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DEPARTMENT OF COMPUTER SCIENCE & INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

GURU GHASIDAS VISHWAVIDYALAYA, BILASPUR


(A Central University)

A
Major Project Report
ON
“PERSONAL VOICE ASSISTANT”
MCA 6th Semester
(Session: 2020-21)
SUBMITTED BY
SATYA PRAKASH
ROLL NO.-18606050
Enroll No:- GGV/18/5070

SUBMITTED TO UNDER THE


GUIDANCE OF
PUSHPLATA PUJARI AKHILESH SHRIVAS
HOD ( CSIT Dept. ) ASSISTANT PRO. (CSIT
Dept.)

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 CERTIFICATE OF COMPLETION

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ACKNOWLEDGMENT
“Task successful” makes everyone happy. But the happiness
will be gold without glitter if we didn’t state the persons who have
supported us to make it a success.
Success will be crowned to people who made it a reality but
the people whose constant guidance and encouragement made it possible
will be crowned first on the eve of success.
This acknowledgement transcends the reality of formality when
we would like to express deep gratitude and respect to all those people
behind the screen who guided, inspired and helped me for the completion
of our project work.
I consider myself lucky enough to get such a good project. This project
would add as an asset to my academic profile.
I would like to express my thankfulness to my project guide,
AKHILESH SHRIVAS for her constant motivation and valuable help
through the project work, and I express my gratitude to
VAIBHAV JAJODIYA, Director of JAJODIYA TECH SOLUTION, Bilaspur,
for his constant supervision, guidance and co-operation through-out the
project.
I also extend my thanks to my Team Members for their co-
operation during my course.
Finally I would like to thanks my friends for their co-operation
to complete this project.

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SATYA PRAKASH

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ABSTRACT
Adoption of social network sites and use of smart phones with number of
sensors in them has digitized user’s activities in real-time. Smart phone
applications such as calendar, email, and notes contain lot of user
information and provide a view into user’s activities, while sensors such as
GPS sensor can be used to passively find information about the user. In
addition to this user and device data, these devices have access to the
Internet that can be leveraged to build powerful applications.

Personal voice assistant software (smart agent) can be used as an


interface to the digital world to make the consumption of this information
timely and efficient for the user’s specific tasks. Goal of the thesis is to
design personal assistant software that understands the semantics of the
task, is able to decompose the task into multiple tasks within the context
of the user and plan these tasks for the user. It will be designed using
semantic web technologies and knowledge databases to understand the
relations between the tasks. Agent will be integrated with online web-
services to harvest the data available online with the data available on the
device and help the user to manage his or her tasks.

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CONTENTS
1. INRODUCTION 1
1.1 INTRODUCTION 1
1.2 PROBLEM STATEMENT 2
1.3 BACKGROUND 3
1.4 OBJECTIVES 4

2. PERSONAL ASSISTANT SOFTWARE IN THE MARKET 5


2.1 GOALS OF PERSONAL ASSISTANT SOFTWARE 5
2.2 DIFFERENT TYPES OF PERSONAL ASSISTANT SOFTWARE 5
2.2.1 VOICE RECOGNITION AS INPUT ENTRY MEDIUM 5
2.2.2 VOICE RECOGNITION BASED TASK AUTOMATION
OR INFORMATION RETRIEVAL 5
2.2.3 PLANNING 6
2.3 HISTORY OF VOICE ASSISTANTS 6
2.4 WHAT ARE INTELLIGENT PERSONAL ASSISTANTS OR
AUTOMATED PERSONAL ASSISTANTS? 8
2.5 HOW DO ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE ASSISTANTS
INTERACT WITH PEOPLE? 10

3. CHAPTER-3 FEASIBILITY REPORT 11


3.1 TECHNICAL FEASIBILITY 11
3.2 OPERATION FEASIBILITY 12
3.3 ECONOMICAL FEASIBILITY 12

4. SOFTWARE AND HARWARE REQUIREMENT


SPECIFICATIONS 13
4.1 INTRODUCTION 13
4.1.1 PURPOSE 13
4.1.2 SCOPE 13
4.2 DEVELOPERS RESPONSIBILITIES OVERVIEW 13
4.3 REQUIRED FEATURES OF SYSTEM 13
4.4 REQUIRED SOFTWARE SPECIFICATION 14
4.5 REQUIRED HARDWARE SPECIFICATION 14

5 SELECTED SOFTWARE AND HARDWARE 15


5.1 SOFTWARE SELECTED 15
5.2 PYTHON 3.7 VERSION 17
5.3 PYCHARM IDE 2019.1.3 22

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6. BUILDING OF PERSONAL VOICE ASSISTANT 27
6.1 BUILDING A PERSONAL VOICE ASSISTANT 27
6.2 DEPENDENCIES AND REQUIREMENTS 28
6.3 LET’S START BUILDING OUR DESKTOP VOICE ASSISTANT
USING PYTHON 28
6.4 FLOW-CHART 32
6.5 DATA FLOW DIAGRAM 33

7. PROS AND CONS OF PERSONAL VOICE ASSISTANT 34


7.1 PROS 34
7.2 CONS 35
7.3 ADVANTAGES OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN
PERSONAL VOICE ASSISTANT 36
7.4 DISADVANTAGES OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN
PERSONAL VOICE ASSISTANT 38

8 CONCLUSION 40

9. FUTURE ENHANCEMENTS 41

10. BIBLOGRAPHY 42

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CHAPTER-1
INTRODUCTION
1.1 INTRODUCTION
The basic idea behind this project is to create a simple stand-alone
application that helps less tech savvy people in the world to use the
computer without feeling ignorant or computer illiterate.
Computers have become a very important devices and as well as less
expensive over time.
The application works same like Siri/ Google Assistant etc. But the
application deals with the computer itself mainly.
The U.I of the application is self-explanatory and minimal.
Currently it takes text as input as most of the people are not very good at
speaking.

Nowadays the Mobile Technology is being very famous for the User
Experience, because it is very easy to access the applications and services
from anywhere of your Geo-location. Android, Apple, Windows, Blackberry,
etc. are various famous and commonly used Mobile Operating Systems. All
the Operating Systems provides plenty of applications and services for
users.
For an instance, the Contacts Applications is used to store the contact
details of the user's contact and also helps user to connect a call or send
an SMS to other person using the contents stored in this application. We
can get similar types of application all around the world via Apple Store,
Play Store, etc. All this features gives birth to various kinds of sensors or
functionalities to be implemented in the mobile devices.
The Most famous application of iPhone is “SIRI” which helps the end user
to communicate end user to mobile with voice and it also responds to the
voice commands of the user. Same kind of application is also developed by
the Google that is “Google Voice Search” which is used for in Android
Phones. But this Application mostly works with Internet Connections. But
our Proposed System has capability to work with and without Internet
Connectivity.
It’s named as Personal Assistant with Voice Recognition Intelligence, which
takes the user input in form of voice or text and process it and returns the

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output in various forms like action to be performed or the search result is
dictated to the end user.

One of the goals of Artificial intelligence is the realization of natural


dialogue between humans and machines in recent years, the dialogue
systems, also known as interactive conversational systems are the fastest
growing area in AI Many companies have used the dialogue systems
technology to establish various kinds of Virtual Personal Assistants(VPAs)
based on their applications and areas, such as Microsoft’s Cortana, Apple’s
Siri, Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, and Facebook’s M. However, in this
proposal, I have used the single modal dialogue system which processes
user input mode, such as speech in order to design the Next Generation of
PVAs model The new model of PVAs will be used to increase the interaction
between humans and the machines by using different technologies, such
as gesture recognition, image/video recognition, speech recognition, the
vast dialogue and conversational knowledge base, and the general
knowledge base. Moreover, the new PVAs system can be used in other
different areas of applications, including education assistance, medical
assistance, personal voice assistants and vehicles, disabilities systems,
home automation, and security access control.

1.2 PROBLEM STATEMENT


Artificial Intelligence personal assistants have become plentiful over the
last few years. Applications such as Siri, Bixby, Ok Google and Cortana
make mobile device users’ daily routines that much easier. You may be
asking yourself how these functions. Well, the assistants receive external
data (such as movement, voice, light, GPS readings, visually defined
markers, etc.) via the hardware’s sensors for further processing - and take
it from there to function accordingly.
Not too long ago, building an AI assistant was a small component of
developers’ capacities; however, nowadays, it is quite a realistic objective
even for novice programmers. To create a simple personal AI assistant,
one simply needs dedicated software and around an hour of working time.
It would take much more time, though, to create something more
advanced and conceptually innovative. Nonetheless, well thought-out
concepts can result in a great base for a profitable startup. Let us consider

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the six most renowned applications based on artificial intelligence concepts
that can help create your virtual AI assistant app.

1.3 BACKGROUND

Siri. Siri is Apple Inc.’s cloud software that can answer users’ various
questions and give recommendations, due to its voice processing
mechanisms. When in use, Siri studies the user's’ preferences (like
contextual advertising) to provide each person with an entirely individual
approach. This software solution is also useful for developers; the
presence of API called SiriKit provides smooth integration with new
applications developed for iOS and watchOS platforms.

Ok Google. Ok Google is an Android-based voice recognition application,


which is launched by users uttering commands of the same name. This
software features very advanced functions including web search, route
optimization, memo scheduling etc. that can collectively help users solve a
wide array of daily tasks. Like Siri, the creators of Ok Google offer Google
Voice Interaction API. This interface can become a truly indispensable tool
in the development of mobile applications for the Android platform.

Cortana. A virtual intelligent assistant with the function of voice


recognition and AI elements, Cortana was developed for such platforms as
Windows, iOS, Android, and XBox One. It can predict users’ wants and
needs based on their search requests, e-mails, etc. One of Cortana’s
distinguishable features is her sense of humor. “She” can sing, make jokes
and speak to users
informally.

Amazon Echo. Amazon Echo combines hardware and software that can
search the web, help with scheduling of upcoming tasks and play various
sound files all based on voice recognition. A small speaker equipped with
sound sensors, the device can be automatically activated by exclaiming
“Alexa.”

Nina. Software with AI elements that has a main goal of narrowing down
the amount of physical effort spent on the solution of daily tasks (web
search, scheduling, etc.) Due to elaborate analytical mechanisms, Nina
becomes “smarter” with every day of personal utilization.

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Bixby. Samsung’s Bixby application is another successful implementation
of the AI concept. It also builds a unique user approach, based on interests
and habits. Bixby features advanced voice recognition mechanisms, and
uses the camera to identify images, based on markers and GPS.

1.4 OBJECTIVES

Main objective of this thesis is to show feasibility of building a personal


voice assistant software (a smart agent) using python data sources
available on the web, user generated content, data providing knowledge
from knowledge databases as well as from inference technologies of web
3.0.

To design a smart agent that has contextual information about the user
and helps in managing and planning tasks, using python web technologies
and open data available on the Internet. Contextual information about the
user can be location, current time, calendar appointments, relation
between tasks, decomposition of tasks, past history of tasks, user
interests, likes etc. Agent can use data gathered about the user as well as
environment data to better understand what each of the tasks mean and
decompose the tasks based on sequence of steps stored in its knowledge
base and then plan individual tasks.

Planning part of the agent will strive to optimize resources and try to
improve productivity of the user. It can be used as a time management
application as well as a task management application. By combining,
related tasks together that can be completed at the same time and around
the same location, agent will optimize the user’s resources to complete
these tasks.

A feedback loop from the user will help the agent to make decisions when
there are multiple paths and agent does not have sufficient information to
make those decisions.

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Assumptions, limitations and constraints in the solution will be highlighted
and any additional infrastructure necessary as a complement to the
system will be identified.

CHAPTER-2
PERSONAL ASSISTANT SOFTWARE IN THE
MARKET

2.1 GOALS OF PERSONAL ASSISTANT SOFTWARE

Goal of a personal assistant software is to act as an interface into


the digital world by understanding user requests or commands and
then translating into actions or recommendations based on agent’s
understanding of the world. This understanding of the world is
modeled in a knowledge base that contains relationships,
connections and rules between various concepts of the world. These
agents, at least at present are not expected to replace humans but
can be delegated mundane tasks that user would otherwise not be
interested in doing or efficiently doing these mundane tasks by
processing large amounts of relevant and real-time information on
the web.

2.2 DIFFERENT TYPES OF PERSONAL ASSISTANT SOFTWARE

There have been multiple approaches to building personal assistant


software, based on how the user enters the tasks and how the
system interprets them.

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2.2.1 VOICE RECOGNITION AS INPUT ENTRY MEDIUM

In this category of personal assistant software, focus is relieving the


user of entering text input and using voice as primary means of user
input. Agent then applies voice recognition algorithms to this input
and records the input. It may then use this input to call one of the
personal information management applications such as task list or
calendar to record a new entry.

2.2.2 VOICE RECOGNITION BASED TASK AUTOMATION OR


INFORMATION RETRIEVAL

In this category of personal assistant software, focus is on capturing


the user input thru voice, recognizing the input and then executing
the tasks if the agent understands the task. Software takes this
input in natural language, and so makes it easier for the user to
input what he or she desires to be done. SIRI and Google Glass fall
under this category of software.

2.2.3 PLANNING

In this category of personal assistant software, focus is on


understanding the task, sub tasks associated with it and then
creating a plan for the user to complete the tasks. SIRI for certain
supported tasks such as booking a reservation at a restaurant using
web services such as OpenTable and the agent designed as part of
thesis belong to this category.

2.3 HISTORY OF VOICE ASSISTANTS

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A modern history of Voice Assistants

In recent times, Voice assistants got the major platform after Apple
integrated the most astonishing Virtual Assistant — Siri which is
officially a part of Apple Inc. But the timeline of greatest evolution
began with the year 1962 event at the Seattle World Fair where
IBM displayed a unique apparatus called Shoebox. It was the actual
size of a shoebox and could perform scientific functions and can
perceive 16 words and also speak them in the human recognizable
voice with 0 to 9 numerical digits.
During the period of the 1970s, researchers at Carnegie Mellon
University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania — with the considerable help
of the U.S Department of Defence and its Defence Advanced
Research Projects Agency (DARPA) — made Harpy. It could
understand almost 1,000 words, which is approximately the
vocabulary of a three-year-old child.
Big organizations like Apple and IBM sooner in the 90s started to
make things that utilized voice acknowledgment. In 1993,
Macintosh began to building speech recognition with its Macintosh
PCs with PlainTalk.
In April 1997, Dragon NaturallySpeaking was the first constant
dictation product which could comprehend around 100 words and
transform it into readable content.

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Having said that, how cool it would be to build a simple voice-based
desktop/laptop assistant that has the capability to:-
1. Open the YouTube in the browser.
2. Open any website in the browser.
3. Send an email to your contacts.
4. Launch any system application.
5. Tells you the current weather and temperature of almost any city
6. Tells you the current time.
7. Greetings
8. Play you a song on VLC media player(of course you need to
have  VLC media player installed in your laptop/desktop)
9. Change desktop wallpaper. 
10. Tells you latest news feeds.
11. Tells you about almost anything you ask.
So here in this article, we are going to build a voice-based
application which is capable of doing all the above-mentioned tasks.

2.4 WHAT ARE INTELLIGENT PERSONAL ASSISTANTS OR


AUTOMATED PERSONAL ASSISTANTS?
Intelligent Personal Assistant has the ability to organize and
maintain information and includes the management of emails,

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calendar events, files, and to do lists. Some automated personal
assistants can perform concierge type tasks or provide information
based on voice input or commands and some smart personal
agents, which can automatically perform management or data
handling tasks based on online information without user initiation or
interaction.
Intelligent Agents can be classified based on their degree of
perceived intelligence and capability such as simple reflex agents,
model-based reflex agents, goal-based agents, utility-based agents
and learning agents.
The Intelligent Personal Assistant software is an application that has
been designed to assist people with basic tasks using an inbuilt
natural language user interface. Intelligent personal assistants help
answer and respond to queries based on the data that the user
inputs into it. They are ropersonal voice assistants that help solve
problems in real-time which enhances human capability and
productivity.
 Calendar & Meeting Reminder: Intelligent Personal Assistant
schedule meetings & appointments reminders instantly on behalf
of the user. IPAs also helps the user remember everything they
have set it to remind them and send the user signals, photos,
links and more via SMS, emails or other means. This software
can set alarms to tell the user of an upcoming event or task.
 Automation: Help to automate most of the essential functions
that the user wants. The user can utilize IPAs to do research,
identify landmarks, shop, and translate foreign languages among
other tasks.
 Natural Conversation: Intelligent Personal Assistant can
understand and respond to complex questions. It recognizes the
intent of the user's inquiry, personalizes the responses based on
context, and troubleshoots the problem using conversational
strategies when answering social questions, reacting to customer
frustrations and even becomes a live chat agent when need be.
The user can create reminders, ask questions and even type
anything they want by speaking to the program.

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 Recommending: They can recommends things, places and
items to the user. The user can find whatever they need
including shops, hospitals and more with a swipe or tap.
 Smarter Learning: Artificial intelligence technology uses
personal voice assistanth machine learning and natural language
understanding which allows it to obtain industry-specific
knowledge and unique business data and thus can do marketing
for an enterprise.
 Integration: They can be set up in any digital channel instantly
or later on. IPA also integrates into the human-assisted
engagements by either consolidating with an unseen coach or
transferring all relevant data when switching to live chat, to
ensure that the user experience is never disturbed.

2.5 HOW DO ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE ASSISTANTS


INTERACT WITH PEOPLE?
As technology evolves, the ways people interact with it also
changes. Think about how internet searches have become easier. It
wasn’t long ago that an internet search had to be very specific and
would often yield strange and unrelated results. Now, it seems like
search engines, such as Google, can almost read your mind and
know exactly what you are looking for. Engines understand context
and the intent of your search.

Artificial intelligence assistants have also evolved. Early on, text


was the only way to interact with an assistant app (typing in a
phrase triggered a response). Now, voice has taken over.
Assistant apps or smart speakers are always listening for their wake
words. By default, the words “Hey Siri,” “OK Google,” “Hey Google,”
and “Alexa” are the standards on their respective devices, but users
can personalize their wake words to some degree. “Alexa” can
become “Echo,” “Amazon,” or simply “computer.” The ability to

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make these adjustments can be especially helpful if someone
named Alex or Alexis lives in the home.

Wake words rely on a special algorithm that is always listening for a


particular word or phrase so that a phone, smart speaker, or
something else can begin communicating with a server to do its
job. Wake words need to be long enough to be distinct, easy for a
human to speak, and simple for a machine to recognize. This is why
you cannot change your wake word to anything you want it to be.  

Voice assistants don’t really “understand” what you’re saying —


they just listen for their wake word and then begin communicating
with a server to complete a task. NLP is a form of artificial
intelligence that helps technology interpret human language.

CHAPTER-3
FEASIBILITY REPORT
Preliminary investigation examine project feasibility, the likelihood
the system will be useful to the organization. The main objective of
the feasibility study is to test the Technical, Operational and
Economical feasibility for adding new modules and debugging old
running system. All system is feasible if they are unlimited
resources and infinite time. There are aspects in the feasibility
study portion of the preliminary investigation:
1 Technical Feasibility
2 Operation Feasibility
3 Economic Feasibility

3.1 Technical Feasibility


The technical issue usually raised during the feasibility stage of the
investigation includes the following:
1 Does the necessary technology exist to do what is suggested?
2 Do the proposed equipment have the technical capacity to hold
the data required to use the new system?

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3 Will the proposed system provide adequate response to
inquiries, regardless of the number or location of users?
4 Can the system be upgraded if developed?
5 Are there technical guarantees of accuracy, reliability, ease of
access and data security?
Earlier no system existed to cater to the needs of ‘Secure
Infrastructure Implementation System’. The current system
developed is technically feasible. Thus it provides an easy access to
the users. The database’s purpose is to create, establish and
maintain a workflow among various entities in order to facilitate all
concerned users in their various capacities or roles. Permission to
the users would be granted based on the roles specified. Therefore,
it provides the technical guarantee of accuracy, reliability and
security. The work for the project is done with the current
equipment and existing software technology. Necessary bandwidth
exists for providing a fast feedback to the users irrespective of the
number of users using the system.

3.2 Operational Feasibility


Proposed projects are beneficial only if they can be turned out into
information system. That will meet the organization’s operating
requirements. Operational feasibility aspects of the project are to
be taken as an important part of the project implementation. Some
of the important issues raised are to test the operational feasibility
of a project includes the following: -
1 Is there sufficient support for the management from the users?
2 Will the system be used and work properly if it is being
developed and implemented?
3 Will there be any resistance from the user that will undermine
the possible application benefits?
This system is targeted to be in accordance with the above-
mentioned issues. Beforehand, the management issues and user
requirements have been taken into consideration. So there is no
question of resistance from the users that can undermine the
possible application benefits.

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The well-planned design would ensure the optimal utilization of the
computer resources and would help in the improvement of
performance status.

3.3 Economic Feasibility


A system can be developed technically and that will be used if
installed must still be a good investment for the organization. In the
economic feasibility, the development cost in creating the system is
evaluated against the ultimate benefit derived from the new
systems. Financial benefits must equal or exceed the costs. The
system is economically feasible. It does not require any addition
hardware or software. Since the interface for this system is
developed using the existing resources and technologies. There is
nominal expenditure and economical feasibility for certain.

CHAPTER-4
SOFTWARE AND HARWARE REQUIREMENT
SPECIFICATIONS
4.1 INTRODUCTION
4.1.1 Purpose: The main purpose for preparing this document is
to give a general insight into the analysis and requirements of the
existing system or situation and for determining the operating
characteristics of the system.
4.1.2 Scope: This Document plays a vital role in the development
life cycle (SDLC) and it describes the complete requirement of the
system. It is meant for use by the developers and will be the basic
during testing phase. Any changes made to the requirements in the
future will have to go through formal change approval process.

4.2 DEVELOPERS RESPONSIBILITIES OVERVIEW:

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The developer is responsible for:
 Developing the system, which meets the SRS and solving all the
requirements of the system?
 Demonstrating the system and installing the system at client's
location after the acceptance testing is successful.
 Submitting the required user manual describing the system
interfaces to work on it and also the documents of the system.
 Conducting any user training that might be needed for using the
system.
Maintaining the system for a period of one year after installation.

4.3 REQUIRED FEATURES OF SYSTEM


Usability
The system is designed with completely automated process hence
there is no or less user intervention.
Reliability
The system is more reliable because of the qualities that are
inherited from the chosen platform php. The code built by using php
is more reliable.
Performance
This system is developing in the high level languages and using the
advanced front-end and back-end technologies it will give response
to the end user on client system with in very less time.
Supportability
The system is designed to be the cross platform supportable. The
system is supported on a wide range of hardware and any software
platform, which is having Apache, built into the system.
Implementation
The system is implemented in web environment using core php.
The apache is used as the web server and windows xp professional
is used as the platform.

4.4 REQUIRED SOFTWARE SPECIFICATION


 OS WINDOWS 10X OR EARLIER UPTO 7X
 PYTHON 3.X VERSION
 PYCHARM IDE 2019.1.3

4.5 REQUIRED HARDWARE SPECIFICATION


 Processor : - INTEL CORE I3 OR ABOVE
 RAM :- 1 GB
 Hard Disk : - 40 GB
 Monitor :- Color monitor

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 Keyboard :- 104 keys
 Mouse :- Any pointing device

CHAPTER-5
SELECTED SOFTWARE
5.1 SELECTED SOFTWARE
WINDOWS OS 10 HOME
Microsoft Windows 10 for desktop, the successor to Windows 8.1,
comes in two versions: Windows 10 Pro and Windows 10 Home. This is
a stark contrast to earlier versions of Windows, which came in as many
as seven editions. Of the two editions, Windows 10 Pro, as you may
have guessed, has more features. Unlike Windows 7 and 8.1, in which
the basic variant was markedly crippled with fewer features than its
professional counterpart, Windows 10 Home packs in a large set of
new features that should suffice most users' needs. This begs the
question, which among Windows 10 Pro and Windows 10 Home is the
right version for you.
What do you get with Windows 10 Home
Windows 10 Home is the basic variant of Windows 10. It comes with a
number of new features including the revamped Start Menu. The

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company decided to chop it off from Windows 8 three years ago, but
on popular demand, this feature is making a return to the desktop
operating system. You also get a full-fledged version of Cortana, the
digital voice assistant formerly exclusively available on Windows
Phone. Other than that, the Home edition also gets you features like
Battery Saver, TPM support, and company's new biometrics security
feature called Windows Hello.
Battery Saver, for those unfamiliar, is a feature that makes your
system more power efficient. It does so by limiting the background
activity on the device. A TPM is a microchip that offers additional
security-related functions. Many motherboard manufacturers install
TPM chip on their device. Microsoft assures that if your motherboard
has that chip, Windows 10 Home will provide support for it.

Home users will also be able to utilise the all-new Virtual Desktops
option and Snap assist feature with up to 4 apps on one screen.
Furthermore, they can also give a whirl to Continuum, a flagship
feature of Windows 10 that lets you quickly switch from desktop mode
to tablet mode. You are also bestowed with Microsoft Edge, the brand
new browser in town.
The Home edition also supports Windows Update - eligible to snag
automatic updates from Microsoft - and also provides security
measures such as Microsoft Passport. The aforementioned features
should fit an average Joe's bill as the company is providing all the
essential features in the basic variant.
However, if you crave for more sophisticated protection, or if your
work requires features such as support for side-loading of business
apps, the Home edition could leave a lot to be desired, and you are
better off with the Pro edition.
What do you get with Windows 10 Pro
The Pro edition of Windows 10, in addition to all of Home edition's
features, offers sophisticated connectivity and privacy tools such as
Domain Join, Group Policy Management, Bitlocker, Enterprise Mode
Internet Explorer (EMIE), Assigned Access 8.1, Remote Desktop, Client
Hyper-V, and Direct Access.
Assigned Access 8.1, for instance, allows you to lock user accounts
and prevent them from accessing specific apps. BitLocker, on the other
hand, is one of the most powerful disk-encryption tools on Windows. It
lets you encrypt your external USB-drives. You also get tools that
facilitate seamless connectivity while joining Azure Active Directory,
and a Business Store for Windows 10. So should you get the Pro
edition instead?

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It all comes down to this: do you need features such as Client Hyper-
V, which is a built-in virtualisation solution in Windows. Does your
work require you to connect to a Windows domain? If yes, you should
purchase the Pro edition. Else, the Home edition is what you need.
Beyond Home and Pro
While Windows 10 Home and Pro are direct paths for retail users,
there are other variants of Windows 10 as well like Windows 10
Enterprise and Windows 10 Student. The Enterprise edition, as you
may expect, is meant to meet the demands of medium and large sized
organisations. It comes with even more sophisticated features such as
Device Guard, which gives a company the ability to lock down devices.
Unlike the other two Windows 10 Editions, however, the Enterprise
variant won't be available for sale in retail stores. Instead, it will be
sold through volume licensing.
The Windows 10 Education edition is designed for schools - students,
teachers, staff, and administrators. The edition comes with most of
Enterprise edition's feature. It too won't be available on sale at retail
stores, though, and will be seeded out through academic volume
licensing.
Speaking of other Windows 10 editions, we also have Windows 10
Mobile, and Windows 10 Mobile Enterprise. As their names suggest,
personal voice assistanth are designed to empower smartphones and
not the desktop platform. Microsoft is also releasing Windows 10 Core,
an operating system for Internet of Things devices.

5.2 PYTHON 3.7 VERSION


What is Python?
Python is a popular programming language. It was created by Guido
van Rossum, and released in 1991.

It is used for:
web development (server-side),
software development,
mathematics,
system scripting.

What can Python do?


Python can be used on a server to create web applications.
Python can be used alongside software to create workflows.

24 | P a g e
Python can connect to database systems. It can also read and modify
files.
Python can be used to handle big data and perform complex
mathematics.
Python can be used for rapid prototyping, or for production-ready
software development.

Why Python?
Python works on different platforms (Windows, Mac, Linux, Raspberry
Pi, etc).
Python has a simple syntax similar to the English language.
Python has syntax that allows developers to write programs with fewer
lines than some other programming languages.
Python runs on an interpreter system, meaning that code can be
executed as soon as it is written. This means that prototyping can be
very quick.
Python can be treated in a procedural way, an object-orientated way
or a functional way.

Good to know
The most recent major version of Python is Python 3, which we shall
be using in this tutorial. However, Python 2, although not being
updated with anything other than security updates, is still quite
popular.
In this tutorial Python will be written in a text editor. It is possible to
write Python in an Integrated Development Environment, such as
Thonny, Pycharm, Netbeans or Eclipse which are particularly useful
when managing larger collections of Python files.

Python Syntax compared to other programming languages


Python was designed for readability, and has some similarities to the
English language with influence from mathematics.
Python uses new lines to complete a command, as opposed to other
programming languages which often use semicolons or parentheses.
Python relies on indentation, using whitespace, to define scope; such
as the scope of loops, functions and classes. Other programming
languages often use curly-brackets for this purpose.

Python is an interpreted, high-level, general-purpose programming


language. Created by Guido van Rossum and first released in 1991,
Python's design philosophy emphasizes code readability with its
notable use of significant whitespace. Its language constructs and

25 | P a g e
object-oriented approach aim to help programmers write clear, logical
code for small and large-scale projects.

Python is dynamically typed and garbage-collected. It supports


multiple programming paradigms, including procedural, object-
oriented, and functional programming. Python is often described as a
"batteries included" language due to its comprehensive standard
library.

Python was conceived in the late 1980s as a successor to the ABC


language. Python 2.0, released 2000, introduced features like list
comprehensions and a garbage collection system capable of collecting
reference cycles. Python 3.0, released 2008, was a major revision of
the language that is not completely backward-compatible, and much
Python 2 code does not run unmodified on Python 3. Due to concern
about the amount of code written for Python 2, support for Python 2.7
(the last release in the 2.x series) was extended to 2020. Language
developer Guido van Rossum shouldered sole responsibility for the
project until July 2018 but now shares his leadership as a member of a
five-person steering council.

Python interpreters are available for many operating systems. A global


community of programmers develops and maintains CPython, an open
source[32] reference implementation. A non-profit organization, the
Python Software Foundation, manages and directs resources for
Python and CPython development.
Python is an easy to learn, powerful programming language. It has
efficient high-level data structures and a simple but effective approach
to object-oriented programming. Python’s elegant syntax and dynamic
typing, together with its interpreted nature, make it an ideal language
for scripting and rapid application development in many areas on most
platforms.
The Python interpreter and the extensive standard library are freely
available in source or binary form for all major platforms from the
Python Web site, https://www.python.org/, and may be freely
distributed. The same site also contains distributions of and pointers to
many free third party Python modules, programs and tools, and
additional documentation.

The Python interpreter is easily extended with new functions and data
types implemented in C or C++ (or other languages callable from C).
Python is also suitable as an extension language for customizable
applications.

26 | P a g e
This tutorial introduces the reader informally to the basic concepts and
features of the Python language and system. It helps to have a Python
interpreter handy for hands-on experience, but all examples are self-
contained, so the tutorial can be read off-line as well.

For a description of standard objects and modules, see The Python


Standard Library. The Python Language Reference gives a more formal
definition of the language. To write extensions in C or C++, read
Extending and Embedding the Python Interpreter and Python/C API
Reference Manual. There are also several books covering Python in
depth.

This tutorial does not attempt to be comprehensive and cover every


single feature, or even every commonly used feature. Instead, it
introduces many of Python’s most noteworthy features, and will give
you a good idea of the language’s flavor and style. After reading it,
you will be able to read and write Python modules and programs, and
you will be ready to learn more about the various Python library
modules described in The Python Standard Library.

History
Guido van Rossum at OSCON 2006.
Main article: History of Python
Python was conceived in the late 1980s by Guido van Rossum at
Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) in the Netherlands as a
successor to the ABC language (itself inspired by SETL), capable of
exception handling and interfacing with the Amoeba operating system.
Its implementation began in December 1989. Van Rossum continued
as Python's lead developer until July 12, 2018, when he announced his
"permanent vacation" from his responsibilities as Python's Benevolent
Dictator For Life, a title the Python community bestowed upon him to
reflect his long-term commitment as the project's chief decision-
maker.[36] In January, 2019, active Python core developers elected
Brett Cannon, Nick Coghlan, Barry Warsaw, Carol Willing and Van
Rossum to a five-member "Steering Council" to lead the project.

Python 2.0 was released on 16 October 2000 with many major new
features, including a cycle-detecting garbage collector and support for
Unicode.

Python 3.0 was released on 3 December 2008. It was a major revision


of the language that is not completely backward-compatible. Many of

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its major features were backported to Python 2.6.x[40] and 2.7.x
version series. Releases of Python 3 include the 2to3 utility, which
automates (at least partially) the translation of Python 2 code to
Python 3.

Python 2.7's end-of-life date was initially set at 2015 then postponed
to 2020 out of concern that a large body of existing code could not
easily be forward-ported to Python 3. In January 2017, Google
announced work on a Python 2.7 to Go transcompiler to improve
performance under concurrent workloads.

Features and philosophy


Python is a multi-paradigm programming language. Object-oriented
programming and structured programming are fully supported, and
many of its features support functional programming and aspect-
oriented programming (including by metaprogramming[45] and
metaobjects (magic methods)). Many other paradigms are supported
via extensions, including design by contract and logic programming.

Python uses dynamic typing, and a combination of reference counting


and a cycle-detecting garbage collector for memory management. It
also features dynamic name resolution (late binding), which binds
method and variable names during program execution.

Python's design offers some support for functional programming in the


Lisp tradition. It has filter, map, and reduce functions; list
comprehensions, dictionaries, sets and generator expressions. The
standard library has two modules (itertools and functools) that
implement functional tools borrowed from Haskell and Standard ML.

The language's core philosophy is summarized in the document The


Zen of Python (PEP 20), which includes aphorisms such as:

Beautiful is better than ugly


Explicit is better than implicit
Simple is better than complex
Complex is better than complicated
Readability counts
Rather than having all of its functionality built into its core, Python was
designed to be highly extensible. This compact modularity has made it
particularly popular as a means of adding programmable interfaces to
existing applications. Van Rossum's vision of a small core language

28 | P a g e
with a large standard library and easily extensible interpreter stemmed
from his frustrations with ABC, which espoused the opposite approach.

Python strives for a simpler, less-cluttered syntax and grammar while


giving developers a choice in their coding methodology. In contrast to
Perl's "there is more than one way to do it" motto, Python embraces a
"there should be one—and preferably only one—obvious way to do it"
design philosophy. Alex Martelli, a Fellow at the Python Software
Foundation and Python book author, writes that "To describe
something as 'clever' is not considered a compliment in the Python
culture."

Python's developers strive to avoid premature optimization, and reject


patches to non-critical parts of the CPython reference implementation
that would offer marginal increases in speed at the cost of clarity.
When speed is important, a Python programmer can move time-critical
functions to extension modules written in languages such as C, or use
PyPy, a just-in-time compiler. Cython is also available, which
translates a Python script into C and makes direct C-level API calls into
the Python interpreter.

An important goal of Python's developers is keeping it fun to use. This


is reflected in the language's name—a tribute to the British comedy
group Monty Python and in occasionally playful approaches to tutorials
and reference materials, such as examples that refer to spam and
eggs (from a famous Monty Python sketch) instead of the standard foo
and bar.

A common neologism in the Python community is pythonic, which can


have a wide range of meanings related to program style. To say that
code is pythonic is to say that it uses Python idioms well, that it is
natural or shows fluency in the language, that it conforms with
Python's minimalist philosophy and emphasis on readability. In
contrast, code that is difficult to understand or reads like a rough
transcription from another programming language is called unpythonic.

Users and admirers of Python, especially those considered


knowledgeable or experienced, are often referred to as Pythonists,
Pythonistas, and Pythoneers.

5.3 PYCHARM IDE 2019.1.3

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PyCharm is a dedicated Python and Django IDE providing a wide range
of essential tools for Python developers, tightly integrated together to
create a convenient environment for productive Python development
and Web development.

PyCharm is available in three editions: Professional, Community, and


Educational (Edu). The Community and Edu editions are open-source
projects and they are free, but they have less features. PyCharm Edu
provides courses and helps you learn programming with Python. The
Professional edition is commercial, and provides an outstanding set of
tools and features. For details, see the editions comparison matrix.\

PYCHARM FEATURES

Intelligent Coding Assistance


PyCharm provides smart code completion, code inspections, on-the-fly
error highlighting and quick-fixes, along with automated code
refactorings and rich navigation capabilities.

Intelligent Code Editor


PyCharm’s smart code editor provides first-class support for Python,
JavaScript, CoffeeScript, TypeScript, CSS, popular template languages
and more. Take advantage of language-aware code completion, error
detection, and on-the-fly code fixes!

Smart Code Navigation


Use smart search to jump to any class, file or symbol, or even any IDE
action or tool window. It only takes one click to switch to the
declaration, super method, test, usages, implementation, and more.

Fast and Safe Refactorings


Refactor your code the intelligent way, with safe Rename and Delete,
Extract Method, Introduce Variable, Inline Variable or Method, and
other refactorings. Language and framework-specific refactorings help
you perform project-wide changes.

Built-in Developer Tools


PyCharm’s huge collection of tools out of the box includes an
integrated debugger and test runner; Python profiler; a built-in
terminal; integration with major VCS and built-in database tools;
remote development capabilities with remote interpreters; an
integrated ssh terminal; and integration with Docker and Vagrant.
Debugging, Testing and Profiling

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Use the powerful debugger with a graphical UI for Python and
JavaScript. Create and run your tests with coding assistance and a
GUI-based test runner. Take full control of your code with Python
Profiler integration.

VCS, Deployment and Remote Development


Save time with a unified UI for working with Git, SVN, Mercurial or
other version control systems. Run and debug your application on
remote machines. Easily configure automatic deployment to a remote
host or VM and manage your infrastructure with Vagrant and Docker.

Database tools
Access Oracle, SQL Server, PostgreSQL, MySQL and other databases
right from the IDE. Rely on PyCharm’s help when editing SQL code,
running queries, browsing data, and altering schemas.
Web Development
In addition to Python, PyCharm provides first-class support for various
Python web development frameworks, specific template languages,
JavaScript, CoffeeScript, TypeScript, HTML/CSS, AngularJS, Node.js,
and more.

Python Web frameworks


PyCharm offers great framework-specific support for modern web
development frameworks such as Django, Flask, Google App Engine,
Pyramid, and web2py, including Django templates debugger,
manage.py and appcfg.py tools, special autocompletion and
navigation, just to name a few.

JavaScript & HTML


PyCharm provides first-class support for JavaScript, CoffeeScript,
TypeScript, HTML and CSS, as well as their modern successors. The
JavaScript debugger is included in PyCharm and is integrated with the
Django server run configuration.
Live Edit
Live Editing Preview lets you open a page in the editor and the
browser and see the changes being made in code instantly in the
browser. PyCharm auto-saves your changes, and the browser smartly
updates the page on the fly, showing your edits.

Scientific Tools
PyCharm integrates with IPython Notebook, has an interactive Python
console, and supports Anaconda as well as multiple scientific packages
including Matplotlib and NumPy.

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Interactive Python console
You can run a REPL Python console in PyCharm which offers many
advantages over the standard one: on-the-fly syntax check with
inspections, braces and quotes matching, and of course code
completion.

Scientific Stack Support


PyCharm has built-in support for scientific libraries. It supports
Pandas, Numpy, Matplotlib, and other scientific libraries, offering you
best-in-class code intelligence, graphs, array viewers and much more.

Conda Integration
Keep your dependencies isolated by having separate Conda
environments per project, PyCharm makes it easy for you to create
and select the right environment

Debug Your Python Code with PyCharm


Visual Debugging
Some coders still debug using print statements, because the concept is
hard and pdb is intimidating. PyCharm’s python debugging GUI makes
it easy to use a debugger by putting a visual face on the process.
Getting started is simple and moving on to the major debugging
features is easy.

Debug Everywhere
Of course PyCharm can debug code that you’re running on your local
computer, whether it’s your system Python, a virtualenv, Anaconda, or
a Conda env. In PyCharm Professional Edition you can also debug code
you’re running inside a Docker container, within a VM, or on a remote
host through SSH.

Debug Inside Templates PRO ONLY


When you’re working with templates, sometimes a bug sneaks into
them. These can be very hard to resolve if you can’t see what’s going
on inside them. PyCharm’s debugger enables you to put a breakpoint
in Django and Jinja2 templates to make these problems easy to fix.

Note: to debug templates, first configure the template language.


JavaScript PRO ONLY
Any modern web project involves JavaScript, therefore any modern
Python IDE needs to be able to debug JavaScript as well. PyCharm
Professional edition comes with the highly capable JavaScript debugger

32 | P a g e
from WebStorm. Personal voice assistanth in-browser JS and NodeJS
are supported by the JavaScript debugger.

Debugging During TDD


Test-driven development, or TDD, involves exploration while writing
tests. Use the debugger to help explore by setting breakpoints in the
context you are investigating:

This investigation can be in your test code or in the code being tested,
which is very helpful for Django integration tests (Django support is
available only in PyCharm Professional Edition). Use a breakpoint to
find out what is coming from a query in a test case:

No Code Modification Necessary


PDB is a great tool, but requires you to modify your code, which can
lead to accidentally checking in `pdb.set_trace()` calls into your git
repo.

See What Your Code Does


Breakpoints
All debuggers have breakpoints, but only some debuggers have highly
versatile breakpoints. Have you ever clicked ‘continue’ many times
until you finally get to the loop iteration where your bug occurs? No
need for that with PyCharm’s conditional breakpoints.

Sometimes all you want to do is see what a certain variable’s value is


throughout code execution. You can configure PyCharm’s breakpoints
to not suspend your code, but only log a message for you.
Exceptions can ruin your day, that’s why PyCharm’s debugger is able
to break on exceptions, even if you’re not entirely sure where they’re
coming from.

To help you stay in control of your debugging experience, PyCharm


has an overview window where you can see all of your breakpoints, as
well as disable some by checkbox. You can also temporarily mute all of
your breakpoints until you need them.
See Variable Values at a Glance
As soon as PyCharm hits a breakpoint, you’ll see all your variable
values inline in your code. To make it easy to see what values have
changed since the last time you hit the breakpoint, changed values are
highlighted.

Watches

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Customize your variable view by adding watches. Whether they’re
simple or complex, you’ll be able to see exactly what you want to see.

Control Your Code


Visually Step Through Your Code
If you want to know where your code goes, you don’t need to put
breakpoints everywhere. You can step through your code, and keep
track of exactly what happens.

Run Custom Code


In some cases, the easiest way to reproduce something is to force a
variable to a certain value. PyCharm offers personal voice assistanth
`evaluate expression` to quickly change something, and a console if
you’d like more control. The console can even use the ipython shell if it
is installed.

Speed
Faster Than PDB
For Python 3.6 debugging, PyCharm’s debugger is the fastest
debugger on the market. Even faster than PDB. What this means is
that you can simply always run your code under the debugger while
developing, and easily add breakpoints when you need them. Just
make sure to click ‘install’ when PyCharm asks whether or not to
install the Cython speedups.

CHAPTER-6
BUILDING OF PERSONAL VOICE ASSISTANT

6.1 BUILDING A PERSONAL VOICE ASSISTANT


If the available personal voice assistants don’t perform all the tasks
you want them to, it is possible to build your own. For a text-based

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personal voice assistant, you don’t even need to know how to code.
There are apps available to help people create assistants that can
automate tasks or events.
Creating a voice activated personal voice assistant is much more
difficult. That’s where companies like Converse.AI. “We make it
easier for non-developers to build and automate the services that
they need. No coding experience is required,” Lucas says.
A text-based personal voice assistant automates tasks and interacts
with customers. It can also help answer questions for clients,
access databases, and help customers help themselves. For more
information about customer self-service portals, many of which use
personal voice assistants, read "Customer Service Portals: Help
Your Users Help Themselves."
If you choose to create a personal voice assistant, make sure it’s
representative of your brand. Also, make sure it works, since
technology will not do your business any good if it doesn’t help
customers. “The danger is that people will try it, it won’t work, and
they won’t go back,” Mutchler warns. She mentions Samsung’s
Bixby, which debuted on the Galaxy S8 phone but was not fully
functional when it came out. Many customers tried it a few times,
then asked Samsung to develop a way to disable it, which they did
in a software update.
Here are some other elements to consider when building a personal
voice assistant:
 Remember the end user.
 Choose useful features.
 Give it personality.
 Integrate it with various platforms.
Building a personal voice assistant takes time, so it’s better not to
rush it. Focus on doing a few things extraordinarily well instead of
trying to do many things (and, therefore, doing them
unsuccessfully). Also, remember to update the personal voice
assistant as necessary. It’s not a “build it and leave it” venture.

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6.2 DEPENDENCIES AND REQUIREMENTS :
System requirements: Python 3.7, Pycharm IDE, WinOS (version 10)

Install all these python libraries :


pip install SpeechRecognition
pip install pyttsx3
pip install webbrowser
pip install smptlib
pip install random
pip install wikipedia
pip install datetime
pip install wolframalpha
pip install os
pip install sys

6.3 LET’S START BUILDING OUR DESKTOP VOICE ASSISTANT


USING PYTHON

Start by importing all the required libraries :

import pyttsx3
import webbrowser
import smtplib
import random
import speech_recognition as sr
import wikipedia
import datetime
import wolframalpha
import os
import sys

36 | P a g e
For our voice-assistant to perform all the above-discussed
features, we have to code the logic of each of them in one
method.
So our first step is to create the method which will interpret
user voice response.

def myCommand():
r = sr.Recognizer()
with sr.Microphone() as source:
print("Listening...")
r.pause_threshold = 1
audio = r.listen(source)
try:
query = r.recognize_google(audio, language='en-in')
print('User: ' + query + '\n')

except sr.UnknownValueError:
speak('Sorry sir! I didn\'t get that! Try typing the command!')
query = str(input('Command: '))

return query

Next, create a method that will convert text to speech.

def speak(audio):
print('Computer: ' + audio)
engine.say(audio)
engine.runAndWait()

Now create a loop to continue executing multiple commands.


Inside the method assistant() passing user
command(myCommand()) as parameters.

while True:

query = myCommand();
query = query.lower()

if 'open youtube' in query:


speak('okay')
webbrowser.open('www.youtube.com')

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elif 'open google' in query:
speak('okay')
webbrowser.open('www.google.co.in')

elif 'open gmail' in query:


speak('okay')
webbrowser.open('www.gmail.com')

elif "what\'s up" in query or 'how are you' in query:


stMsgs = ['Just doing my thing!', 'I am fine!', 'Nice!', 'I am nice
and full of energy']
speak(random.choice(stMsgs))

elif 'email' in query:


speak('Who is the recipient? ')
recipient = myCommand()

if 'myself' in recipient:
try:
speak('What should I say? ')
content = myCommand()

server = smtplib.SMTP('smtp.gmail.com', 587)


server.ehlo()
server.starttls()
server.login("[email protected]", 'password')
server.sendmail('[email protected]',
"[email protected]", content)
server.close()
speak('Email sent!')

except:
speak('Sorry Sir! I am unable to send your message at this
moment!')

elif 'nothing' in query or 'abort' in query or 'stop' in query:


speak('okay')
speak('Bye Sir, have a good day.')
sys.exit()

elif 'hello' in query:

38 | P a g e
speak('Hello Sir')

elif 'bye' in query:


speak('Bye Sir, have a good day.')
sys.exit()

elif 'play music' in query:


music_folder = Your_music_folder_path
music = [music1, music2, music3, music4, music5]
random_music = music_folder + random.choice(music) + '.mp3'
os.system(random_music)

speak('Okay, here is your music! Enjoy!')

else:
query = query
speak('Searching...')
try:
try:
res = client.query(query)
results = next(res.results).text
speak('WOLFRAM-ALPHA says - ')
speak('Got it.')
speak(results)

except:
results = wikipedia.summary(query, sentences=2)
speak('Got it.')
speak('WIKIPEDIA says - ')
speak(results)

except:
webbrowser.open('www.google.com')
speak('Next Command! Sir!')

Our next step is to create multiple if statements corresponding


to each of the features. So let us see how to create these small
modules inside if statement for each command.
6.4 FLOW-CHART

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6.5 DATA FLOW DIAGRAM

41 | P a g e
CHAPTER-7
PROS AND CONS OF PERSONAL VOICE
ASSISTANT
7.1 PROS

1. Keep your home safe


You can connect your virtual assistant to your smart home security
devices to make it easier to keep your property safe. For example, you
can connect the Blink security camera system to any Amazon Alexa
device and once the Blink 'skill' is enabled on your Alexa app you can
give voice commands such as 'Alexa, ask Blink to arm my home
security system'.

2. Save money on your energy bills


Virtual assistants can control smart home devices, including next-gen
lighting options. You could hook up a smart thermostat such as the
Nest to Google Home or Alexa and tell your VPA when you're leaving
the house, so that your heating gets turned off. Tests carried out by
Nest suggest that UK users can reduce their energy usage by as much
16.5 per cent, saving cash in the long run.

3. Save money on flights


You might just be able to nab yourself a bargain holiday by asking
your smart speaker. For example, asking Google Home, 'OK Google,
how much are flights to New York?' will prompt the speaker to ask a
few follow-up questions about your preferences, after which you'll
receive an email about prices from Google Flights. Alexa-powered
devices, meanwhile, can be used to search for bargains using travel
search engine SkyScanner.

4. Save money on your Uber


Once you've set your default pick-up location, you can hail a cab from
home by simply saying 'Alexa, ask Uber for a ride'. Alexa will let you
know how far away the nearest car is, and you can change your pick-
up location if you need to. What's more, it'll let you know if there's
surge pricing before you book your ride, helping you to get the best
price
possible.

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7.2 CONS

1. Initial cost could outweigh savings


While it's possible to make both time and cash savings using these
virtual assistant devices, they don't always come cheap. The Amazon
Echo Plus comes with a price tag of £139.99, while the Google Home is
slightly cheaper at £129.
However, Apple's HomePod, which was released in 2018, is pricier at
£319. The Amazon Echo Dot is the cheapest of the bunch at £49.99.

2. Security could be an issue


'Even if Amazon doesn't do anything questionable with your Echo
interactions, it does store them in the cloud, which isn't totally hacker-
proof,' says David Emm (@emm_david), principal security researcher
at Kaspersky Lab (@kaspersky).
He also emphasises the importance of making sure your home WiFi
network is secure by using strong passwords and regularly checking
for and installing software updates. Also, smart speaker makers install
software onto their devices to make them secure, such as voice
command encryption before they're transferred to the cloud.

3. Voice recognition isn't perfect


Voice recognition has come a long way in recent years, and Amazon
and Google's tech is among the best so far. However, it's still not
perfect, and you might find that you still have to occasionally repeat
yourself to make the smart speaker understand your command.
The good news is that the AI-based voice assistants learn and adapt to
your voice as you go along.

4. A microphone in your home


The always-on speakers don't record or send your voice commands
until you use the wake word (such as 'Alexa...'). But if having a
microphone constantly listening bothers you, it can be easily turned off
for privacy.
What's more, a record of each voice command can be easily reviewed
and deleted. And while voice control can make ordering goods from
the internet a lot easier, it's wise to set a PIN to confirm any
purchases. It's also possible to turn off voice ordering all together - if
the kids are home alone, for example.

Virtual assistants can save you valuable time and money, as well as
help keep your home secure, but it's important to use common sense

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when it comes to cyber security, as you would with any other web-
connected device.
Personal Voice Personal Voice Assistant
Assistant Advantages Disadvantages

Error Reduction High Cost

Difficult Exploration No Replicating Humans

No Improvement with
Daily Application
Experience

Digital Assistants No Original Creativity

Repetitive Jobs Unemployment

No Breaks

7.3 ADVANTAGES OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN PERSONAL


VOICE ASSISTANT:

Artificial intelligence is complex in nature. It uses a very complicated


mixture of computer science, mathematics and other complex
sciences. Complex programming helps these machines replicate the
cognitive abilities of human beings.

1. Error Reduction:
Artificial intelligence helps us in reducing the error and the chance of
reaching accuracy with a greater degree of precision. It is applied in
various studies such as exploration of space.
Intelligent robots are fed with information and are sent to explore
space. Since they are machines with metal bodies, they are more
resistant and have a greater ability to endure the space and hostile
atmosphere.
They are created and acclimatized in such a way that they cannot be
modified or get disfigured or breakdown in a hostile environment.

2. Difficult Exploration:
Artificial intelligence and the science of robotics can be put to use in
mining and other fuel exploration processes. Not only that, these
complex machines can be used for exploring the ocean floor and hence
overcome the human limitations.

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3. Daily Application:
Computed methods for automated reasoning, learning and perception
have become a common phenomenon in our everyday lives. We have
our lady Siri or Cortana to help us out.
We are also hitting the road for long drives and trips with the help of
GPS. The smartphone is an apt and everyday example of how we use
artificial intelligence. In utilities, we find that they can predict what we
are going to type and correct the human errors in spelling. That is
machine intelligence at work.
When we take a picture, the artificial intelligence algorithm identifies
and detects the person’s face and tags the individuals when we are
posting our photographs on social media sites.
Artificial Intelligence is widely employed by financial institutions and
banking institutions to organize and manage data. Detection of fraud
uses artificial intelligence in a smart card based system.

4. Digital Assistants:
Highly advanced organizations use ‘avatars’ which are replicas or
digital assistants who can actually interact with the users, thus saving
the need for human resources.
For artificial thinkers, emotions come in the way of rational thinking
and are not a distraction at all. The complete absence of the emotional
side, makes the robots think logically and take the right program
decisions.
Emotions are associated with moods that can cloud judgment and
affect human efficiency. This is completely ruled out for machine
intelligence.

5. Repetitive Jobs:
Repetitive jobs which are monotonous in nature can be carried out
with the help of machine intelligence. Machines think faster than
humans and can be put to multi-tasking. Machine intelligence can be
employed to carry out dangerous tasks. Their parameters, unlike
humans, can be adjusted. Their speed and time are calculation based
parameters only.
When humans play a computer game or run a computer-controlled
robot, we are actually interacting with artificial intelligence. In the
game we are playing, the computer is our opponent. The machine
intelligence plans the game movement in response to our movements.
We can consider gaming to be the most common use of the benefits of
artificial intelligence.

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6. No Breaks:
Machines, unlike humans, do not require frequent breaks and
refreshments. They are programmed for long hours and can
continuously perform without getting bored or distracted or even tired.
7.4 DISADVANTAGES OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN
PERSONAL VOICE ASSISTANT:

1. High Cost:
Creation of artificial intelligence requires huge costs as they are very
complex machines. Their repair and maintenance require huge costs.
They have software programs which need frequent up gradation to
cater to the needs of the changing environment and the need for the
machines to be smarter by the day.
In the case of severe breakdowns, the procedure to recover lost codes
and reinstating the system might require huge time and cost.

2. No Replicating Humans:
Intelligence is believed to be a gift of nature. An ethical argument
continues, whether human intelligence is to be replicated or not.
Machines do not have any emotions and moral values. They perform
what is programmed and cannot make the judgment of right or wrong.
Even cannot take decisions if they encounter a situation unfamiliar to
them. They either perform incorrectly or breakdown in such situations.

3. No Improvement with Experience:


Unlike humans, artificial intelligence cannot be improved with
experience. With time, it can lead to wear and tear. It stores a lot of
data but the way it can be accessed and used is very different from
human intelligence.
Machines are unable to alter their responses to changing
environments. We are constantly bombarded by the question of
whether it is really exciting to replace humans with machines.
In the world of artificial intelligence, there is nothing like working with
a whole heart or passionately. Care or concerns are not present in the
machine intelligence dictionary. There is no sense of belonging or
togetherness or a human touch. They fail to distinguish between a
hardworking individual and an inefficient individual.

4. No Original Creativity:
Do you want creativity or imagination?
These are not the forte of artificial intelligence. While they can help
you design and create, they are no match to the power of thinking that
the human brain has or even the originality of a creative mind.

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Human beings are highly sensitive and emotional intellectuals. They
see, hear, think and feel. Their thoughts are guided by the feelings
which completely lacks in machines. The inherent intuitive abilities of
the human brain cannot be replicated.
5. Unemployment:
Replacement of humans with machines can lead to large-scale
unemployment.
Unemployment is a socially undesirable phenomenon. People with
nothing to do can lead to the destructive use of their creative minds.
Humans can unnecessarily be highly dependent on the machines if the
use of artificial intelligence becomes rampant. They will lose their
creative power and will become lazy. Also, if humans start thinking in
a destructive way, they can create havoc with these machines.
Artificial intelligence in wrong hands is a serious threat to mankind in
general. It may lead to mass destruction. Also, there is a constant fear
of machines taking over or superseding the humans.
Based on the above discussion, the Association for the advancement of
artificial intelligence has two objectives – to develop and advance the
science of artificial intelligence and to promote and educate about the
responsible usage of artificial intelligence.
Identifying and studying the risk of artificial intelligence is a very
important task at hand. This can help in resolving the issues at hand.
Programming errors or cyber-attacks need more dedicated and careful
research. Technology companies and the technology industry as a
whole needs to pay more attention to the quality of the software.
Everything that has been created in this world and in our individual
societies is the continuous result of intelligence.
Artificial intelligence augments and empowers human intelligence. So
as long we are successful in keeping the technology beneficial, we will
be able to help this human civilization.

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CHAPTER-8
CONCLUSION

Voice Search has now become a definitive mobile experience. An


absence of knowledge and learning makes it especially tough for
organizations to get a strategy on voice search. There is a ton of
chance for a lot further and significantly more conversational
experiences with users for AI in mobile app development.
A great many people are searching for an answer to make various
multitasking tasks more successful, making speech-to-text the ideal
feature. The utilization of voice over content is likewise alluring to the
individuals who don’t want to use typing. With a mistake rate of just
8%, voice search will change how individuals search over the internet.

Personal assistant software improves user productivity by managing


routine tasks of the user and by providing information from online
sources to the user. As discussed earlier, technologies such as web
services, sharing of data, linked data, shared ontologies, knowledge
databases, and mobile devices are proving to be enablers for tools
such as personal assistant software.

Building an agent that can replace a human assistant has been a holy
grail for software industry, especially in the field of artificial
intelligence. Difficulties associated with capturing human intelligence in
models that can be used to drive the agent have been one of the
primary bottlenecks in building such agents. With the availability of
data in semantic form, where the data carries itself the meaning and
data sources are interlinked with each other, provides an opportunity
to first capture human knowledge in this form and then apply
reasoning engines that can interpret these models to make inferences
for simple tasks.

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CHAPTER-9
FUTURE ENHANCEMENT
1. More Personalized Responses With Contextual
Understanding.
The last few years have been about what the user is saying, and
now it will be more about why and where they are saying it.
Contextual understanding is the next step for voice in order for it to
become an integral part of consumers’ lives.

2. Individualized Experiences
Voice assistants will also continue to offer more individualized
experiences as they get better at differentiating between voices.
It also includes features such as nicknames, work locations, payment
information, and linked accounts such as Google Play, Spotify, and
Netflix.

3. Beyond the Mobile Phone


My vision is that people will be able to access Assistant whenever
and wherever they want. That means people may be able to talk to
their cars, refrigerators, thermostats, lamps and all kinds of devices in
and outside their homes.

4. Search Behaviors Will Change


Visibility of voice will undoubtedly be a challenge. This is because
the visual interface with voice assistants is missing. Users simply
cannot see or touch a voice interface unless it is connected to the
Alexa or Google Assistant app.

5. Voice Notifications
In terms of mobile app marketing, voice raises a new challenge-
user engagement and retention. Developers will need to find ways to
capture and maintain their user’s attention by giving them a push
notification to continue using the app.

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CHAPTER-10
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. Hoy, Matthew B. (2018). "Alexa, Siri, Cortana, and More: An
Introduction to Voice Assistants". Medical Reference Services
Quarterly. 37 (1): 81–
88. doi:10.1080/02763869.2018.1404391. PMID 29327988.
2. Daniel B. Kline (2017-01-30). "Alexa, How Big Is Amazon's
Echo?". The Motley Fool.
3. https://www.cnet.com/news/google-finding-its-voice
4. "Virtual digital assistants to overtake world population by 2021".
ovum.informa.com. Retrieved 2018-05-11.
5. Jump up to:a b c "Alexa and Siri Can Hear This Hidden
Command. You Can't". The New York Times. 2018-05-10. ISSN
0362-4331. Retrieved 2018-05-11.
6. "As voice assistants go mainstream, researchers warn of
vulnerabilities". CNET. 2018-05-10. Retrieved 2018-05-11.
7.  "Virtual Assistant Industry Statistics « Global Market Insights,
Inc". Gminsights.wordpress.com. 2017-01-30.
8. "Amazon Lex, the technology behind Alexa, opens up to
developers". TechCrunch. 2017-04-20.

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