ORION: from on-line interaction to off-line delegation
Stephanie Seneff, Chian Chuu, D. Scott Cyphers · 2000
Abstract. This paper introduces orion, a conversational sys-tem that performs off-line tasks and initiates later contact with a user at a pre-negotiated time. Orion has two major episodes of activity: the enrollment of new tasks and the execution of pending tasks. The task manager periodically checks the pend-ing tasks and updates their status, sending off requests to other servers for information and possibly launching a phone call when a particular task has reached its trigger time. A sepa-rate user interface engages in a dialogue with a user to enroll new tasks and/or update existing tasks. Orion is still in an early stage of its development cycle, but it has introduced sev-eral interesting new research issues, such as continuous state maintenance and contact verification.