Abstract
Every person has an ability of exploring the world by means of touch and this specifically becomes the core ability if a person is visually impaired. This core ability is unfolded by the mobile application SparshJa that accepts the input through touch-based Braille keypad. SparshJa is a Sanskrit word which means “Gaining Knowledge through Touch”. SparshJa presents a user interface which mimics the Braille cell on touch screen phone where position of each dot is identified by means of distinct vibratory patterns. This Haptic feedback is augmented by auditory feedback that spells out the input letter. This dual feedback system makes the design of application and especially graphical interface totally user centric. The user-centric design improves utility of the application by simplifying navigation and reducing the learning curve. These claims are validated by means of on-field user trials which evaluate usability of SparshJa.
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Acknowledgement
This research was funded by Board of College and University Development, Savitribai Phule Pune University (BCUD, SPPU). We would also like to thank Ms. Archna Sarnobat, Administrative Officer of The Poon School & Home for Blind Trust, Kothrud, Pune for allowing us to conduct on field user trials.
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Gokhale, P., Pimpalkar, N., Sawke, N., Swain, D. (2017). SparshJa: A User-Centric Mobile Application Designed for Visually Impaired. In: Behera, H., Mohapatra, D. (eds) Computational Intelligence in Data Mining. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 556. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-3874-7_37
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-3874-7_37
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