Dialogue system with slot-filling strategies

A system for operating a chatbot in a dialogue setting, the system comprising:

• a human-machine interface (HMI) configured to receive input from a user and provide output to the user;
• one or more storage devices;
• and
• one or more processors in communication with the HMI and the one or more storage devices, the one or more processors programmed to:
• at the chatbot, receive a first input from the user;
• determine a first intent of the first input;
• store, in the one or more storage devices, slot-filling context associated with the determined first intent;
• at the chatbot, query the user to provide a slot-filling answer to fill a slot associated with the determined first intent;
• at the chatbot, receive a second input from the user responsive to the query;
• and
• determine a second intent of the second input based on the slot-filling context saved in storage.

A computer-implemented method of operating a dialogue system, the computer-implemented method comprising:

• at a chatbot, receiving an input from a user;
• identifying a plurality of candidate intents corresponding to the input;
• generating a confidence score for each candidate intent, wherein the confidence score indicates a confidence that the corresponding candidate intent is a valid intent of the input;
• determining one or more of the candidate intents are part of a common intent group;
• merging the one or more candidate intents into a merged intent group having a confidence score represented by the aggregate of the confidence scores of the candidate intents within the merged intent group;
• selecting a largest of the confidence scores of the merged intent group or the plurality of candidate intents;
• and
• based on the largest of the confidence scores being the merged intent group, determining an intent of the input as being one of the candidate intents within the merged intent group.