Microsoft Ignite Australia 2017 - Conversations as a Platform

Have you ever wondered how a computer can learn to speak to a human? Siri and Cortana are recent examples of conversation bots, but the technology has been around for decades in different forms. Last week Dr Neil Roodyn from nsquared presented talks at Microsoft’s Australian tech conference, Ignite. His first two talks were about building bots that can hold a conversation with a customer, and potential ways in which this process could be used for business.

Click on the links below to watch the presentations.   

Conversation as a Platform Part 1 
Neil discusses the ways in which conversations have evolved in contemporary life through the use of various forms of technology. He explains how to code a conversational bot in Microsoft Visual Studio, using the example of ordering food online. Neil talks about how developers can create a good structure for the code, and explains the complex steps of chaining dialogs.

   

Conversation as a Platform Part 2 
In Part 2 Neil discusses ways in which we can create richer conversations between customers and applications. He discusses ways in which programs can make devices seem more intelligent, and how they can use data and ‘machine learning’ to gather information to make accurate predictions about customers. He talks in depth about LUIS – Language Understanding Intelligent Service, which allows apps to understand language.