1THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE I-MAIL PROTOTYPEFinal Project ReportInternet DreamsCSCI 7000, Fall 2000Leo Burd, Jan Kaiser and Thuha Nguyen21. IntroductionThe goal of this project is to develop an interface prototype for the I-Mail (InclusiveMail) tool, which is an e-mail client targeted at people with mental and/or physicaldisabilities.Currently, there are many communication devices developed to address the specific needsof the disabled. However, there seems to be a lack of Internet communication tools forthis population. Challenges involved in this kind of project include dealing with adomain we are not familiar with and do not know much about, specific technicalconstraints, and the novelty of the field itself.In order to deal with this problem, the design of the I-Mail interface requires not only theinvolvement of assistive technology professionals, but also the constant interaction withthe disabled in their real settings. Moreover, it requires the application of universalaccessibility guidelines and a continuous assessment of the right level of personalizationand scaffolding to be provided for each user in different situations.2. Related Work and ReferencesTo guide our project, the following references have been used:• Catalogs and web sites of special technology companies such as• Laureate Learning (http://www.laureatelearning.com/)• Slater Software (http://www.slatersoftware.com/)• Don Johnston (http://www.donjohnston.com/), and• Mayer-Johnson (http://www.mayer-johnson.com/)• Accessibility guidelines like the ones proposed by the• Trace Research and Development Center(http://trace.wisc.edu/docs/software_guidelines/software.htm),• The Center for Universal Design (http://www.design.ncsu.edu:8120/cud/), and• the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative (http://www.w3.org/WAI/), and• Articles about the design and use of PapoMania, a chat tool developed in Brazil forpeople with Down Syndrome (http://www.caleidoscopio.aleph.com.br/)• Technical descriptions of the most common disabilities and their necessities in termsof technology. In special, we focused on descriptions provided by the professionalsthat were involved in the project and on the "Telecommunications problems anddesign strategies for people with cognitive disabilities" report developed by the WorldInstitute on Disability (http://www.wid.org/) in 1999.• Access to other products being developed that are pretty similar to I-Mail. The bestexample is Inter_Comm, by Widgit Software LTD. (http://www.widgit.com/), an e-mail client for people with special needs. It is worth mentioning that Inter_Comm ispart of an European Community project entitled ALDICT (http://www.inclusion-europe.org/aldict/). In 2001, Inter_Comm is supposed to be released in US market.33. Our ApproachSince none of us have developed anything like I-Mail before, we decided to carry outsome research to identify what needed to be provided. The idea was to create somethingsimple enough to be used by people with disabilities and, yet, powerful enough tomotivate them and facilitate their communication via the Internet.To do that, we consulted the references, described in section 2 above, and decided onimportant characteristics that the interface could not lack. These characteristics aredescribed in great detail in section 4.1.After acquiring the initial ideas and defining the overall guidelines, we started to developthe prototype on paper. We went through a couple of revisions of the prototype, withchanges made initially based on the heuristics evaluation. We then visited theEisenhower Elementary School several times and used the hand-drawn version to gainfeedback from the teachers. Besides being experts in special education, they would be theones helping the students using the software later on. Details of these interviews aredescribed in section 4.2 and 4.3, respectively.Once the paper-based prototype became stable, we developed a static, digital versionusing Photoshop. Then we went back to the school two more times and interviewed theteachers again.The current version of the prototype reflects our best efforts in promoting ease of use aswell as scaffolding to the I-Mail users.4. Our ProcessAs the field of assistive technology is very broad and new to us, we decided to start bydeveloping something simple whose major challenges have already been addressed byexisting technologies. Later on, new features could be added based on perceived demand.For this reason, we decided to focus on physical disabilities, offering a variety ofaccessibility modes like direct manipulation (via mouse and/or touch screens), scanning(for single switches), audio feedback and special keyboards. On the cognitive side, wedecided to offer a PCS (Picture Communication Symbol) –like interface, which combinespictures with their associated textual captions.There are already several PCS libraries – some with more than 3000 symbols – availablein the market. It would be nice to build I-Mail on top of them.The process of developing the prototype for I-Mail included:• Familiarization with technologies for people with disabilities• Study and identification of design heuristics• Development of a paper-based, static, hand-drawn mockup• Heuristic evaluation of the mockup• Interview teachers with the hand-drawn version of the mockup• Mockup digitalization4• Cognitive walkthrough• Additional interviews• Mockup finalizationThe most relevant steps are further discussed in the following sections.4.1. Heuristic evaluationIn order to design an appropriate interface for the I-Mail project it is an essential task toconsider the currently existing heuristics. This includes both, general guidelines fordesigning interfaces as well as existing guidelines for the development of interfaces fordisabled children. The below mentioned heuristics have been applied to the I-Mailinterface prototype:• Keep it as simple as possible: focus on the most common tasks and options the useris likely to use. Add more stuff only if necessary. Always ask whether a givenfunctionality or button can be removed or substituted by something better. Personalsettings that do not change very often should be moved to the profile manager, asidekick application that will deal with all the technical details and configurations thatonly facilitators (caregivers, special-education teachers, relatives, etc.) are supposedto deal with. This is the case, for instance, of e-mail