Towards the Use of Ontologies for Improving User Interaction for People with Special Needs Shuaib Karim, A Min Tjoa (skarim, Institute of Software Technology & Interactive Systems Vienna University of Technology

CONFENIS Outline Motivation Introduction Accessibility requirements Proposed Solution Conclusion

CONFENIS Motivation Ability to store user’s personal information items in our prototype with the facility to make annotations leads to our next step – “make the system accessible for people with special needs”

CONFENIS The existing situation We have different types of: User impairments (blindness, hearing problems, motor problems, cognitive problems, etc) Interface characteristics (text, sound, UI widgets and their behavior, etc) Accessibility guidelines – recommends UI according to impairments

CONFENIS –Providing alternate text for the pictures –Avoiding certain colors for the color blind –Avoiding complex table layout for the blind –Difficulty in interaction by mouse/keyboard due to motor problems –Difficulty in system behavior recall due to cognitive problems etc. Every impairment requires a renewed effort for providing accessibility

CONFENIS Impairments severity may change over time –Voice feedback (beep, alarm) would no more work if hearing impairment is introduced or becomes more severe –Response of tactile feedback will change with severity of motor problems –Cognitive problems may increase over time etc. A corresponding change of system behavior over time is required in these cases

CONFENIS One impairment may have consequences on another –Color blind + motor problems –Color blind + cognitive problems (for example difficulty in comprehension) Consider the case when a human operator is suffering from either of the above combinations, and he/she has to take quick action to respond (for example in call centre scenario)

CONFENIS User Interface characteristics Text – size, color, font Sound – volume, pitch,... UI components – text field, button, scrollbar,... Certain UI components go well with each other and not with all Interface characteristics evolve over time

CONFENIS Accessibility guidelines WCAG make web content (Document Content, Structure, and Presentation) accessible to people with disabilitiesWCAG 1.Provide equivalent alternatives to auditory & visual content.Provide equivalent alternatives to auditory & visual content. 2.Don't rely on color alone.Don't rely on color alone. 3.Use markup and style sheets and do so properly.Use markup and style sheets and do so properly. 4.Clarify natural language usageClarify natural language usage 5.Create tables that transform gracefully.Create tables that transform gracefully. 6.Ensure that pages featuring new technologies transform gracefully.Ensure that pages featuring new technologies transform gracefully. 7.Ensure user control of time-sensitive content changes.Ensure user control of time-sensitive content changes.

CONFENIS Ensure direct accessibility of embedded user interfaces.Ensure direct accessibility of embedded user interfaces. 9.Design for device-independence.Design for device-independence. 10.Use interim solutions.Use interim solutions. 11.Use W3C technologies and guidelines.Use W3C technologies and guidelines. 12.Provide context and orientation information.Provide context and orientation information. 13.Provide clear navigation mechanisms.Provide clear navigation mechanisms. 14.Ensure that documents are clear and simple.Ensure that documents are clear and simple. Focus mainly on vision and motor impairments. Other impairments are not significantly addresses which are equally important in today‘s interactive systems.

CONFENIS Our system is not just about web content! The primary information items in our prototype SemanticLIFE are:SemanticLIFE – s –Browsed web pages –Chat sessions –Process state data –Appointments –Documents –File system monitor log

CONFENIS Associations between the primary information items Some examples are: e1 relatedWith File f1 File f1 relatedWith ProcessStateData p1 File f1 collaboratedWith Contact c1 WebPage w1 relatedWith e1 File f1 sharableWith Contact c1

CONFENIS Accessibility requirements for our system Present the primary information items and the already existing associations between those Explore and make new associations Users may vary from normal users to a user having some special needs System should be accessible on multiple devices Conformance with WCAG guidelines

CONFENIS Mapping information explicitly specified in ontology Explicit description of concepts is very helpful for people with special needs using system through assitive technology Semantic web technology can be applied using reasoners for making inefernce Sharable over the web Proposed approach – ontology for Impairments and user interface characteristics

CONFENIS Human Disease Treatment Cause Chemotherapy Drug Therapy Surgery Psychotherapy Physiotherapy Type EnvironmentalGenetic Symptom Extension of ontology by “Hadzic M. and Chang E., Ontology-based Support for Human Disease Study, HICSS’05”

CONFENIS Approach followed – 1/4 Purpose & scope: Provides mapping information bewteen the user‘s physical and cognitive impairments, and the user interface characteristics Possible interaction with other ontologies: DOID, UMLS, ICD9CM, MeSH

CONFENIS Approach followed – 2/4 Sample user scenarios To avoid the confusing colors on an interface for a user with particular type of color blindness Font size adjustment according to user‘s visual acuity Information presentation on the better part of the screen for a user suffering from Hemianopsia (absence of vision in half of visual field)

CONFENIS Approach followed – 3/4 Competency questions What is suitable font size for the user? Which colored control buttons are suitable? What is the most suitable screen area for displaying information? Which UI components are appropriate?

CONFENIS Approach followed – 4/4 Impairments Taxonomy Collection of important terms realted to impairments Find the relation between those terms and their interconnections A sample impairments taxonomy was prepared by consulting different resources and by interviewing some physiciansimpairments taxonomy Determining class hierarchy, properties,... and creation of ontology in OWL-DL using Protege 3.1

CONFENIS Part of proposedImapirment-UI ontology

CONFENIS Consequences of impairments-user interface ontology –Helpful in automatically adapting the UI for a specific user –Helpful in deducing the best match of UI characteristics for a user with multiple impairments –Historical data would be beneficial for studying the cause-effect relationship between the impairments and the computer interfaces –Could be useful for rehabilitation purposes

CONFENIS Conclusions Presenting information to different users with varying impairments is a difficult task Our approach paves the way for a generic solution using semantic web technology The effort could be equally useful for diversity A sample proof of concept presented

CONFENIS Acknowledgements Higher Education Commission of Pakistan ASEAN-EU University Network Initiative Zubair Kareem, M.D. Phy-Neurologist Holyoke MA

CONFENIS Thanks a lot!