An intelligent automated assistant system engages with the user in an integrated, conversational manner using natural language dialog, and invokes external services when appropriate to obtain information or perform various actions. The system can be implemented using any of a number of different platforms, such as the web, email, smartphone, and the like, or any combination thereof. In one embodiment, the system is based on sets of interrelated domains and tasks, and employs additional functionally powered by external services with which the system can interact.

Intelligent Automated Assistant

Media objects are transformed into active, connected objects via identifiers embedded into them or their containers. In the context of a user's playback experience, a decoding process extracts the identifier from a media object and possibly additional context information and forwards it to a server. The server, in turn, maps the identifier to an action, such as returning metadata, re-directing the request to one or more other servers, requesting information from another server to identify the media object, etc. The linking process applies to broadcast objects as well as objects transmitted over networks in streaming and compressed file formats.

Connected audio and other media objects

The various methods and devices described herein relate to devices which, in at least certain embodiments, may include one or more sensors for providing data relating to user activity and at least one processor for causing the device to respond based on the user activity which was determined, at least in part, through the sensors. The response by the device may include a change of state of the device, and the response may be automatically performed after the user activity is determined.

Automated Response to and Sensing of User Activity in Portable Devices

A virtual assistant uses context information to supplement natural language or gestural input from a user. Context helps to clarify the user's intent and to reduce the number of candidate interpretations of the user's input, and reduces the need for the user to provide excessive clarification input. Context can include any available information that is usable by the assistant to supplement explicit user input to constrain an information-processing problem and/or to personalize results. Context can be used to constrain solutions during various phases of processing, including, for example, speech recognition, natural language processing, task flow processing, and dialog generation.

Using context information to facilitate processing of commands in a virtual assistant

A method for detecting against unauthorized transmission of digital works comprises the steps of maintaining a registry of information permitting identification of digital copyrighted works, monitoring a network for transmission of at least one packet-based digital signal, extracting at least one feature from the at least one digital signal, comparing the extracted at least one feature with registry information and applying business rules based on the comparison result.

Copyright detection and protection system and method

A method for reproducing speech signals at a
controlled speed whereby rate conversion of the time axis
may be facilitated, and can be realized by a simplified
structure based on the encoded speech data without
changing the phoneme. With the speech reproducing method,
an encoding unit 2 discriminates whether an input speech
signal is voiced or unvoiced. Based on the results of
discrimination, the encoding unit 2 performs sinusoidal
synthesis and encoding for a signal portion found to be
voiced, while performing vector quantization by closed-loop
search for an optimum vector for a portion found to
be unvoiced using an analysis-by-synthesis method, in
order to find encoded parameters. The decoding unit 4
compands the time axis of the encoded parameters obtained
every pre-set frames at a period modification unit 3 for
modifying the output period of the parameters for
creating modified encoded parameters associated with
different time points corresponding to the pre-set
frames. A speech synthesis unit 6 synthesizes the voiced
speech portion and the unvoiced speech portion based on
the modified encoded parameters.

Method and apparatus for reproducing speech signals

Signal processing method and equipment

Verfahren zur Rauschreduktion eines Sprachsignals und zur Detektion des Rauschbereichs

PURPOSE:To reduce the arithmetic operation quantity by detecting the analytic output of a past speech signal which has the shortest distance to the analytic output of a current input speech signal and encoding the current input speech on the basis of this detection output. CONSTITUTION:A speech signal S(n) which is sampled, for example, at a 8kHz sampling frequency fs and converted into a digital signal is inputted to an input terminal 9. A short-period predictive inverse filter 10 filters the input signal reversely to predict a sound generated at the inner part of the throat, and its residual output r(m) is supplied to a subtracter 8; and the output of the subtracter 8 is supplied as an output difference e(n) to an energy calculation part (SIGMA() ) 11. Then this energy calculation part 11 calculates the energy of the output difference e(n) between the residual output r'(n) and the residual output r(n) from a short-period predictive inverse filter 10 and then selects, for example, the dynamic code vector of a dynamic code vector 1 from a terminal 12 so as to minimize the energy of the output difference e(n).

Speech encoding method

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To generate background noise with unnatural feeling relaxed by using encoded data by outputting plural kinds of parameters after a predetermined time in a speech encoding process when a judgment result shows background noise section SOLUTION: An input signal judgment device 21 judges whether an input signal supplied from an input terminal 1 and converted into a digital signal by an A/D converter 10, is voice sound V or unvoiced sound UV or background noise in a predetermined time section And, an idVUV parameter is outputted which shows the result of V/UV judgment such as '0' presenting unvoiced sound, '1' presenting background noise, '2' presenting 1st voiced sound or '3' presenting 2nd second voiced sound When a voice encoding device 20 grasps from the judgment result in this input judgment part 21, namely, the idVUV parameter that the input signal is a background noise section, the voice encoding device 20 outputs plural kinds of parameters for UV after a predetermined time COPYRIGHT: (C)1999,JPO

Masayuki Nishiguchi

Papers

Method and apparatus for reproducing speech signals

Signal processing method and equipment

Verfahren zur Rauschreduktion eines Sprachsignals und zur Detektion des Rauschbereichs

Speech encoding method

Method of encoding speech and device therefor, and method of decoding speech and device therefor