Chart plotting application for blind sailors
The goal of this project is best understood by reading the account from a visually impaired sailor below. It’s probably only of interest to a student who has some knowledge of Nautical Chart Plotting. This project would involve a study of Inclusive Design, meetings with a user group and development and field testing of the app itself. Support would be provided on the inclusive design side of things by the NCBI. This is primarily a development project, the main goal being to produce a deployable iPhone app that satisfies the users’ needs.
A blind sailor wrote the following: "Last week I went to the UK to sail in blind week, an annual event. There were forty vision impaired sailors on twenty boats. We can helm boats because there is an audible compass. It bleeps a high pitch sound if you deviate to port and a low pitched sound for starboard. It is easy to use and you get used to it after a while. What we cannot do is plot courses. Paper charts are no good as we cannot read them. The other navigation system is chart plotters, a small screen and no sound. Because we cannot use charts we cannot navigate at sea thus taking away a large part of the fun of sailing. As a sighted person I loved chart plotting and feel I am not a complete sailor unless I can plot a course. This was echoed by those I talked to. Blind Sailing is an international organisation crying out for someone to devise an audible chart plotting system, which obviously has to be on the nose accurate or we could all be literally lost at sea. This is not a small group of people but a large number who continue to sail and want to learn to sail. I hope this is of interest to students".
Co-supervised by Mel Ó Cinnéide and Guenole Silvestre.