AN ENGINEERING ENVIRONMENT FOR NATURAL LANGUAGE INTERFACES TO INTERACTIVE COMPUTER SYSTEMS

This paper discusses the development of natural language interfaces to interactive computer systems using the NALIGE user interface management system. The task of engineering such interfaces is reduced to producing a set of well-formed specifications which describe lexical, syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic aspects of the selected application domain. These specifications are converted by NALIGE to an autonomous natural language interface that exhibits the prescribed linguistic and functional behavior. Development of several applications is presented to demonstrate how NALIGE and the associated development methodology may facilitate the design and implementation of practical natural language interfaces. This includes a natural language interface to Unix and its subsequent porting to MS-DOS, VAX/VMS, and VM/CMS; a natural language interface for Internet navigation and resource location; a natural language interface for text pattern matching; a natural language interface for text editing; and a natural language interface for electronic mail management. Additionally, design issues and considerations are identified/addressed, such as reuse and portability, content coupling, morphological processing, scalability, and habitability.