Voice Recognition And Response

By Author: peter
Total Articles: 191

Voice recognition and voice response promise to be the easiest method of providing a user interface for data entry and conversational computing, since speech is the easiest, most natural means of human communication. Voice input and output of data have now become technologically and economically feasible for a variety of applications.

Voice recognition systems analyze and classify speech or vocal tract patterns and convert them into digital codes for entry into a computer system. Most voice recognition systems require "training" the computer to recognize a limited vocabulary of standard words for each user. Operators train the system to recognize their voices by repeating each word in the vocabulary about 10 times. Trained systems regularly achieve a 99 percent plus word recognition rate. Speaker-independent voice recognition systems, which allow a computer to understand a voice it has never heard before, are used in a limited number of applications.

Voice recognition devices are used in work situations where operators need to perform data entry without using their hands to key in data or instructions, or where it would Cartier Replica provide faster and more accurate input. For example, voice recognition systems are being used by manufacturers for the inspection, inventory, and quality control of a variety of products, and by airlines and parcel delivery companies for voice-directed sorting of baggage and parcels. Voice recognition is also available for some microcomputer software packages for voice input of data and commands. However, voice input is expected to become very popular for most word processing applications in the next few years.

Voice response devices range from mainframe audio-response units to voice-messaging minicomputers to speech synthesizer microprocessors. Speech microprocessors can be found in toys, calculators, appliances, automobiles, and a variety of other consumer, commercial, and industrial products. Voice-messaging minicomputer and mainframe audio response units use voice-response software to verbally guide an operator through the steps of a task in many kinds of activities. They may also allow computers to respond to verbal and touch-tone input over the telephone. Examples of applications include computerized telephone call switching, telemarketing surveys, bank pay-by-phone bill-paying services, stock quotations services, university registration systems, and customer credit and account balance inquiries.

Optical scanning devices read text or graphics and convert them into digital input for a computer. They include optical character recognition (OCR) equipment that can read special-purpose characters and codes. Optical scanning of pages of text and graphics is especially popular in desktop publishing applications. Thus, optical scanning provides a method of direct input of data from source documents into a computer system. Optical Scanning. There are many types of optical readers, but they all emplo photoelectric devices to scan the characters being read. Reflected light patterns of the data are converted into electronic impulses, which are then accepted as input into the computer system Devices can currently read many types of printing and graphics. Progress is continually being made in improving the reading ability of scanning equipment.

OCR-based optical scanning systems are used extensively in the credit card blink Tag Heuer Replica operations of credit card companies, banks, and oil companies. They are also used to process! Utility bills, insurance premiums, airline tickets, and cash register machine tapes. QCF scanners are used to automatically sort mail, score tests, and process a wide variety of forms ii business and government.

Optical scanning devices such as handheld wands are used to read data on merchandise tags and other media. This frequently involves reading bar coding, a code that utilizes bars to represent characters. Thus, Universal Product Code (UPC) bar coding on packages of food items and other products has become commonplace. For example, UPC bar coding is read by the automated checkout scanners found in many supermarkets. Supermarket scanners emit laser beams, which are reflected off a UPC bar code. The reflected image is converted to electronic impulses, which are sent to the in-store minicomputer, where they are matched with pricing information. Pricing information is returned to the terminal, visually displayed, and printed on a receipt.