Maria Claudia Buzzi

Making visual maps accessible to the blind

Visual maps deliver content in a simple and effective way. They can be useful for various purposes in areas such as street guidance, surrounding information, and education. However, sightless persons are unable to explore visual maps and risk being cut off from several multimedia Web applications. In this paper, starting from accessibility issues of map-based applications, we discuss possible interaction modalities and devices to use for truly achieving usage perspectives desired by blind people. New ways to interact with a mobile device (such as gestures or touch commands) and possible solutions for making a map truly effective are investigated. In order to better explain the issues and needs of blind users accessing visual maps, an example of an interaction is presented.

Accessing e-Learning Systems via Screen Reader: An Example

The evolution of the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and the rapid growth of the Internet have impelled the pervasive diffusion of e-Learning systems. This is a great opportunity for visually-disabled people provided that both the interactive environment, created by the Learning Management Systems, and the Learning Objects, created by teachers, are properly designed and delivered. In this paper we investigate interaction of the blind user with an open source Virtual Learning Environment (Moodle) and discuss how the use of the W3C Accessible Rich Internet Applications (ARIA) suite may improve the experience of navigation via screen reader.

Designing a text entry multimodal keypad for blind users of touchscreen mobile phones

In this report, we share our experience and observations on the challenges blind people face with text entry on touch-based mobile phones, particularly from the perspective of one of the authors, who is blind. To better understand these issues we developed and tested Multimodal Text Input Touchscreen Keypad (MTITK), an audio-tactile text entry prototype based on multitap, which relies on a telephone keypad layout organized into five key groups with distinct audio-tactile feedback. Users explore the screen to identify the current selected key, tap to enter text, and gesture to edit it, while receiving the corresponding voice, audio, and tactile feedback; no additional equipment is necessary in our software-only approach. We implemented a prototype on Android and tested its usability with visually impaired participants; they welcomed its multimodality and the familiar layout, but also expressed the need to increase vibration pattern differentiation and refine the character selection mechanism.

Accessing Google docs via screen reader

Groupware systems allow remote collaboration via computer in a simple, economic and efficient way. However, to be universally valuable, groupware systems must be accessible and usable for all, including the differently-abled. In this paper we discuss the results of testing the accessibility and usability of Google Docs (http://docs.google.com) when using a screen reader and a voice synthesizer, and suggest some basic guidelines for designing effective, efficient and satisfactory User Interfaces (UIs).

Haptic reference cues to support the exploration of touchscreen mobile devices by blind users

Mobile devices are currently used for an increasing number of activities. However, their use is still a challenge for blind users. Main problems are especially due to the interaction via touchscreen and the lack of hardware keys for quickly detecting or activating functions. In this paper we investigated the use of the tactile channel to make interaction with touch-based mobile devices easier for blind users. After introducing common touchscreen usability problems, we presented our proposal aimed at enriching the user interface with haptic points to aid blind user orientation on the main sections of a user interface. Starting from two use cases, in order to set-up the proposed solution we have developed a simple controller prototype, based on Arduino open-hardware.

Conceptual Framework: How to Engineer Online Trust for Disabled Users

The Internet has penetrated our lives, becoming an indispensable tool for social, business and personal growth. Thanks to the Web, users can easily carry out many tasks that were previously difficult. Differently-abled persons need to have the same opportunities as everyone else, so accessibility and usability must be included in the design of all Web resources, applications and services. To be extensively applicable, accessibility and usability guidelines should be delivered as simple design features. In previous studies some conceptual frameworks have been introduced with this aim. However, the specific applicative environment such as trustworthy e-commerce services, may offer ad hoc challenges. In this paper, we propose some guidelines to extend the design of usability conceptual frameworks in order to promote trust in e-commerce websites for people with visual disabilities.

Vibro-Tactile Enrichment Improves Blind User Interaction with Mobile Touchscreens

Interaction via mobile devices is a challenge for blind users, who often encounter severe accessibility and usability problems. The main issues are due to the lack of hardware keys, making it difficult to quickly reach an area or activate functions, and to the new way of interacting via touchscreen. A touchscreen has no specific reference points detectable by feel, so a blind user cannot easily understand exactly where (s)he is positioned on the interface nor readily find a specific item/function. Alternative ways to provide content are mainly vocal and may be inadequate in some situations, e.g., noisy environments. In this study we investigate enriching the user interfaces of touchscreen mobile devices to facilitate blind users’ orientation. We propose a possible solution for improving interaction based on the vibro-tactile channel. After introducing the idea behind our approach, two implemented Android Apps including the enriched user interfaces are shown and discussed.

Web 2.0: Twitter and the blind

The latest Internet phenomenon is Twitter, a micro-blogging platform that in just a few years has attracted millions of users. With short messages (tweets), following and followers, Twitter is reshaping ways of interacting online. Thus, its accessibility is very important for social interaction as well as for work. In this paper we discuss the accessibility of Twitter for blind users interacting via screen reader and voice synthesizer. First, basic functions such as registration, login, posting and reading tweets have been analyzed highlighting accessibility issues, then a discussion is based on the analyzed case study, offering suggestions for designers.

Usability and Accessibility of eBay by Screen Reader

The evolution of Information and Communication Technology and the rapid growth of the Internet have fuelled a great diffusion of eCommerce websites. Usually these sites have complex layouts crowded with active elements, and thus are difficult to navigate via screen reader. Interactive environments should be properly designed and delivered to everyone, including the blind, who usually use screen readers to interact with their computers. In this paper we investigate the interaction of blind users with eBay, a popular eCommerce website, and discuss how using the W3C Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA) suite could improve the user experience when navigating via screen reader.

Playing with geometry: a Multimodal Android App for Blind Children

Geometry is a traditionally difficult subject to teach to visually impaired subjects. This paper investigates tools to help blind children learn geometry. An accessible vibro-tactile-based android application has been designed to allow children to make freehand drawings and play with geometry, recognizing common geometric shapes or topological configurations. An initial usability test of the application, performed by a blind researcher, has revealed some limitations of the proposed approach that could soon be overcome thanks to current technological innovation in the mobile world.