Introduction to Dialogflow

Here's a brief history of Dialogflow. In 2012, Speaktoit received venture capital to create a platform for building natural language user interfaces. In 2014, Speaktoit released Api.ai, allowing developers to build voice user interfaces for Android, iOS, HTML5, and Cordova (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialogflow). In 2016, Google acquired Api.ai and in 2017, Api.ai was rebranded to Dialogflow. Since then, Dialogflow has continued to add new features at lightning speed in order to compete with the counterpart technology of Amazon's Alexa. Dialogflow's strength lies in its ability to perform natural language processing through the use of machine learning and artificial intelligence, the core engine behind creating voice user interfaces. As a developer, you will never have to worry about the complexity of natural language processing, machine learning, or artificial intelligence aspects, because that is what Dialogflow handles behind the scenes, allowing you as a developer to focus on creating the voice user interfaces for your applications. Going forward, all Google voice applications (Google Assistance, Google Home, and Google Auto) covered in this book will use Dialogflow as the backbone engine for creating voice user interfaces.