title: Commercial applications of speech interface technology: an industry at the threshold.
abstract: Speech interface technology, which includes automatic speech recognition, synthetic speech, and natural language processing, is beginning to have a significant impact on business and personal computer use. Today, powerful and inexpensive microprocessors and improved algorithms are driving commercial applications in computer command, consumer, data entry, speech-to-text, telephone, and voice verification. Robust speaker-independent recognition systems for command and navigation in personal computers are now available; telephone-based transaction and database inquiry systems using both speech synthesis and recognition are coming into use. Large-vocabulary speech interface systems for document creation and read-aloud proofing are expanding beyond niche markets. Today's applications represent a small preview of a rich future for speech interface technology that will eventually replace keyboards with microphones and loud-speakers to give easy accessibility to increasingly intelligent machines.
mesh_terms: D003201:Computers; D004282:Documentation; D006801:Humans; D007256:Information Systems; D008838:Microcomputers; D013060:Speech; D013067:Speech Perception; D013689:Telephone; D014584:User-Computer Interface; D014831:Voice