Hello everyone, I have been using ultra Hal from Zabaware since 2004. My version of ultra Hal supports using Haptek characters. In the past I had been able to get the character to change clothing by using trigger words but in the latest version I have been having problems with the Haptek character. So I have decided to do some research on other types of chat bot’s.
  I have been able to download an older but free version of VirtualFem which works in Windows 7.
I’ve also put Aimlpad which contains a chat bot and Rebecca which I was able to download. At this point in time I have removed all of the Aiml files and replaced them with Rebecca’s files except for the dictionary which was used with VirtualFem.
  At this point in time I have a character window with a looping film, a chat bot that works and is able to handle a somewhat normal conversation. Unfortunately the dictionary which I recently added seems to create as well as solve problems. An example would be : he is disabled and needs help to get things done.  Bot >disabled…  Ah, disabled, people who are crippled or otherwise physically handicapped.
  I’ll be adding some questions to the forum later.
Carl

Hi, Carl, and welcome to chatbots.org!

From what you’ve described regarding the dictionary, I wonder if it may be that there is either only one definition per term, or if there’s a method of selecting the correct definition that isn’t being utilized. Without further info, it’s hard to do more than guess, though.

  Here is a sample of a conversation that seems to have gone wrong but serves as a good example:
Courtney>greeting…  Ah, greeting, an acknowledgment or expression of good will (especially on meeting).
Carl>so we are greeting each other?
Courtney>greeting…  Ah, greeting, an acknowledgment or expression of good will (especially on meeting).
Carl>I will say hi as my greeting.
Courtney>greeting…  Ah, greeting, an acknowledgment or expression of good will (especially on meeting).
Carl>what would you like to say?
Courtney>Let’s talk about movies.
Carl>what type of movie do you like?
Courtney><sad>What difference would it make? t wouldn’t be any fun.
Carl>of course it makes a difference to me.
Courtney>difference…  Ah, difference, the quality of being unlike or dissimilar.
  As the dictionary I originally put in 26 aiml (listed d2-a to d2-z) files which did not work as a dictionary, I then added two additional aiml files !xdef and !xdefbrain-n2 and the dictionary function works.  I’d just opened the !xdefbrain-n2 aiml and found the definition for disabled is the same as above and the definition in the d2-d is a little different.  So it seems that the d2 files are not needed and can be removed which I will try next.  For conversational purposes I feel that the dictionary hinders rather than helps the conversation at this time.
  At this time I would like to say thank you for responding to this post so quickly, I believe you have moved me forward in the right direction.
Carl

I can see where you would be a bit dissatisfied by that conversation, Carl. It’s not very “conversational”, is it?

As a bit of advice, to make posts of that nature a bit easier to read, I would like to suggest that you surround those conversation snippets with a [ quote ] tag (no spaces, though). The result of that would look like this:

Courtney>greeting…  Ah, greeting, an acknowledgment or expression of good will (especially on meeting).
Carl>so we are greeting each other?
Courtney>greeting…  Ah, greeting, an acknowledgment or expression of good will (especially on meeting).
Carl>I will say hi as my greeting.
Courtney>greeting…  Ah, greeting, an acknowledgment or expression of good will (especially on meeting).
Carl>what would you like to say?
Courtney>Let’s talk about movies.
Carl>what type of movie do you like?
Courtney><sad>What difference would it make? t wouldn’t be any fun.
Carl>of course it makes a difference to me.
Courtney>difference…  Ah, difference, the quality of being unlike or dissimilar.

As you can see, the separation of the conversation snippet from the rest of the post helps greatly with readability.

Just a thought.

Please let us know how it goes when you remove the original dictionary files. I, for one, am interested in finding out if it helps.

It sounds like you are defining each word as the conversation develops. Just a wild guess but you aren’t misusing the <srai> tags like this are you:

Could you post a sample category you are using which is causing problems and we can take a closer look.

  At this time I believe I have found the solution for the problem I was having, I had found that the !xdef aiml is needed to start the search, putting in the d2-a to d2-z files does not cause a problem and is where the search is conducted. The problem seems to come from the !defbrain2-nr file which contains XDEF and standard pattern with templates. 
  The <srai> at this time is over my head, haven’t done a thing with them but would like to learn more about them for future use.  I also have a learning aiml that I don’t think is working.
Carl2