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AI software that actually works is available free at http://alicebot.org.

You'll find little of the new age nonsense about the "singularity" there, too -- just a straightforward, minimalist approach to handling conversation that won the Loebner Prize last year.

Kino Coursey, one of the participants in the Alicebot/AIML project (see http://alicebot.org/bios/kinocoursey.html has already started porting Alice to the AIBO.

AI software that actually works is available free at http://alicebot.org.

You'll find little of the new age nonsense about the "singularity" there, too -- just a straightforward, minimalist approach to handling conversation that won the Loebner Prize last year.

Kino Coursey, one of the participants in the Alicebot/AIML project (see http://alicebot.org/bios/kinocoursey.html has already started porting Alice to the AIBO.

YES YES! the NERDS win again!
i finally have my very own golden penguin!
take that Michael Tiemann!

some other show highlights:
IBM had a good showing with lots to exhibit. i wasn't sure if it was IBM or a partner, but they had a great display of a java app that checks to see if your eyes are open or closed. this would be great to incorporate it into a car.

also, check out alicebot for a good AI example of a psycho-analysis program.

try A.L.I.C.E. (that's http://www.alicebot.org/ for the goatsecx paranoid). Its one of the better bots that has won awards and stuff. Sure it isn't perfect, but its a neat toy to play with.

I just downloaded an AliceBot to run on my laptop yesterday, first to see if I can get it to talk XML RPC or SOAP to my home automation server running Misterhouse, and second to see if I could turn it into a level 1 tech support agent for the TOTALLY inane questions that cripple the daily operations of my client's help desk.

First thing I have to do is whittle down AliceBot's knowledge base from over 27,000 categories to just a few. First, how to get the weather report. Next, how to read Slashdot, and finally, the rest of home automation.

For those who want to see the current state of AI you might want to try Alice Bot. It's very good and I tricked one of my friends into thinking it was a chat room....

A good ChatterBot site is The Simon Laven Page. It has listings of interesting ChatterBots. My favorite is NIALL. It learns from what you tell it and comes up with some very funny responses.

--Volrath50

Isn't this something that an Alicebot could be taught to deal with? If the current alicebot could be taught through the Admin web interface, I'd be dumping answers to common user queries in it right now so that when people mail our helpdesk it would give recommended possible answers along with assigning a ticket number and letting them know that someone will get back to them within 15 minutes. As it stands right now, the thing really doesn't remember anything but my name, so making it useful isn't a choice right now. All the programmings seems to have to come in as pre-made AIML files, which is not the intended interface, but the result of learning and reductionism.

This is the wave of the future, though. Using these limited expert/knowledgebase/intelligent systems to take care of the menial knowledge while letting us concentrate on the real fires will let us produce more. Until we have to debug the bot and explain to the CEO why it told him to "F off" after mailing in his 10th Microsoft Office question of the week.

The bot learned to get sick of you quickly and burned out. We'll have to clean out all the AIML files and start over now.

I think the best open source AI out there is ALICE:

http://www.alicebot.org/

Have fun

the plugins. You can get a plugin to do just about anything. For instance, many of you have probably heard of AOLiza. Occasionally, I've got a bot running on TheAliceBot. That screen name uses a GAIM plugin to turn it into a bot based on the Alice bot engine (it works GAIM version 9.20, but not the latest version of GAIM; perhaps someone could edit the source and post a link . . . ?). You can't do that with AOL's IM client. Secondly, you can have more than one instance of GAIM running on the same desktop, each logged onto a different screen name. You can't do that either (without a patch) with AOL's client.

For real fun, you can try the AI that won the last Turing test (to convince a human that it was another human, and not a computer) at www.alicebot.org.

Ok I might be biased by from what I have heard from slashdot and the apps I have seen that really isn't all that hot.

Take a good example alicebot look at the java version. The same version of that program in C/C++ takes 1Mb of memory. The Java version takes *at least* 64 and you are suggested to have 128 to make it work comfortably. And mind you the Java version is better tested! Also the new jvm from Sun takes up about 40Mb for the compressed file. Why dosn't someone update kaffe a little more. The only useful java applications I have ever used or thought about were Freenet and some text editor in java.

All the stuff you mention would require you to have probably a monster box just to run nibbles. I hate to see what the sysrequirements are for things like Quake 3 in Java *shudder*.

This is slightly-OT, but I thought it was interesting. The current "state of the art" in web-based AI is the "AliceBot." It's a conversation bot that won an international competition for AI.. it was dubbed the "most human computer." It's pretty interesting, but as you play around with it for a while, you'll get the impression that it really isn't all-too advanced. While I realize that AI that generates conversation may be much more difficult than any AI you're planning on coding, I still think it's interesting to look at the current leader in the field. I'm sure trying to make a computer seem "human" and trying to use AI to tailor web experiences are two different things, but I still think there's a cross-over.

Alice: What can I call you?
Jeeves: You Can Call Me Willy
A: OK I will call you Willy.
J: Willy Porter
A: "OK I will call you Willy"? willy porter?
J: Where can I find a step-by-step guide to preparing a will?
A: I would suggest a search. Would you like to know more?
J: We'd like to know more about you!
A: By "we" do you mean you and me?
J: The Golden Mean
A: Is that a fact.
J: What is FACT?
A: It is a good question. Have you tried www.whatis.com? I can ask someone about it.
J: Who am I?
A: You are Willy, seeker.
J: The Seeker, Reuniting America!
A: I have never heard about it.
J: Have you heard the one about. . .?
A: No. Tell me more.
J: I Love to Tell the Story
A: You love to tell the story. What do you like about it so much?
J: Every life has a story to tell
A: That is a generalization.
J: What is generalization?
A: The act or process of gerneralizing.
J: Caught - In - The - Act
A: I hope it is not contagious. Also I hope you get well soon.
J: Smile! It's Contagious!

Whenever we're talking to a bot, we tend to use our knowledge of how they work to try and break them by giving reasonable but awkward answers. However, my memory of the Turing Test was that you had two groups of answerers - one human (who were allowed to respond however they pleased) and one of bot. The bot was decided to have passed if over half couldn't tell which was which.

Anyway. I've been playing with Alicebot after someone recommended it above - won the Loebner Prize or something similar. Now, I managed to catch it out, but it's doing far better than any other I've played with. It's actually managed to recover from a bad conversation, which most can't.

Whether it could pass a Turing Test or not I wouldn't know, but with a bit of luck in the questions it would stand a fair chance.

Greg

Did I miss its specialist topics or something?

Regards, Ralph.

For an open source bot, check out the AliceBot, winner of the Loebner Prize (a Turing Test competition) for this year. The source, in both C and Java form, is released under the GNU GLP.