Author: Umakant Mishra
Abstract:
Physically or mentally challenged people cannot use a
computer in the same way a normal people can. For example, a person with
disability in hands cannot use a standard keyboard or mouse efficiently. People
having hearing problem, visual challenge etc. cannot interact with a computer
like a normal person. So it is necessary to specially design the computers,
interfacing devices and software interfaces, which can be used by the
physically challenged people.
There are many special devices like mouse, keyboard,
pointers, and touch screens etc. to assist the visually challenged users. It is
a challenge for the inventors and manufacturers to build such devices. It is
difficult for the inventors to visualize the difficulties of a visually
impaired person and invent special devices to assist them. Similarly it is
challenging for the manufacturers to build these special equipments, as they
may not find enough customers for a commercial viability.
This article analyses the types of visual disabilities,
different assistive technologies for different visual disabilities, guidelines
for developing user interfaces for the visually impaired, software products
available for assisting the visually impaired, and Inventions made on such
adaptive technologies. The objective is to analyze and explore various
assistive technology for the visually impaired users, and throw some light on
the scope for future improvements on such interfaces.
Keywords: TRIZ, Innovation, Inventive Problem
Solving, Invention, Software Patents, GUI, Software inventions, Graphical User
Interface, GUI design, GUI elements, assistive technologies, adaptive interfaces,
speech recognition, VRS, Visual disabilities, Karaoke, speech synthesis,
Braille,
