GPS Technology Helps Blind Find Way
From: Wall Street Journal - 03/17/2004- P. B4D
By: Marcelo Prince

A number of portable devices on the market or under development are designed
to help blind or visually impaired users get around, often by employing
location data pinpointed by global-positioning-system (GPS) technology. Pulse
Data International's BrailleNote is a textbook-size device equipped with a
Braille keyboard and display; its uses, beyond sending email and Web
browsing, include providing walking directions by voice output or the Braille
display when linked to a GPS receiver. BrailleNote also integrates GPS with
digital street maps and points of interest to tell blind users their location
and surroundings. The Trekker navigation tool from VisuAide includes a GPS
and voice receiver, and can store street maps and points of interest in a
database; a forthcoming Trekker upgrade can emit vocal directions and create
walking routes. Both gadgets suffer from one of GPS' biggest limitations:
They cannot work indoors because GPS satellite signals are blocked by
buildings. Vectronix is working with VisuAide and Sendero to address this
problem by developing a machine that mates a GPS receiver to motion sensors;
once users move indoors, the sensors activate to pinpoint their location and
relay directions via a BrailleNote or handheld computer with mapping software
and databases. Testing demonstrates that the gadget, which was adapted from
technology originally developed for military applications, boasts an error
rate of roughly 5 percent of the distance traveled, according to Vectronix's
Quentin Ladretto. Techniques and devices for blind-pedestrian navigation are
being explored and evaluated as part of a project underwritten by the
National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research: One initiative
spearheaded by University of Minnesota researchers involves organizing a
database of floor plans and building interiors that can be downloaded off the
Web or transmitted wirelessly to a handheld gadget.

http://www.pulsedata.com/Products/Notetakers/BrailleNoteGPS.asp
http://www.visuaide.com/news_trekker2_0.html