Acquire the knowledge needed to work effectively in conversational artificial intelligence (AI) and understand the opportunities and threats it can potentially bring. This book will help you navigate from the traditional world of dialogue systems that revolve around hard coded scripts, to the world of large language models, prompt engineering, conversational AI platforms, multi-modality, and ultimately autonomous agents.

In this new world, decisions are made by a system that may forever remain a ‘black box’ for most of us. This book aims to eliminate unnecessary noise and describe the fundamental components of conversational AI.

Past experiences will prove invaluable in constructing seamless hybrid systems. This book will provide the most recommended solutions, recognizing that it is not always necessary to blindly pursue new tools.

Written in unprecedented and turbulent times for conversational interfaces you’ll see that despite previous waves of advancement in conversational technology, now conversational interfaces are gaining unparalleled popularity. Specifically, the release of ChatGPT in November 2022 by Open AI revolutionized the conversational paradigm and showed how easy and intuitive communication with a computer can be.

Old professions are being disrupted, new professions are emerging, and even the most conservative corporations are changing their strategy and experimenting with large language models, allocating an unprecedented amount of budget to these projects. No one knows for sure the exact future of conversational AI, but everyone agrees that it’s here to stay.

What You'll LearnSee how large language models are constructed and used in conversational systems Review the risks and challenges of new technologies in conversational AI Examine techniques for prompt engineering Enable practitioners to keep abreast of recent developments in conversational AIWho This Book Is For Conversation designers, product owners, and product or project managers in conversational AI who wish to learn about new methods and challenges posed by the recent emergence in the public domain of ChatGPT. Data scientists, final year undergraduates and graduates of computer science.