Interactive Speech Systems

When we use a computer system to perform a certain task, the computer system acts both as a tool and as a partner in communication. It would be stretching the sense of the term “communication” beyond reasonable limits to say that one communicates with a spade when using it. The computer is different to the spade in important ways. The user must input information in some form in order to make the system execute. Similarly, to inform the user of its state, processes and their results, the computer must output information to the user. The information which is being exchanged between user and system during task performance can be represented in different forms, or modalities, using a variety of different input/output devices. For a wide range of tasks, the system can achieve task adequacy as a tool by exchanging information with its users in ways that are completely different to those of human-human communication, such as through a keyboard and mouse as input devices, the screen as an output device and typed command notation as the key modality for representing input information. With or without the inclusion of typed command input notation, this form of interaction is called the graphical user interface (GUI) paradigm.