Abstract
The use of a voice interface, along with textual, graphical, video, tactile, and audio interfaces, can improve the experience of the user of a mobile device. Many applications can benefit from voice input and output on a mobile device, including applications that provide travel directions, weather information, restaurant and hotel reservations, appointments and reminders, voice mail, and e-mail. We have developed a prototype system for a mobile device that supports client-side, voice-enabled applications. In fact, the prototype supports multimodal interactions but, here, we focus on voice interaction. The prototype includes six voice-enabled applications and a program manager that manages the applications. In this chapter we describe the prototype, including design issues that we faced, and evaluation methods that we employed in developing a voice-enabled user interface for a mobile device.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Multimodal Interface: The integration of textual, graphical, video, tactile, speech, and other audio interfaces through the use of mouse, stylus, fingers, keyboard, display, camera, microphone, and/or GPS.
Global Positioning System (GPS): A system that is used to obtain geographical coordinates, which includes a GPS satellite and a GPS receiver.
Speech Synthesis: The artificial production of human speech. Speech synthesis technology is also called text-to-speech technology in reference to its ability to convert text into speech.
Hidden Markov Model (HMM): A technique, based on a finite state machine that associates probabilities with phonemes, and pairs of phonemes, that is used in speech recognition systems, to determine the likelihood of an expression spoken by a user of that system.
Web Service: A software application identified by a Uniform Resource Indicator (URI) that is defined, described, and discovered using the eXtensible Markup Language (XML) and that supports direct interactions with other software applications using XML-based messages via an Internet protocol.
Location Aware: An application that is based on a particular physical location, as given by geographical coordinates, physical address, zip code, and so forth, that determines the output of the application.
Mobile Device: For the purposes of this chapter, a handheld device, such as a cell phone or personal digital assistant (PDA), that has an embedded computer and that the user can carry around.
Speech Recognition: The process of interpreting human speech for transcription or as a method of interacting with a computer or a mobile device, using a source of speech input, such as a microphone.