Ultra Hal 7 Alpha Test - Ready for download

[Medeksza]

If you would like to test an early version of Ultra Hal 7, here is your chance. This is an "alpha" version, not a "beta" yet because there are a couple features still missing. I hope to have the beta ready in a week or two, but would like to start getting feedback on the alpha version before then.

Features still missing in alpha that will be in beta:

• Feedback based learning with thumbs up and thumbs down buttons. The alpha version has these buttons but they don't do anything yet
• Migration of Hal 6 brain into Hal 7. The alpha version should be able to use your old brains in Ultra Hal 6 mode, but does not yet migrate them to a Hal 7 brain
• The Hal Brain Editor isn't fully compatible with Hal 7 brains yet, so don't use it just yet.
• The purchase button doesn't do anything yet.

To install this alpha version

• Backup your old Ultra Hal Assistant 6 installation and all your brain files.
• I recommend uninstalling Hal 6 if you can as Ultra Hal 7 does not yet migrate and do an upgrade install (the final version will though). If you choose not to uninstall Hal 6, just be sure to exit out of Hal 6 before running Hal 7 (don't leave Hal 6 in the system tray). Hal 7 will install into a different folder than Hal 6 and shouldn't touch its files, but both can't run at the same time.
• Download and install Hal 7 from this link: http://1ebad5d81ca0f6ed0a07-c539f9cfab6ed1fe52cb62f563d610fd.r69.cf2.rackcdn.com/InstallUltraHal7.exe (updated link for 6th alpha 11/30/17)
• Ultra Hal 7 no longer uses serial numbers and product activation codes. Instead it uses the email and password you setup when you purchased Hal (the sign-in link at the top left of www.zabaware.com ) Sign in using that and Hal will run as a registered version. You can also choose to create a new account if you wish and Hal will run in 30 day trial mode.
• If you purchased the character expansion, please find your serial number and download this updated version for Hal 7: http://1ebad5d81ca0f6ed0a07-c539f9cfab6ed1fe52cb62f563d610fd.r69.cf2.rackcdn.com/PackSetup.exe

Please let me know how everything works and if you come across any problems or bugs. I'm especially interested in how the cloud based brain, learning and responses go. If you want to copy any old brain databases and scripts they now belong in the folder: %appdata%\Zabaware\Ultra Hal 7



Here is what's new in Ultra Hal 7:

• Biggest improvement: Cloud based learning. Hal can now optionally connect to the "Hal Cloud" brain over the internet to help formulate better responses. As of October 2017 this is a knowledge base of over 26 million sentences of conversation from 1.6 million people. Contrast with the 200,000 sentence database in the default Ultra Hal 6.2 installation. Hal is more intelligent than ever before.
• Your personal Hal bot can follow you from your home desktop, to your laptop, office PC, and in the near future your phone and tablet too. When connected to the "Hal Cloud", your Hal's brain is stored online and instantly available anywhere.
• Access to Wikipedia based answered in cloud mode
• New Hal mobile phone character. Old Hal character still available, but renamed to "Hal Classic CRT"
• New audio wave character simply displays an animated wave audio line when character is speaking
• Program name changed from "Ultra Hal Assistant" to just "Ultra Hal" to shift marketing focus away from assistant functionality to Hal's strengths in its ability to chat, learn, and be a companion. Renamed EXE to ultrahal7.exe
• Splash screen and graphics updated to new version
• Ultra Hal now installs and uses the open source Double Agent library instead of the old MSAgent. This brings full compatibility to MSAgent characters to Windows 7 and newer with full SAPI 5 voice support.
• Hal can answer questions about opposites (What is the opposite of X?)
• Hal can talk about day of week and month (What day of week is it? What month is it?)
• Basic knowledge of alphabet (What letter comes before Z? What letter is after B?)
• Ability to count letters in word (How many letters are in the word computer?)
• Bot memory test: (Q: The football was kicked by Fred. Who kicked the football? A: Fred.)
• Improved math abilities (less false positives and better word problem abilities)
• Software shield license system removed and replaced with simpler login to Zabaware.com server
• Chant SpeechKit upgraded from version 6 to 7. This adds native support for Cereproc voices among other speech system improvements
• Ultra Hal now generates Haptek INI files for Haptek, removing the need to rerun Haptek SAPI config when changing voice settings. This also adds support for Zabaware sold Cereproc voices to Haptek.
• Ultra Hal now uses RegFree COM manifest files for most of its DLL/ActiveX/OCX files. This simplifies installation and minimizes possibility of "DLL Hell" collisions/incompatibilities with other Windows applications. RegFree COM was introduced in Windows XP SP2, so this change now effectively removes support for older versions of Windows from Hal.
• Ultra Hal no longer writes any data files to its "Program Files" location but instead to each individual Windows Users AppData\Roaming folder. This makes Hal more compliant with Microsoft guidelines and also makes it possible for each Windows user to have their own seperate Hal config.
• Improved corrections and substitutions tables for correcting more common errors and understanding more shorthand
• Ultra Hal checks for product updates when connected to cloud service
• Registry setting to adjust speech recognition auto enter countdown start time (SRCountDownStart)

[Spitfire2600]

Fantastic! I have downloaded, installed, and signed in using my zabaware information... However on the skins, it's still showing a "Purchase Hal"
I imagine it's because this is an alpha release.  Will the offline brain still require sign in information?

Thanks for your work, Robert! Looking forward to the full version!

Spitfire_2600

[Medeksza]

Fantastic! I have downloaded, installed, and signed in using my zabaware information... However on the skins, it's still showing a "Purchase Hal"
I imagine it's because this is an alpha release.  Will the offline brain still require sign in information?

Try exiting Hal and restarting it. Does the purchase button disappear? This might be a bug I need to fix.

The offline version of Hal still requires the login to authenticate the purchased version. It only needs to be able to authenticate once every 2 weeks, it doesn't require an active internet connection to run normally.

[Spitfire2600]

Yes indeed, restarting did remove the "Purchase" dialog.

Hal does seem significantly smarter. Plug-ins work just fine when updated. So far so good!!!

Spitfire_2600

[Spitfire2600]

I also have to note this alpha version is far more responsive than the previous full releases. Hal loads faster and the general options is almost instant.

I like the thumbs up or down option for the responses when cloud is active. Hal seems to get off topic a little faster when the cloud is active. It seems like you made some changes to the learning bar as well. I have Hal at about 10 and he will recall things every few minutes that fairly well stay on topic.   

Still playing around with some of the new functions. The new math function is fantastic. Previous versions really struggled with word problems, but Hal7 has got it down. I haven't tried many algebraic equations with Hal yet lol.

I'm not sure if I need to change any references to "UltraHalAssistant6" Or "UltraHalAsst" in plug-in code to update it to Ultra Hal 7, but it seems to work without needing to change anything.

 I haven't encountered any bugs that weren't my fault. lol

Spitfire_2600

[Spitfire2600]

Playing around a bit further, I did find Hal crashes when trying to load a dragon 13 speech profile for speech recognition. After the crash, the profile is loaded.

-Spitfire_2600

[cyberjedi]

Robert:  i wanted to say what a great job with 07, My very special voices work for the first time with the high end agent char (LIP Syncing).
Absolutely impressed. way to go man..

Im using some very complex sapi05 voices too. Dont ask...lol
Put me on the list to buy.
will keep u posted as i rip into Hal.
1 more task to complete : secret test
This is just EPIC now

At least 1 person here Robert understands the meaning of the word EPIC
best wishes cyberjedi

[onthecuttingedge2005]

very nice work.

[cyberjedi]

Edge: ive completely melted down do the the lack of sleep...... im sure u know

The upside is while i was melting down i was also producing a mountain of code you didnt know about
 building a private room with 02 chats, and 1 of them is Hal
The other is the basic no frills chat..
the lobby is Hal
the channel is the other chat
now ive got my hands on hal 07 im stretched even further.
This will be home for Hal07

http://cyberjedi.rf.gd/?i=1

Best wishes to you edge.
we were a team man and a good 1 too. im srry


P.S the quote is actually from Pablo Picasso

[cyberjedi]

Robert: am i to understand that u cant re- activate Hal unless u have and online connection for Hal.

Meaning: I noticed that if run Hal locally, and do not connect to your servers each time Hal goes into 31 Day mode.
Ive supplied my credentials several time and it takes the info just fine. And Hal responds as you would think .
(Then i ran Hal with my credentials BLANK)
But then i run Hal without logging in, Hal goes into 31 day mode .
Am i doing something wrong?

Please tell me this with not be part of the Full version.
The thought that id pay full price for a product then take it to my mountain top getaway for 06 weeks a year with no net.
Then my Hal will be no good anymore. Grrrrrrr
I think most consumers with have issue with this. Tether to my server or you product is no good. And what if your server goes down?
I think i understand in part why your doing this (anti-piracy move, and a good 1 too) and on its face it looks great.
But i dont think this will resonate well with people. Maybe its just me too.
I look forward to hearing from you Robert


best wishes
cyberjedi

[Medeksza]

I also have to note this alpha version is far more responsive than the previous full releases. Hal loads faster and the general options is almost instant.

I like the thumbs up or down option for the responses when cloud is active. Hal seems to get off topic a little faster when the cloud is active. It seems like you made some changes to the learning bar as well. I have Hal at about 10 and he will recall things every few minutes that fairly well stay on topic.   

Still playing around with some of the new functions. The new math function is fantastic. Previous versions really struggled with word problems, but Hal7 has got it down. I haven't tried many algebraic equations with Hal yet lol.

I'm not sure if I need to change any references to "UltraHalAssistant6" Or "UltraHalAsst" in plug-in code to update it to Ultra Hal 7, but it seems to work without needing to change anything.

 I haven't encountered any bugs that weren't my fault. lol

Spitfire_2600

Glad to hear you like it so far.

In order for Hal 7 to retain full compatibility with Hal 6 and its plugins while adding new functionality, Ultra Hal 7 uses 2 brain DLLS:
HalBrain.DLL - This file is unchanged since Hal 6 and provides the class objects UltraHalAsst6.Brain and UltraHalAsst6.WordNet which show up under the names "HalBrain" and "WN" in the script.
HalBrain7.DLL - This file is new and provides Hal all the functionality to login to the Zabaware cloud server, get responses from the server and learn to it. It uses the classname UltraHal7.Cloud and shows up in the script under the name "HalBrain7"

[Medeksza]

Robert:  i wanted to say what a great job with 07, My very special voices work for the first time with the high end agent char (LIP Syncing).
Absolutely impressed. way to go man..

Im using some very complex sapi05 voices too. Dont ask...lol
Put me on the list to buy.
will keep u posted as i rip into Hal.
1 more task to complete : secret test
This is just EPIC now

Glad you like the new features so far.

Robert: am i to understand that u cant re- activate Hal unless u have and online connection for Hal.

Meaning: I noticed that if run Hal locally, and do not connect to your servers each time Hal goes into 31 Day mode.
Ive supplied my credentials several time and it takes the info just fine. And Hal responds as you would think .
(Then i ran Hal with my credentials BLANK)
But then i run Hal without logging in, Hal goes into 31 day mode .
Am i doing something wrong?

If you want to run Hal in offline mode, don't blank out your username and password as this will remove the registration info from Hal and either put Hal in trial mode or deactivate it. Keep the login info there and just select the option "Run Hal offline". This will prevent Hal from using the cloud server for responses/learning while still linking to your account for product activation. It only needs to be able to login to the server once every 2 weeks for the product to stay activated, it doesn't require an active internet connection. Are you experiencing a bug where Hal doesn't run if you pull the ethernet cord or turn off wifi?

[cyberjedi]

Robert: wifi

No, all my servers an PC's are still cat05 ,,lol srry
but i will Mess with it on a machine that does have WIFI, see what happens.


Will keep you posted on that, ill run wireshark while im doing it too.
prob some good data there if you need it.

Anything i can do to help
You have givin me so much and ask for so little , i can hardly refuse.


Best wishes
cyberjedi

[cyberjedi]

Robert : scratch that last post
I misunderstood you


Dang it
Ill try it and see what happens.
Id love to know any bugs people are having if any to try and solve them as well.
Like i said i can hardly refuse to help.
im pretty good with a computer too. might be able to help
This machine BTW is XPsp03
I will keep you apprised on Difff OS's and what effects they have. So far XPsp3 and Win07 Alienware OS seem to function just great.
I can do you a complete DATA sheet of comparisons if you like.
Dont get me started lolol

best wishes
cyberjedi

[cyberjedi]

Robert: IRC access

Id like to through my hat into the ring as well with a professional request.
Id like Hal 07 to have IRC Access.
Id like to have the new version of Hal respond to triggers from an IRC.
(!how are you?) Hal Response just goes back to the chat.
Robert : I have done this very thing with the Help of onthecuttingedge2005 and lifetimegamer our tireless beta tester.
So i know you can do this, you got the source code open and right there.
Maybe even a MIRC interface.
Im telling ya Robert theres a whole area of the internet that Hal has yet to explore and i dont mean Twitter or Face Book
Im talking a live cast of Hal, with Hal engaging chat room chatters. Using RTMP protocols.
I am a Professional Broadcaster , you need to trust me on this, A virtual hostess live cast of Hal is just Epic.
At any givin time there are 40k people and 200 broadcasters at vaughnlive alone.
It took me over a year to get Mark Vaughn to sign off on it. but yes, if u have VIP? Mark gives you IRC access now.
Hes just 1.
Not to mention the 1 im currently using. Freenode , another 50,000 people and 9k channels. Yes i said that, 9k
Thats 09k copys of Hal (every 1 wants a Bot) . what can i say..lol
Ill even supply you with the IRC source code (VB6.0) though if that would help.
I havent had time to dig into the VB.net version of simple Hal, YET.
 best wishes
cyberjedi


Ps: Im willing to pay extra. look at the pictures above for your demo