Technology Lends a Hand

Imagine a life without books or computers. Now, imagine a life full of them but where you don’t have the sight to read the pages or the physical ability to make a mouse click.
Imagining either scenario is equally difficult for most of us, but the latter is reality for people with disabilities.

In the blink of an eye: Thanks to Eye-B-PoD, new locally designed software to make technology more accessible for people with disabilities, the computer pointer can be controlled using eye movements and blinks. (JP/Anissa Febrina)

Two recent innovations from groups of student at private university Bina Nusantara might give them the keys to open the door to that wealth of knowledge and information that many of us often take for granted.

Sitting in front of a laptop, 22- year-old Stanley Audrey Kosasih stares at the screen, his eyes focused on the icon of a file he wants to open. He blinks his right eye and the action is done: His blink replaces the click of the mouse.

“It takes a while to get used to it and yes, your eyes get tired after a while. But this will provide access to using computers for people with disabilities,” said Stanley, a graduate from the university.

Working with two colleagues, Josephine Klara and Victor Kurnia, what Stanley has developed is simply computer software that will help users operate pointers at the screen with eye movements, without infra red or other features that would expose the user to certain types of radiation.

Eye-based pointing software Eye B-PoD, the end product of the group’s four-month intensive research for their graduation project, basically works with any computer equipped with a web camera. The program detects the face and eye as captured by the camera, translates their movements and blinks into a language that the computer will understand as the command to move the cursor and open the icons that are focused on.

“We developed this for people with disabilities as well as for people who have been paralyzed,” Stanley explained. “It’s much simpler than similar existing devices as it doesn’t require additional hardware aside from a webcam.”

Without requiring additional apertures, Eye B-PoD allows users to operate a computer at a more affordable price, assuming they have access to one equipped with a webcam. The innovation is not entirely a new thing in the development of devices for people with disabilities, but most of the existing ones cost at least US$100.

“For one which operates on the Windows operating system, we set the price of Rp 100,000 [$10]. We also plan to develop an open-source Linux-based type,” Stanley explained.

The software prototype built on the C++ programming system currently includes four features. Its automatic face and eye detection allows for a short calibration time that could immediately detect a user once the software and webcam are turned on.

Meanwhile, its smart dominant face detector allows only one user to operate it even when the webcam captures other faces. The false positive blink detector can tell the difference between reflex blinks and ones intended as a signal of clicking an icon.

At the tip of your fingers: For people who are visually impaired, a reading device such as MLM for the Blind, which can translate electronic text into Braille, could be an accessible alternative to e-books. (JP/Anissa Febrina)

“You just need to hold your blink a second longer. A blink of your right eye signals a right-click and your left a left-click,” Josephine explained. The auto-sensitivity calibration of the software will help automatically re-calibrate should the censor loses its detection of the user’s eyes.

Stanley and his colleagues have so far tested the use of the prototype, which won a second-place Merit Award at the 2009 Indonesia ICT Awards on themselves, as well as with the help of a woman with disabilities.

“So far, it’s worked well. But we are still planning to add a speech-to-text feature to also enable blind people to use computers,” he said. “It might even work for able-bodied people as it allows multitasking while using a computer.”

Being in a minority, people with disabilities often end up neglected in the innovation of technological devices, making it difficult for them to enjoy the convenience of modern life and, more importantly, access to information.

The Social Affairs Ministry estimates that currently there are some 7.8 million Indonesians with disabilities, or around 3.1 percent of the total population. Half of them are in their productive age.

Hands off: Software developer Stanley Audrey Kosasih shows that, as well as making computers accessible for people with disabilities, the new technology can raise productivity by helping users to multitask. (JP/Anissa Febrina)

However, the World Health Organization makes a higher estimation, stating that actually some 10 percent of the Indonesian population have disabilities.
The United Nations in 2006 came up with the universal design convention for the disabled to assure equal rights when living in a world that, more often than not, marginalizes them.
Take books, for example. Even though Braille was invented decades ago, access to books for visually impaired people is still limited, partly because of the expensive printing and reading devices.

My Learning Module for the Blind (MLM for the Blind), a device developed by another group of students at Bina Nusantara University, offers a more affordable, locally made alternative.
By converting texts in digital form with a micro-controller, the tool allows the visually impaired to read e-books, for example.

“You simply insert a multimedia card holding files in the format with the ‘.txt’ extension. One can choose which file to open and which page to read from the 42 Braille cells,” said graduate Erik Taurino Chandra, who worked on the project with two colleagues.
MLM for the Blind is a stand-alone device powered by a rechargeable battery that is intended to be placed in libraries, Erik explained.

“This is a more affordable alternative than other Braille-reading devices. But still it won’t likely be affordable for individuals as the imported set of Braille cells itself costs Rp 18 million,” he added.

Working with Mitra Netra Foundation, an NGO for the visually impaired, Erik and his colleagues calculated that one single MLM for the Blind would cost Rp 20 million to make. It is indeed more affordable than the current device that Mitra Netra uses, which costs around Rp 50 million.
In more developed countries, computer devices for the disabled have long been an interesting research and development niche, from the speech synthesizer that converts visual displays to audio files to Braille displays embedded in a computer set. But, as always, the problem of getting those inventions in developing countries is all about affordability.

And this is behind the dreams of these young researchers.
“If we can start focusing our research on such tools and manufacture them locally, we might be able to open up the world for the disabled,” Erik said.

Anissa S. Febrina , The Jakarta Post , JAKARTA Mon, 08/24/2009 11:51 AM Sci-Tech