Design and Analysis of Haptic-Audio Based System for the Visually Impaired to Shop Online

Abstract

Many visually impaired customers are keen to shop online, however, they often encounter accessibility barriers such as accessing and interpreting complex designed websites and when trying to make online payment which required them to input card details by filling up payment form. In order to study whether the visually impaired could shop online without assistance, an online store which has features such as product catalogue, shopping cart and payment system was developed. The system utilizes the Falcon haptic device and voice recognition for navigation, interaction, accessing and haptic evaluation of products. Some of our qualitative analysis suggests that a framed three-section design product catalogue with directed dialogue, directional cues, audio information along with a haptic-audio enabled browser is feasible for the visually impaired to browse, select and haptically evaluate products; a XHTML and VoiceXML based shopping cart system can enable the visually impaired to interact and verify its contents; and a voice password based payment system can be used to automate forms data entry process and to help the visually impaired to make online payment independently.