Introduction
to Microsoft Agent
Microsoft®
Agent is a set of programmable software services
that supports the presentation of interactive
animated characters within the Microsoft
Windows® interface. Developers can use
characters as interactive assistants to introduce,
guide, entertain, or otherwise enhance their Web
pages or applications in addition to the
conventional use of windows, menus, and controls.
Microsoft Agent enables software developers and
Web authors to incorporate a new form of user
interaction, known as conversational interfaces,
that leverages natural aspects of human social
communication. In addition to mouse and keyboard
input, Microsoft Agent includes optional support
for speech recognition so applications can
respond to voice commands. Characters can respond
using synthesized speech, recorded audio, or text
in a cartoon word balloon.
The conversational interface approach facilitated
by the Microsoft Agent services does not replace
conventional graphical user interface (GUI)
design. Instead, character interaction can be
easily blended with the conventional interface
components such as windows, menus, and controls
to extend and enhance your application's
interface.
Microsoft Agent's programming interfaces make it
easy to animate a character to respond to user
input. Animated characters appear in their own
window, providing maximum flexibility for where
they can be displayed on the screen. Microsoft
Agent includes an ActiveX® control that makes
its services accessible to programming languages
that support ActiveX, including Web scripting
languages such as Visual Basic® Scripting
Edition (VBScript). This means that character
interaction can be programmed even from HTML
pages using the <OBJECT> tag. Purpose
Microsoft Agent
version 2.0 provides unprecedented technology to
create innovative, new conversational interfaces
for applications and Web pages. It provides
powerful animation capability, interactivity, and
versatility, with incredible ease of development.
Microsoft Agent
is a technology that provides a foundation for
more natural ways for people to communicate with
their computers. It is a set of software services
that enable developers to incorporate interactive
animated characters into their applications and
Web pages. These characters can speak, via a text-to-speech
engine or recorded audio, and even accept spoken
voice commands. Microsoft Agent empowers
developers to extend the user interface beyond
the conventional mouse and keyboard interactions
prevalent today.
Enhancing
applications and Web pages with a visible
interactive personality will both broaden and
humanize the interaction between users and their
computers.
Where
Applicable
There are a
limitless number of roles and functions that
developers can create for these personalities to
perform.
- A
welcome host could greet new users and
provide a guided tour the first time a
computer is turned on, an application is
run, or a Web site is browsed.
- A friendly
tutor could lead someone through a task
or a decision tree with instructions step-by-step
along the way.
- A messenger
could deliver a notification or alert
that a new e-mail has arrived and then
offer to read it to you.
- An
assistant could perform tasks for you
like looking up information on the
Internet and then reading it out loud.
To see a demo of Microsoft Agent Technology click
the View Demo button.
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