Prospects for Practical Natural Language Systems

As the author of a "practical" NL data base query system, one of the suggested topics for this panel is of particular interest to me. The issue of what hurdles remain before NL systems become practical strikes particulary close to home. %s someone with a more pragmatic view of NL processing, my feeling is, not surprisingly, that we already have the capability to construct practical ~:L systems. Significant enhancement of existing manmachine communication is possible within the current NL technology if we set our sights appropriately and are willing to take the additional effort to craft systems actually worthy of being used. The missing link isn't a utopian parsing algorithm yet to be discovered. The hurdles to practical NL systems are of a much more conventional variety that require, as Edison said, more perspiration than inspiration.