Contributions of “ambient” multimodality to Universal Access

ISBN: 9780805862805; ISBN 10: 0805862803This chapter aims at demonstrating and illustrating the potential benefits that can be derived from research advances in the implementation of Ambient Intelligence (AmI) for promoting Universal Access (UA) in the coming Information Society. In the first section, we show that advances in the implementation of AmI have the potential to contribute to the progress of UA by extending the range of interaction modalities available to Physically Disabled (PD) users and providing the necessary technology for implementing enhanced Assisted Living (AL). The second section presents recent advances in the processing of some new input modalities (speech, gestures, gaze or haptics) and synergistic combinations of modalities which are currently viewed as appropriate substitutes for Direct Manipulation in situations where the use of keyboard and mouse is awkward or impossible. The benefits of these advances for users engaged in other manual activities or on the move, as well as for users with motor or perceptual disabilities, are suggested. In the third section, we survey some major recent or running projects on AmI which illustrate the potential contribution of recent advances, such as wireless sensor networks or smart rooms to the implementation of enhanced AL for PD people. The fourth section describes a software architecture designed for multimodal user interfaces which takes into account the recent diversification of modalities and the emergence of context-aware systems distributed in the user's life environment. The fifth section briefly surveys a few research projects which attempt to implement AmI concepts with a view to advancing AL or UA (especially to AmI environments)