Bot News
Marvin

By Brian Proffitt

"He is 12 years old - cheeky - wears a pair of horn-rimmed glasses,
bermudas and bath-slippers..."

No, this is not a miniature Jimmy Buffett, but rather the latest virtual agent technology from Germany's InterLinx GmbH, named Marvin.

This description of Marvin comes from InterLinx's Chairman, Carsten Hirche. Hirche further described Marvin as a product of their VirAge technology, which InterLinx markets as a virtual agent ready for use on customer's Web sites.

Like most chat bots of this type, Marvin is designed to be a spokesperson for a given company or product. Using natural language technology, Marvin works well with interacting with others--provided you understand German.

Marvin, at the present time, can only converse in that language, though Hirche says there are plans in the works to add English and Japanese to Marvin's repetoire.

Marvin will also have an advantage for deployment. InterLinx's VirAge technology is based on Java and is platform-independent. VirAge's modular design will also allow future developments with a good deal of adaptability.

"We are also providing a user interface called "Dialog-Manager" to supervise and modify dialogues," Hirche added. This tool is particularly geared for non-technical users.