Hello Erel,
I did help Bruce a little with ChatScript to get it to compile
in Visual Studio 2008 C++, when it was first released. However,
Dave Morton is an assistant to the ChatScript project. So, Ill
let him go into detail about ChatScript.
79b.org is my 2011 Chatterbox Challenge contest entry running RiveScript.
It scored above average, so it is official, RiveScript is contest
level. You can build an Alicebot or an Elizabot (or combine both in one bot),
or build a new custom chatbot that is a contest level chatbot.
The 79b.org RiveScript chatbot is Perl/CGI and MySQL. Yet, other languages
are supported. There is a video on RiveScript.com of a RiveScript bot
with advanced voice recognition and voice synthesis, from anywhere in the room.
On the web, they say RiveScript is the one to watch, and I think that is true.
Mentioned, more or less to give credit where credit is due. AIML remains one of the
very best choices. For example, Program O is about to release version 2.0 with AIML
that supports the LEARN tag right out of the box. The LEARN tag was written by the
author of Mitsuku, an AIML chatbot that has become famous.