Voice User Interface Design VUI

Oh yeah, it’s that time of the year again. If you’re planning to attend this year’s SpeechTEK in New York, please stop by and say hi.

Also, you can now look at the final version of the program. In particular, I would like to invite you to the following sessions:

1. Introduction to Voice User Interface Design (STKU-2)

   Sunday August 23rd, from 1:30 PM to 5:00 PM. This workshop is designed to quickly get those new to VUI design up-to-speed so they can make the most of the Principles of VUI Design track at the conference

2. Efficient Design (B102)

   Monday August 24rd, from 11:15 AM to 12:00 PM. Here we’ll talk about “Truths and Myths About Reusable Designs”. How can you design for reuse? Can user requirements be captured the standard way?

3. Bilingual Spanish/English Design (B301)

   Wednesday August 26th, from 10:45 AM to 11:30 AM. Here we’ll talk about “How to Present Names of
   Geographical Locations in Spanish Systems”. Yes, listening for and capturing names of places seems like a trivial task, but what factors should be considered when making translation/pronunciation decision? What do those decisions say about you and your company?

Safe travels, and see you there.

Finally had a chance to look at this month’s cover article of the SpeechTEK magazine. What a joy! I was very pleased to see that once again, the topic of Translations (which I often refer to as “Transgressions”) comes up in an attempt to raise awareness about the implications of simply taking content in once language and doing a straight 1:1 translation without any consideration for cultural issues and linguistic nuances. As the author pointed out, translations are “a quick, cheap, lousy idea.” (well said!)

As the article points out, in the particular case of IVR systems there are various syntax and grammatical issues to consider as well as code implications and underlying logic divergences derived from those structural differences – it’s not just a matter of word order!

Furthermore, the author makes a really good point about the dual nature of IVR and Speech Recognition systems in the sense that we should not only be careful about what we say and how we say it (the outgoing activity) but also about the incoming activity – what callers say, how they say it, etc.

Along with the list of Tricks of the Trade provided, things such as the use of a native speaker for reviewing localized Dialog are of utmost importance.

Finally, one of the topics that often comes up when dealing with countries where more than one variety of the same language are spoken (for example, Spanish in the US), is the issue of which “version” of the language should be spoken so as to accommodate various countries of origin – normally referred to as “neutral Spanish”. I loved the definition they used because it captures the complexity of finding that middle ground while still taking into consideration the technical/financial implications and realities which we often face in our projects – “the neutral version of any accent is the version that offends the fewest people”

Happy Reading!

As promised, here’s a copy of my presentation from this year’s SpeechTEK in New York: “Customers Request the Darndest Things – 10 Challenges for VUI Designers”

Description: Business owners have business goals, objectives, and requirements. Designers bring experience and advocate user needs throughout the design process. So how can we create outstanding experiences when objectives may seem to clash or customers have preconceptions about “how the system should work”? Explore some common challenges, understand the real issues behind resistance, and discover how to focus instead on successful systems.

Thoughts?

A friend of mine sent me this, and I thought it was really funny. It seems IVRs are entering prime time television not only in the US (as seen in the “Saturday Night Live” sketches of Julie) but in other countries too. It is interesting how even though we all speak different languages, we always somehow manage to repeat the same mistakes in any language, don’t you think?

Unfortunately, the interaction isn’t that far off from some of the actual live calls I’ve heard from systems our there in productions – specially trying to avoid transferring the caller, but we’re all working on fixing that, right?

You can watch the video below, and if you don’t speak French, here’s a brief transcript of the interaction so you can read and weep:

• “Lady” calls in but person isn’t available (gets voicemail message)
• Attempts to leave voice message but system interrupts with “If you’re satisfied with your message, press 1.”
• Caller says she isn’t satisfied and again is interrupted by “To record it again, press 2.”
• Caller presses 2… and the advanced dialog begins… the system says “You’ve pressed 2. If you’re satisfied with choosing 2, press 1.”
• Caller presses 1, system says “You’ve pressed 1. Press 3 if you’ve chosen 1 because you’re satisifed with your message. Or 4 if you’ve chosen 1 because you’re satisfied with pressing 2 because you’re not satisfied with your message.”
• Caller hesitates to system helps with “Press 5 if you want 10 more seconds to press 3 because you want 2, or press 6 for 10 seconds to press 4 because you want 1 because you would like 2. Press 7 to start over. 8 to hear this again. Or 9 to not hear it anymore.”
• Caller presses 7 so system asks “Was that 9?”
• You get the picture…

By popular demand, here’s a list of the Top 10 Strategies VUI Designers can follow to design a Spanish application, as published in SpeechTEK’s magazine:

1. Make Spanish as important as any other language
2. Apply Spanish Marketing 101: understand your market
3. Follow user-centric design methodologies: combine usage-case scenario analysis with actual observation
4. Seek professional advice on localization: translations aren’t enough, consider all language, cultural and branding aspects
5. There’s no such thing as “neutral Spanish”: carefully design your persona and coach your voice talent
6. Anticipate recognition, tuning and text-to-speech challenges early: Spanish modules and tools aren’t as robust as English
7. Adapt the transcription process: specific transcription conventions for multilingual utterances
8. Eliminate duplicate documentation: keep all languages synchronized in a single document
9. Context, context, contex: localize the entire dialog and check and check for coherent flow
10. Identify divergence during development: adapt code to dialogue, not the other way around

You can also download the full article: Bueno – Are you listening to your Spanish Speakers