DSML: A Proposal for XML Standards for Messaging Between Components of a Natural Language Dialog System

In this paper, we propose using standard XML messaging interfaces between components of natural language dialog systems. We describe a stock trading and information access system, where XML is used to encode speech acts, transactions and retrieved information in messages between system components. We use an XML/XSL based unification approach to display personalized, multi-modal system responses. We are proposing the creation of XML standards for all messaging between components of NLP systems. We hope that the use of XML in messaging will promote greater interoperability of both data and code. The working name of the proposed standard messaging language(s) is DSML (“Dialog System Markup Language”.)