This book explains how to build Natural Language Generation (NLG) systems - computer software systems which use techniques from artificial intelligence and computational linguistics to automatically generate understandable texts in English or other human languages, either in isolation or as part of multimedia documents, Web pages, and speech output systems. Typically starting from some non-linguistic representation of information as input, NLG systems use knowledge about language and the application domain to automatically produce documents, reports, explanations, help messages, and other kinds of texts. The book covers the algorithms and representations needed to perform the core tasks of document planning, microplanning, and surface realization, using a case study to show how these components fit together. It also discusses engineering issues such as system architecture, requirements analysis, and the integration of text generation into multimedia and speech output systems.

"Consistent and well-developed...a valuable guide..." General Linguistics

"[A]n indispensable guide...extremely well-organized and well-written." User Modeling and User-Adapted Interaction

"Each topic is clearly presented...the information is very well organized...It is detailed, without being too dense or overloaded with technical jargon...This book should be read by anyone interested in natural language processing who wants to get a better idea of the specifics of NLG." Computing Reviews