech dialogue system (SDS) is provided for carrying out a speech dialogue with a user to control an electronic device. The SDS includes a speech dialogue interruption unit for interrupting the speech dialogue and a speech dialogue continuation unit for continuing the interrupted speech dialogue. The system provides a method of conducting the speech dialogue between the speech dialogue system and a user. The method provides the steps of interrupting the speech dialogue upon receipt of a predetermined pause command from the user or from an electronic device. The method continues the speech dialogue with the speech dialogue system when the user or the electronic device provides a predetermined continuation command to the SDS. The method further allows the canceling of the speech dialogue when the user provides a predetermined cancellation command to the SDS.