Step-by-Step Prompts Put the Blind on Track

The New York Times
Sponsored by Starbucks

October 17, 2002

Step-by-Step Prompts Put the Blind on Track
By THOMAS J. FITZGERALD

AN interactive personal navigation system developed at the University of
Florida could someday guide blind people through corridors and along busy
city
sidewalks.

The system combines off-the-shelf hardware, software and a voice-controlled
interface of the students' own design. It communicates wirelessly with
widely
available but little-known databases of detailed geographic information that
can quickly be updated to reflect changing conditions.

The project began as a master's thesis project for Steve Moore when he was a
computer science student at the university's Gainesville campus.

When the user gives voice commands to ask for directions, the system
responds with verbal instructions, giving distances in feet and providing
corrective
guidance along the way.

"Right now we have it down to feet, but we're working on calibrating it with
your stride length," Mr. Moore said. "There are so many little things to
work
on, and there are only a few of us."

The system can reroute users around trouble spots that may develop on short
notice, like construction sites or big crowds, and can describe points along
routes.

Mr. Moore began the project in 1999 and has since enlisted two other
students, Balaji Ramachandran and Lisa Ran, to add expertise in geographical
information
systems and indoor navigation.

Mr. Moore's father, Theral, an associate professor of mathematics on the
same campus, helped test the system. Professor Moore, who is totally blind,
said
he does not ordinarily walk around on the busy campus without an escort. But
when testing the system, he said, he felt much better about trying. "I could
actually head out to go to another building and feel comfortable," he said.

The system is named Drishti, for vision in Sanskrit, and the students expect
that it can be configured to work in cities, in airports and on other
campuses.
Features like its voice-controlled interface and dynamic capabilities
distinguish it from navigation systems available for the blind today.

The heart of the system is a wearable computer about the size of a thick
paperback book, which is worn on the user's waist, runs Windows 98 and is
voice-controlled
with an interface that uses
I.B.M.'s
ViaVoice software. The computer is connected to a Global Positioning System
receiver carried on the user's back, which keeps track of the latitude and
longitude.
It also gets data from the university's geographical information system, or
G.I.S., a dynamic layout of the Gainesville campus that can be updated by
campus
officials as they learn about trouble spots like construction sites.

As the user navigates the route given by the computer, the system compares
data from the G.P.S. receiver with data from the G.I.S. to refine the route
and
warn if the user is straying off course or even away from the center of the
sidewalk.

Professor Moore said the system designed by his son could greatly benefit
the visually impaired, although he would prefer that the equipment were less
bulky.
"You can't demand luxuries when you're in a predicament like mine, so I can
tolerate it," he said. The professor overseeing Drishti, Sumi Helal, said
the
next step would be to seek grant money, recruit more students for the effort
and refine it with smaller technologies and enhancements.

One improvement on which they are now working is indoor navigation. In the
current system, the G.P.S. receiver loses the satellite signal inside
buildings.
But by placing ultrasonic transmitters on the building's ceilings and
receivers on the computer, Professor Helal said, the system could continue
to provide
directions, guiding the user up stairways, along corridors and to
rest-rooms, classrooms and other locations stored in the university's
database.

The system could be expanded to cities or other campuses by reconfiguring it
to draw on the G.I.S. databases of those entities. These geographical
databases
are growing in popularity among municipalities and institutions, and Mr.
Moore said that Drishti could pull information from many of them over the
Internet.
ESRI, a leading maker of G.I.S. software, said that many of them are already
shared across the Internet.

Drishti has already attracted outside interest. Voxit, a Swedish software
company that is seeking to develop a similar system, is negotiating with the
University
of Florida to obtain a replica of Drishti in the hope of testing a version
along footpaths and roads in the Swedish city of Borlange.

"We intend to test the prototype with a group of people with different kinds
of visual impairment," said Leif Bergman, project manager for Voxit, which
makes speech-recognition software.

Mr. Moore estimated that it would be about two years before a Drishti-like
product became commercially available, with the big hurdle being gaining
access
to public and private G.I.S. databases.

"It should not be too far away," he said.

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