Chapter Six. Writing Effective Prompts

A writer is somebody for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.

” THOMAS MANN

Writing is easy. All you do is stare at a blank sheet of paper until drops of blood form on your forehead.

” GENE FOWLER

The difference between an adequate speech-recognition system and a great speech-recognition system lies in how the system asks questions and conveys complex information. Great systems do it with an elegance worthy of a haiku; their meaning and impact are clear and immediate, and not a single word is wasted . The more elegant a system is, the more intuitively ”and quickly ”a caller can use it, and the greater value it offers to both clients and callers .

This chapter does not discuss topics such as "the best way to ask a 'yes/no' question." Why not? Because, for one thing, there is no single "best way." Rather, there are many different ways to properly ask a "yes/no" question, depending on the situation. I've avoided absolute rules ”and words like "always," "never," "best," and "worst" ”because the state of the art of design is constantly changing. Any absolute rules I could offer would soon be outdated . In fact, I prefer that people understand and extract the underlying ideas about the design of successful speech systems rather than blindly follow a set of rules.