Amazon is pushing towards expanding the response skills of its voice assistant, Alexa, according to reports from Venture Beat.
Better Skills
It is reported that very soon Alexa will not be asking users the usual clarifying questions before offering a response. Amazon’s voice assistant will soon have an improved idea of what the user is asking. This is due to Amazon making a solid attempt at pushing or expanding the conservational skills of the assistant.
Categories or Intents
Originally, the voice assistant was able to manage fifteen categories of commands or intents, connected with a voice enquiry. Some of the common categories consist of stop or cancel and help or yes and no. In addition, the programming also includes what are known as slots, similar to a data type. The slots are connected with dates and numbers or cities and the time. In addition, Alexa is also able to offer additional enrichment to the response. For instance, if users question the assistant regarding the weather, Alexa has information related to several climatic factors and is aware of the normal ways in which users ask such questions.
Hundred to Five Thousand
Users can locate and download as well as activate Alexa’s skills from the Marketplace and the original number of skills was hundred. However, that number is now five thousand. Skills can be compared to mobile applications, though they are created for a voice exchange with the assistant, using her command sets and vocabulary. It can relate to outcomes, such as relating a joke or setting up an alarm or dimming smart lights in the room if they are compatible, noting down an appointment, offering local weather reports, etc.
New Intents
In the course of the next few weeks, Amazon is planning to add several hundreds of additional commands and intents to the skills set of Alexa. Initially, these will be available for users in the US alone. The Skills set has tools that are used by developers for creating skills. Amazon is adding new intents and this will make it simpler for developers to build skills in a shorter time.
Tracking Question patterns
Amazon is interested in improving the way in which the voice assistant, Alexa, understands users’ questions and responds to the requests. To do this, Amazon has started tracking the way in which the questions are being framed in order to enhance the understanding of the voice assistant. The company aims at making it easy for the user to get the relevant reply for questions or the correct action from the voice assistant, without resorting to any unnatural language while framing a request or question. Amazon has now made it easier for developers to build the skills of the voice assistant. It has also improved the ability of Alexa while responding to the user’s question framed in a normal or natural language. This will result in an increase in the skills available to Alexa and also an increase in the number of users who want to use the service.