Ticker: An Adaptive Single-Switch Text Entry Method for Visually Impaired Users

Abstract

Ticker is a novel probabilistic stereophonic single-switch text entry method for visually-impaired users with motor disabilities who rely on single-switch scanning systems to communicate. Ticker models and tolerates a wide variety of noise, which is inevitably introduced in practical use of single-switch systems. Efficacy evaluation consists of performance modelling and three user studies.

A Performance Evaluation of Nomon: A Flexible Interface for Noisy Single-Switch Users

“…A game for children with motor impairments [33,34,36] demonstrates Nomon's applicability in real life. Nel et al [43] extended Nomon's noise model to develop a communication method for single-switch users who are also visually-impaired.…”

The Statistical Model for Ticker, an Adaptive Single-Switch Text-Entry Method for Visually Impaired Users

“…We have shown in [1] how to effectively parallelise the audio input stream: Groups of letters are uttered in the same audio channel by the same person, as illustrated in Figure 1(b). The user is expected to wear headphones.…”

“…In the shown example, it allows one to play the alphabet twice to the user in just over five seconds. We refer to the main paper [1] for an overview of the system and definitions of terminology and notation.…”

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This paper presents the statistical model for Ticker [1], a novel probabilistic stereophonic single-switch text entry method for visually-impaired users with motor disabilities who rely on single-switch scanning systems to communicate. All terminology and notation are defined in [1].

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Accelerating Text Communication via Abbreviated Sentence Input

“…Further, monitoring predictions can be difficult without visual feedback. Eyes-free text input can be slow for users who are visually-impaired (Nicolau et al, 2019), and even slower for users who are motor-and visually-impaired (Nel et al, 2019). Finally, eyes-free text input may be needed in future augmented reality (AR) interfaces where visual feedback is limited or non-existent (e.g.…”