AsTeRICS, a Flexible Assistive Technology Construction Set

Ossmann, Roland; Thaller, David; Nussbaum, Gerhard; Pühretmair, Franz; Veigl, Christoph; Weiss, Christoph; Morales, Blanca; Diaz, Unai

doi:10.1016/j.procs.2012.10.001

Cited by 11 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…Consequently, AT developed to meet the needs of a homogenized population can fail to address the specific and complex needs of individuals [10,29]. As a result, people with disabilities are often given AT that only provides an approximate response to their requirements [8,10] and may need to be customized or modified before they can be used effectively [18,23]. DIY-AT has the potential to be tailored to meet the needs of individuals [9,10,15,16] and, therefore, might provide a solution in situations where an off the shelf product is not suitable.…”

Section: Research Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

A study of the challenges related to DIY assistive technology in the context of children with disabilities

Hook

Verbaan

Durrant

et al. 2014

Proceedings of the 2014 Conference on Designing Interactive Systems

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The term Do It Yourself Assistive Technology (DIY-AT) refers to the creation and adaptation of AT by nonprofessionals, including people with disabilities and their families, friends and caregivers. Previous research has argued that the development of technologies and services that enable people to make their own DIY-AT will lead to the rapid and low cost development of assistive devices that are tailored to meet the complex needs of individual people with disabilities. We present the results of a qualitative study that explored challenges related to the process of making DIY-AT for children with disabilities. A series of eleven semi-structured interviews with a broad range of stakeholders involved in the current use, provision and adaptation of AT for children with disabilities revealed a number of challenges relating to the prevalence and scope of ongoing DIY-AT practice, barriers to participation, and the challenges faced by makers and users of DIY-AT.

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Section: Research Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

A study of the challenges related to DIY assistive technology in the context of children with disabilities

Hook

Verbaan

Durrant

et al. 2014

Proceedings of the 2014 Conference on Designing Interactive Systems

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“…AsTeRICS [ 11 ] is an accessible technology (AT) construction set that provides plug-ins for many common input devices and signal processing operations. By combining already existing and newly developed plug-ins into an AsTeRICS model, raw input physiological signals are pre-processed before being sent to the reasoning module.…”

Section: Easy Reading User Tracking and Reasoningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Automatic Assistance to Cognitive Disabled Web Users via Reinforcement Learning on the Browser

Murillo-Morales

Heumader

Miesenberger

2020

Lecture Notes in Computer Science

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This paper introduces a proof of concept software reasoner that aims to detect whether an individual user is in need of cognitive assistance during a typical Web browsing session. The implemented reasoner is part of the Easy Reading browser extension for Firefox. It aims to infer the user’s current cognitive state by collecting and analyzing user’s physiological data in real time, such as eye tracking, heart beat rate and variability, and blink rate. In addition, when the reasoner determines that the user is in need of help it automatically triggers a support tool appropriate for the individual user and Web content being consumed. By framing the problem as a Markov Decision Process, typical policy control methods found in the Reinforcement Learning literature, such as Q-learning, can be employed to tackle the learning problem.

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“…Besides the implementation and modification of models, the ACS can fully control the ARE. In addition, the ACS can create the GUI that end users will see and use on the ARE .…”

Section: Model Creationmentioning

confidence: 99%

AsTeRICS, a flexible AT construction set

Ossmann¹,

Parker²,

Thaller³

et al. 2014

Adaptive Control & Signal

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A vast number of people with disabilities are supported by assistive technologies (AT). Often, AT solutions do not directly fit the specific requirements of a user, making costly adaptations necessary. Assistive Technology Rapid Integration & Construction Set (AsTeRICS) aims to change this situation by employing rapid prototyping technologies in AT. A construction set of building blocks to create flexible prototypes for each individual user is provided. This set is configured by a visual modelling software application which allows to connect all building blocks as needed, tailoring the prototype to the user's abilities and needs. Building blocks include sensors (which in this context includes not only stand-alone sensors such as simple switch inputs but also vision systems, brain computer interfaces, and many more), data processing elements (mathematical and flow control), and actuators (such as mouse/keyboard replacement, smart environments, and mobile phone access). As central part of AsTeRICS, a runtime environment has been developed, handling all signal processing and data exchange operations needed for the interaction of the building blocks. R. OSSMANN ET AL.finalizing the project, there were already more functionalities implemented than originally planned. Since then, development has continued in the scope of follow-up projects, diploma thesis and traineeships, and also by the help of volunteer programmers during their free time. The current release is version 2.2, featuring more than 120 plug-ins. Since December 2013, there is an open source repository on Github, which is already being used by several organizations and persons. Target groupIn Europe, there is a strong need for AT supporting people with reduced motor capabilities [2]. A Eurostat statistics [3] from 2005 suggests that between 1.7% (Hungary) and 17.5% (Norway) of people with long-term disabilities have problems with their arms or hands. In absolute figures, that means more than 2.6 million people in Europe have impairments affecting their upper limbs and therefore many of them depend on assistive technologies (AT). As the requirements of the individual user are very specific, adaptive, Information and Communication Technology (ICT)-based solutions are needed to let this population group participate in modern society.Over the last decades, a considerable number of information and communication technologybased AT devices have become available for people with disabilities. These AT devices often ask for adaptation of software and/or hardware to fit the user's abilities before they can be used. All too often, assistive tools that have been optimized for particular applications cannot be used in other situations out-of-the-box. Additionally, some people cannot be supplied with AT devices at all due to the limits of adaptability or unaffordable costs of the necessary adaptations.Accessible technologies are a key factor to support people with disabilities in their daily life and to let them participate in a modern and open society. The design-for-al...

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AsTeRICS, a Flexible Assistive Technology Construction Set

Cited by 11 publications

References 2 publications

A study of the challenges related to DIY assistive technology in the context of children with disabilities

A study of the challenges related to DIY assistive technology in the context of children with disabilities

Automatic Assistance to Cognitive Disabled Web Users via Reinforcement Learning on the Browser

AsTeRICS, a flexible AT construction set

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