Hands-Free Mouse-Pointer Manipulation Using Motion-Tracking and Speech Recognition

Technology is advancing at a rapid pace, automating many everyday chores in the process. Information technology (IT) is changing the way we perform work and providing society with a multitude of entertainment options. Unfortunately, in the past designers of many software systems have not considered the disabled as active users of technology, and thus this significant part of the world population has often been neglected. A change in this mindset has been emerging in recent years, however, as private-sector organizations and governments have started to realize that including this user group is not only profitable, but also beneficial to society as a whole. This paper introduces an alternative method to the traditional mouse input device, using a modified Lucas-Kanade optical-flow algorithm for tracking head movements, and speech recognition to activate mouse buttons