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Using machines as a means to an end is intrinsically human, but a wired vision of near-total human-technological integration is becoming more real with each day. From smartphones to social networking to online gaming, we constantly interact with the digital world in ways that mutate and change themselves to suit each individual. And it’s this person-specific computing that is taking assistive tech to the next level, beyond simple “one size fits all” hardware to the kind of evolved reality science fiction has been promising for decades.

The Toronto Dominion Centre in Toronto’s financial district is a monolith of black steel and blacker glass. Near the top is one of TD Bank’s three assistive tech labs. Here, employees pre-test and certify new technology, train on the new hardware, and help educate developers about the specific needs of employees with disabilities. Brad Boyd, an IT specialist who’s been with the bank for 24 years, is showing off a work station designed for people with low vision.

“Here we have a keyboard with larger letters, and a larger monitor. And this is software that’ll zoom the image on the screen,” he says as he navigates the simple controls. The computer’s voice suddenly announces, “Zoom text enabled!” and all the words on the screen jump in size and focus. A kind of scanner, also included in the low-vision workstation, helps do the same thing for hard-copy documents. The sharp text that the device generates on its screen is a far cry from the distorted images provided by the standard magnifying glass.

There’s also software for people with no vision. As Boyd scrolls his mouse over lines of text, the computer reads each word aloud. “With every keystroke, it’ll give you context and allow you to input data,” Boyd explains as the computer continues to recite copy, sounding very pleased with itself. And it should be. It’s also equipped with a voice-activated program that allows users with dexterity-related disabilities to ask it to wake up, open the Start menu, and so on, all without ever having to touch a mouse or keyboard. The lighting at the workstation is adaptable too, and the desk adjusts to accommodate just about anyone who wants to sit at it.

Boyd is confident that the technology available to TD employees will continue to improve with more input from unique users. Through the contributions of labs like this one, the bank boasts more than 800 accommodations company-wide, with a 90 percent success rate. “Our door is open, and I can say from personal experience that there’s a lot of commitment to people with disabilities. Even after we implement an accommodation, there’s a lot of commitment to trying to make it work,” he says. TD’s comprehensive accessibility program depends largely on the active participation of the employees who use it, and an ongoing influx of new hires with disabilities. “Our HR recruitment groups and talent management would be very interested to hear from anybody with this passion to come in. That’s one of our mandates: to have the best and the brightest.”

While office hardware is obviously a big part of accessibility at work, there’s a lot of assistive tech that’s more applicable to everyday life outside the office. Much of it functions as part of what’s coming to be known as Web 3.0, or Cloud computing. In the Cloud, shared resources exist remotely and are accessible by anyone, from anywhere, eliminating the need for locally installed programs. The easiest and most familiar example of Cloud computing is web-based email: you don’t need an email program installed on your computer, laptop, or mobile, because your browser allows you to access your email online.

Ryerson University’s Digital Media Zone’s (DMZ) purpose couldn’t be more in form with its physical manifestation. It’s an open concept space with high ceilings, exposed ductwork, and a wall of windows overlooking the neon jumble of Yonge-Dundas square. Hossein Rahnama, a professor at Ryerson, is standing in front of a huge touch-screen monitor, demonstrating the inner workings of a revolutionary program designed and implemented by his team at the DMZ. It’s called the Transit Travel Assistant, and it launched this past spring in Paris to such great success that its expansion into other transit systems and public spaces seems inevitable.

Rahnama believes the future of all technology, and assistive tech in particular, is mobile, and will rely on the Ryerson-born concept of context awareness. Context aware technology tailors the Cloud to each user’s needs rather than requiring users to adapt to inert, inactive hardware; these kinds of programs also allow devices to interpret and adapt to their surroundings for their users. “It’s aware and self-adaptive,” Rahnama says of his transit guide program, which, depending on the user, can be voice-activated for touch-free computing – useful for those with dexterity disabilities as well as for people who can’t see the screen or keys on a smartphone. Details input by the user on his or her individual profile tell the technology how to work in particular, whether it’s guiding someone who needs to find a barrier-free route home or sending vocal instructions to a user who has no vision.

Back in the TD lab, Christine Senitza, a GL Officer at a branch services centre in Mississauga, is demonstrating her favorite piece of new assistive technology. It’s a web-cam set up so that she’s able to speak with coworkers via a remote video interpreter. Senitza has been deaf from birth and until now relied on a TTY phone to communicate when a situation prevented her from signing. “Because it’s visual, I can see the communication easily. This way, a deaf person doesn’t miss any information; we’re able to get access to all information through an interpreter,” she explains of the webcam set-up, through an interpreter who isn’t even in the same room.

“Interpreters can work remotely so that they’re not spending as much time traveling between appointments. For smaller meetings or one-on-one meetings, it’s easier for us to be able to book an interpreter and have that exchange,” Senitza goes on. “Everyone’s able to get more done, because there are a number of deaf people who work at TD.” Making this technology wireless would mean deaf or hard-of-hearing employees at TD would be able to take a virtual interpreter with them anywhere there’s a WiFi connection. And it also means that customers with hearing disabilities would have near-instant access to interpreting services at their local branch of the bank, without having to arrange their visit ahead of time – an adaptation with exciting possibilities.

Jason Nolan, PhD, is the director of the Experiential Design and Gaming Environments (EDGE) Labat Ryerson University. The DMZ and all its smooth planes of Apple white lie just beyond a room divider, but here at Nolan’s workstation, almost everything is Hallowe’en orange. His monitor is lit up with a swirling Second Life avatar and his workbench is covered in bits of brightly painted cardboard. Many of the adaptive design projects that he and his students work on are intentionally low-tech. They’re developing solutions for people with disabilities that have been carefully engineered to be possible to build without specialized tools, equipment, or materials. One example: multiple layers of cardboard cut are out to a downloadable and adjustable pattern, glued together, and hand painted to make a special chair for a young girl with developmental disabilities. Using the chair, she can sit and play in the sandbox with her classmates. There are also adaptive designs for easels, book rests, and other kinds of furniture, conceived by Nolan and his team on a case-by-case basis and built together with their end users.

“My goal is to bring about a design practice where you can make it yourself, design it, build it, share, and make a living in a community-based career,” Nolan says. The Cloud is present here too, in spite of the homemade nature of most of the projects. EDGE Lab’s simple creations spread via their users on the Internet, and are meant to be open-source, adaptive, and shared amongst communities. And games like Second Life, in many cases, provide a virtual meeting place for those communities to traffic their ideas and techniques. “It’s not about rules or technique,” he says of his designs and their far-reaching potential. “Sharing ideas and solutions through existing social media is essential.”

The web provides us with a slew of new cat pictures, viral videos, and tedious blogs every day. But beyond the endless distraction, it’s also a great equalizer. It breaks down barriers of distance and ability, it’s adaptive to each individual’s needs and desires, and it thrives on new ideas. Until recently, these tendencies were trapped within the boundaries of cyberspace. But through open-source software, virtual communities, and near-ubiquitous access to online stores of information, everyone now has the ability to apply democratizing technology to their offline lives, augmenting reality at the speed of ideas. 

Photo: auimeesri/Thinkstock