Speech interfaces: UI revolution or intelligent evolution?

Speech interfaces have received a lot of attention recently, especially with the marketing blitz for Siri, the new speech interface for the iPhone.

After watching some of the TV commercials you might conclude that you can simply talk to your phone as if it were your friend, and it will figure out what you want. For example, in one scenario the actor asks the phone, “Do I need a raincoat?”, and the phone responds with weather information.

A colleague commented that if he wanted weather information he would just ask for it. As in “What is the weather going to be like in Seattle?” or “Is it going to rain in Seattle?”.

Without more conversational context, if a friend were to ask me, “Do I need a raincoat?”, I would probably respond, “I don’t know, do you?” — jokingly, of course.

Evo or revo?

Are we ready to converse
with our phones and cars?

Kidding aside, systems like Siri raise an important question: Are we about to see a paradigm shift in user interfaces?

Possibly. But I think it will be more of a UI evolution than a UI revolution. In other words, speech interfaces will play a bigger role in UI designs, but that doesn't mean you're about to start talking to your phone — or any other device — as if it’s your best friend.

Currently, speech interfaces are underutilized. The reasons for this aren't yet clear, though they seem to encompass both technical and user issues. Traditionally, speech recognition accuracy rates have been less than perfect. Poor user interface design (for instance, reprompting strategies) has contributed to the overall problem and to increased user frustration.

Also, people simply aren't used to speech interfaces. For example, many phones support voice-dialing, yet most people don't use this feature. And user interface designers seem reluctant to leverage speech interfaces, possibly because of the additional cost and complexity, lack of awareness, or some other reason.


"Relying heavily on speech can lead
to a suboptimal user experience..."
As a further complication, relying heavily on speech as an interface can lead to a suboptimal user experience. Speech interfaces pose some real challenges, including recognition accuracy rates, natural language understanding, error recovery dialogs, UI design, and testing. They aren't the flawless wonders that some marketers would lead you to believe.

Still, I believe there is a happy medium for leveraging speech interfaces as part of a multi-modal interface — one that uses speech as an interface where it makes sense. Some tasks are better suited for a speech interface, while others are not. For example, speech provides an ideal way to provide input to an application when you can capitalize on information stored in the user’s head. But it’s much less successful when dealing with large lists of unfamiliar items.

Talkin' to your ride
Other factors, besides Apple, are driving the growing role of speech interfaces — particularly in automotive. Speech interfaces can, for example, help address the issue of driver distraction. They allow drivers to keep their “eyes on the road and hands on the wheel,” to quote an oft-used phrase.

So, will we see a paradigm shift towards speech interfaces? It's unlikely. I'm hoping, though, that we'll see a UI evolution that makes better use of them.

Think of it more as a paradigm nudge than a paradigm shift.

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Recommended reading

Situation Awareness: a Holistic Approach to the Driver Distraction Problem
Wideband Speech Communications for Automotive: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

 

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Honing, lubrication and oil consumption

Cast iron has been successfully used for monolithic blocks. This is because the casting process can mass-produce large complex shapes. The cylinder bore must have high dimensional accuracy. Honing is the finishing process used to give accurate roundness and straightness. It is performed after the fine boring process. Figure 2.10 shows a micrograph of a honed bore surface.

The honing whetstone carved the crosshatch pattern. During engine operation, the groove of the crosshatch holds lubricating oil. The resulting oil film generates hydrodynamic lubrication Figure 2.11 is a picture of a honing machine. The tool shaft installs a honing head with a segmented whetstone at its end (Fig. 2.12). The whetstone grinds the bore by exerting an expanding pressure. The vertical motion of the head together with revolution generates the crosshatch pattern. The sharpness of the whetstone determines the profile of the crosshatch. A dull honing

stone with an excess pressure gives an unwanted over-smeared surface. Ideally the finished surface exposes graphite without burr. The quality of the honing is measured by surface roughness value.

The graphite in the cast iron block works as a solid lubricant during machining as well as in engine operation. A solid lubricant gives a low frictional force without hydrodynamic lubrication. Graphite, MoS2, WS2,

Sn, and Pb are all well known as solid lubricants. The low frictional force of graphite comes from the fact that the crystal structure has a very low frictional coefficient during slip at the basal plane. Figure 2.13 shows a schematic representation of the mechanism. The crystal slides easily along its basal plane even with a low shear force. The graphite decreases friction for tools during machining. The brittle nature of graphite makes chips discontinuous.The resultant high machinability gives high dimensional accuracy to cast iron parts. The graphite also works as a solid lubricant to prevent seizure of the piston or piston ring even under less oily conditions.

The micro-burr of the crosshatch disrupts the oil film to obstruct hydrodynamic lubrication. Additional Mn-phosphate conversion coating (refer to Appendix H) chemically removes the micro-burr to increase oil retention.This prevents seizure during the running-in stage. As well as dimensional accuracy, the surface profile also determines oil retention which, in turn, greatly influences wear resistance. An appropriate profile should be established. One pass finish with the whetstone usually shapes the surface profile to the normal type shown in Fig. 2.14(a)2. An additional finish, scraping off the peak, generates the trapezoid pattern shown in Fig. 2.14(b). This finishing is called plateau honing.

A customer does not want to change engine oil frequently. Less oil consumption is therefore required. Figure 2.152 compares the oil consumption of a 1.9L car engine, measured by the final oil consumption value (FOC). For a normal type profile, the low Ra = 0.12 μm, middle Ra = 0.4 μm and high Ra = 0.62 μm. For the plateau type, the low Ra = 0.14 μm, middle Ra = 0.32 μm and high Ra = 0.88 μm. The oil consumption is least in the normal type of low Ra. However, it is worth mentioning that the scuffing resistance of the low Ra surface is poor. When the bore wall temperature is high, the plateau surface shows excellent resistance to scuffing although oil consumption is high. This feature comes from the fact that the plateau shape can maintain

more lubricating oil without disrupting the oil film.

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The science and technology of materials in automotive engines

Hiroshi Yamagata

Woodhead Publishing and Maney Publishing

on behalf of

The Institute of Materials, Minerals & Mining

CRC Press

Boca Raton Boston New York Washington, DC

WOODHEAD PUBLISHING LIMITED

Cambridge England

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