#virtual private assistants
CONTENT
CERTIFICATE…………………………………………………...…II
DECLARATION…………………………………………………….III
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT………………………………………..…IV
CONTENT…………….…………...……………………………...…V
LIST OF FIGURES ……………………….……………………......VI
LIST OF TABLES ………..………..……………………………….VII
ABSTRACT………………………………………………………....1
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION……………………………….....2
1.1. Background of study…………………………………..…2
1.2. Problem statement……………………………………..…2
1.3. Objectives and scope of study ………………………..….2
1.4. Project relevancy, feasibility…………………………..…3
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW………………..……..….4
2.1. Introduction……………………………………………...4
2.2. Computerized systems………………………………..…4
2.3. Web-based application…………………………………..5
2.4. Programming languages on the World Wide Web….......5
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY………………...……………...6
3.1. Research Methodology…….…………………………....7
3.2. Project Activities………………………………………..7
3.3. Tools………………….………………………………...10
CHAPTER 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION……….……….…11
4.1. Use Case Diagram………………………...……………11
4.2. System Flow Chart………………………………..……12
4.3. Entity Relationship Diagram……………………..…….13
4.4. Data Flow Diagram…………………………….………14
4.5. Data Base Design…………………………….………...14
4.6. Output………...………………….….............................15
CHAPTER 5: SUMMARY & CONCLUSIONS...………………16
REFERENCES………………………………………………...…..17
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: waterfall model ………………………...……..8
Figure 2: Use Case Diagram ……………………..…….11
Figure 3: System Flow Chart …………………………..12
Figure 4: ER Diagram………………………………..…13
Figure 5: Data Flow Diagram…………………………..14
ABSTRACT
In recent times, many businesses increasingly rely on the use of virtual assistants for their customer management processes. However, whether these virtual assistants are perceived as useful remains at large. Specifically, the perceived usefulness of virtual assistants in the stages of the customer journey remains unexplored.
Firstly, this paper will discuss relevant theoretical insights and theories about the perceived usefulness, AI technologies in general, and the customer journey, which will result in the development of seven hypotheses, which are centered around the effect of external variables on the perceived usefulness and the consumer’s perception of the usefulness of virtual assistants in the customer journey. Consecutively, this paper will include a description of the survey that was used to gather the necessary data to answer the proposed hypotheses. The findings of the survey demonstrate that the perceived ease of use, attitude towards the technology, and the quality of the virtual assistant have a positive effect on the perceived usefulness of virtual assistants. Also, the findings show that there are significant differences in the perceived usefulness of virtual assistants in the three customer journey stages. In more detail, the analysis showed that virtual assistants are perceived as most useful in the Transaction stage.
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1. BACKGROUND OF STUDY
There already exist a number of desktop virtual assistants. A few examples of current virtual assistants available in the market are discussed in this section along with the tasks they can provide and their drawbacks.
SIRI from Apple
SIRI is personal assistant software that interfaces with the user thru a voice interface, recognize commands, and acts on them. It learns to adapt to the user’s speech and thus improves voice recognition over time. It also tries to converse with the user when it does not identify theuser request.
It integrates with calendar, contacts and music library applications on the device and also integrates with GPS and camera on the device. It uses location, temporal, social and task-based contexts, to personalize the agent behavior specifically to the user at a given point of time.
Supported Tasks
• Call someone from my contacts list
• Launch an application on my iPhone
• Set an alarm for 5am tomorrow morning
• Play a specific song in my iTunes library
Drawback
SIRI does not maintain a knowledge database of its own and its understanding comes from the information captured in domain models and data models.
1.2. PROBLEM STATEMENT
The user goes to the shop and purchases the medicine required.
So a lot of time is wasted finding the required medicine and the person gets tired.
If he wants to exchange the product, once again he goes to the shop and replaces them.
The complete process depends on the physical interactions.
The Medicine SEO is easy to use.
The user searches for the required medicines with a single click.
1.3. OBJECTIVE AND SCOPE OF STUDY
The main objective of building personal assistant software (a virtual assistant) is using semantic data sources available on the web, user-generated content, and providing knowledge from knowledge databases. The main purpose of an intelligent virtual assistant is to answer questions that users may have. This may be done in a business environment, for example, on a business website, with a chat interface. On the mobile platform, the intelligent virtual assistant is available as a call-button-operated service where a voice asks the user “What can I do for you?” and then responds to verbal input.
Virtual assistants can tremendously save you time. We spend hours in online research and then making the report in our terms of understanding. JIA can do that for you. Provide an atopic for research and continue with your tasks while JIA does the research. Another difficult task is to remember test dates, birthdates, or anniversaries. It comes with a surprise when you enter the class and realize it is a class test today. Just tell JIA in advance about your tests and she remind you well in advance so you can prepare for the test.
1.4. PROJECT CONTRIBUTION, FEASIBILITY
1.4.1. TECHNICAL FEASIBILITY
Building this project is technically feasible. The hardware and the software needed are all available, it’s not much difficult to get them. Briefly, I can say that the resources needed for the development and maintenance of the system are available.
1.4.2. OPERATIONALLY FEASIBILITY
This project development is operationally feasible as there is no need for users to have good knowledge in a computer before using it. The user can learn and use the system with easiness, he/she just needs to just read the manual or tutorial from the developers.
1.4.3. ECONOMIC FEASIBILITY
Besides being technically feasible, developing this system is economically feasible as well. The development of the system does not require the developers to spend a lot of money. The tools used for the development of this
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1. Introduction
Virtual Assistants are software programs that help you ease your day-to-day tasks, such as showing weather reports, creating reminders, making shopping lists, etc. They can take commands via text (online chatbots) or by voice. Voice-based intelligent assistants need an invoking word or wake word to activate the listener, followed by the command.
This system is designed to be used efficiently on desktops. Personal assistant software improves ulivesproductivity by managing routine tasks of the user and by providing information from online sources to the user.
2.2. Computerized Systems
Technology advances so fast that computers become part of our daily live. People use computers everywhere, at work, at school, and at home. Computerized systems are very efficient, process huge amounts of data and keep a big amount of information.
Malolos ET .al (2002) says that automated systems are important as the time and manual efforts are minimized.
Janes(2001) elaborated that computers are devices that are greatly reliable and very powerful. He said that computers possess three advantages compared to other equipments in the office. Computers have these three benefits in the sense that they are faster, more accurate, and more economical.
Reyes (2005) stated that performing work manually is time-consuming. But using computers makes our task more practical.
In Flores (2002) point of view, he defined automation as the replacement of machine control of human.
According to Dioso (2001), computer helps in planning, organizing and controlling in an intelligent manner.
In Ralph M. Stair (1999) point of view, the growing of technology helps people to perform a lot of tasks with less effort.
Gurewich (1999) said that in any corporation the work is done faster when using database system. With the use of computerized system everything is done faster compared to tasks that are performed in a manual way.
Mane (2000) said that the invention of the computer made the task easier to perform than by doing it manually. The computer is very necessary for everyone and it is very good productivity machine. The data are stored in the computer and users can access the information whenever they are in need.
Bryan (2006) defined the information as a set of people, procedures and resources that collects processes and distributes information in an organization. They consist of simple manual information system and as well as computer-based information system that uses hardware, software telecommunication and other forms of information technology.
Sender (2002) referred computers as an intelligence amplifier that can free human to use their time effectively. Computers perform tasks with high speed and accuracy.
Thowsand (2005) defined database system as a structured set of data. These data can be about people, products or event.
Adamski (2007) highlighted the benefits of database by saying it is economical, a lot of information can be retrieved from some amount of data, and there is control of redundancy, integrity, security, flexibility, responsiveness, improvement of maintenance and data independence.
2.3. Web-Based Application
A web application is defined as any application that is accessed through the web over a network for instance Internet or intranet. Nijaz (2000) stated that web applications are famous for the fact that there is the ability to update and maintain these applications without disturbing and installing software on millions of clients’ computers. In the same way, Bohle (2002) also elaborated on the popularity of web applications because of the ubiquity of the client.
According to Nijaz (2000) and Jurca (1999), the web is world-wide and has the capacity to broadcast, it s a mechanism to distribute information, a platform that allows users to collaborate, to interact regardless the geographic location. The principal rea ason for enhancing Web services is to build systems that are interactive, friendly and flexible to users.
2.4. Programming languages on the World Wide Web
• The main building technology of the application, Computer-Based Testing System is Python, a computer programming language often used to build websites and software, automate tasks, and conduct data analysis. Python is a general-purpose language, meaning it can be used to create a variety of different programs and isn't specialized for any specific problems.
• pyttsx3 is a text-to-speech conversion library in Python. Unlike alternative libraries, it works offline and is compatible with both Python 2 and 3. An application invokes the pyttsx3. In it() factory function to get a reference to a pyttsx3.
• Speech Recognition is an important feature in several applications used such as home automation, artificial intelligence, etc. This article aims to provide an introduction to how to make use of the Speech Recognition library of Python. This is useful as it can be used on microcontrollers such as Raspberri Pis with the help of an external microphone.
• In Python, webbrowser module is a convenient web browser controller. It provides a high-level interface that allows displaying Web-based documents to users. webbrowser can also be used as a CLI tool. It accepts a URL as the argument with the following optional parameters: -n opens the URL in a new browser window, if possible, and -t opens the URL in a new browser tab.
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY (WORKDONE)
3.1. Research Methodology
This quantitative research aims to answer the following research question: Do consumers perceive virtual assistants as useful in their customer journey? And how do external factors influence the perceived usefulness? To be able to answer this question, the overall opinion of respondents on the general topic of AI and more specifically virtual assistants needs to be known, their opinion concerning the use of AI technologies in the customer journey and their opinion on the usefulness of such technologies as well as their perception on the ease of use of such technologies as a contributor to the perceived usefulness.
3.2. Project Activities
In order to give solution to problems in an industry, software developer or a team of developers must incorporate a development strategy that encompasses the process, methods and tools layers and generic phases. This strategy is often referred to as process model or a software developing paradigm. A process model for software developing is chosen based on the nature of project and application, the methods and tools to be used, and the controls and deliverables that are required. All software development can be characterized as a problem-solving loop in which distinct stages are encountered. Regardless of the process model that is chosen for a software project, all of the stages coexist simultaneously at some level of detail.
The methodology chosen to develop this system is waterfall model approach. I opted for this method because I found that it is the best for my project where the stages involved can assist my level of progress. Many developers prefer waterfall model and widely use it as a development strategy.
Waterfall model approach is chosen because the approach allows the development of the system to be revised after the stages is finished. Once the stages are not satisfied, then going back to the previous stages can be considered necessary to add or modify any features. The different stages for this model:
• Project Planning
• Requirements Design
• Design
• Development
• Integration and Testing
• Installation and Acceptance
Figure 1: waterfall model
3.2.1. Planning
The purpose of this phase is to determine the best solution and steps taken to develop the system. Planning involves the details planning for the timing of the working progress and types of technique will be taken next. Planning also involves that the methodology that will going to use for this project.
3.2.2 Requirement Analysis
The purpose of this phase is to build logical model of this system. In addition, this phase also needed to understand the applications, fact finding technique like document reviews, surveys, observations, and sampling must be made to identify application requirement, software requirement and hardware requirement.
3.2.3. Design
This phase will produce draft of the system architecture and the prototype of the application that will satisfy all requirement analysis. At this phase the user interface and all necessary input and process will be identify. This phase also determines the application architecture, which is going to shows how to transform the logical design into basic system coding to generate the first prototype of the system.
3.2.4. Implementation
During this implementation phase, the system will be constructed. All codes are generated inside this phase. At the end of this phase, system should run and most of the function for the system should be able to use. Based from the previus phase, from the prototype, the system will become the first version inside this phase.
3.2.5. Testing
This phase will evaluate or verify the system that was developed. This phase will have a simulation data which will simulate the true database for the system. This is to test the functionality of the system in comparing a capture data with a database. Besides, all the functionality that may cause errors or problems to the system must be specified inside this phase because, the final result of the system is a very high priority and important. However, the testing phase will only cover to overcome the problem statement and the system objectives.
3.3. TOOLS
The tools/ software required to develop this Virtual Assistance are:
• Backend: Python
o pyttsx3
o speech_recognition
o datetime
o webbrowser
CHAPTER 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
4.1. Use Case Diagram
The unified modelling language used is use case diagram. A use case is a set of scenarios that describes an interaction between a user and a system. A use case diagram displays the relationship among actors and use cases. The two main components of a use case diagram are use cases and actors. The actors in our system are students and lecturers. The use case diagram is designed in the following figure.
Figure 2: use case diagram
4.2. System Flow Chart
System flowcharts are a way of displaying how data flows in a system and how decisions are made to control events. To illustrate this, symbols are used. They are connected together to show what happens to data and where it goes. Note that system flow charts are very similar to data flow charts.
Figure 3: system flow chart
4.3. ER Diagram
An entity-relationship diagram (ERD), also known as an entity-relationship model, is a graphical representation that depicts relationships among people, objects, places, concepts or events within an information technology (IT) system.
Figure 4: ER Diagram
4.4. Data Flow Diagram
A data flow diagram (DFD) uses a very limited number of primitive symbols to represent the functions performed by a system and the data flow among the functions. Starting with a set of high-level functions that a system performs, a DFD model hierarchy represents various subfunctions.
Figure 5: Data Flow Diagram
4.5. Database Design
The database is used for the purpose of handling information as an integrated whole. It is defined as a collection of interrelated data stored with less or no redundancy to serve many users quickly and effectively.
• Controlled Redundancy
• Data independence
• Accurate and integrating
• More information at low cost
• Recovery from failure
• Privacy and security
• Performance
4.6. Output
CHAPTER 5: SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
5.1. SUMMARY
1. This virtual private assistance can be used in private companies and institutions for custom commands because in virtual assistants like Alexa, and Siri it is not possible to create custom commands.
2. All the details related to private companies and institutions will be available in this system.
3. At whatever point the user search for details about his company or institution, at that point this system will help the user with finding the details as soon as possible.
5.2. CONCLUSION
A virtual assistant will save time and money by doing small tasks for you and doing them accurately and with high quality. If you handle the virtual assistant correctly, it will be a boom in your business.
REFERENCES
1. Assudani, Manish & Quamar, Kamran & Dhongde, Palash & Thakare, Pawan & Yadav, Ritik & Rahim, Sayyed. . AI Based Virtual Assistance on Raspberry PI , International Journal of Advanced Research in Science, Communication and Technology. (pg. 381-385) [ 2022, April] .DOI: 10.48175/IJARSCT-3279
2. Subhash, S & Srivatsa, Prajwal & Siddesh, S & Ullas, A & Santhosh, B. . Artificial Intelligence-based Voice Assistant. 2020 Fourth World Conference on Smart Trends in Systems Security and Sustainablity (WorldS4) (pg. 593-596) [2020,July]. DOI: 10.1109/WorldS450073.2020.9210344
3. Mukherjee, Siddhartha & Nediyanchath, Anish & Singh, Abhishek & Prasan, Vinuthkumar & Gogoi, Verma & Parmar, Surya Pratap. . Intent Classification from Code Mixed Input for Virtual Assistants. 15th IEEE International Conference on Semantic ComputingAt: San Diego, CA, USA. [2020, December ] ,DOI: 10.1109/ICSC50631.2021.00027.
4. Germanos, Georgios & Kavallieros, Dimitrios & Kolokotronis, Nicholas & Georgiou, Nikolaos. . Privacy Issues in Voice Assistant Ecosystems. 2020 IEEE World Congress on Services (SERVICES) (pg. 205-212), [2020, October], DOI:10.1109/SERVICES48979.2020.00050
5. Anniappa, Deeksha & Kim, Yoohwan. . Security and Privacy Issues with Virtual Private Voice Assistants, 2021 IEEE 11th Annual Computing and Communication Workshop and Conference (CCWC), (pg. 0702-0708), [2021, January] DOI:10.1109/CCWC51732.2021.9375964.
6. Bohouta, Gamal & Këpuska, Veton. Next-Generation of Virtual Personal Assistants (Microsoft Cortana, Apple Siri, Amazon Alexa and Google Home). IEEE CCWC 2018, The 8th IEEE Annual Computing and Communication Workshop and ConferenceAt: University of Nevada, Las Vegas, USA . Project: Improving Wake-Up-Word and General Speech Recognition Systems [2018, January]
7. N, Kumaran & V, Rangaraj & S, Siva & Ranganayakulu, Dhanalakshmi. Intelligent Personal Assistant – Implementing Voice Commands enabling Speech Recognition. 2020 International Conference on System, Computation, Automation, and Networking (ICSCAN). (pg. 1-5),[2020, July] DOI: 10.1109/ICSCAN49426.2020.9262279.
8. Kollamudi, Pavani & Koduru, Bhargavi & Poranki, Bharathi & Golla, Madhu. Smart virtual assistant. Materials Today: Proceedings. [2021,July] ,DOI: 10.1016/j.matpr.2021.07.303.
9. Chandana, Ch & Ashita, V. & Neha, G. & Kumar, K. & Babu, D. & Kishore, G. & Bharathi, Y.. Voice-Enabled Virtual Assistant. In book: Sustainable Communication Networks and Application (pg.335-346), [2022, January], DOI: 10.1007/978-981-16-6605-6_24.
10. Maheswari, K.G. & Meenakshi, R. & Nalinipriya, G. & Anandasayanam, K & Hariram, B & Pandian, G. Dynamic AI based Email Voice Assistant for Web Services. (pg. 1-4) , [2022,March], DOI: 10.1109/ICSTSN53084.2022.9761287.
11. Liu, Yanqing & Quan, Qiaoli. (2022). AI Recognition Method of Pronunciation Errors in Oral English Speech with the Help of Big Data for Personalized Learning. Journal of Information & Knowledge Management. (pg.21),[2022,May], DOI:10.1142/S0219649222400287.