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

A device with a touch-sensitive display may be unlocked via gestures performed on the touch-sensitive display. The device is unlocked if contact with the display corresponds to a predefined gesture for unlocking the device. The device displays one or more unlock images with respect to which the predefined gesture is to be performed in order to unlock the device. The performance of the predefined gesture with respect to the unlock image may include moving the unlock image to a predefined location and/or moving the unlock image along a predefined path. The device may also display visual cues of the predefined gesture on the touch screen to remind a user of the gesture.

Unlocking a device by performing gestures on an unlock image

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

An electronic device with a display and a fingerprint sensor may authenticate a user for a respective function. While a respective function of the device is in a locked state, the device displays a graphical element on the display, the graphical element indicating a first direction of finger movement that enables unlocking of the respective function. While displaying the graphical element, the device detects an input that includes movement of a finger in the first direction over the fingerprint sensor and determines whether the input meets unlock criteria based at least in part on fingerprint information of the finger detected by the fingerprint sensor during the input. In accordance with a determination that the input meets the unlock criteria, the device unlocks the respective function; and in accordance with a determination that the input does not meet the unlock criteria, the device maintains the respective function in the locked state.

Embedded authentication systems in an electronic device

A method and apparatus are provided for building an intelligent automated assistant. Embodiments of the present invention rely on the concept of “active ontologies” (e.g., execution environments constructed in an ontology-like manner) to build and run applications for use by intelligent automated assistants. In one specific embodiment, a method for building an automated assistant includes interfacing a service-oriented architecture that includes a plurality of remote services to an active ontology, where the active ontology includes at least one active processing element that models a domain. At least one of the remote services is then registered for use in the domain.

Method and apparatus for building an intelligent automated assistant

A pipeline processing system capable of high speed operation and capable of realizing a reduction of power consumption and an information processing apparatus to which this is applied, wherein a decoder/encoder circuit accesses a first memory and a second memory in parallel in accordance with status information at decoding processing to perform decoding processing, stores the data after processing in a tracking memory, then transfers the data stored in the tracking memory to a host apparatus according to a request from the host apparatus, while writes the user data transferred in unit of blocks from the host apparatus in a third memory serving as a tracking buffer to start the encoder processing in the case of the encoding processing, accesses a plurality of memories in parallel in accordance with the status information to perform the encoding processing, and outputs the same to a clock generation circuit.

Tsuneo Hayashi

Papers

Pipeline processing system and information processing apparatus