HI. the app your describing sounds like blind square?
regards
Maria and crew from australia
email:
[email protected]
check out
www.95-the-mix.com
where we play lots of great music
On 17 Jan 2014, at 4:31 am, Alan Paganelli <[email protected]> wrote:
> I was thinking the same thing. In museums, art centers etc. There is
> another app called There was another app that did something also pretty nice.
> It announced points of interest near by. I don't remember if the app name
> was near by or around me. Anyway, it would read to you about the points of
> interest as you got near them. I had only one problem with the app. It was
> self voicing and that interfered with Voice over. Of course you could turn
> voice over off but that would be like putting blinders on. Anyway this app
> also let you create your own points of interest. There is also a national
> database and you could load in POIS for that State or local. anybody can
> add to the database. I spent several days fooling around with it listening
> to all the points of interest around me. I've lived in Las Vegas 31 years
> and they had places I had never been to or even knew existed.
>
> Regards,
>
> Alan
>
> Please click on:
> HTTP://WWW.home.earthlink.net/~alanandsuzanne/
> There, you'll find free files of my arrangements and performances played on
> the Yamaha Tyros 1 keyboard. The albums in Technics format formerly on my
> website are still available upon request. Thanks for listening!
>
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Julie Dawson" <[email protected]>
> To: <[email protected]>
> Sent: Wednesday, January 08, 2014 7:27 PM
> Subject: Re: App Turns Smartphone Into Virtual Cane
>
>
>> I wonder if this ap could be usedoutside and programmed with routs outside.
>> What terrific idea for an ap!
>> Live simply,
>> Love generously,
>> Care deeply,
>> Speak kindly
>> And leave the rest to God!
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Gary Bowers" <[email protected]>
>> To: <[email protected]>
>> Sent: Wednesday, January 08, 2014 3:16 PM
>> Subject: App Turns Smartphone Into Virtual Cane
>>
>>
>>> App Turns Smartphone Into Virtual Cane for the Blind
>>>
>>> MIT Technology Review
>>> January 8, 2014
>>>
>>>
>>> A smartphone app inspired by Greek mythology has the potential to help the
>>> blind navigate indoors where GPS is unavailable.
>>>
>>>
>>> It's easy to imagine that being blind or visually impaired more or less
>>> excludes people from using smartphones or tablets. But nothing could be
>>> further from the truth. App stores have a dizzying variety of products that
>>> help the visually impaired access all kinds of information much more easily
>>> than would otherwise be possible.
>>>
>>> These apps offer audio books, match clothes by colour and even offer games
>>> played by hearing and touch alone. But the apps designed to give directions
>>> all suffer from the same drawbacks-audio directions are helpful but also
>>> screen out other audio such as conversations or the sound of traffic nearby.
>>> What's more, GPS does not work indoors so these kinds of systems are of
>>> little use in homes and other buildings
>>>
>>> Now Pierluigi Gallo and buddies at the University of Palermo in Italy have
>>> come up with an alternative which offers the blind navigational help without
>>> any form of audio distraction or the need for GPS.
>>>
>>> The approach is surprisingly simple and inspired by the famous Greek myth of
>>> Ariadne and Theseus. In the story, Theseus volunteers to kill the Minotaur
>>> which lives in a labyrinth on the island of Crete. To help him, Ariadne
>>> gives him a sword to kill the beast and a ball of thread to help him find
>>> his way out when the deed is done.
>>>
>>> Gallo and co take a similar approach with their prototype smartphone app
>>> called Arianna, the Italian name for Ariadne. (It's also short for "pAth
>>> Recognition for Indoor Assisted NavigatioN with Augmented perception.) Their
>>> idea is to map out a route through a building by sticking coloured tape on
>>> the ground.
>>>
>>> The user then switches on the smartphone camera and points it towards the
>>> ground, while placing a finger on the screen. He or she then waves the
>>> camera back and forth, scanning the ground for the line.
>>>
>>> In the meantime, the app analyses the frames produced by the camera, picking
>>> out the line as it moves across the screen. When the line passes under the
>>> user's finger on the screen, the app causes the smartphone to vibrate,
>>> providing a tactile indication of where the line falls.
>>>
>>> Scanning the smartphone back and forth allows the user to follow the line in
>>> the same way as he or she might use a cane (see diagram above). At the same
>>> time, QR codes placed on the ground can give the user other information such
>>> as the location of places such as toilets, water coolers, shops and so on.
>>>
>>> Gallo and co say they tested their virtual cane in December at workshop in
>>> Boston organised by the Andrea Bocelli Foundation and say it works well.
>>>
>>> And they plan significant upgrades in future. One idea is to use infrared
>>> lines that are not visible but can nevertheless be picked up by smartphone
>>> cameras which are sensitive to infrared. This infrared sensitivity is
>>> currently an under-used feature of most smartphones, they point out. And
>>> that raises the possibility of games and challenges that are equally
>>> accessible to the blind and sighted.
>>>
>>> All in all, this software could be a significant help to the blind and
>>> visually impaired. Hi-tech aids for this disability tend to be expensive
>>> because they have to be specially designed and manufactured for a relatively
>>> small group of people. But with smartphones widely available at affordable
>>> prices, much of the technology necessary for Ariana is available
>>> off-the-shelf.
>>>
>>> Gallo and co don't say when their new idea will be available as a commercial
>>> app or how much it will cost but it has the potential to be significantly
>>> cheaper than a bespoke device.
>>>
>>> So: useful, simple and potentially cheap. Not a bad combination for an app.
>>>
>>> --
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