This in not for want of trying many experimental NLI interface systems have been built, and a few have been marketed, but none are in wide-spread use. A variety of interface technologies exist for asking simple queries, filling in forms, filtering email, directly manipulating objects graphically, and even constructing applications using drag and drop components. But there is a significant gap when it comes to constructing complex queries and commands. SQL for databases and scripting languages for various applications make this capability possible. But there is so far no good way to make this easy for non-expert users.
Humans use natural language to communicate such needs.
Conventional natural language interface technology has not succeeded in delivering an easy to use, cost effective, componentized capability. Lexical, syntactic, semantic and pragmatic mismatches occur very often in even the best conventional NLI systems. Conventional NLI systems are expensive to develop and maintain because they must cover many ways a user might paraphrase a question or command. This project addresses the problem of assisting the end user in specifying effective, intuitive information queries and commands targeting multiple information systems. The resulting system can be used as a general purpose natural language interface component, but is specifically applied in the OSA to provide a way for end users to access service specific metadata in an Internet Services Architecture.