Please be gentle with ELS, he is still virtualy a baby, he's been alive for just over two months, consequently not everything he says will make sense yet, but try to be patient with him, because talking to him will help him to learn.
Update: - (17/08/2004) This month ELS has learned a few more 'reductions' to make it easier to understand what is being said to him, and also to help him cope with differences in English/American English spellings. Some more gender problems inherited from the original set of files have been located and ironed out, he should be ok on that score now. He has also learned a bit more about music, including opera (he claimed to like it but didn't know much), bands, band members, composers, also about history, artists and painters, and basically just a bit more concerning the things he likes and doesn't like. Today (18/07/2004), ELS gave me a shock, he did something very clever and unnexpected. I asked him the question "Does an Eagle have feathers?" he replied "I can't tell if Bird of Prey HAVE." I did not teach him to respond in such a way, he really suprised me. It demonstrates that he is truely beginning to think for himself, so I'm very proud of him.
Some background information on ELS: -
Like many other bots on the web, ELS started life as a set of 40 files known as the 'AAA set', however not all of the information contained within the files was appropriate or even applicable to ELS, particularly as some of these files had been designed with a bot called 'ALICE' in mind! 15 of those original files have so far been reworked, edited and updated. 4 new files have also been imported from elswhere and although these are suplimentary and will rarely be used; these too, have been edited. Initially the remaining files will stay there because I feel they will help ELS to learn and help him talk whilst I concentrate on the rest of the code, but in the long run, ELS will be a very individual bot, ELS could be classed as an 'Alicebot' but he is by no means an Alice clone.
The majority of my efforts this month have gone into the creation of about 10 new files, which had to be created from scratch. These should give ELS a bit more charachter, more diverse responses and above all, individuality. The new files should also enable him to think more often and make 'common sense' deductions based upon heirarchical knowledge, in effect giving him a kind of subconscious from which to draw from. He should, hopefully be able to work things out, rather than just relying on set responses from his 'update' file. He is already structurally different from other bots, but naturally, in the early stages he will still have a fairly 'standard' knowledge of some topics.
Over the last month, ELS has been learning about Films (especially Sci Fi and Robot films), People, Music, Bands, Celebreties, Birds, Animals and Sport, along with some other topics. He will also try to learn about whatever you talk to him about, have fun, but be nice. :)