IBM Package Lets Hearing-Impaired People Communicate by Phone
 
Microbytes Daily News Service
Copyright (c) 1989, McGraw-Hill, Inc.
IBM yesterday unveiled a hardware/software product that lets
hearing-impaired people send voice messages from PCs and receive
written replies from the keypad of a touch-tone phone. The $600
PhoneCommunicator, available now, breaks down a substantial
barrier for deaf people by providing a way for them to
communicate over the phone.
 
Many deaf people now use TTY/TDD terminals (small acoustic
couplers with keyboards and screens) for conversation with one
another and with organizations that offer TTY/TDD access, but
most hearing individuals don't have such terminals. One common
way to reach hearing people is through "relay" services, offered
by AT&T and other companies, in which an operator reads typed
messages from a deaf caller aloud to the hearing person and then
types back the spoken replies. Relay service is only available in
certain regions at certain times of the day, and it has drawbacks
including cost and lack of privacy.
 
PhoneCommunicator runs on a PC or PS/2 (Models 25 and 30) under
DOS and consists of a multifunction board and software. The board
includes a modem for communication to ASCII electronic bulletin
boards or TTY/TDD devices, a voice synthesizer for speech output,
and an "auto answer" function that records and time-stamps
incoming text messages when nobody is present to receive them.
 
The software provides a simple character-based interface for
sending/receiving messages. To talk, the deaf user types words on
the keyboard and the voice synthesizer speaks them over the
phone. To respond, the hearing user enters letters on the
telephone keypad, separating words with stars. Each sequence of
tones, translated into digits, is then looked up in an 8500-word
dictionary on the caller's PC and then sent to the screen as a
word. In the case where a set of tones equals more than 1 word,
all the choices are listed and the reader picks the correct
meaning from context.
 
Outgoing calls can be initiated manually or by using a built-in
auto-dialer with a phone list. The user will typically begin the
call with a preprogrammed message that identifies him or her as
deaf and gives instructions on how to respond using the phone
keypad. When a call is incoming, the screen flashes to alert the
deaf user, and the synthesizer greets the caller with a
programmed message. All conversations can be saved to disk or
printed out.
 
PhoneCommunicator is not a perfect solution. It helps only deaf
people who have computers, and only when they're in front of
their machines. Using a phone keypad to enter words is tedious,
making some conversations impractical. Yet PhoneCommunicator
opens doors for some hearing-impaired people, enabling them to
make the kind of routine phone calls other people make all the
time.
 
Contact: IBM National Support Center for Persons with
Disabilities, PO Box 2150, Atlanta, GA 30055; (800) 426-3388
(voice) or (800) 426-2133 (TDD).
 
                              --- Andy Reinhardt
 
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