|
Beyond VoiceXML 2.0
By Jim
Larson and
Scott McGlashan
The W3C Voice Browser Working Group (VBWG) reviewed
over 700 requests for change to VoiceXML 1.0. After
careful deliberation, many of these were adopted, resulting
in VoiceXML 2.0 which became a recommendation in March.
The VBWG is now working on two efforts to make VoiceXML
even better:
VoiceXML 2.1 contains features already implemented
by speech platform venders. These include (a) dynamic
reference of grammars and scripts, (b) a <data>
element to fetch XML data structures, and (c) facilities
to record utterances during recognition. VoiceXML 2.1
is completely backward compatible with VoiceXML 2.0:
all VoiceXML 2.0 applications will run without modification
under VoiceXML 2.1. For more details, see
http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/WD-voicexml21-20040323/
V3 is the code name for the follow-on to VoiceXML 2.0.
Requirements for V3 are derived from deferred VoiceXML
2.0 change requests, the SALT 1.0 and XHTML + Voice
1.0 (X+V) contributions to W3C, as well as the Multimodal
Interaction and other W3C Working Groups. V3 will support:
- Modularization
-- a set of modules with common external interfaces.
This enables dialog designers to mix and match voice
with other modes of input, including keyboard and
pen. For example, A V3 module for speech recognition
might be embedded into XHTML, enabling a graphical
web page to accept speech input from the user.
- Extensibility
-- to extend the power of dialog management. VoiceXML
2.0 already supports both system-directed and mixed
initiative dialogs. V3 will allow for plan-based or
rules-based dialog definition by enabling the dialog
author to define new dialog strategies based on low-level
components.
- Low-level
control of media resources -- including speech recognition,
speech synthesis, and audio replay. Using these resources,
application developers will be able to specify their
own control structures, enabling a procedural style
of dialog specification similar to that used by SALT
developers in addition to the declarative programming
style of VoiceXML 2.0 enabled by the Forms Interpretation
Algorithm.
The Voice Browser Working Group will continue to coordinate
with the Multimodal Interaction Working Group to guarantee
the compatibility of V3 with the multimodal languages.
back
to the top
Copyright
© 2001-2004 VoiceXML Forum. All rights reserved.
The VoiceXML Forum is a program of the
IEEE
Industry Standards and Technology Organization (IEEE-ISTO).
|