Speak4it: multimodal interaction for local search

Abstract

Speak4itSM is a consumer-oriented mobile search application that leverages multimodal input and output to allow users to search for and act on local business information. It supports true multimodal integration where user inputs can be distributed over multiple input modes. In addition to specifying queries by voice (e.g., "bike repair shops near the golden gate bridge") users can combine speech and gesture. For example, "gas stations" + will return the gas stations along the specified route traced on the display. We provide interactive demonstrations of Speak4it on both the iPhone and iPad platforms and explain the underlying multimodal architecture and challenges of supporting multimodal interaction as a deployed mobile service.