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Developing "Eyes-Free" Gadgets and Applications
The New York Times is running a story about Google engineer T. V. Raman, who lost his vision at age 14 but didn't let that stand in the way of his interest in technology. In addition to modifying a version of Google's search engine to give preference to pages that were more compliant with accessibility guidelines, Raman is now working on making cell phones easier to use without needing to look at them. "Since he cannot precisely hit a button on a touch screen, Mr. Raman created a dialer that works based on relative positions. It interprets any place where he first touches the screen as a 5, the center of a regular telephone dial pad. To dial any other number, he simply slides his finger in its direction — up and to the left for 1, down and to the right for 9, and so on. If he makes a mistake, he can erase a digit simply by shaking the phone, which can detect motion." Raman and a co-worker, Charles Chen, are also attempting to extend various phones' ability to read back scanned text to include signs that are anywhere in the phone's field of view.
But how does he play Snake?
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
See
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/7807217.stm for an inspirational story by a blind man who got to one of the most powerful positions in the UK govt (the fact he was awful there had very little to do with his blindness).
You could probably translate different things about the text into different audio cues. Bigger text? Louder reading. Stereo headphones could also make the reading come from the direction of the sign. As image recognition gets faster and more accurate, I'm sure a number of different audio cues could tip a blind user off with clues about the environment. I am sure the usefulness of this will go well beyond blind users.
I wish I could remember the name of this device, but it was essentially a MP3 player with no screen; just directional buttons and voice-based navigation. It was manufactured for blind users, and it worked wonderfully. It could even read text files and accept CF cards for expansion!
I think that a cell phone with just buttons on it and braille lettering would suffice, provided that the voice navigation is really good. An added advantage is that having no screen can make for very thin and attractive devices, if aesthetics is something of a priority for them.
"Since he cannot precisely hit a button on a touch screen, Mr. Raman created a dialer that works based on relative positions. It interprets any place where he first touches the screen as a 5, the center of a regular telephone dial pad. To dial any other number, he simply slides his finger in its direction -- up and to the left for 1, down and to the right for 9..."
So simple yet so brilliant. There is so much tripe published about 'innovation' (usually Microsoft), yet I think this is the first time _I_ can use this word properly.
Well done Mr. Raman - truly brilliant.
afaik there are plenty of phones on the market that have speech recognition such as speaking 'mum' and it will auto dial, ive never used them so i dont know what sort of quality they are at atm but that seems to me like it would be a better way of doing things, since it also means you wouldnt need to memorise every number you might need
/.-ers whom might be more qualified to give an opinion?
are there any blind
I have developed an innovative method to control devices entirely with my foreskin. This is better than Linux (tm). Robin Stallman, eat your hear tout!
I suspect that this technology will be used more by drivers and teens than the handicapped.
If we're working on making a touch screen phone more accessible to the sightless, why not ditch the screen entirely and replace it with a tactile display capable of adapting to the needs of the user? This would make it possible to still have your email or even text messages right at your fingertips - literally!
Here's a prototype that I'm sure could be improved upon and made portable given the right amount of funding.
http://www.nist.gov/public_affairs/factsheet/visualdisplay.htm
How about just using a regular cell phone with proper buttons? It's not as if he needs the big display...
Try doing that when you are blind with the mouse.
What he has done is combined touch with an interface that configures itself to the touch, so he knows where his finger is, and at the same time knows where (whatever) the touchpad hotstops are.
I think Ultimately the best solution is embossed numbers on the phone or other tactile methods (for existing touch screen phones, put a sticker on the screen and supplement it with software). With phone numbers you want to make sure you've entered one correctly, you can do a confirmation for the number at the end but that's slow and cumbersome, far better than to minimise the chance of an incorrect number being entered.
Where will this end? First they'll make a cellphone that has no eyes and the next thing you know they'll make one with no spleen.
I better hold onto my Nokia SpleenMaster 5000, it might be the last of its kind.
Equine Mammals Are Considerably Smaller
I went to a college that catered heavily to people with disabilities, primarily the deaf but also a large number of the blind. It occurred to me early on that a great deal of the tech they use is developed by people without disabilities and then tested on people with them.
I think Mr. Raman is pretty unique in the sense he's able to develop like this as a blind man. That said, I'm curious why voice recognition wasn't considered the better option?
What's the difference between this and swype?
Innovation
1 : the introduction of something new
2 : a new idea, method, or device
The fact that you don't find it interesting, or you can think of vaguely similar concepts in unrelated mediums does not discount this idea and implementation from being innovative. Shaking the phone is relatively innovative and the whole package is somewhat interesting.
That said, the device itself seems unlikely to really solve his problem of making cell phones easier to use without looking at them. I get the feeling that the system he's got outlined will take a lot of time to get used to and still require the occasional glance at the phone. In any case it's liable to require more thought processing than just looking at the phone and the disrupted concentration is one of the main points against cellphone use whilst driving.
... why would a blind person even get a touch-display phone? Probably not for the sleek UI, or?
... as long as it begins with 5?
"'I pass the test,' she said. 'I will diminish, and go into the West, and remain Galadriel.'"
- JRR Tolkien.
Even with a high-end noise-canceling Bluetooth headset and a phone with voice recognition, the interface sucks.
First, the Bluetooth headset has one button, which both originates and terminates calls. Pushing it generates a tone, but almost a full second after pushing the button. The same tone is used for connect and disconnect. Dumb.
Starting from the idle but synchronized state, pressing the button yields, after a few seconds, a tone, and then, after another five seconds, the message "Say a command". It's not clear why there's such a long delay before the voice prompt.
Then one says "Voice dial". After a few more seconds, "Say a name or number" comes back. Then one can attempt voice dialing.
The voice recognition is mediocre and slow. It takes another five seconds for a voice recognition cycle, which usually results in a confirmation prompt, or worse, "No match found".
Considering that hands-free operation is mandatory in California for phoning while driving, one would think this would be done better.
The spanish organization ONCE (Organización Nacional de Ciegos Españoles - Blind Spanish Men Organization) has a group that also develops applications for blind people.
Website (in spanish) http://cidat.once.es/
Some applications (which you can download trial versions):
MOBILE SPEAK POCKET
http://cidat.once.es/home.cfm?id=184&nivel=2
You can hear the text of the text in a windows mobile pda
Simple yet brilliant huh?
So, would you say it is patent worthy? Or was it obvious to somebody 'skilled in the art'?
I generally agree with you. That said...
Considering that hands-free operation is mandatory in California for phoning while driving, one would think this would be done better.
I was steering my vehicle with my knees long before "hands free operation" was made mandatory in California.
Any movement to legislate "eyes-free operation" is going to make driving even more challenging, as the braille lane markers are missing from a lot of California's streets. What's a person to do? Get one of those talking GPS navigators!
I wonder why they don't make any mobile phones with chorded keyboards. These would also be easy to use without looking at them, and it would also be easier to type using just the hand you're holding the phone in.
A '5' is the "orientation tap" and any numbers following are the numbers to dial. The phone could say each number as it's tapped and a "swipe" across the screen could delete the most recently tapped digit.
A "fist pounding" on the screen could indicate high user-frustration. The machine could then re-boot to force a "time out" on the user.
Users can be trained.
This is an awful lot of technology just to avoid the fact that all one needs is an old fashioned tactile keypad with real buttons in order to do the same thing.
As an aside, a cool feature would be the cellphone speaker phone saying the number that was pressed as someone dialed. _That_ would be useful.
But phones already do that. They play the tone pair for each digit that the user dials.
Louis Braille, inventor of the alphabet glyphs readable by blind people, was born exactly 200 years ago today.
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make install -not war
What all this really means is those without a visual handicap will probably take advantage of such advances in technology to do more computing while driving. I'm certainly guilty of being able to create, write and send text without looking. The advent of the cell phone internet browser only promoted the ability to browse porn while driving, imho. Now if only they could translate THAT technological advance adequately for our visually impaired friends. Talk about a real contribution to society.
Many people in high government positions are disabled one way or another.
For instance some have congenital absence of integrity or conscience.