Usability of Speech Dialog Systems: Listening to the Target Audience (Signals and Communication Technology)

Many technical issues like speech recognition and signal processing have to be addressed for the design of speech communication systems. However, before designing a speech application starts, 3 key questions that have to be answered: who will use it, why and how often? Only if the designer is clear about these questions, he is able to provide a maximum of target group orientation. This book gives focuses on these high-level questions and gives a criteria when and how to design speech systems. After an introduction, the state of the art in modern voice user interfaces is displayed. The following parts of the book evolve criteria for designing and evaluating successful voice user interfaces. In the last chapter, outlines and trends of this fast growing area are displayed. "Automatic speech dialog systems - even those that are successful on the market - often enough gain a bad reputation in public opinion. From an engineering point of view this verdict may seem unjustified, in view of the fact that these systems have been undergoing a technical maturing process in recent years." "It is the aim of this book to share views from forward-looking experts from industry and academia, presenting their strategies and approaches toward the future of user-friendly speech dialog systems." "Contributors spotlight issues such as automatic user classification, uncovering users' interaction schemes, speech interaction as part of multimodal user interfaces, the relation between subjective and objective data, and the role of voice and style in designing a brand-specific acoustic experience."--Jacket