Abstract
This paper describes the prototype of a conversational agent embedded within a collaborative virtual environment. This prototype —Ulysse — accepts spoken utterances from a user enabling him or her to navigate within relatively complex virtual worlds. It also accepts and executes commands to manipulate objects in the virtual world. We are beginning to adapt our agent to parse certain written descriptions of simultaneous actions of world entities and to animate these entities according to the given description.
The paper first describes what we can expect from a spoken interface to improve the interaction quality between a user and virtual worlds. Then it describes Ulysse's architecture, which includes a speech recognition device together with a speech synthesiser. Ulysse consists of a chart parser for spoken words, a semantic analyser, a reference resolution system, a geometric reasoner, a dialogue manager, and an animation manager, and has been integrated in the DIVE virtual environment. Ulysse can be ‘personified’ using a set of behavioural rules. A number of tests have demonstrated its usefulness for user navigation. We are currently developing simulations of written reports of car accidents within Ulysse; such simulations provide dynamic recreations of accident scenarios for individual and collaborative reviewing and assessment.
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Bersot, O., El Guedj, P.O., Godéreaux, C. et al. A conversational agent to help navigation and collaboration in virtual worlds. Virtual Reality 3, 71–82 (1998). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01409799
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01409799