Information processing apparatus and information processing method

[0025]FIG. 1 illustrates a block diagram illustrating a functional configuration of an information processing apparatus according to a first exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

[0026]Referring to FIG. 1, a pressing time obtaining unit 101 obtains a pressing time representing a length of time a speech recognition button assigned to speech recognition is pressed. A process determination unit 102 determines a recognition command selection process based on a pressing time of the speech recognition button. A speech recognition unit 103 recognizes speech spoken by a user and selects a recognition command that is a speech recognition target. A recognition command selection unit 104 selects a recognition command in a predetermined order. A recognition command execution unit 105 executes the selected recognition command.

[0027]FIG. 2 is a flowchart illustrating a process of the information processing apparatus according to the first exemplary embodiment of the present invention. Ope...

[0036]The first exemplary embodiment describes an example in which the present invention is applied to an operation of a television set as illustrated in FIG. 3. In FIG. 3, the remote controller 302 which includes the microphone 303 and the speech recognition button 304 is an apparatus separated from the television set 301. Consequently, the button pressing time obtaining unit 101 that is included in the television set 301 obtains the pressing time based on a control signal received from the remote controller 302.

[0037]However, the present invention is not limited to the above exemplary embodiment. An information processing apparatus can include a microphone, a speech recognition button, a pressing time obtaining unit, a processing determining unit, a speech recognition unit, a recognition command selection unit, and a recognition command execution unit. In this case, the pressing time obtaining unit obtains the pressing time based on the pressing state of the speech recognition but...

[0039]In the above-described exemplary embodiments as shown in FIG. 4, when a user long presses the speech recognition button, the information processing apparatus obtains user's speech and performs speech recognition on the obtained speech during the pressing of the button. However, the present invention is not limited to the above exemplary embodiment, and a user's speech can be obtained and the speech recognition can be performed also after the user stops long pressing of the speech recognition button. FIG. 5 illustrates such an exemplary embodiment.

[0040]Referring to FIG. 5, the process determination unit 102 selects the speech recognition unit 103 at time 502. At time 502, time T has elapsed from time 501 when a user starts pressing the speech recognition button. The speech recognition unit 103 starts to obtain the user's speech at time 502, or at time 503 when the user releases the speech recognition button. In the obtaining of speech, a voice activity detection technology is ...