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Dialing for documents: An experiment in information theory

  • Stony Brook University

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionpeer-review

10 Scopus citations

Abstract

Standard telephone keypads are labeled with letters of the alphabet, enabling users to enter textual data for a variety of possible applications. However, the overloading of three letters on a single key creates a potential ambiguity as to which character was intended, which must be resolved for unambiguous text entry. Existing systems all use pairs of keypresses to spell out single letters, but are extremely cumbersome and frustrating to use. Instead, we propose single-stroke text entry on telephone keypads, with the ambiguity resolved by exploiting information-theoretic constraints. We develop algorithms capable of correctly identifying up to 99% of the characters in typical English text, sufficient for such applications as telephones for the hearing-impaired, Email without a terminal, and advanced voice-response systems.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationProceedings of the 7th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology, UIST 1994
PublisherAssociation for Computing Machinery, Inc
Pages147-155
Number of pages9
ISBN (Electronic)0897916573, 9780897916578
DOIs
StatePublished - Nov 2 1994
Event7th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology, UIST 1994 - Marina del Rey, United States
Duration: Nov 2 1994Nov 4 1994

Publication series

NameProceedings of the 7th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology, UIST 1994

Conference

Conference7th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology, UIST 1994
Country/TerritoryUnited States
CityMarina del Rey
Period11/2/9411/4/94

Keywords

  • Information theory
  • Telephone keypads
  • Telephones for the hearing-impaired
  • Viterbi algorithm

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