A Dialogue manager for task-oriented agents based on dialogue building-blocks and generic cognitive processing

Abstract

This paper introduces a novel dialogue manager, called DAISY, for intelligent virtual agents. The proposed approach is based on two central concepts: (i) dialogue building-blocks, which offer a systematic approach to the representation and implementation of human-agent dialogue, and (ii) cognitive processing in the form of sequences of simple, generic cognitive actions. The generic nature of the cognitive actions makes it possible to represent a large variety of cognitive processing (e.g, retrieving and manipulating memory content) by using a rather small set of such actions. DAISY is illustrated by means of a specific example, namely an agent acting as an information system for travel and tourist information. The example highlights the usefulness of the systematic approach offered by DAISY.