Conversations with Data

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An example of a multi-turn text-to-SQL task. The user query “Find the names of the top 3 highest sales books” corresponds to the formal program “SELECT title FROM book ORDER BY sale_amount DESC LIMIT 3”. The follow-up user query, “Who are their authors,” corresponds to the formal program “SELECT t1.title, t1.name FROM author AS t1 JOIN book AS t2 ON t1.id = t2.author_id ORDER BY t2.sale_amount DESC LIMIT 3”. In the corresponding database, there is an “Author” table with an “id” column, a “name” column, a “country” column, and an ellipsis signifying additional columns; a “Press” table with an “id” column, a “name” column, an “address” column, and an ellipsis signifying additional columns; and a “Book” table with an “id” column, a “title” column, an “author id” column, a “sale_amount” column, and an ellipsis signifying additional columns.
Microsoft Research Blog

| Alex Polozov, Chris Meek, and Ahmed Awadallah

One key aspiration of AI is to develop natural and effective task-oriented conversational systems. Task-oriented conversational systems use a natural language interface to collaborate with and support people in accomplishing specific goals and activities. They go beyond chitchat conversation. For…