The world of consumer electronics was given a sneak preview
of how natural language may be a viable user interface choice
when dealing with complex consumer electronics. Gregg Vanderheiden,
Director of the Trace Center at the University of Wisconsin,
demonstrated user interface sockets and an interaction with
Babble to control TV programming at the International Consumer
Electronics show in Las Vegas on Friday January 7. Gregg was
part of a distinguished panel discussing the problem of electronic
products becoming too complex for average consumers to operate
in a session entitled "Managing Complexity".
The Trace Center is developing user interface sockets, which
would allow consumers to select whatever interface they feel
most comfortable with to control their electronic products.
This might be a remote control similar to what we use today,
a PDA with a graphical style interface or a natural language
interface like Babble. Consumers wouldn't need to learn new
controls for every product because their preferred interface
would work with any electronic product having user interface
sockets.
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To demonstrate a natural language control, Gregg had Babble
respond to questions and commands such as the ones below.
Gregg's requests are in blue and Babble's responses in red:
When is American Chopper on?
There are 2:
Saturday, January 8 2005 at 1:00 am and
Friday, January 7 2005 at 6:00 pm
Record American Chopper at 6:00 pm.
Recording American
Chopper Friday, January 7 2005 at 6:00 pm on The Discovery
Channel
Record Days of Our Lives tomorrow.
No broadcasts of Days of our Lives tomorrow
Who broadcasts NFL Football?
WMSN
What time is Meet the Press?
10:00 am
Record it.
Recording Meet
the Press Sunday, January 9 2005 at 10:00 am on WMTV
Custom Technology has been working with the Trace Center
to combine tridbit technology with user interface sockets
to develop a prototype natural language control for household
devices. This work is being funded by an NSF grant. For more
information you can read about the
grant award here or visit the Trace
Center's web page describing this work.
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