Designing a Tactile Document UI for 2D Refreshable Tactile Displays: Towards Accessible Document Layouts for Blind People
Understanding document layouts is vital for enhancing document exploration and information retrieval for sighted individuals. However, for blind and visually impaired people, it becomes challenging to have access to layout information using typical assistive technologies such as screen readers. In t...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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MDPI AG
2024-11-01
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| Series: | Multimodal Technologies and Interaction |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2414-4088/8/11/102 |
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| author | Sara Alzalabny Omar Moured Karin Müller Thorsten Schwarz Bastian Rapp Rainer Stiefelhagen |
| author_facet | Sara Alzalabny Omar Moured Karin Müller Thorsten Schwarz Bastian Rapp Rainer Stiefelhagen |
| author_sort | Sara Alzalabny |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Understanding document layouts is vital for enhancing document exploration and information retrieval for sighted individuals. However, for blind and visually impaired people, it becomes challenging to have access to layout information using typical assistive technologies such as screen readers. In this paper, we examine the potential benefits of presenting documents on two-dimensional (2D) refreshable tactile displays. These displays enable the tactile perception of 2D data, offering the advantage of dynamic and interactive functionality. Despite their potential, the development of user interfaces (UIs) for such displays has not advanced significantly. Thus, we propose a design of an intelligent tactile user interface (TUI), incorporating touch and audio feedback to represent documents in a tactile format. Our exploratory study for evaluating this approach revealed satisfaction from participants with the experience of directly viewing documents in their true form, rather than relying on screen-reading interpretations. Additionally, participants offered recommendations for incorporating additional features and refining the approach in future iterations. To facilitate further research and development, we have made our dataset and models publicly available. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-84cc51034d804e27bb8ba5ede3b8997d |
| institution | DOAJ |
| issn | 2414-4088 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2024-11-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Multimodal Technologies and Interaction |
| spelling | doaj-art-84cc51034d804e27bb8ba5ede3b8997d2025-08-20T02:48:01ZengMDPI AGMultimodal Technologies and Interaction2414-40882024-11-0181110210.3390/mti8110102Designing a Tactile Document UI for 2D Refreshable Tactile Displays: Towards Accessible Document Layouts for Blind PeopleSara Alzalabny0Omar Moured1Karin Müller2Thorsten Schwarz3Bastian Rapp4Rainer Stiefelhagen5NeptunLab, University of Freiburg, 79110 Freiburg, GermanyACCESS@KIT, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76131 Karlsruhe, GermanyACCESS@KIT, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76131 Karlsruhe, GermanyACCESS@KIT, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76131 Karlsruhe, GermanyFreiburg Center of Interactive Materials and Bioinspired Technologies, University of Freiburg, 79110 Freiburg, GermanyACCESS@KIT, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76131 Karlsruhe, GermanyUnderstanding document layouts is vital for enhancing document exploration and information retrieval for sighted individuals. However, for blind and visually impaired people, it becomes challenging to have access to layout information using typical assistive technologies such as screen readers. In this paper, we examine the potential benefits of presenting documents on two-dimensional (2D) refreshable tactile displays. These displays enable the tactile perception of 2D data, offering the advantage of dynamic and interactive functionality. Despite their potential, the development of user interfaces (UIs) for such displays has not advanced significantly. Thus, we propose a design of an intelligent tactile user interface (TUI), incorporating touch and audio feedback to represent documents in a tactile format. Our exploratory study for evaluating this approach revealed satisfaction from participants with the experience of directly viewing documents in their true form, rather than relying on screen-reading interpretations. Additionally, participants offered recommendations for incorporating additional features and refining the approach in future iterations. To facilitate further research and development, we have made our dataset and models publicly available.https://www.mdpi.com/2414-4088/8/11/102tactile user interfacedocument layout2D refreshable tactile displayaccessible layout |
| spellingShingle | Sara Alzalabny Omar Moured Karin Müller Thorsten Schwarz Bastian Rapp Rainer Stiefelhagen Designing a Tactile Document UI for 2D Refreshable Tactile Displays: Towards Accessible Document Layouts for Blind People Multimodal Technologies and Interaction tactile user interface document layout 2D refreshable tactile display accessible layout |
| title | Designing a Tactile Document UI for 2D Refreshable Tactile Displays: Towards Accessible Document Layouts for Blind People |
| title_full | Designing a Tactile Document UI for 2D Refreshable Tactile Displays: Towards Accessible Document Layouts for Blind People |
| title_fullStr | Designing a Tactile Document UI for 2D Refreshable Tactile Displays: Towards Accessible Document Layouts for Blind People |
| title_full_unstemmed | Designing a Tactile Document UI for 2D Refreshable Tactile Displays: Towards Accessible Document Layouts for Blind People |
| title_short | Designing a Tactile Document UI for 2D Refreshable Tactile Displays: Towards Accessible Document Layouts for Blind People |
| title_sort | designing a tactile document ui for 2d refreshable tactile displays towards accessible document layouts for blind people |
| topic | tactile user interface document layout 2D refreshable tactile display accessible layout |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2414-4088/8/11/102 |
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