A natural language web-based dialogue system with a talking face

In this paper we discuss our research on interactions in a virtual theatre that has been built using VRML and therefore can be accessed through Web pages. In the virtual environment we employ two agents. Presently, our WWW-based virtual theatre allows navigation input through keyboard and mouse. In development is a navigation agent that allows speech input. We also have an information agent which allows a natural language dialogue with the system where the input is keyboard-driven and the output is both screen and (speech) synthesizer based. The system's spoken dialogue contribution is presented by visual speech; that is, a simple 'talking face' on the screen mouths the systems questions and responses