| The Case of LIA -- Libri Italiani Accessibili | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 4-7 | |
| Cristina Mussinelli | |||
| The paper present the case study of the LIA services aimed at providing
accessible e-books for blind and visual impaired readers in the mainstream
publishing distribution channels. The service had been launched in June 2013
and the catalogue offers at the time of the publication of the paper more than
6.000 accessible e-books of fiction and non fiction, mainly new titles and best
sellers. More than 400 titles are added every month thanks to the collaboration
of more than 65 Italian publishers. Keywords: e-Book; Accessible; Accessibility; e-Pub; Mainstream; Visually Impaired;
Interoperability | |||
| Semi-automatic DVS Authoring Method | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 8-12 | |
| Inseon Jang; ChungHyun Ahn; Younseon Jang | |||
| Descriptive video service (DVS) is the main method of making programs
accessible to those with seeing disabilities, but only a few of conventional
broadcasting programs have been reproduced in the form of DVS contents because
of practical limitations. It takes much of the time and professional manpower
to produce the DVS contents so it is quite costly. In this paper, we propose
semi-automatic DVS authoring method. Non-dialog sections detected through
audio/subtitles analysis are recommended and then the author is able to insert
appropriate audio description (AD) scripts and to produce their synthesized AD
using TTS easily. Currently we have completed a basic study and developed the
trial version of the proposed. Keywords: the Blind; Descriptive Video Service; Non-dialog Section Detection;
Text-to-Speech | |||
| Gaps between the Expectations of People with Hearing Impairment toward Subtitles and the Current Conditions for Subtitle Creation in Japan | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 13-16 | |
| Sawako Nakajima; Naoyuki Okochi; Kazutaka Mitobe; Tetsujiro Yamagami | |||
| In this study, questionnaire surveys were conducted with film
producers/directors and deaf and hard-of-hearing people to consider the issues
surrounding subtitling of films for people with hearing impairment in Japan.
The results show that only a small number of film producers taking part in this
study have engaged in subtitling, and a majority pointed out the low
profitability of producing subtitles under circumstances where the actual
movie-viewing demand of hearing-impaired people is unclear. On the other hand,
the survey of deaf and hard-of-hearing people revealed the actual movie-viewing
tendencies of people with hearing impairment equal to that of hearing people
and their high expectations regarding subtitles, despite limited opportunities
to watch Japanese films in movie theaters. These results suggest possibilities
of creating new economic models for increasing production and access to
subtitles for hearing-impaired people sustainably. Keywords: Subtitle; Deaf People; Hard-of-hearing People; Film Producer; Film Director;
Film; Cinema; Audio-Visual Media | |||
| Empowerment by Digital Media of People with Disabilities | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 17-24 | |
| Christian Bühler; Bastian Pelka | |||
| The paper differentiates three dimensions of access for eInclusion
instruments: Firstly, digital media are understood as environments that offer
multiple channels for interaction between persons with disabilities and their
environment. This dimension is challenged by barriers that hinder people to use
digital media. Peer support could be understood as a second dimension: Social
media can empower people to act as social innovators and help people with
disabilities. Barriers are identified in the effort that has to be done or in
unsuitable ICT-applications. On a third dimension, the advantages of "space"
are explored: Public internet access points can be understood as a "space" that
offers ICT access, support for individual needs and competences, facilitated by
specialized staff. The high costs, missing political backing and need for
competences could be understood as main barriers here. The paper suggests to
capitalize on social innovation approaches to design new support instruments
for eInclusion. Keywords: Digital Media; Social Media; Public Access Point; People with Disability;
Empowerment; eInclusion; Telecentre | |||
| Tactile Captions: Augmenting Visual Captions | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 25-32 | |
| Raja Kushalnagar; Vignesh Ramachandran; Tae Oh | |||
| We explore the efficacy of tactile captions as a supplement to online
captioned video. Closed captions are not fully accessible, because many
auditory signals are not easily represented by words, e.g., the sound of the
ball being hit by a bat, or to describe a ring tone. The goal is to explore
whether audiovisual information can be effectively represented through an
equivalent tactile-visual interface. We compare viewers preferences between
viewing video with captions alone, and captions plus tactile captions. Our
study showed that viewers significantly preferred tactile captions to captions. Keywords: Accessible Technology; Educational Technology; Deaf and Hard of Hearing
Users; Dual Tasks | |||
| Captioning System with Function of Inserting Mathematical Formula Images | | BIBA | Full-Text | 33-40 | |
| Yoshinori Takeuchi; Yuji Sato; Kazuki Horiike; Daisuke Wakatsuki; Hiroki Minagawa; Noboru Ohnishi | |||
| We propose a captioning system with a function of inserting mathematical formula images. [We match/The system matches?] mathematical formulas presented orally during a lecture with those simultaneously projected on a screen in the lecture room. We then manually extract the mathematical formula images from the screen for displaying on the monitor of the system. A captionist can input mathematical formulas by pressing a corresponding function key. This is much easier than inputting mathematical formulas by typing. We conducted an experiment in which participants evaluated the usefulness of the proposed captioning system. Experimental results showed that 14 of the 22 participants could input more sentences when using the function of inserting mathematical formula images than when not using it. Furthermore, from the results of a questionnaire, we could confirm that the proposed system is effective. | |||
| Synote Second Screening: Using Mobile Devices for Video Annotation and Control | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 41-44 | |
| Mike Wald; Yunjia Li; George Cockshull; David Hulme; Douglas Moore; Aidan Purdy-Say; James Robinson | |||
| This paper describes a new important enhancement to Synote, the freely
available, award winning, open source, web based application that makes web
hosted recordings easier to access, search, manage, and exploit for learners,
teachers and other users. The feature supports 'flipped' classrooms and allows
students to ask questions through annotations on their personal mobile devices
while also being able to remotely control and play relevant video fragments. Keywords: Second Screen; Recorded Lectures; Learning; Flipping Classroom | |||
| A Comparison of the Listening Speed of the Korean TTS for the Blind: Based on Their Screen Reader Experiences | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 49-52 | |
| Heeyeon Lee; Yujin Jang; Ki-Hyung Hong | |||
| The purpose of this study was to examine the listening speed of the Korean
TTS for the blind based on their screen reader experiences. Among ten
participants, five people have used a screen reader and the other five had few
experiences of using a screen reader. Participants were asked to recall what
they heard after they listened to the same sentences for ten repeated sentence
sets, and they were asked to recall what they heard after they heard different
sentences for the five random sentence sets. For all sentence sets, sentences
were provided with fifteen differentiated speeds ranged from 0.8 to 3.6. The
results showed that there were positive correlations between participants'
screen reader experiences and their listening speed of the Korean TTS, and
between the familiarity of sentences and the differences in the listening
speed. Keywords: The Blind; Screen Reader; TTS; Listening Speed | |||
| Dynamic Subtitle Authoring Method Based on Audio Analysis for the Hearing Impaired | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 53-60 | |
| Wootaek Lim; Inseon Jang; Chunghyun Ahn | |||
| The broadcasting and the Internet are important parts of modern society that
a life without media is now unimaginable. However, hearing impaired people have
difficulty in understanding media content due to the loss of audio information.
If subtitles are available, subtitling with video can be helpful. In this
paper, we propose a dynamic subtitle authoring method based on audio analysis
for the hearing impaired. We analyze the audio signal and explore a set of
audio features that include STE, ZCR, Pitch and MFCC. Using these features, we
align the subtitle with the speech and match extracted speech features to
subtitle as different text colors, sizes and thicknesses. Furthermore, it
highlights the text via aligning them with the voice and tagging the speaker ID
using the speaker recognition. Keywords: The Hearing Impaired; Media Accessibility; Dynamic Subtitle; Speaker
Recognition | |||
| Communicating Text Structure to Blind People with Text-to-Speech | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 61-68 | |
| Laurent Sorin; Julie Lemarié; Nathalie Aussenac-Gilles; Mustapha Mojahid; Bernard Oriola | |||
| This paper presents the results of an experiment conducted with nine blind
subjects for the evaluation of two audio restitution methods for headings,
using Text-To-Speech. We used specialized audio and two voices to demarcate
headings. This work is part of a research project which focuses on structural
in-formation accessibility for the blind in digital documents. Keywords: Accessibility of Digital Documents; Blind People; Document Structure;
Text-to-Speech; Specialized Audio | |||
| TTS-Based DAISY Content Creation System: Implementation and Evaluation of DaisyRings™ | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 69-76 | |
| Kosei Fume; Yuka Kuroda; Taira Ashikawa; Yoshiaki Mizuoka; Masahiro Morita | |||
| Digital Accessible Information System (DAISY) content is expected to gain
popularity gradually among the visually impaired according to the prevalence of
e-book reading devices and the development of text-to-speech (TTS) technology.
However, the development of DAISY-formatted e-books, which is undertaken by
volunteers, is a time-consuming process, making it difficult to meet end user
requirements. In this report, we propose a content transliteration system that
can convert plain text to DAISY content including formatted HTML and audio data
via automatic TTS technology. Furthermore, using the graphic user interface of
the proposed system, users can correct text and accent information by inputting
ruby-type data. Through this functionality, we aim to target support for
transliteration workers such as volunteers, teachers, and parents to make and
edit contents easily and quickly for the visually impaired. Finally, we present
the results of a preliminary evaluation using the proposed method in order to
compare it with the conventional method. Keywords: Transliteration; Text-to-speech; DAISY; Accessibility; Visual disability;
Dyslexia | |||
| Patterns of Blind Users' Hand Movements | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 77-84 | |
| Vassilios Argyropoulos; Georgios Kouroupetroglou; Aineias Martos; Magda Nikolaraizi; Sofia Chamonikolaou | |||
| The main focus of the present study lies on patterns and characteristics of
hand movements when participants with blindness receive typographic meta-data
(bold and italic) by touch through a braille display. Patterns and
characteristics were investigated by the use of six-dot braille and eight-dot
braille code in conjunction with types of reading errors. The results depicted
that the participants' reading errors (phonological type) were similar in both
braille codes. In addition, the participants performed more fluid hand
movements when they used the six-dot braille code, whereas they spent less time
when they were reading through eight-dot braille. The focus of the discussion
was placed on the importance of the development of a suitable design of tactile
rendition of typographic signals through six or eight-dot braille code in favor
of better perception and comprehension. Keywords: Typographic Signals; 6-dot Braille; 8-dot Braille; Braille Display;
Blindness; Patterns of Hand Movements; Reading Errors | |||
| Dialogue-Based Information Retrieval from Images | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 85-92 | |
| Pavel Hamrík; Ivan Kopecek; Radek Ošlejšek; Jaromír Plhák | |||
| Our concept of communicative images aims to provide graphical information by
means of dialogue interaction, which is suitable for people with various
disabilities. Communicative images are graphical objects integrated with a
dialogue interface and linked to an associated knowledge database which stores
the semantics of the objects depicted. This paper deals with the utilization of
formal ontologies for the process of image annotation and dialogue-based
investigation in the context of assistive technologies. Keywords: Ontologies; Picture Semantics; Dialogue Systems | |||
| Annotation Tool for the Smart Web Accessibility Platform | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 93-100 | |
| Sébastien Aupetit; Vincent Rouillé | |||
| Active and passive accessibility are two manner to improve web
accessibility. While active accessibility mostly relies on norms and
recommendations, it is practically proved that it is not sufficient. Passive
accessibility is achieved by a posteriori content transformations. The Smart
Web Accessibility Platform (SWAP) is a set of open source tools designed to
tackle the passive accessibility problem of web contents. This article presents
the goals and aims of SWAP through its main components: the proxy, the server
and the annotation tool. The annotation tool is built using the proxy of SWAP.
We explain how such design allows the annotation tool to be maintainable,
independent of the browser and very flexible compared to other design. Keywords: Web Accessibility; Annotation Tool; Proxy; Smart Web Accessibility Platform;
Web Page Transformation | |||
| Iberoamerican Observatory of Web Accessibility | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 101-108 | |
| Carlos Benavidez; Claudia Cardoso; Jorge Fernandes; Emmanuelle Gutiérrez y Restrepo; Henry Gutiérrez; Loïc Martínez-Normand | |||
| The web content accessibility guidelines (WCAG) were first published 15
years ago. Since then, there has been a lot of progress in web accessibility,
but much work is still needed to reach good levels of accessibility. It is
therefore important to measure the degree of accessibility of current websites
and the rate of improvement. There have been several studies on the
implementation of web accessibility in Europe and the world, but such studies
are unstable, with a methodology and sample that changes from year to year. The
Iberoamerican Observatory presented in this paper aims to correct this
situation, coordinating the work of the observatories of the different
participating countries, so that all use the same methodology and a consistent
sampling and data structure. Thus, results can be compared within the same
country and with the other countries of the region. Keywords: Web Accessibility; Review; Benchmarking; Monitoring | |||
| Checking Web Accessibility with the Content Accessibility Checker (CAC) | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 109-112 | |
| Eduard Klein; Anton Bolfing; Markus Riesch | |||
| The internet has become an indispensable tool for the access of
in-formation. However, most websites are not sufficiently accessible for people
with disabilities. Accessibility problems originate from either the underlying
CMS systems or from content authors disregarding fundamental accessibility
requirements. With the Content Accessibility Checker CAC we give a tool at hand
to specifically red-flag possible accessibility issues to authors. The checking
criteria form a subset of the WCAG 2.0 standard and are published as a
checklist for authors and publishers. CAC is available as a browser plugin and
is published as open source on github. It is based on JavaScript and can be
ex-tended with specific checking rules. In checking mode it detects
accessibility is-sues on a website, highlights it with an overlay in the web
browser and gives hints and recommendations on improving web accessibility. Keywords: Web Accessibility; E-Inclusion; Design for All | |||
| AdaptNow -- A Revamped Look for the Web: An Online Web Enhancement Tool for the Elderly | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 113-120 | |
| Roberto Dias; Sergi Bermúdez i Badia | |||
| Elderly population will become the largest age group of our society in the
next twenty years. Consequently, we need to be able to accommodate technologies
to the needs of this population. AdaptNow is a web-based application that
allows users to adapt existing webpages and turn them more accessible and user
friendly. Users can do so directly from any web browser thanks to AdaptNow's
user personalization and automatic adaptation artificial intelligence
algorithms. In this paper we present the design and implementation of AdaptNow,
a solution that improves navigation on the web for elderly users. Keywords: Web Enhancements; Elderly Users; Accessibility; Human Computer Interaction | |||
| Accessibility of E-Commerce Websites for Vision-Impaired Persons | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 121-128 | |
| Roopa Bose; Helmut Jürgensen | |||
| We report the results of a detailed analysis of the problems encountered by
blind or vision-impaired persons when accessing web sites which use
technologies like, for example, flash animation, JavaScript, HTML 5. We also
examine typical accessibility problems found in e-commerce websites, especially
in on-line shopping. We check our findings against the WCAG 2.0 accessibility
guidelines and provide detailed recommendations for changes or additions to
these guidelines. Keywords: Web Accessibility; WCAG; Screen Readers; E-Commerce Website Accessibility | |||
| jCAPTCHA: Accessible Human Validation | | BIBA | Full-Text | 129-136 | |
| Matthew Davidson; Karen Renaud; Shujun Li | |||
| CAPTCHAs are a widely deployed mechanism for ensuring that a web site user is a human, and not a software agent. They ought to be relatively easy for a human to solve, but hard for software to interpret. Most CAPTCHAs are visual, and this marginalises users with visual impairments. A variety of audible CAPTCHAs have been trialled but these have not been very successful, largely because they are easily interpreted by automated tools and, at the same time, tend to be too challenging for the very humans they are supposed to verify. In this paper an alternative audio CAPTCHA, jCAPTCHA (Jumbled Words CAPTCHA), is presented. We report on the evaluation of jCAPTCHA by 272 human users, of whom 169 used screen readers, both in terms of usability and resistance to software interpretation. | |||
| Benefits and Challenges of Combining Automated and User Testing to Enhance e-Accessibility -- The European Internet Inclusion Initiative | | BIBA | Full-Text | 137-140 | |
| Mikael Snaprud; Kamyar Rasta; Kim Andreasson; Annika Nietzio | |||
| The European Internet Inclusion Initiative (EIII) presents a new approach by combining the benefits of automated and user testing in order to improve both the quality and the coverage of evaluation results. This paper provides an overview of the challenges posed by online accessibility assessment and outlines the initial steps towards the combination of automated and user testing in the form of crowd sourcing. | |||
| Accessibility of MOOCs | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 141-144 | |
| Marco Bohnsack; Steffen Puhl | |||
| The paper gives a short overview on the topic of Massive Open Online Courses
and providers of MOOC infrastructure. Selected MOOC-platforms are reviewed for
accessibility with different set-ups of common screen-reading software and
browsers. No platform was fully accessible, most lacked correct language
markers and an accessible design. The results show that accessibility was not
in focus when the platforms where built, thus excluding impaired people and not
fulfilling the claim that MOOCs are open to everyone. Keywords: Accessibility; MOOCs | |||
| A First Look into MOOCs Accessibility | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 145-152 | |
| Najd A. Al-Mouh; Atheer S. Al-Khalifa; Hend S. Al-Khalifa | |||
| Since the inception of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), millions of
people have benefitted from their provided content. Yet, the question we need
to ask is: how accessible are MOOCs especially to the Visually Impaired People
(VIP)? In this paper we look thoroughly into the accessibility problems VIP
face while using one of the well-know MOOCs environments (Coursera.org) and
provide some recommendations to improve its accessibility. Keywords: Accessibility; WCAG; MOOCs; e-Learning; Screen readers; Blinds | |||
| How to Increase Contrast Using Color Inversion | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 153-156 | |
| Josef Köble | |||
| This paper discusses why the inverted foreground and background colors
should also be considered when calculating contrast with regard to
accessibility. It is even possible to achieve an enhanced contrast for a pair
of inverted colors while the pair of non-inverted colors meets the minimum
contrast according to the WCAG 2.0. Implementing this benefit would support
users with low vision, especially those who need high contrast. Keywords: Luminance contrast; High contrast; Color inversion; Inverted Color | |||
| Easy to Surf -- What Makes Websites Accessible to People with Intellectual and Learning Disabilities | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 157-160 | |
| Gabriela Antener; Anton Bolfing; Stefania Calabrese | |||
| Special needs of intellectually and mentally challenged people are generally
not considered in ICT, not even in exemplary accessible websites. In this paper
we reveal our scientific approach on how to develop guidelines closing this
gap. We describe the process of extracting relevant and easy-to-understand
directives from scientific literature addressing different aspects of user
interfaces and different cognitive abilities. Considerations on how to further
develop and improve these beta guidelines and on how to implement the gained
insights in the World Wide Web are discussed. Keywords: Intellectual Disability; Learning Disability; Guidelines; Projects;
Development; E-Inclusion; Evaluation; Accessible Websites; Need for Development
and Research | |||
| "Easy-to-Read on the Web": State of the Art and Needed Research | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 161-168 | |
| Klaus Miesenberger; Andrea Petz | |||
| In this paper, we present results from work done within the project WAI-Act
and an online-symposium [1] initiated and put in place by the W3C/WAI RDWG
(Research and Development Working Group) aiming at raising awareness and
collecting / de-riving concise and up-to-date recommendations, guidelines,
standards and tools for enhancing the web experience for users with cognitive
disabilities and other groups facing problems with "standard" information on
the Web and its applications. Keywords: Easy to Read; Web; Cognitive Disability; SPLD; Inclusion | |||
| Testing the Perceived Ease of Use in Social Media | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 169-176 | |
| Julia George; Nils Dietzsch; Michael Bier; Hannes Zirpel; Alexander Perl; Susanne Robra-Bissantz | |||
| In the last few years, social media spread around the globe. Being a
substantial and integral part in today's everyday life of many people,
especially online social networks (OSNs) changed communication behavior
fundamentally. Unfortunately, not everybody is integrated in this "new everyday
life" yet. In our research, we focus on this important issue of e-inclusion and
participation of people with intellectual disabilities in social media. In the
context of this paper, we will present a methodology on how to evaluate the
perceived ease of use of social media applications by people with intellectual
disability. Moreover, we will pre-validate this methodology by applying it in a
test setting with a customized barrier-free OSN, developed in our research
group. This is the first step for developing a target group specific acceptance
model, based on the technology acceptance model. Keywords: Acceptance Testing; Online Social Networks; Experiment; Triangulation | |||
| People with Learning Disabilities Using the iPad as a Communication Tool -- Conditions and Impact with Regard to e-inclusion | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 177-180 | |
| Cordula Edler; Matthias Rath | |||
| This paper presents results of an interdisciplinary pre-study that involved
people with and without learning disabilities using iPads as a communication
tool in their everyday life for self-confidence and empowerment. Main results
highlight the accessibility challenges still prevalent: not usability leading
to a lack of acceptance; but poor level of awareness of the relevance of
media-literate action for the target group; insufficient coaching / personal
support; insufficient technical accessibility and assistance. Keywords: Cognitive Disabilities; Empowerment; Usability; Accessibility | |||
| Implementing PDF/UA in Microsoft Word -- How Can PDF/UA Become an Everyday Part of Document Authoring? | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 181-184 | |
| Roberto Bianchetti; Samuel Hofer; Markus Erle | |||
| The ISO-standard PDF/UA-1 with its clearly-defined requirements promises a
new era of accessible document creation. But users of word processing software
are often overwhelmed when they try to understand how to fulfill the
requirements. This leads to our focus in this paper: how can every document
author using Microsoft Word be able to create a PDF/UA compliant PDF document
without deep knowledge of PDF accessibility or time-consuming quality assurance
and remediation? We present a workflow model which enables in combination with
a special Word-Add-In the easy creation of accessible PDF documents without
special training. Keywords: PDF; Accessibility; PDF/UA; Document; Template; Workflow; Microsoft Word | |||
| PAVE: A Web Application to Identify and Correct Accessibility Problems in PDF Documents | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 185-192 | |
| Luchin Doblies; David Stolz; Alireza Darvishy; Hans-Peter Hutter | |||
| This paper describes the implementation of the PDF Accessibility Validation
Engine (PAVE). PAVE is a web based application for identifying and correcting
accessibility issues in PDF documents. The accessibility analysis is based on
the PDF/UA standard.
We previously introduced the idea of such a system in [1]. The entire application runs on a web server, allowing users to both analyze a PDF document in regard to accessibility issues and then to directly fix these issues within the browser, thus relieving them from installing software. A simple and intuitive user interface allows both experts as well as users with only little previous knowledge of PDF accessibility to work with PAVE. Keywords: Accessibility; Document Accessibility; Visual Impairment; Tagged PDF;
PDF/UA; Web Content Accessibility Guidelines; Screen Readers | |||
| Correcting "Last Mile" Errors -- Quality Assurance of PDF/UA Documents without Being a Developer | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 193-196 | |
| Roberto Bianchetti; Samuel Hofer; Markus Erle | |||
| With the ISO-standard PDF/UA-1 and the free PDF accessibility checker (PAC)
2 it is possible to validate PDF documents for accessibility very easily based
on clearly defined requirements. But users who evaluate their documents are
often faced with hard to correct errors because the mainstream authoring
programs do not fully support PDF/UA yet. Remediation is tedious and
time-consuming and sometimes even impossible with available tools. Therefore we
worked out the main "last mile" errors and developed a special tool for
"quickfixing" these errors -- even for document authors without PDF
accessibility knowledge on expert level. In this paper we present this approach
and the tool. Keywords: Accessibility; Evaluation; PDF; PDF/UA; Remediation | |||
| PDF Accessibility Checker (PAC 2): The First Tool to Test PDF Documents for PDF/UA Compliance | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 197-201 | |
| Andreas Uebelbacher; Roberto Bianchetti; Markus Riesch | |||
| In 2012, the new standard PDF/UA (ISO 14289-1) was published, specifying the
requirements for accessible PDF documents. The Matterhorn Protocol by the PDF
Association details the list of 136 test conditions that need to be fulfilled,
but so far, there was no test tool to check a given PDF document against these
requirements. This paper presents the PDF Accessibility Checker 2.0 (PAC 2),
which is the first tool that allows for an automatic test of those 108 test
conditions which can be tested fully automatically. The tool provides a
detailed report of a document analysis, and various features such as visual
inspection of standard violations, supporting further improvement of the PDF
document. As the PAC 2 is free of charge and can be used without technical
knowledge, the tool promotes PDF accessibility among a wider user group and has
the potential to increase compliance of PDF documents with the respective
accessibility standard. Keywords: Accessible PDF; PDF/UA; ISO 14289-1; PDF Analysis | |||
| A Strategic Approach to Document Accessibility: Integrating PDF/UA into Your Electronic Content | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 202-204 | |
| Adam Spencer; Karen McCall | |||
| Many countries, provinces and states have legislation mandating the
accessibility of documents and formatted content. There are now existing and
emerging standards for specific content formats such as PDF. The question
remains as to why there are so many recently produced inaccessible documents if
we have tools, legislation and standards clearly mandating accessible
documents. Keywords: PDF/UA; AODA; Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act; Information
Communication Technology; ICT; Procurement; Training; Standard; Organizational
Policy | |||
| Multimodal Fusion and Fission within W3C Standards for Nonverbal Communication with Blind Persons | | BIBA | Full-Text | 209-213 | |
| Dirk Schnelle-Walka; Stefan Radomski; Max Mühlhäuser | |||
| Multimodal fusion and multimodal fission are well known concepts for multimodal systems but have not been well integrated in current architectures to support collaboration of blind and sighted people. In this paper we describe our initial thoughts of multimodal dialog modeling in multiuser dialog settings employing multiple modalities based on W3C standards like the Multimodal Architecture and Interfaces. | |||
| A Mind Map for Brainstorming Sessions with Blind and Sighted Persons | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 214-219 | |
| Dirk Schnelle-Walka; Ali Alavi; Patrick Ostie; Max Mühlhäuser; Andreas Kunz | |||
| Accessible mind maps tools are, due to their visual nature hardly available
and, if available, they focus on rendering the structure, not considering
nonverbal communication elements in ongoing discussions. In this paper, we
describe the need for this type of communication as well as a mind map tool
that is capable of processing the respective information, coming from a Leap
tracking system attached to the interactive surface. Keywords: Accessibility; Non-verbal Communication Clements; Computer Supported
Collaborative Work; MindMap | |||
| Presenting Non-verbal Communication to Blind Users in Brainstorming Sessions | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 220-225 | |
| Stephan Pölzer; Klaus Miesenberger | |||
| In co-located meetings, which are part of our professional and educational
lives, information exchange relies not only on information exchange using
artifacts like bubbles in mind-maps or equations presented on electronic
whiteboards in classrooms, but also to a large extent on non-verbal
communication. In the past much effort was done to make the artifact level
accessible but also non-verbal communication heavily relies on the visual
channel to which blind people do not have access. Thereby co-located meetings
are seen as first domain to research accessibility of non-verbal communication,
which are well defined and should lead to more general research on access to
non-verbal communication. We present a first prototypical system which allows
experimenting with access to non-verbal communication elements by blind people
using both the input from a "human" transcriber or automatic tracking and
recognition of non-verbal communication cues. Keywords: Co-located meetings; Non-verbal Communication; Blind User | |||
| Towards an Information State Update Model Approach for Nonverbal Communication | | BIBA | Full-Text | 226-230 | |
| Dirk Schnelle-Walka; Stefan Radomski; Stephan Radeck-Arneth; Max Mühlhäuser | |||
| The Information State Update (ISU) Model describes an approach to dialog management that was predominantly applied to single user scenarios using voice as the only modality. Extensions to multimodal interaction with multiple users are rarely considered and, if presented, hard to operationalize. In this paper we describe our approach of dialog modeling based on ISU in multiuser dialog settings employing multiple modalities, including nonverbal communication. | |||
| Virtual Braille-Keyboard in Co-located Meetings | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 231-236 | |
| Emre Zaim; Markus Gruber; Gottfried Gaisbauer; Peter Heumader; Stephan Pölzer; Klaus Miesenberger | |||
| Our daily live is no longer imaginable without touch devices. Besides
standard touch devices as mobile phones and tablets also touch-tables have the
chance to find their way into our daily lives. Co-located meetings can be seen
as a good application area for touch-tables. They can present the artifact
information layer to the whole group. On touch surfaces virtual keyboards are
used by sighted people for text input and text manipulations. For blind people,
such keyboards are only accessible with a decreased working speed. In
co-located meetings, manipulation of artifacts (for instance bubbles of
mind-maps) is very dynamic. Therefore, a decreased working speed to generate
and manipulate textual inputs makes an equal participation of blind people in
co-located meetings impossible. The ongoing work is concerned with the
development of a virtual Braille-keyboard to allow a better integration of
blind users into co-located meetings. Keywords: Braille-keyboard; Blind user; Co-located Meetings; Touch devices | |||
| Accessibility of Brainstorming Sessions for Blind People | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 237-244 | |
| Andreas Kunz; Klaus Miesenberger; Max Mühlhäuser; Ali Alavi; Stephan Pölzer; Daniel Pöll; Peter Heumader; Dirk Schnelle-Walka | |||
| Today, research focuses on the accessibility of explicit information for
blind users. This gives only partly access to the information flow in
brain-storming sessions, since non-verbal communication is not supported.
Advances in ICT however allow capturing implicit information like hand gestures
as important part of non-verbal communication. Thus, we describe a system that
al-lows integrating blind people into a brainstorming session using a mind map. Keywords: Accessibility; Mind map; Non-verbal Communication Elements | |||
| Detection and Utilization of Emotional State for Disabled Users | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 248-255 | |
| Yehya Mohamad; Dirk T. Hettich; Elaina Bolinger; Niels Birbaumer; Wolfgang Rosenstiel; Martin Bogdan; Tamara Matuz | |||
| In this paper, we present an experimental approach to design systems
sensitive to emotion. We describe a system for the detection of emotional
states based on physiological signals and an application use case utilizing the
detected emotional state. The application is an emotion management system to be
used for the support in the improvement of life conditions of users suffering
from cerebral palsy (CP). The system presented here combines effectively
biofeedback sensors and a set of software algorithms to detect the current
emotional state of the user and to react to them appropriately. Keywords: Affective Computing; Machine Learning Algorithm; Disabled Person; Context;
Emotion; Emotion Management; User Interface; E-Learning; Web-Based | |||
| Influence of Emotions on Web Usability for Users with Motor Disorders | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 256-259 | |
| José Laparra-Hernández; Juan-Manuel Belda-Lois; Álvaro Page; Alberto Ferreras Remesal | |||
| Emotions are related with many key cognitive processes during human computer
interaction (HCI). The aim of this study was to validate usability
recommendations depending on user profile, to check the effect of the emotional
state on HCI and to compare physiological response analysis and questionnaires.
10 control users and 10 users with upper limb disorders were involved. An
orthogonal design with seven usability parameters were used to generate 16
websites with different styles but with the same content. Galvanic skin
response and facial electromyography on the corrugator supercilii and
zygomaticus major muscles were used to assess emotional response, which are
related to arousal and valence respectively; and user opinion was collected
using a questionnaire. The results showed significant correlations between
questionnaires and physiological signals, which are more sensitive to web
parameters effect; and most of usability recommendations improve usability but
only have a significant influence on users with motor disorders. Keywords: Usability; Emotions; Physiological Response; User with Motor Disorders;
Websites | |||
| User Participation in the Design of an Alternative Communication System for Children with Diskinetic Cerebral Palsy Including Emotion Management | | BIBA | Full-Text | 260-263 | |
| Juan-Manuel Belda-Lois; Amparo López-Vicente; José Laparra-Herrero; Rakel Poveda-Puente; Alberto Ferreras-Remesal | |||
| People with Diskinetic Cerebral Palsy (DCPs) has speech disorders limiting physical and social activity. Alternative Communication is an alternative to improve capacity. However, participation of DCPs in the development process of DCPs is very uncommon. In this contribution, new methodologies to improve participation of DCPs in a new communicator using physiological signals for interaction is described. | |||
| Digital Video Games for Older Adults with Cognitive Impairment | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 264-271 | |
| Arlene Astell; Norman Alm; Richard Dye; Gary Gowans; Philip Vaughan; Maggie Ellis | |||
| Digital video games offer opportunities for older adults with cognitive
impairment to engage in meaningful activities. However, to achieve this benefit
digital video games are needed that take account of the players' cognitive
impairment. This paper reports work with older adults with cognitive impairment
due to dementia to find out how they can best be prompted to initiate and play
games independently, what sorts of digital video activities they like to play,
and if playing digital video games is engaging. The results demonstrate that
older adults with cognitive impairment can learn to play new digital video
activities and can be prompted to play independently through visual and
auditory cues. Their behaviour indicates features of Flow similar to that
reported in other gaming studies. Keywords: Dementia; Games; Engagement; Enjoyment | |||
| "Gardener" Serious Game for Stroke Patients | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 272-275 | |
| Ágnes Nyéki; Veronika Szucs; Péter Csuti; Ferenc Szabó; Cecilia Sik Lanyi | |||
| This study introduces a serious game, "Gardener", which is one of the games
planned within the "StrokeBack" project. The aim of this game is to support the
rehabilitation process of stroke patients with upper limb impairments and
damaged psychomotor abilities. Keywords: serious game; stroke patients; rehabilitation | |||
| Towards an Interactive Leisure Activity for People with PIMD | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 276-282 | |
| Robby van Delden; Dennis Reidsma; Wietske van Oorsouw; Ronald Poppe; Peter van der Vos; Andries Lohmeijer; Petri Embregts; Vanessa Evers; Dirk Heylen | |||
| We address the possibilities of truly interactive systems for people with
Profound Intellectual and Multiple Disabilities (PIMD). These are intended to
improve alertness, movement and mood. We are working on an interactive ball
that follows body movement and an interactive floor mat for this target group.
We explain the key features in the design that are essential for the possible
success. Keywords: Snoezelen; Interactive Therapy; Profound Intellectual and Multiple
Disabilities; PIMD; Interactive Ball; Interactive Floor Mat | |||
| Blind Bowling Support System Which Detects a Number of Remaining Pins and a Ball Trajectory | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 283-288 | |
| Makoto Kobayashi | |||
| Blind bowling is known as one of the popular sports for the visually
impaired people. They can enjoy the bowling with sighted assistant who tells
them a number of remaining pins, a ball trajectory, and scores. Bowling is such
a well-adapted sports for the visually impaired people, nevertheless they want
to acquire all of the information by themselves without support by the
assistant. To fill this need, a prototype system was developed as a first step.
The system detects the remaining pins and ball trajectory in the area of arrow
marks using simple image processing. Severe visually impaired player tested the
function of remaining pins and the results proved that the system works well
and it is useful and helpful for them. Addition to it, unexpected advantage was
discovered. With the prototype system, bowling game became more enjoyable for
the blind player since they can also acquire information of remaining pins of
other players. Keywords: Blind Bowling; Remaining Pins; Trajectory; Image Processing | |||
| Interacting Game and Haptic System Based on Point-Based Approach for Assisting Patients after Stroke | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 289-296 | |
| Mario Covarrubias; Alessandro Mansutti; Monica Bordegoni; Umberto Cugini | |||
| This paper describes a system that combines haptic, virtual reality and game
technologies in order to assist repetitive performances of manual tasks to
patients, which are recovering from neurological motor deficits. These users
are able to feel virtual objects by using a haptic device, which acts as a
virtual guide taking advantages of its force feedback capabilities. A virtual
environment is used forming a haptic interface between the patient and the
game. The haptic device is driven under the users movements and assisted
through the Magnetic Geometry Effect (MGE). Preliminary evaluation has been
performed in order to validate the system in which two different tasks have
been performed (throw down bricks in an hexagonal tower without and with haptic
assistance) with the aim to obtain more information related to the accuracy of
the device. Keywords: Haptic interface; Virtual Reality; Post-stroke Rehabilitation; Gaming | |||
| Exploring the Usage of 3D Virtual Worlds and Kinect Interaction in Exergames with Elderly | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 297-300 | |
| Hugo Paredes; Fernando Cassola; Leonel Morgado; Fausto de Carvalho; Silvia Ala; Francisco Cardoso; Benjamim Fonseca; Paulo Martins | |||
| The combination of the potentialities of the interactive technologies, like
exergames and the emerging motion capture devices with the ability of 3D
virtual worlds for socialisation and context, can produce a platform to promote
the physical activity of its users, which leverages its potential. The
OnlineGym is an exploratory project based on an online 3D virtual worlds
platform that allows users to interact with the system through the use of a
motion capture device. This paper discusses the chosen technological approaches
and the preliminary results of the experiments performed with users. Keywords: Active Ageing; Virtual Worlds; Physical Activity; OnlineGym | |||
| Games for Wireless Cubes in Cognitive Enhancement Therapy | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 301-308 | |
| Krzysztof Dobosz; Magdalena Dobosz; Tomasz Depta; Tomasz Fiolka; Marcin Wojaczek | |||
| Sifteo Cubes is an interactive tactile entertainment solution with own
unique control interface gestures. The aim of the study was the use of games
for wireless cubes in the rehabilitation of people with cognitive impairment
staying in the neurology department of the hospital. Most of the exercises
provided by physiotherapists can be classified into specific groups of tasks
using the same way to resolve. During the analysis of sets of exercises, the
following main categories of tasks are proposed: anagrams, memory games, and
reflex games. As a part of a pilot program of introduction wireless cubes to
the rehabilitation of people with brain injuries, three sample games, one from
each category were developed. Keywords: Wireless Cubes; Rehabilitation; Cognitive Impairment | |||
| Mobile Gamebook for Visually Impaired People | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 309-312 | |
| Krzysztof Dobosz; Jakub Ptak; Marcin Wojaczek; Tomasz Depta; Tomasz Fiolka | |||
| The goal of the project was to create a mobile game application for Android
OS platform that follows the rules of playing a gamebook. Developed application
interacts with user using touch and speech interface, which is crucial in case
of blind users. The paragraphs and general game data should be stored in
external XML document. Game implementation introduced a form of entertainment
for users with vision disabilities and established a speech and tactile
interface implementation, which could be also used in implementation of other
games, which target blind players. Keywords: Gamebook; Blind People; Mobile Devices; XML | |||
| Accessibility and Inclusion Requirements for Future e-Identity Solutions | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 316-323 | |
| Trenton Schulz; Lothar Fritsch | |||
| Future e-identity services will need to be accessible for people with
different types of abilities. We review current sets of accessibility
guidelines and standards, current assistive technology, and current e-identity
technology to determine accessibility and inclusion requirements for a future
e-identity solution. For our project, we found that the area we could influence
the most was the development of user interface for the client for e-identity
and focused on these areas with the assumption that users would have access to
inclusive cards and card readers. The requirements are divided into content and
presentation, control and operation, legal requirements, testing, and help and
support. We also provide possible areas for future research. Keywords: Accessibility; e-Identity; Smart Cards | |||
| Roadmap to eAccessibility | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 324-331 | |
| Andrea Petz; Klaus Miesenberger | |||
| Within three main topical areas, the eAccess+ network identified and
consulted relevant stakeholder groups, analyzed and discussed the state of the
art in eAccessibility, supported stakeholders in working on key issues to
foster eAccessibility and disseminated experiences and knowledge all over
Europe. Finally, all findings were connected and combined within a roadmap
document to find appropriate future actions to support eAccessibility and its
uptake. Keywords: eAccessibility; Accessibility; Roadmap; Web Accessibility; Digital TV; iDTV;
Total Conversation; Self-Service-Terminals; Accessible Documents; Accessible
Tourism; Education on (e)Accessibility | |||
| Web Accessibility for Older Readers: Effects of Font Type and Font Size on Skim Reading Webpages in Thai | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 332-339 | |
| Sorachai Kamollimsakul; Helen Petrie; Christopher Power | |||
| Most guidelines for making websites accessible for older people have been
developed for the Latin alphabet. Currently, there are no web design guidelines
for the Thai language or for Thai older people. Our research investigated the
effect of font type and size in Thai on skim reading for Thai younger (21-39
years) and older (59-72 years) adults. There were two levels of font types
(Conservative and Modern, which correlate to serif and sans serif types,
respectively) and three levels of font sizes (12, 14, 16 point). There was a
significant effect of font type on reading time per web page, but not for font
size or age group. There was also a significant main effect of font type and
font size on reader preferences, but no effect of age group. These findings
form the basis of recommendations for evidence-based web design guidelines for
the Thai language. Keywords: Web Accessibility; Older Adults; Web Design Guidelines; Font Type; Font
Size; Thai Language | |||
| Self-Service Terminals for Older and Disabled Users: Attitudes of Key Stakeholders | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 340-347 | |
| Helen Petrie; Jenny S. Darzentas; Christopher Power | |||
| Self-service terminals (SSTs) are becoming an increasing important part of
the service landscape for both the public and private sector. There is very
little information regarding the current state of accessibility practice in
this area. This paper presents the results of interviews with 22 stakeholders
in the supply and deployment communities for SSTs regarding their knowledge of
accessibility issues. The analysis of these interviews helps explain the
current poor state of accessibility of SSTs. In addition, we analysed academic
literature on self-service technology, particularly from the management and
marketing disciplines, to understand their perspectives and see how these could
inform the accessibility debate. Finally, building on these analyses, we make
recommendations for the ways forward to improve SST accessibility and that of
self-service in general and provide an initial information resource to help
improve current practice. Keywords: Self-Service Terminals (SSTs); Automatic Teller Machines (ATMs); Older
People; People with Disabilities | |||
| Speaking the Language of Web Developers: Evaluation of a Web Accessibility Information Resource (WebAIR) | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 348-355 | |
| David Swallow; Christopher Power; Helen Petrie; Anna Bramwell-Dicks; Lucy Buykx; Carlos A. Velasco; Aidan Parr; Joshue O Connor | |||
| This paper describes the design and evaluation of a new accessibility
information resource, the Web Accessibility Information Resource (WebAIR), for
assisting web developers in the creation of accessible websites and
applications. Evaluations were conducted with 26 web developers in which they
had opportunity to use both WebAIR and an existing accessibility information
resource, the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, to perform accessibility
testing on their own websites. The results indicate that a number of design
decisions relating to the language, organisation and comprehensiveness of
WebAIR have been successful in improving access to web accessibility
information that supports web developers' practices. Keywords: Web Accessibility; Web Developers; Web Accessibility Guidelines; Web
Accessibility Information Resources | |||
| A Multimodal Tablet-Based Application for the Visually Impaired for Detecting and Recognizing Objects in a Home Environment | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 356-359 | |
| Rabia Jafri; Syed Abid Ali | |||
| Object recognition solutions for the visually impaired based on a single
modality cannot provide optimal performance under all circumstances, since each
modality is best suited for particular usage scenarios. An object recognition
application for the visually impaired, meant for a RFID-enabled tablet, which
combines three approaches -- RFID-based, visual-tag computer vision based and
non-visual tag computer vision based -- into a single piece of software is,
therefore, presented in this paper. This solution has the benefits of being
portable, accessible, low cost (the user needs only an RFID-enabled tablet,
some inexpensive passive RFID tags and some visual tags (which can be printed
out for free)) and more robust in a wider range of conditions than the
approaches it is comprised of. The application will be adapted to other mobile
platforms and devices (e.g., RFID-enabled smartphones) in the future. Keywords: Object Recognition; Computer Vision; Blind; Visually Impaired; Mobile
Application; Assistive Technologies; RFID; Visual Tags; Multi-Modal Recognition | |||
| Usage Situation Changes of Touchscreen Computers in Japanese Visually Impaired People: Questionnaire Surveys in 2011-2013 | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 360-368 | |
| Takahiro Miura; Masatsugu Sakajiri; Haruo Matsuzaka; Murtada Eljailani; Kazuki Kudo; Naoya Kitamura; Junji Onishi; Tsukasa Ono | |||
| This paper demonstrates the usage of touchscreen interfaces in the Japanese
visually impaired population by means questionnaire surveys conducted in 2011,
2012, and 2013. In 2011 and 2013, we carried out usage situations of
touchscreens and the reasons why some of them did not use it. The surveys in
2012 and 2013 comprised the questionnaire items regarding specific manipulation
situations of touchscreens. Some of the results indicate that an increasing
number of visually impaired people used and required to use touchscreen
computers; some of them did not want to use it because they were satisfied with
conventional cell phones, and because they are waiting for the device which can
feedback tactually; the users of touchscreen computers with total and partial
visual impairments mainly uses double-tapping after tracing for selecting
buttons and objects; The proper uses and manipulations of smartphones and
tablet computers mainly depends on the application usability and the screen
size, respectively. Keywords: visually impaired people; touchscreen computers; usage conditions | |||
| Accessible Single Button Characteristics of Touchscreen Interfaces under Screen Readers in People with Visual Impairments | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 369-376 | |
| Takahiro Miura; Masatsugu Sakajiri; Murtada Eljailani; Haruo Matsuzaka; Junji Onishi; Tsukasa Ono | |||
| Regardless of the improvement of accessibility functions, people with visual
impairments have problems using touchscreen computers. Though the size of
accessible objects may differ for visually impaired users because of the
manipulations under screen readers are different from those without screen
readers, the characteristics of desired objects and useful gestures on the
touchscreen computers for the visually impaired remain unclear. In this paper,
our objective is to clarify the accessible single button characteristics and
preferable gestures for visually impaired users of touchscreen computers. We
studied these characteristics by evaluating the single button interaction of
touchscreen interfaces for visually impaired people under a screen reader
condition. As a result, the performance of task completion time on selecting
task with a single button decreased as the button size became larger; they were
ranked in descending order of double-tapping after flicking, double-tapping
after tracing, and split-tapping after tracing. Keywords: Visually Impaired People; Touchscreen Computers; Manipulation under Screen
Reader Condition; Accessible Button | |||
| Tablet-Based Braille Entry via a Framework Promoting Custom Finger Spacing | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 377-382 | |
| Stephanie Ludi; Michael Timbrook; Piper Chester | |||
| This paper outlines the development of the AccessBraille framework, an iOS
framework designed to provide a Braille keyboard to an iOS application. The
proof-of-concept app developed with this framework is presented as an example
of how the framework can be utilized, demonstrating its use across multiple
contexts where Braille entry is used. The AccessBraille keyboard framework
provides a natural way for blind users to enter US Type 1 or Type 2 Braille
text into an app. The keyboard allows for users to customize finger placement
for comfort and hand size. User feedback was solicited through observation on
the task of entering Braille using the framework at various stages of
development. In addition, feedback was gathered for the deployed app itself.
The feedback will provide input into the prioritization of revisions and new
features. Keywords: Braille; Framework; Tablet; Visually Impaired | |||
| Nonvisual Presentation, Navigation and Manipulation of Structured Documents on Mobile and Wearable Devices | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 383-390 | |
| Martin Lukas Dorigo; Bettina Harriehausen-Mühlbauer; Ingo Stengel; Paul Dowland | |||
| There are a large number of highly structured documents, for example:
newspaper articles, scientific, mathematical or technical literature. As a
result of inductive research with 200 blind and visually impaired participants,
a multi-modal user interface for non-visual presentation, navigation and
manipulation of structured documents on mobile and wearable devices like smart
phones, smart watches or smart tablets has been developed. It enables the user
to get a fast overview over the document structure and to efficiently skim and
scan over the document content by identifying the type, level, position,
length, relationship and content text of each element as well as to focus,
select, activate, move, remove and insert structure elements or text. These
interactions are presented in a non-visual way using earcons, tactons and
speech synthesis, serving the aural and tactile human sense. Navigation and
manipulation is provided by using the multitouch, motion (linear acceleration
and rotation) or speech recognition input modality. It is a complete solution
for reading, creating and editing structured documents in a non-visual way.
There is no special hardware required. For the development, testing and
evaluation of the user interface, a flexible platform independent software
architecture has been developed and implemented for iOS and Android. The
evaluation of the user interface has been undertaken by a structured
observation of 160 blind and visually impaired participants using an
implemented software (App) over the Internet. Keywords: Assistive Technology; User Interface; Multi-Modal; Nonvisual; Presentation;
Navigation; Manipulation; Earcons; Tactons; Multitouch; Gestures; Motion;
Mobile Devices; Smart Phone; Smart Watch; Smart Tablet; Wearable Devices;
Document; Structure; Mathematics; Accessibility; Blind; Visual Impairment | |||
| Never too Old to Use a Tablet: Designing Tablet Applications for the Cognitively and Physically Impaired Elderly | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 391-398 | |
| Luuk Muskens; Rico van Lent; Alexander Vijfvinkel; Paul van Cann; Suleman Shahid | |||
| People live longer than ever before and the population of elderly is
increasing. Many elderly visit day care centres in order to avoid loneliness
and continuously look for new methods of entertainment. A possible new mean of
entertainment can be found in the use of tablet applications. However, due to
the physical and/or cognitive impairments of these elderly, most tablet
applications are not accessible. This research tries to design an
elderly-friendly entertainment application. Several design guidelines were
determined via a literature review and a contextual inquiry for the design of
three prototypes. These prototypes successfully eliminated problems concerning
button size, navigation, readability of the fonts and swiping. Furthermore,
results indicated that the elderly had a strong preference for the design which
had a low number of icons, a more direct way of giving information, no deep
hierarchy, larger buttons with immediate feedback when pressed, a clear
notification that the screens had changed and the screens which used bright
colours were more effective. Keywords: Human Computer Interaction; Design Principles; Cognitively and Physically
Impaired Elderly; User Interface Design | |||
| Tablets in the Rehabilitation of Memory Impairment | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 399-402 | |
| Krzysztof Dobosz; Magdalena Dobosz; Tomasz Fiolka; Marcin Wojaczek; Tomasz Depta | |||
| The aim of this study was the analysis of existing sets of rehabilitation
exercises for possible adapting them to mobile devices (tablets). We analyzed
more than 300 different memory tasks presented on the pages of workbooks.
Numerous tasks were classified to different categories because of the type of
content and cognitive functions trained. For each type there was assigned a
certain number of specific tasks. In each type the feasibility of adaptation
for tablets (full, partial, impossible) and complexity of interaction (entering
characters, indication, drag&drop) were evaluated. That is a big help for
many older people (most of the patients in the Rehabilitation Center), because
they have problems entering text with the virtual keyboard displayed on the
screen. Keywords: Mobile Devices; Memory Impairment; Rehabilitation | |||
| Transit Information Access for Persons with Visual or Cognitive Impairments | | BIBA | Full-Text | 403-410 | |
| German Flores; Benjamin Cizdziel; Roberto Manduchi; Katia Obraczka; Julie Do; Tyler Esser; Sri Kurniawan | |||
| We are developing a location-based information delivery system to facilitate efficient and safe use of public transportation by people who have visual or cognitive impairments. This system comprises Wi-Fi beacons (access points) that are placed at bus stations and inside bus vehicles. Users of this system receive information on their cell phone, without the need for GPS or for Internet connectivity. The system allows one to receive information about an upcoming bus at a bus stop and to select a specific bus line. Once the desired bus arrives, the system automatically connects to the access point on the bus vehicle and remains connected while the user is riding the bus. The user can specify a desired bus stop, and the system informs the user (by a speech message) with enough advance notice when the bus is approaching the stop. | |||
| Indoor Navigation System for the Visually Impaired Using One Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) and Barometer to Guide in the Subway Stations and Commercial Centers | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 411-418 | |
| Jesus Zegarra Flores; René Farcy | |||
| The main research about indoor navigation is about the use of Wi-Fi,
Bluetooth or Ultra Wide band technology for locating one person in a building.
These systems give an absolute position of the person; however, it is mandatory
to put the hotspots of every technology in the building for calculating this
position. An Inertial Measurement Unit is usually placed on the foot because,
it is easier to compute the distance. The aim of this work is to use
inexpensive sensors which come in a Smart Phone, which are handheld, or belt
mounted for guiding one visually impaired in two main tests: the subway station
and the commercial center. We are not intending neither to put any hotspot or
landmarks on the place nor to use the IMU on the foot for ergonomic reasons.
The results and performances are better in the subway stations than in the
commercial centers. Keywords: Visually Impaired; Mobility; IMU; Subway Stations; Commercial Centers | |||
| Communication System for Persons with Cerebral Palsy | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 419-426 | |
| Yohan Guerrier; Janick Naveteur; Christophe Kolski; Franck Poirier | |||
| People with disabilities may encounter many communication difficulties. Our
main goal is to develop a communication system, called COMMOB, designed to
assist people with cerebral palsy in different contexts: at home, at work and
in public places. After a brief review of the different categories of assistive
communication systems, our user-centered design approach is presented. It was
tested in a public place in the context of a help request by a cerebral palsy
person in a wheelchair. The result concerns particularly the response rate. The
assistive power of COMMOB was rated from the respondents' and the user's point
of view. The main lesson to be learned is that the most difficult was to
attract the attention of people and to engage the interaction. Keywords: Communication; mobility; cerebral palsy (CP); communication aid; COMMOB | |||
| Determining a Blind Pedestrian's Location and Orientation at Traffic Intersections | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 427-432 | |
| Giovanni Fusco; Huiying Shen; Vidya Murali; James M. Coughlan | |||
| This paper describes recent progress on Crosswatch, a smartphone-based
computer vision system developed by the authors for providing guidance to blind
and visually impaired pedestrians at traffic intersections. One of Crosswatch's
key capabilities is determining the user's location (with precision much better
than what is obtainable by GPS) and orientation relative to the crosswalk
markings in the intersection that he/she is currently standing at; this
capability will be used to help him/her find important features in the
intersection, such as walk lights, pushbuttons and crosswalks, and achieve
proper alignment to these features. We report on two new contributions to
Crosswatch: (a) experiments with a modified user interface, tested by blind
volunteer participants, that makes it easier to acquire intersection images
than with previous versions of Crosswatch; and (b) a demonstration of the
system's ability to localize the user with precision better than what is
obtainable by GPS, as well as an example of its ability to estimate the user's
orientation. Keywords: Visual Impairment; Blindness; Assistive Technology; Smartphone; Traffic
Intersection | |||
| The Design and Evaluation of the Body Water Management System to Support the Independent Living of the Older Adult | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 433-436 | |
| Airi Tsuji; Naoki Yabuno; Noriaki Kuwahara; Kazunari Morimoto | |||
| Aiming for older adult's comfortable and independent outing, we are
researching and developing the body water management system according to their
outing schedule, their surrounding environment, and their activities like
eating and drinking. In this paper, we describe our proposed system, the
physiological formula for non-invasive estimation of the body water balance and
the method of calculating the suggestion timing. Keywords: Elderly People; Dehydration; Context Driven; Body Water Balance | |||
| An Investigation into Incorporating Visual Information in Audio Processing | | BIBA | Full-Text | 437-440 | |
| Ender Tekin; James M. Coughlan; Helen J. Simon | |||
| The number of persons with hearing and vision loss is on the rise as lifespans increase. Vision plays an important role in communication, especially in the presence of background noise or for persons with hearing loss. However, persons with vision loss cannot make use of this extra modality to overcome their hearing deficits. We propose automatically utilizing some visual information in hearing aids through the addition of a small wearable camera. Our initial results show potentially significant benefits to incorporating low level robust visual cues when the background noise is high. This technique can potentially benefit all persons with hearing loss, with substantial improvements possible for the speech perception performance of persons with dual sensory loss. | |||
| Indoor Positioning for Visually Impaired People Based on Smartphones | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 441-444 | |
| Thomas Moder; Petra Hafner; Manfred Wieser | |||
| Autonomous navigation is a critical factor for visually impaired people.
Outdoors, positioning based on ubiquitous signals is available, contrary
indoors no ubiquitous navigation solution does exist. Because of the
implementation of screen-reader software into mobile devices, visually impaired
people start using smartphones. This paper focuses on the abilities of an
indoor positioning purely based on sensors already present in smartphones
nowadays. Therefore, algorithms specifically designed for low-cost sensors are
developed. The outcome of these algorithms, which process the accelerometer,
gyroscope, magnetometer and barometer data and a WiFi fingerprinting, is
integrated within a mathematical filter to get a final position and heading
information. Keywords: Indoor Positioning; Visually Impaired People; Smar | |||
| Extended Scaffolding by Remote Collaborative Interaction to Support People with Dementia in Independent Living -- A User Study | | BIBA | Full-Text | 445-450 | |
| Henrike Gappa; Gabriele Nordbrock; Manuela Thelen; Jaroslav Pullmann; Yehya Mohamad; Carlos A. Velasco | |||
| IT-based assistive services offer the potential to support the independent living of people with dementia provided that they accommodate their specific needs. Due to their declining cognitive functions, these users face among other issues a diminishing capacity for problem solving and attention focus. As a consequence they get easily distracted and finally lost while using assistive services. To counteract such situations it is necessary to implement scaffolding features that will assist users in navigating through all relevant sub-tasks. In our user study it was evaluated whether remote collaborative interaction -- obtained by offering family carers remote access to assistive services running in the homes of the relatives they care for -- could serve as an extended scaffolding feature. The user study has shown promising results because the vast majority of users even in later stages of dementia understood this concept and could achieve a task in collaborative interaction with their relatives. | |||
| Effective Application of PALRO: A Humanoid Type Robot for People with Dementia | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 451-454 | |
| Kaoru Inoue; Naomi Sakuma; Maiko Okada; Chihiro Sasaki; Mio Nakamura; Kazuyoshi Wada | |||
| PALRO is a humanoid type robot which can communicate with human through
voice. This paper describes effective application for people with Dementia of
PALRO. PALRO, a humanoid communication robot (Fujisoft Co Ltd.). It responds to
users' speaking and even remembers faces of over 100 people. Our team wanted to
see how seniors with dementia would react to PALRO and it's programs. We
concluded that the effectiveness of PALRO is encourage people with dementia to
interact with others, verbal and non-verbal interactions with others, et
cetera. Keywords: Communication Robot; Robot Therapy; Occupational Therapy; Dementia | |||
| The Feasibility and Efficacy of Technology-Based Support Groups among Family Caregivers of Persons with Dementia | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 455-458 | |
| Sara J. Czaja; Richard Schulz; Dolores Perdomo; Sankaran N. Nair | |||
| With the aging of the population the numbers of people with a chronic
condition such as Alzheimer's disease (AD) are expected to increase. Most
people with a chronic condition, such as AD, are cared for by a family member.
Although caregiving can be rewarding many caregivers experience emotional
distress and physical comorbidities. In this regard, there a broad range of
interventions aimed at decreasing caregiver stress. Despite the proliferation
of these interventions they have only met with limited success for a variety of
reasons. Information technology offers the potential of enhancing the ability
of caregivers to access needed services and programs. This paper evaluated the
feasibility and efficacy of technology-based psychosocial intervention for
family caregivers of AD patients. Overall, the results indicated that the
caregivers were enthusiastic about the program, found the technology easy to
use, and indicated that the intervention enhanced their access to resources,
support and caregiving skills. Keywords: Caregiving; Technology; Dementia Patients | |||
| Making Music Meaningful with Adaptive Immediate Feedback Drill for Teaching Children with Cognitive Impairment: A Dual Coding Strategy to Aural Skills | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 459-462 | |
| Yu Ting Huang; Chi Nung Chu | |||
| Seventeen fifth graders of elementary school in Taipei were administered a
web-based AIFD learning system where they practiced aural skills in response to
musical intervals, pitch identifications, and rhythms then tested on their
recall of these aural skills while using adaptive immediate feedback drill as
cues. The pre and post-tests resulted in a significant increase in scores from
the pre-test to post-test (t (16) = 2.759, p = .014). Advanced analysis showed
significant differences were observed between the pre and post-tests only for
the interval recognition (t (16) = 2.634, p = .018). The result of the
interviews showed that the teachers and the parents hold positive views on this
AIFD learning system. They were satisfied with the progress of the students'
aural skills, participation during the class, and preference on music. Keywords: Aural Skills; Intellectual Disabilities; Adaptive Immediate Feedback Drill | |||
| Evaluating New Interaction Paradigms in SEN Teaching: Defining the Experiment | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 463-470 | |
| Paloma Cantón; José L. Fuertes; Ángel L. González; Loïc Martínez | |||
| New devices have made their way into everyday life in recent years, opening
the doors to new ways of interacting with computers, providing different, and
potentially better, solutions to some problems. But this raises the question of
if there is any way of measuring whether or not these new devices are suitable.
This paper presents a strategy for evaluating the suitability of new
interaction devices in the context of teaching children with special
educational needs. Keywords: SEN; Education; Touch; Touchless; Gesture; Assessment; User Interface;
Kinect; Interaction Paradigms | |||
| How to Make Online Social Networks Accessible for Users with Intellectual Disability? | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 471-477 | |
| Carmit-Noa Shpigelman; Carol J. Gill | |||
| Participation in online social networks has considerable potential to
empower people with intellectual disability who might experience social
isolation in the real world. However, this issue has received little research
attention. In response to this challenge, we conducted an accessible online
research survey to learn how adults with intellectual disability use and
perceive Facebook. Results from 58 respondents indicated that they use Facebook
much as non-disabled users do to connect with family members and real-world
friends. At the same time, the respondents reported challenges such as privacy
setting and literacy demands. We discuss these findings and how to make social
networking sites accessible for this population. Keywords: Online Social Networks; Facebook; Accessibility; Disability | |||
| Improving Social and Communication Skills of Adult Arabs with ASD through the Use of Social Media Technologies | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 478-485 | |
| Alaa Mashat; Mike Wald; Sarah Parsons | |||
| People with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) find it hard to communicate and
interact with other people. Although technology has been involved in
sup-porting people with ASD in developed countries, research on such
technologies has been mainly related to Western culture. Arab adults with ASD
require sup-port for improving their social skills. However, cultural
differences could limit the usability of existing technologies. The proposed
study aims to investigate the use of social networks for supporting Arab adults
with High-Functioning Autism or Asperger syndrome in order to improve their
abilities in social situations such as family relations and friendships,
considering the influence of culture and tradition views on the usability and
sociability of social media technologies. Keywords: Accessibility; Usability; Autism Spectrum Disorder; Arabs; Adults; Social
Media; Technology; Social Skills; Communication | |||
| The Role of User Emotional Attachment in Driving the Engagement of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) in Using a Smartphone App Designed to Develop Social and Life Skill Functioning | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 486-493 | |
| Joseph Mintz | |||
| There has been, in the last ten years, a fast developing interest in the
potential use of mobile technology in the classroom and in particular, in the
use of such technology to support children with ASD (Autistic Spectrum
Disorders). The HANDS project developed a software application for mobile
Smartphones based on the principles of persuasive technology design, which
supports children with ASD with social and life skills functioning -- areas of
ability which tend to be impaired in this population. Issues with the
application of a behaviorist approach to the complex social field of special
educational needs are considered. An argument is made for the need for 'thick'
persuasive applications which take account of such complexity including the
role of mediating factors. Particular focus is given to qualitative results
indicating that user emotional attachment is one such key factor. Keywords: User Emotional Attachment; Autism; Special Educational Needs; Instructional
Design; Persuasive Technology | |||
| Gamification for Low-Literates: Findings on Motivation, User Experience, and Study Design | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 494-501 | |
| Dylan Schouten; Isabel Pfab; Anita Cremers; Betsy van Dijk; Mark Neerincx | |||
| This study investigated the effects of the gamification elements of
scaffolding, score and hints on the user enjoyment and motivation of people of
low literacy. In a four-condition within-subjects experiment, participants
per-formed mental spatial ability tests with the aforementioned elements.
Quantitative results were inconclusive, but post-test interviews provided
insights on the limited effectiveness of the gamification elements. Complex
questionnaire wording, high task difficulty, and an improperly situated task
environment all contributed to ceiling effects in the influence of scaffolding.
Score was found to be ineffective without proper contextualization connecting
the numerical score to clearer performance measures. Finally, the underused
hints functionality has indicated the need for adequate 'mixed initiative'
support. Keywords: Literacy; Gamification; Motivation; User Enjoyment | |||
| Designing Tangible and Multitouch Games for Autistic Children | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 502-505 | |
| Weiqin Chen | |||
| Tangible multitouch tabletops allow multiple users to interact with physical
and virtual objects simultaneously and afford natural and intuitive social
interactions. Although some applications have shown that multitouch tabletop
technology is an applicable technology with potentials for children with ASD,
more research is need to understand how to take advantage of the affordance of
this technology. This research presents an effort in exploring the potentials
of tangible and multitouch games for children with ASD. Keywords: Autism Spectrum Disorder; Tangible User Interfaces; Multitouch; Tabletop
Games; Children | |||
| You Talk! -- YOU vs AUTISM | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 506-512 | |
| Alessandro Signore; Panagiota Balasi; Tangming Yuan | |||
| This paper reports our work in developing a mobile application, which helps
autistic children communicate with those around them, by using PECS symbols to
formulate a sentence and later on speak it out loud. The application in
question has gone through a rigorous development process: both the requirements
gathering and evaluation for this project have been conducted with experts in
the world of autism in order to further establish the soundness of the work.
All the issues that were found throughout the evaluation, which was carried out
as a cognitive walkthrough, were fixed and suggested additional functionalities
were taken into consideration in order to enhance the application with more
features. A user-based evaluation, which was conducted in order to further
establish the validity of the work, proved that the application was well
accepted by the autistic community in the virtual world. Keywords: Autism; Autistic; Verbal Impairment; PECS; Makaton | |||
| A Game-Based Intervention for Improving the Communication Skills of Autistic Children in Pakistan | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 513-516 | |
| Muneeb Imtiaz Ahmad; Suleman Shahid; Johannes S. Maganheim | |||
| In this paper, we discuss the design and evaluation of a computer game
"Guess Who" which was used as a tool to encourage social interaction in
autistic children. We performed an evaluation of the game for a span of six
weeks at an autistic school in Pakistan. We present the qualitative results
collected from the weekly feedback taken from teachers against every child's
behavior. We also present the video analysis results that give us information
about the amount of social interaction among children while playing the game. Keywords: Autistic Children; Games; Social Communication | |||
| Intelligent Tutoring Math Platform Accessible for Visually Impaired People | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 519-524 | |
| Piotr Brzoza; Michal Mackowski | |||
| Nowadays there are many problems with the access to scientific and
educational materials for visually impaired people. It especially refers to
learning mathematic. Only a small number of such materials is published in a
form accessible for blind and low vision people. Particularly, it limits
significantly disabled persons to participate in education research and
engineering works in many science and technology disciplines. Fortunately new
technological solutions, such as e-learning become more and more popular, and
many universities use it to improve educational offer and create new
possibilities for disabled people. However, in many cases it may cause the
problems with accessibility. The article presents developed, intelligent,
interactive tutoring platform for math teaching. Currently, the platform is
used in the process of education of students from Faculty of Mathematics at
Silesian University of Technology, and disabled students from others faculties
of the University. The research results clearly indicate the improvement of
learning quality by visually impaired people, and also confirm the efficacy of
designed rules for adapting mathematical formulas to visually impaired people
needs. Keywords: e-Learning; Mathematics; Accessibility; Visual Impaired | |||
| Gesture-Based Browsing of Mathematics | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 525-532 | |
| Shereen El Bedewy; Klaus Miesenberger; Bernhard Stöger | |||
| This paper is introducing a new concept which is combining gestures and
speech in applications to help people navigate through Mathematica notebooks.
The application can be used by all people, but it is targeting visually
impaired people specifically. On the basis of the $1 gesture recognition
algorithm our definition of gestures started and advanced to include the
enhancements that took place in the $1 gesture recognition itself. The
prototype system allows users to navigate through the Mathematica notebooks on
the basis of the tree structure receiving speech as an output. Finally the
evaluation and the conclusion that sums the basic concept and the user feedback
is also provided in this content. Keywords: Mathematics; Mathematica Notebooks; Touch Gestures; Visually Impaired
People; Speech Output; Gesture Recognizers | |||
| Towards the 8-Dot Nemeth Braille Code | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 533-536 | |
| Aineias Martos; Georgios Kouroupetroglou; Vassilis Argyropoulos; Despina Deligiorgi | |||
| In this work, a language-independent design methodology for the systematic
development of an 8-dot braille code, has been applied to the Nemeth code.
First, we set the design principles: compression, intra-similarity,
inter-similarity, unambiguity, consistency and foresight. Then, we follow the
Nemeth principles: non enclosure, just in time information, be true to the
print, good mnemonics and continuous notation. Finally, we introduce 24
transition rules from 6- to 8-dot Nemeth code. Indicative results of the
methodology are also presented. Keywords: Braille; 8-Dot Braille; Nemeth Code; Assistive Technologies | |||
| AudioFunctions: Eyes-Free Exploration of Mathematical Functions on Tablets | | BIBA | Full-Text | 537-544 | |
| Marzia Taibbi; Cristian Bernareggi; Andrea Gerino; Dragan Ahmetovic; Sergio Mascetti | |||
| It is well known that mathematics presents a number of hindrances to visually impaired students. In case of function graphs, for example, several assistive solutions have been proposed to enhance their accessibility. Unfortunately, both hardware tools (e.g., tactile paper) and existing software applications cannot guarantee, at the same time, a clear understanding of the graph and a full autonomous study. In this paper we present AudioFunctions, an iPad app that adopts three sonification techniques to convey information about the function graph. Our experimental evaluation, conducted with 7 blind people, clearly highlights that, by using AudioFunctions, students have a better understanding of the graph than with tactile paper and existing software solutions. | |||
| Markdown -- A Simple Syntax for Transcription of Accessible Study Materials | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 545-548 | |
| Jens Voegler; Jens Bornschein; Gerhard Weber | |||
| Transcription of study materials into accessible formats is a challenging
but necessary task. The sources of study materials vary from images to
multimedia files, which often have to be transcribed manually. A fully
accessible target format such as HTML is the goal of every transcription
process, supported by guidelines and helpful tools. Therefore the transcribers
have to deal not only with the content but also with the right usage of the
used tools. We show that the usage of the easy to use Markdown language can
improve the technical quality and accessibility of the resulting documents. For
further improvements of the transcription process several helping tools are
presented to simplify and speed up the process as well. Keywords: Transcription; Image Description; LaTeX; HTML; Markdown; SVG; Accessibility;
Transcription Process Optimization; Pandoc; Gladtex | |||
| Making Graph Theory Algorithms Accessible to Blind Students | | BIBA | Full-Text | 549-556 | |
| Lukáš Másilko; Jirí Pecl | |||
| The authors of the proposal are teachers of mathematics for students with visual impairment at Masaryk University (Brno, Czech Republic). When giving instruction, they face the following problem: how can blind people use a given mathematical algorithm in view of the fact that they follow all the information in linear way. Often the instructors have to decide whether to adapt such an algorithm or let blind students work with it in the same manner as their sighted peers do. Their goal is to find an optimal set of methods which would respect blind people's linear manner of working with information and at the same time be sufficiently effective. In their paper, the authors will present several adaptations of two algorithms of Graph Theory. They will assess the pros and cons of all the proposed modifications. | |||
| Braille Capability in Accessible e-Textbooks for Math and Science | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 557-563 | |
| Katsuhito Yamaguchi; Masakazu Suzuki; Toshihiro Kanahori | |||
| DAISY or accessible EPUB3 could be a good solution to make e-textbooks more
accessible. However, unfortunately, a good method to include Braille in them is
not established, yet. Due to complicated Situations in Braille notations,
automatically converting print contents, especially, ones for math/science into
Braille has its own problem. Furthermore, Braille translation in Japanese is
usually context-dependent. After reviewing those situations and how Braille is
currently treated in DAISY, what are required for Braille capability in DAISY/
accessible EPUB3 are discussed. Based on our DAISY/EPUB3 authoring tools,
"ChattyInfty3," and Braille editor, "BrailleInfty," a practical solution to
realize the Braille capability is given. Keywords: Braille; e-textbook; mathematics; DAISY; Accessible EPUB3 | |||
| MathMelodies: Inclusive Design of a Didactic Game to Practice Mathematics | | BIBA | Full-Text | 564-571 | |
| Andrea Gerino; Nicolò Alabastro; Cristian Bernareggi; Dragan Ahmetovic; Sergio Mascetti | |||
| Tablet computers are becoming a common tool to support learning since primary school. Indeed, many didactic applications are already available on online stores. Most of these applications engage the child by immersing the educational purpose of the software within an entertaining environment, often in the form of a game with sophisticated graphic and interaction. Unfortunately, this makes most of these applications inaccessible to visually impaired children. In this contribution we present MathMelodies, an iPad application that supports math learning in primary school and that is designed to be accessible also to visually impaired children. We describe the main challenges we faced during the development of this didactic application that is both engaging and accessible. The application, currently publicly available, is collecting enthusiastic reviews from teachers, who often contribute with precious insight for improving the solution. | |||
| An Interactive Workspace for Helping the Visually Impaired Learn Linear Algebra | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 572-579 | |
| Bassam Almasri; Islam Elkabani; Rached Zantout | |||
| In this paper an interactive workspace designed to help visually impaired
students practice the fundamentals of linear algebra is introduced. Unlike most
of the approaches, this interactive workspace aims at enhancing math
manipulation abilities for students who are visually impaired, mainly dealing
with linear algebra expression that requires more complicated techniques in
accessing. Read-expression, Hide-Row/Column, and Text-Tools are examples of
techniques that the workspace implements. Such techniques are invoked by hot
access keys which in turn with audio feedback allow the user to navigate and
edit the linear algebra expression, access its elements especially matrices,
find the solution and save it for further review and edit. The methodology
followed is to list all the operations required in Linear Algebra. Then the
tasks which require visual abilities were isolated and implemented in the
framework. Keywords: Accessibility; Linear Algebra; Visually impaired | |||
| The LEAN Math Accessible MathML Editor | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 580-587 | |
| John A. Gardner | |||
| This article describes the new LEAN Math application. LEAN Math will input
MathML and convert it to an internal representation from which any number of
accessible formats can be generated. It is useful for reading math, but its
real importance is that it fills a void for blind people who need an efficient,
usable tool to create, edit, and manipulate math equations in braille and/or
audio. The first application of LEAN Math is as an editor for MathType
equations in MS Word, the most popular scientific authoring system today. The
editor can open and edit existing equations or create new ones. It also puts a
word description or braille translation of the equation into the MathType alt
text property. This alt text is read by any screen reader, making MathType
equations in MS Word fully accessible. This paper gives a brief overview of its
features. Keywords: Accessible Math; Reading Math; Writing Math; Manipulating Math; MS Word;
MathType | |||
| SVGPlott -- Generating Adaptive and Accessible Audio-Tactile Function Graphs | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 588-595 | |
| Jens Bornschein; Denise Prescher; Gerhard Weber | |||
| Curve sketching is a hard task for blind and visually impaired pupils and
students, but it is an essential part in education. To help those students as
well as their colleges, teachers and other people to prepare good tactile
function plots the platform independent console program SVGPlott was developed.
It enables users without any special knowledge about creating graphics for
blind or visually impaired people to prepare highly adaptable mathematical
function plots in the SVG format, which can also be used for audio-tactile
exploration. SVGPlott was developed in a user-centered design process,
including teachers and users. We show that blind and sighted users can prepare
function plots including key as well as an automatically generated textual
description not only for tactile, audio-tactile and print output, but also for
usage on a dynamic tactile pin device and as a high contrast visualization for
low vision people. Keywords: Accessible SVG; Science and Mathematics; Function Graph Plots; Tactile
Graphics; Audio-Tactile Graphics; Adaptability of Graphics; Style Sheets; User
Groups; Blind and Visually Impaired Users; Tactile Pin Device; Accessibility | |||
| Free Tools to Help Blind People with Musical Learning | | BIBA | Full-Text | 596-601 | |
| Nadine Jessel | |||
| This paper describes solutions to improve the access to music for blind people. These solutions are proposed during the European project Music4VIP. The objective of the project is to help teacher to teach music to blind pupils and to create tools which will enable blind people to learn music independently. A method base on SUS questionnaire is described and used to have a quick feedback for users. These first results indicate that users perceive our solution as good but these results have to be consolidated with further surveys with a large number of respondents. | |||
| The Development of a Music Presentation System by Two Vibrators | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 602-605 | |
| Nobuyuki Sasaki; Satoshi Ohtsuka; Kazuyoshi Ishii; Tetsumi Harakawa | |||
| We have been developing the Body-Braille system, which transmits Braille
characters to disabled people through vibrations on any part of the body. Five
years ago, we began working on music applications of this. Using 9 micro
vibrators, any melody with a sound range less than 2 octaves can be expressed
by vibration. Last year, we developed the music presentation system using only
two vibrators. Using special equipment (Pocket-Body braille, Pocket-Bbrll), we
performed two experiments and obtained successful results for applying a small
number of vibrations to music expression. The details of the system to present
music tone by vibration and the results of the experiment are described. Keywords: Body-Braille; Vibration; Deaf-blind People; Music | |||
| Multimodal Interface for Working with Algebra: Interaction between the Sighted and the Non Sighted | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 606-613 | |
| Silvia Fajardo Flores; Dominique Archambault | |||
| In an integrated school environment for Mathematics learning, effective
communication and collaboration between sighted and non sighted students and
teachers is a crucial aspect. Common activities in the classroom as doing
dictations, exercises and exams, become cumbersome without an adequate support.
We have developed a prototype interface to support these activities using
visual, speech and braille output modalities. User testing with students showed
that the interface facilitated writing, manipulation and communication. Keywords: Visual Disability; Accessibility; Mathematics; HCI | |||
| Performance Metrics and Their Extraction Methods for Audio Rendered Mathematics | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 614-621 | |
| Hernisa Kacorri; Paraskevi Riga; Georgios Kouroupetroglou | |||
| We introduce and compare three approaches to calculate structure- and
content-based performance metrics for user-based evaluation of math audio
rendering systems: Syntax Tree alignment, Baseline Structure Tree alignment,
and MathML Tree Edit Distance. While the first two require "manual" tree
transformation and alignment of the mathematical expressions, the third obtains
the metrics without human intervention using the minimum edit distance
algorithm on the corresponding MathML representations. Our metrics are
demonstrated in a pilot user study evaluating the Greek audio rendering rules
of MathPlayer with 7 participants and 39 stimuli. We observed that the obtained
results for the metrics are significantly correlated between all three
approaches. Keywords: Math Audio Rendering; Metrics; Accessibility; MathML; Usability | |||
| Developing Tactile Graphic Output Functions Necessitated in the Performance of Research Using Statistical Methods by Blind Persons | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 622-629 | |
| Kazunori Minatani | |||
| It is difficult for blind persons to conduct research using statistical
methods in an effective and independent manner. Jonathan Godfrey emphasized the
usability of R for blind persons. His BrailleR package can be said to use is
the "method of transcribing values represented in graphics into characters."
The author has shown that the advantages of the "method of converting graphics
into a tactile graphic." This research realized access by blind persons to
graphics output by R using that method with no human intervention. The software
developed through this research was employed the approach of interpreting SVG
output produced by RSVGTipsDevice. It was configured that dot size and
inter-dot pitch could be defined. An experiment showed that the question of
which method is more effectively applied differed according to the experiment
participant. Keywords: Blind Persons; Tactile Graphics; Statistics; R; SVG | |||
| The Study of a New Actuator for a Two-Point Body-Braille System | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 630-633 | |
| Nobuyuki Sasaki; Kazuya Nakajima; Satoshi Ohtsuka; Kazuyoshi Ishii; Tetsumi Harakawa | |||
| We have been studying the Body-Braille system that transmits Braille
characters to disabled people through vibrations on any part of the body. Two
years ago, we began to use a SMA (Shape Memory Alloy) device instead of a
micro-vibrator. As a result, several advantages were obtained such as smaller
equipment size, high resolution transmission, and low power consumption. This
year, we developed test equipment for the SMA device which can supply flexible
PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) parameters and performed several tests for Braille
reading. The test results reveal several possibilities for using a SMA device
as a communication channel. Keywords: Body-Braille; Vibration; Deaf-blind; SMA | |||
| Design Guidelines of Tools for Facilitating Blind People to Independently Format Their Documents | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 634-641 | |
| Lourdes M. Morales; Sonia M. Arteaga; Peter Cottrell; Sri Kurniawan | |||
| In professional and educational settings, a document's presentation can be
as important as its content. Thus, blind people often rely on sighted help for
fear of having their documents treated dismissively or misinterpreted as lack
of professionalism or education, by sighted readers when the documents do not
meet presentation 'standards'. Still, most work on helping blind people with
word-processed documents focuses on the content rather than the formatting. Our
work aims to enable the development of efficient tools to help blind people
independently format their documents. We first sought to understand blind
peoples' experiences and issues with document formatting and sighted readers'
strategies and expectations regarding well-formatted documents. As a result, we
compiled a set of guidelines for such tools and present them here. Keywords: Assistive Technology; User Interface; Blind Users; Word Processors; Screen
Readers | |||
| Contribution to the Automation of the Tactile Images Transcription Process | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 642-649 | |
| Yong Chen; Zehira Haddad; Jaime Lopez Krahe | |||
| This paper presents an image conversion process on tactile maps intended for
the use by people with blindness. This process is based on the image processing
which includes image segmentation, shape recognition and text recognition. The
proposed approach can be applied to different types of images. Keywords: Accessibility for Blind People; Image Segmentation; Shape Recognition; Text
Detection; Fuzzy Methods | |||
| Dots and Letters: Accessible Braille-Based Text Input for Visually Impaired People on Mobile Touchscreen Devices | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 650-657 | |
| Elke Mattheiss; Georg Regal; Johann Schrammel; Markus Garschall; Manfred Tscheligi | |||
| Tailored text input methods for visually impaired and blind users are needed
on touchscreen devices to support their accessibility. Therefore, we developed
a new Braille-based text input method named EdgeBraille, which allows entering
Braille characters by swiping one finger along the edges of the touchscreen.
The approach was compared with the current standard method of a talking
keyboard, first in a short-term lab study (14 participants) and then during two
weeks of daily training (7 participants). Overall EdgeBraille was perceived
well by the users. In terms of user performance we found no significant
differences between the two methods. Based on the evaluation results and the
feedback of our participants, we discuss advantages and disadvantages of
Braille-based methods in general and EdgeBraille in particular, as well as
possibilities for improvements. Keywords: Text Input Method; Touchscreen; Mobile Devices; Braille; Visually Impaired
and Blind Users | |||
| Real-Time Text Tracking for Text-to-Speech Translation Camera for the Blind | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 658-661 | |
| Hideaki Goto; Takuma Hoda | |||
| Some mobile devices have been developed for helping the visually-impaired
people to obtain useful information from text on documents, goods, and
signboards. However, it is still difficult for the blind to find or even notice
the text in the environment and to capture the images suitable for character
recognition and speech synthesis. We developed a prototype of reading assistant
device with a scene text locator that shows the text location by sound signals.
To improve the device further, this paper proposes a real-time text tracking
method that enables character recognition on-the-fly and also helps the users
to obtain the text information easily and efficiently with less searching
efforts. The presented method is based on our former one, and provides a new
feature that it is tolerant of temporary occlusion or out-of-view of text
regions. Keywords: Reading Assistant; Scene Text Detection; Text Tracking; OCR (Optical
Character Recognition); Text-To-Speech | |||
| Towards Displaying Graphics on a Cheap, Large-Scale Braille Display | | BIBAK | Full-Text | 662-669 | |
| Elisabeth Wilhelm; Thorsten Schwarz; Gerhard Jaworek; Achim Voigt; Bastian E. Rapp | |||
| Large-scale Braille displays will make participation in modern media society
easier for visually impaired people. At the moment extensive research is done
on developing new technologies for affordable refreshable Braille displays.
However, the developed displays often do not match the user requirements. This
is because most of the engineers entrusted with the development know little to
nothing about the potential users of their systems. To bridge that gap we
carried out an online survey. Within this survey 69 people who either are
visually impaired themselves or take care of someone who has lost his/her sight
stated their opinion on how a large-scale refreshable Braille display should be
designed. The results of this survey were used to build a first prototype of a
large-scale refreshable braille display for displaying text and tactile
graphics. This prototype relies on cheap, energy efficient microfluidic phase
change actuators. Keywords: Refreshable Braille Display; Braille; Tactile Graphics; Computer Display for
the Visually Impaired | |||