Project Description
TypeOver is a prototype iOS application that helps users of the Tecla Shield type faster. It consists of a keypad like a mobile phone. Each key contains three or four letters and a number. When the user selects a key, the program cycles through the characters on that key one at a time. The user can select a desired character by activating a switch when that character is highlighted. The app currently has simple word prediction based on word frequency-of-use statistics. Predictions are displayed after the user has input a user-selectable number of letters. The initial word prediction database was brought over from the Tecla Access application for Android.
One major goal of the project is to add text-to-speech capabilities so that TypeOver becomes useful for face-to-face communication for AAC users. Initially, we will use the open source TTS engine called OpenEars. We plan on evaluating multiple voices both male and female. There will be a speak button near the top of the application user interface to provide ease of access. Each time the user inserts a full stop, the VoiceOver cursor will automatically move to the speak button. When the user selects the speak button, the button will change to function as a stop speaking button.
We are also planning on improving word prediction by implementing a bigram model. This would enable the application to predict words that are relevant to the sentence the user is typing. For example, let's say the user is typing 'I want a drink please'. The word 'I' would be followed by 'want' in word prediction. Over time, the application will learn the users word patterns.
The project will also include iterative cycles of user-interface design and testing.
