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Projects
Dante
Eloquent
LLIS
MIND
Nuts&Bolts
proXimity
Towel
Dante
The 'Dante' project is looking at how visually impaired people access Hypermedia environments, of which Web is the most popular example. The main goal is to devise a tool that uses a model-driven approach to analyse and transform Web pages to increase mobility in virtual environment.
Eloquent
Our communication tool, 'Eloquent', was created primarily for written communications and with the needs of Aphasic users in mind. 'Eloquent' differs from other communication tools in that complex communications are initially created from single simple symbols which can then be modified based on: (1) intelligent choices presented to the user and derived from previously selected concepts (represented symbolically), (2) an underlying knowledge (in the form of plug-able ontology's) of the communication domain, (3) and a superficial knowledge of the user. 'Eloquent' does not contain an initial understanding of all complex communication domains (medical, emotional, mechanical communications etc.) but rather provides a plug-able infrastructure to enable custom communication domains to be added and changed. 'Eloquent' works in a bi-directional fashion by annotating the produced output using metadata such that text and symbols can be inter-converted. The system is based on the concept of the Chinese pictogram where a single pictogram represents a single word, however, we theorise that using new technology it is possible for a single 'Eloquent' symbol (using a small number of modifiers) to represent a complex sentence and that the symbol would be easily understood by certain groups of users with aphasia. 'Eloquent' is not just about utilitarian communications but also tries to assist the user in relating emotions and desires in as flexible a way as possible.
Low-Cost Lightweight Instance Store (LLIS)
Visually impaired users are hindered in their efforts to access the largest repository of electronic information in the world, namely the World Wide Web (Web). A visually impaired user's information and presentation requirements are different from a sighted user in that they are highly egocentric and non-visual. These requirements can become problems in that the web is visually-centric with regard to presentation and information order / layout, this can (and does) hinder users who need presentation-agnostic access to information. Our objective is to address these problems by creating usable appropriately 'displayed' web pages for use by all users who wish to understand the meaning as opposed to the presentation and order of the information. We assert that the only way to accomplish this is to encode the pages semantic information directly into the page. And the only way this will occur in the real world is if authors (graphic designers and information architects) have low 'semantic overhead' when creating these pages.
Morse Input from Numerous Devices (MIND)
Morse Code is an increasingly forgotten means of communication, however for users with extreme physical disabilities it may provide a faster method of input to computer systems than is currently open to them. Some systems do already exist however they rely on bespoke and expensive hardware. It will involve the creation of an application to take input from numerous devices including voice.
Nuts&Bolts
Sensory and cognitive impairments are both about perception. This means that if we can design our software with a perception agnostic ethos then we may be able to support users with a disability more easily. This is however important for everyone. At some point in the new world of moving communications and increasingly complex tasks, users will need to be supported as they will find themselves perception-ally disadvantaged by the technology they are using, or being forced to use. The behavioural project is my answer to these theories. The research perspective is focused on assisting the cognitive needs of users as they move through information. This now includes the real world were we are bombarded with information giving appliances (both implicitly and explicitly). This is focused on a sequence of formative evaluations to analyse user preference on various questions associated with cognition of information.
proXimity
proXimity is a multi-disciplinary cross-platform system joining the three domains of Knowledge, Environment, and User. It seeks to address research challenges in these domains and produce a number of theoretical and practical outcomes based on our underlying concerns and assertions about the world, how the world will be, and how we think the world should be.
Towel
The 'Towel' project seeks to find solutions to problems encountered by both visually impaired and sighted users when travelling in the World Wide Web. Drawing similarities between real-world travel metaphors of visually impaired people and web-based travel metaphors of both visually impaired and sighted people, enhances an understanding of the problem and therefore enables solutions to these travel problems to be more easily identified.