4 ms·

If these speech to computer interfaces are so important, why don't we develop a dialect for humans to speak to computers more efficiently, kind of like the graf

If these speech to computer interfaces are so important, why don't we develop a dialect for humans to speak to computers more efficiently, kind of like the grafiti alphabet on the palm pilot but for speech?

pmontra 10y ago
Or the way we google. It would mean acknowledging that the listener (the computer) is severely limited. Actually it happens when speaking with foreigners with low proficiency in our language.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 10y ago
  Acknowledging that the computer is severely limited seems like a good first step. Some people hate thinking of it that way though, and I have no idea why. It's annoying.
wmf 10y ago
While we're at it, maybe all my coworkers could speak in an American accent, too. That would just be so much easier.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 10y ago
  Like Totally!
jnbiche 10y ago
This is an interesting question. I wonder if the limitations are due to particularities of English and other common languages in general, or to particularities of human speech in general.
- ebalit 10y ago
  This poster[1] might be interesting. English spelling-pronunciation mapping is really complex compared to Italian for example. I wonder if Italian would be a better language for speech recognition. Most of speech recognition research is targeted at English, but with similar effort, maybe Italian would enable lower error rates. [1]: http://web.psych.ualberta.ca/~chrisw/ML3/84.pdf http://web.psych.ualberta.ca/~chrisw/ML3/84.pdf
corysama 10y ago
Here's an example, at least for code. "Using Python to Code by Voice" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SkdfdXWYaI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SkdfdXWYaI
rsi_oww 10y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lojban https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lojban ?
- schoen 10y ago
  Communicating with computers was one specific goal of Loglan!
stevetrewick 10y ago
OT, this concept was explored by British author Robert Westall in his 1983 SF dystopia Futuretrack 5 : "Was it just coincidence that computerspeak, which we'd learned with such throat wrenching difficulty, was also a complaining, niggling, nit picking noise that gave any normal human being a pain in the arse?" Now me, I used Graffiti a ton as well as the not quite so single stroke and therefore not so patent encumbered version that MS used on their late PDAs. I even implemented my own version on an early windows touchscreen netbook (angular delta and Levenshtein distance, match) so much so that it still pollutes my hand writing to this very day. I find it elegant and immediately understandable. Every one else thinks I'm writing in pig pen cipher.
contextfree 10y ago
I wonder if we will get there gradually, as "power users" of Siri/OkGoogle/Cortana/etc, and features targeted to them, start to emerge. Initially it won't be couched as a new dialect but more like "shortcuts" which will become more sophisticated over time.

pmontra 10y ago

Or the way we google. It would mean acknowledging that the listener (the computer) is severely limited. Actually it happens when speaking with foreigners with low proficiency in our language.

0xdeadbeefbabe 10y ago
Acknowledging that the computer is severely limited seems like a good first step. Some people hate thinking of it that way though, and I have no idea why. It's annoying.

wmf 10y ago

While we're at it, maybe all my coworkers could speak in an American accent, too. That would just be so much easier.

0xdeadbeefbabe 10y ago
Like Totally!

jnbiche 10y ago

This is an interesting question. I wonder if the limitations are due to particularities of English and other common languages in general, or to particularities of human speech in general.

ebalit 10y ago
This poster[1] might be interesting. English spelling-pronunciation mapping is really complex compared to Italian for example. I wonder if Italian would be a better language for speech recognition. Most of speech recognition research is targeted at English, but with similar effort, maybe Italian would enable lower error rates. [1]: http://web.psych.ualberta.ca/~chrisw/ML3/84.pdf http://web.psych.ualberta.ca/~chrisw/ML3/84.pdf

corysama 10y ago

Here's an example, at least for code. "Using Python to Code by Voice" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SkdfdXWYaI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SkdfdXWYaI

rsi_oww 10y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lojban https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lojban ?

schoen 10y ago
Communicating with computers was one specific goal of Loglan!

stevetrewick 10y ago

OT, this concept was explored by British author Robert Westall in his 1983 SF dystopia Futuretrack 5 : "Was it just coincidence that computerspeak, which we'd learned with such throat wrenching difficulty, was also a complaining, niggling, nit picking noise that gave any normal human being a pain in the arse?" Now me, I used Graffiti a ton as well as the not quite so single stroke and therefore not so patent encumbered version that MS used on their late PDAs. I even implemented my own version on an early windows touchscreen netbook (angular delta and Levenshtein distance, match) so much so that it still pollutes my hand writing to this very day. I find it elegant and immediately understandable. Every one else thinks I'm writing in pig pen cipher.

contextfree 10y ago

I wonder if we will get there gradually, as "power users" of Siri/OkGoogle/Cortana/etc, and features targeted to them, start to emerge. Initially it won't be couched as a new dialect but more like "shortcuts" which will become more sophisticated over time.