Make a shorter list by entering letters via DTMF

How to make a list in a voice app shorter by entering letters via DTMFPavel Růžička, January 2012T-Mobile Czech Republic

Agenda•List – hidden treasure of VoiceObjects•When a list is too long•How to enter letters via DTMF•Let the user navigate by a letter•Optimization•Summary•Example to import into your project•Resources 2Pavel Růžička, January 2012T-Mobile Czech Republic

List object – a treasure of VoiceObjects•allows users go through collection of data •without significant effort of a developer •its like an audible excel sheet with unified navigation 3 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

When a list is too long Afghanistan Albania Algeria American Samoa • Imagine a list of countries Andorra Angola Anguilla Antarctica Antigua And Barbuda • Isnt it cruel to let the user go Argentina Armenia through 216 items to reach Aruba Australia Turkey? Austria Azerbaijan Bahamas Bahrain Bangladesh Barbados Belarus Belgium Belize Benin Bermuda Bhutan Bolivia Bosnia And Herzegowina ... ... Trinidad And Tobago Tunisia Turkey ... ... Zimbabwe 4 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Make the user closer to the target Taiwan Tajikistan Tanzania • make the list alphabetically Thailand Togo ordered Tokelau Tonga Trinidad And Tobago Tunisia • offer items starting with a chosen letter Turkey Turkmenistan Turks And Caicos Islands Tuvalu • approximatelly 12 items starting with the same letter • Turkey is 10th • isnt that nice?  5 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Is it possible to enter letters via DTMF? • of course by CCITT it recognizes also A,B,C and D • but not on common phones. Its too little, its useless. • there is other possibility – users know it from sending SMS • e.g. for B you need to press the key twice A-2 B - 22 ... O - 666 ... Z - 9999 6 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

What do we need to get a letter from DTMF digits? • input object with grammar for 1-4 digits • good explanation what you expect from the user • translation collection • VALUESUBSTITUTION expression 7 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Input with TTG grammar and with translation expression 8 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Translation the input result value 9 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Digits are translated – but what if user needs to enter a real digit? • the approach of translation prevents users to enter the real value of a key • we should offer an alternative how to enter any digit • only one key at once is valid for generating a letter • we can recognize different key as a request for suppressing the translation • if the entered value is not in the translation collection – return the first pressed key • 22 will be translated as B • 963, 7*, 54 are not in translation collection only first digit will be taken: 9, 7, 5 10 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Check if the entered value can be translated • FINDROW expression to check if the value exists in the translation collection 11 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Translation or assign unchanged value?• CONDASSIGN expression to conditionally assign translated or unchanged value• LEFT to return only the first pressed digit (unchanged value) 12 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Wrap it to sequence with confirmation• Confirmation object to confirm and, if necessary, to correct information from the preceding dialog 13 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Long list - let the user navigate by the first letter • filter out unnecessary items Taiwan • copy the collection to a temporary collection Tajikistan Tanzania and then with ITERATE and DELETEROW Thailand expressions delete redundant items Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad And Tobago Tunisia • scroll the list down to the first item Turkey Turkmenistan starting with chosen letter Turks And Caicos Islands Tuvalu • you need to find row index of the item going through the collection using LOOP object or ITERATE expression with INDEX • then update row index of the list • you have to ensure there is at least one item starting with the letter 14 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Other optimization• include special chars to the translation collection like _ . @ # <row> <col name="key">1</col> <col name="default">.</col> </row> <row> <col name="key">11</col> <col name="default">_</col> </row> <row> <col name="key">*</col> <col name="default">@</col> </row>• since grammar allows to enter 4 digits its good to translate 4th press of a key with only 3 letters as well as 3rd letter to help users avoid of mistyping <row> <col name="key">8</col> <col name="default">T</col> </row> <row> <col name="key">88</col> <col name="default">U</col> </row> <row> <col name="key">888</col> <col name="default">V</col> </row> <row> <col name="key">8888</col> <col name="default">V</col> </row> 15 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

More than one letter at once• enhanced algorithm could allow to enter more than one letter at once • grammar needs to be changed • way of confirmation needs to be changed to confirm after whole input • whole input needs to be splitted by clusters of the same key to collection, then translated • real digit in the input could be followed by an asterisk (*) or by 1 wich has no meaning• could be useful for experienced users, special applications, admin interfaces • you can enter alphanumeric password, e-mail address etc... 16 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Summary• create a special input for entering a letter by numbers with proper grammar • sequence with confirmation will make it much more useful• fill the translation collection and implement translation into postprocessing of the input• use the letter from the input for your alphabetically ordered list as an key for filtering or scrolling down• here is an example with the translation collection to import into your project  17 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Resources• Natural Dialog Management.pdf• VoiceObjects Help 18 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

Pavel Růžička Programmer – Analyst Service Development DepartmentT-Mobile Czech Republic a.s. Tomíčkova 2144/1, 149 00 Praha 4 T-Mobile: +420 603 416 974 E-Mail: pavel.ruzicka@t-mobile.cz 19 Pavel Růžička, January 2012 T-Mobile Czech Republic

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Make a shorter list by entering letters via DTMF

by Pavel Růžička

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