Personalized agent for portable devices and cellular phone

A personal messaging device comprising:

• a hand held mobile device having an audio receiver and an audio transmitter, said audio receiver operable to receive input audio signals, and said audio transmitter operable to transmit output audio signals, said hand held mobile device in communication with a mail storage database;
• a speech recognizer operable to convert said input audio signals into text;
• a text to speech synthesizer operable to convert said text into output audio signals;
• and
• a search engine interface in communication with said speech recognizer, said search engine interface operable to receive verbal or textual search queries from a user, said search engine interface further operable to retrieve a text or voice message from said mail storage database based on said search queries.

A method for inputting speech into a hand held mobile device having an audio receiver and an audio transmitter, wherein the input speech is returned to the device in the form of text or synthesized speech for the purpose of review and correction by the user, the process comprising steps of:

• transmitting said input speech to a speech recognizer;
• converting said input speech into a text message;
• converting said text message into synthesized speech;
• and
• transmitting said synthesized speech to a user.

A method for retrieving a summary of a stored electronic mail or text message using a hand held mobile device having an audio receiver and an audio transmitter, wherein the message is returned to the device based on an audio search query input by a user, the process comprising steps of:

• transmitting the audio search query to a speech recognizer;
• converting audio query into a text query;
• interfacing with a search engine;
• searching a mail database with the search engine;
• retrieving an electronic mail or text message from the mail database based on the search query;
• extracting a summary of the contents of the message;
• converting the summary of the message into synthesized speech;
• and
• transmitting the summary of the message to the hand held mobile device in the form of synthesized speech.

A method for retrieving a summary of a stored voice conversation or voice message using a hand held mobile device having an audio receiver and an audio transmitter, wherein the message is returned to the device based on an audio search query input by a user, the process comprising steps of:

• transmitting the audio search query to a speech recognizer;
• converting audio query into a text query;
• interfacing with a search engine;
• searching an audio database with the search engine;
• retrieving a voice conversation or voice message from the audio database based on the search query;
• extracting a summary of the contents of the voice conversation or message;
• converting the summary of the message into synthesized speech;
• and
• transmitting the summary of the message to the hand held mobile device in the form of synthesized speech.

A method for responding to e-mail messages comprising:

• ascertaining the contents of an e-mail message;
• dictating information in response to said e-mail message and transcribing said information into text using a speech recognizer;
• capturing audio data corresponding to said dictated information and associating said audio data with said text;
• storing said text and associated audio data for subsequent manipulation whereby said audio data is replayed and used to edit said text.