Connexion

Many people with disabilities have difficulty speaking clearly enough to communicate well, particularly with regard to operating voice activated smart home hubs to control various devices in their house. It would be useful to be able to select phrase choices organized in banks according to the requirement (home automation, general living, caregiver interaction, etc.) that could then be spoken aloud. People may also not have the dexterity to navigate a touch screen therefore the 'movement' or scrolling within and between banks of phrases should be carried out by physical switches ranging from capacitor touch to button type with the number and type dependent on the user capability and requirement. Your task is to develop a system to articulate vocal words/phrases needed for general use in the home/outdoors and with caregivers which will be selected from a display. It should be compatible with various home automation systems (Alexa and Google) and may need pictures to accompany the words or phrases. It should also be easy for non-technical caregivers to modify the phrase options/banks and voice output. Finally, the complete system should be wheelchair-mountable, and capable of running off wheelchair power.

Since disabilities range in shapes and sizes the system should be as modular as possible so that different input systems and user interfaces can be added in the future (e.g. scanning menus or head-mouse).