Patent Application
20180293829
This application expressly incorporates by reference, in its entirety, U.S. Pat. No. 8,985,435.
The present disclosure relates to the voting systems for elections. More specifically, it provides a system and method for providing haptic feedback to a voter.
A variety of electronic and paper voting systems are well known. One feature of modern voting systems is voter accessibility. Various federal, state and local authorities require election polling sites and equipment to be accessible to all voters. As part of voter accessibility, voting systems should accessible to visually impaired voters. Various mechanisms are known to provide accessibility to visually impaired voters, including the provision of braille instructions and audio instructions to visually impaired voters. However, it is desirable to provide an improved voting experience for visually impaired voters, including providing a visually impaired voter a voting process that requires less intervention and assistance from polling station officials.
In one embodiment, the present disclosure describes providing haptic feedback to a visually impaired voter to give guidance to the voter. More particularly, the haptic feedback may include vibration. In one embodiment, the vibration may provide guidance by vibrating tactile written instructions, such as braille. The vibration may also provide guidance to the voter via the location of the vibration. In one embodiment, a particular tactile instruction may be selectively highlighted at the appropriate time and location at the voting device. In this manner, haptic cues are provided to a visually impaired voter. In one embodiment, the haptic feedback is provided by vibrating a relevant braille instruction at the relevant time during the voting process. Thus, vibrating guidance and cues are provided to a voter that is visually impaired. In this manner, touch sense guidance and cues are provided to a voter to emphasize what braille instructions are currently relevant to a voter and the location of such relevance.
In another embodiment, the present disclosure provides an election voting device. The election voting device may comprise a tactile plate located on, or as part of, a surface of the election voting device, the tactile plate being located in a manner to allow touching by a voter during use of the election voting device. The election voting device may further comprise a mechanical vibrator located proximate to the tactile plate so that the tactile plate may vibrate in response to vibrations of the mechanical vibrator. In one embodiment, the tactile plate may include tactile conveyed writing, such as for example, braille. In one embodiment, the mechanical vibrator is a vibrating motor controlled by the election voting device. In one embodiment, the tactile plate is detachable from the mechanical vibrator. In one embodiment, the tactile plate is detachable from the election voting device. In one embodiment, the tactile plate includes tactile conveyed written instructions related to use of the election voting device during a voting process. In one embodiment, the tactile plate is provided in a location such that the location of the tactile plate provides information to a voter. In one embodiment, the tactile plate is located proximate to a ballot insertion location of the election voting device. In one embodiment, the tactile plate has braille that provides instructions related to a status of the election voting device, the status related to ballot insertion.
In yet another embodiment, a method of providing information to a visually impaired voter during an election voting process is disclosed. The method may comprise providing an election voting device and providing guidance regarding the voting process to the visually impaired voter by vibrating a tactile plate. In one embodiment, the guidance regarding the voting process may include tactile written instructions on the tactile plate, such as for example, braille. In one embodiment, the guidance regarding the voting process may include guidance as to a relevant location on the election voting device. In one embodiment, the location on the voting device may be a ballot insertion location of the election voting device.
A more complete understanding of the present invention and advantages thereof may be acquired by referring to the following description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which like reference numbers indicate like features. It is to be noted, however, that the accompanying drawings illustrate only exemplary embodiments of the disclosed concept and are therefore not to be considered limiting of its scope, for the disclosed concept may admit to other equally effective embodiments.
The present disclosure provides an improved haptic feedback experience for a visually impaired voter. A typical voting process requires providing a voter a wide range of instructions at a polling station or booth. For example, at a polling station instructions may be provided to a voter to instruct the voter to submit an identification number or code, submit jurisdiction information, submit ballot information, select a particular race, select a particular voting choice, select another race, print a ballot, insert a ballot into ballot processing unit, etc. The instructions provided to a voter at a polling station are wide ranging and also vary widely from voting system to voting system and jurisdiction to jurisdiction. In addition, typically the voting process must be performed in a prescribed order. Typically a voter is guided through these actions via visually cues such as text, lights, color coding, etc.
The visually impaired voter may be assisted through the voting process via a tactile writing system such as braille. However, merely providing braille instructions fails to create the same experience as perceived by a visually enabled voter. For example, the sequential nature of displaying instructions only when relevant is lost. Further, the ability to highlight when and where an action is to occur on a voting device is less than satisfactory when visual cues are not accessible.
As described herein, additional haptic feedback is provided to a visually impaired voter to highlight a particularly tactile instruction. Thus, a particular tactile instruction may be selectively highlighted at the appropriate time and location at the voting device. In this manner, haptic guidance and cues are provided to a visually impaired voter. In one embodiment, the haptic feedback is provided by vibrating a relevant braille instruction at the relevant time during the voting process. Thus, vibrating guidance and cues are provided to a voter that is visually impaired. In this manner touch sense guidance and cues are provided to a voter to emphasize what braille instructions are currently relevant to a voter and the location of such relevance.
At various places on the voting device 100, tactile writing system instructions, such as braille characters, may be provided for use by the visually impaired voter. As shown in
Control wiring 315 may be provided to the mechanical vibrator 310. The control wiring 315 may provide signals to the mechanical vibrator 310 so as to activate the vibration. The signals may be provided from other computer, processing or control components of the voting device 100, such as for example, the processor 204. The signals on the control wiring provide the appropriate control of the mechanical vibrator 310 so that based upon the state of the voting process, vibration is provided to the proper tactile plate 300 of the voting device 100.
As described above, braille instructions may be provided at various locations on the voting device 100. Some or all of these instructions may be configured in a manner such as shown in
Though the tactile plate 300 is shown in
In this manner a vibrating tactile writing system, such as a vibrating braille system, may be used to provide haptic feedback to a visually impaired voter as to what particular tactile instruction is relevant at a particular time and/or where on a voting device the particular instruction is most relevant.
In order to provide an example usage of the techniques described herein, usage of the technique for a particular instruction will be described below. It will be recognized by those skilled in the art that this particular instruction is merely exemplary. Thus, the techniques provided herein may be utilized with other instructions and at other locations on a voting device, all as would be recognized by those skilled in the art.
As shown in
As discussed above, it will be recognized that the instructions and locations described above with regard to
Other features may also be optionally incorporated into the vibrating touch cue techniques disclosed herein. For example, in one embodiment, the vibrating plate may be combined with a touch sensor. In such a case, the touch sensor may indicate when a visually impaired voter is touching the tactile plate. In this embodiment, the vibration may be limited to only when a touch is detected. Thus, for battery powered systems, power may be conserved so that needless vibration is not provided when the plate is not being touched. In addition, the haptic techniques described herein may be utilized in combination with other accessibility features. For example, the vibrating cues may be utilized in conjunction with audio cues, thus providing a multimedia presentation to the visually impaired voter. In one example, the audio instructions may be synchronized with the vibrational cues. One such embodiment may include audio instructions to perform an operation at the location of the vibrating plate. For example, with regard to the example of
Though the embodiments shown herein are described with regard to an exemplary voting device, as used herein “voting device” is meant to encompass any device utilized in a voting process. Thus, the voting device may be a device in which a voter enters voter information, a voter provides voting choices, a voter casts ballots, a voter prints ballots, a voter submits ballots, etc. Further, a voting device may be any peripheral connected devices utilized at a voting location such as scanners, printers, accessibility interfaces, ballot receptacles, storage devices, etc. Further, a voting device may be a device utilized to control or operate a polling location such as computers, network controllers, storage devices, etc. In this manner, it will be recognized that a voting device may be any device or equipment in which a visually impaired person may interact with during the voting process, whether the person is a voter or an election official.
Though described herein with respect to voting devices and equipment, it will be recognized that the concepts described herein may be utilized with regard to other devices or equipment. Thus, the concepts described herein may be adapted to any of a wide range of devices or equipment in which a visually impaired person needs to interact with. Further, the concepts described herein may provide a particular benefit when the visually impaired person's interaction with the equipment requires instructions to be provided to the visually impaired person at particular times or in a particular order. Further, the concepts described herein may provide a particular benefit when the visually impaired person's interaction with the equipment requires an interaction at a particular location on the equipment. In this manner, it will be recognized that the techniques described herein are not limited to usages in voting devices but can be extended to a wide range of devices and equipment, all of which would be recognized to those skilled in providing accessibility to the visually impaired after having the benefit of review of the techniques described herein.
Further modifications and alternative embodiments of this invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art in view of this description. Accordingly, this description is to be construed as illustrative only and is for the purpose of teaching those skilled in the art the manner of carrying out the invention. It is to be understood that the forms and methods of the invention herein shown and described are to be taken as presently preferred embodiments. Equivalent techniques may be substituted for those illustrated and describe herein and certain features of the invention may be utilized independently of the use of other features, all as would be apparent to one skilled in the art after having the benefit of this description of the invention.
