Raising the visibility of a voice-activated user interface

A user interface system for raising visibility of voice-activated command and control, the user interface system comprising:

• a speech support user interface element that is associated with an application that supports the voice-activated command and control;
• a visible representation of a voice-activated command, the visible representation of the voice-activated command originating from an area proximate to the speech support user interface element and including text indicative of words recognized from within the voice-activated command;
• a visible representation of action to be taken in response to the voice-activated command to the visible representation of action having multiple appearances, the one of the appearances that is utilized in a given situation being dependent upon which one of a plurality of different applications that the voice-activated command corresponds to;
• a visible association that relates said visible representation of the voice-activated command to the visible representation of action to be taken, the visible association comprising a line positioned between said visible representation of the voice-activated command and the visible representation of action to be taken so as to visually infer a connection between said visible representation of the voice-activated command and said visible representation of action to be taken, one end of the line overlapping or being adjacent to the visible representation of the voice activated command and the other end of the line overlapping or being immediately adjacent to the visible representation of action to be taken;
• and
• a computer processor that is a component Of a computing device, the computer processor rendering, simultaneously on an output display that is also a component of the computing device, the speech support user interface element, the visible representation of the voice-activated command, said visible representation of action to be taken, and the visible association, the visible representation of action to be taken being displayed in a window of an application that is associated with the action to be taken, the visible representation of the voice-activated command and the speech support user interface element being displayed outside of the window of the application, and the visible association being displayed both within the window of the application and the outside of the window of the application, the computer processor generating and displaying the visible representation of the action to be taken based upon receipt of the voice-activated command such that the visible representation of the action to be taken appears after the voice-activated command has been received, the visible representation of the action to be taken maintaining a visual continuity from a time it appears to a time it disappears, and the visible representation of the action to be taken disappearing upon an execution of the action to be taken.

A computer-implemented method for raising the visibility of a voice-activated user interface, the method comprising:

• providing, on a display, a first user interface element that is associated with a first application and a second user interface element that is associated with a second application, the first and the second applications being different from one another;
• providing, on the display, a textual representation of one or more words associated with a voice-activated command;
• identifying one of the first and the second applications as a target application based at least in part upon a determination of which one of the first and the second applications that the voice-activated command is associated with;
• utilizing a computer processor that is a component of a computing device to move the textual representation across the display towards the target application, the textual representation being moved utilizing different methods depending upon which one of the first and the second applications that it is associated with;
• and
• modifying display properties of the textual representation and of the target application to create an association between the textual representation and the target application.