Accessibility Challenges of the Next Decade: Cloud and Mobile Computing and Beyond

Y4iT XI, 17-19 September 2013
Accessibility Challenges of
the Next Decade:
Cloud and Mobile
Computing and Beyond
Bebo White
SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory/
Stanford University
bebo@slac.stanford.edu
Sunday, September 22, 13

Agenda - Remember
the grass is greener on the other side...
to be inspired!
to listen to stories and more stories...
to be informed!
that the devil is in the details...
to constantly be challenged!
(courtesy of Irwin King)

Let’s revisit some
deﬁnitions

New deﬁnition of Cloud
• “Traditionally” thought of as a “service
environment” - SaaS, PaaS, IaaS - providing
storage, software, computing resources, etc.
• Now includes
• social networks
• big data
• a platform for the “Internet of Things” -
“Sensor as a Service” (SenaaS)

From the Web to the
Cloud

What is “The Internet/
Web of Things?”
• The networked interconnection of everyday
things that can be uniquely identiﬁed and accessed
• An interactive universe of objects, things, data,
ideas/concepts and processes both real & virtual
• A communications revolution
• Actual communicating not just copying
• All objects can be integrated & communicate - an
environment of co-dependency

The Cloud/IOT/WOT is
a very “noisy” place
• An unbelievable of objects (theoretically
more than 10e38) will be able to talk to us
and to each other (orders of magnitude
more than now)
• We will be interested in hearing what some
of them have to say
• How can we manage these conversations?
• Traditional interfaces break down

New deﬁnition of
Accessibility
• For “challenged” users, the ability to
• perceive, understand, navigate, interact, contribute
• For general users, mechanisms to support
• different user needs, preferences, situations
• For all users, providing “unprecedented access to
information and interaction”
• Means more that just access to Web pages
• Users are not just humans

How accessible is the IOT in the cloud?

New deﬁnition of Mobile
• We are in a BYOD (“BringYour Own Device” society)
• More than just a mobile phone or tablet, but a fully-
functional computer
• Is a “ﬁrst class citizen” within a wireless network
infrastructure
• Our mobile devices are (in many instances) the closest
technical manifestations of us
• Can act as a magic wand or a sensory extension or an
agent in aiding accessibility

“By 2040 the Web will exceed humanity
in processing power”
--- Kevin Kelly
How will this power be accessed?
How will all this processing power be used?

IOT/WOT Accessibility
• Number of components in the IOT will make
navigation un-doable
• Relationships between components could provide a
navigational model
• Components are capable of participation in social
groups and exhibiting crowd/group intelligence
• Component negotiation could result in manageable
individual accessibility
• How might this work?

Negotiable Interfaces
• Ordinary interfaces plus behavioral/contextual/temporal
information
• Objects negotiate according to speciﬁc criteria and reach
an agreeable outcome
• Similar to format negotiation or client details (e.g., browser,
mobile, etc.) in the “old” Web - but these negotiations are
one-to-one (e.g., client-server)
• A reasonable negotiable outcome could be interface details
• What interface components are negotiable? (not simply
“look and feel”)

Interactions
• People2People, Objects2Objects, People2Objects,
Objects2People
• Without intermediaries or with intermediaries in
the background
• MHC (Model-Human Computer) interaction has
limited range; in WOT range is universal
• Things/objects become transmitters and receivers
that can initiate and respond to stimuli

Intent
• Objects/things are named entities
• Objects/things have attributes
• Intents are satisﬁed by presenting objects/
things and their attributes

Natural Objects
• Transmit & receive - atoms/molecules,
animals/plants, stars/galaxies
• All with deliberate intent according to
natural laws
• If you believe in QM,“spooky action at a
distance”

Why Shouldn’t Man-
made Objects?
• Intent deﬁned by programming and
personalization
• Can turn on & off - not always subject to
natural law
• Sensitive to security & privacy
• The technology exists

• Premises
• Nature is data processing engine (and the
best)
• The best engineering emulates nature
• Forget the human brain - the Internet/
brain comparison is lame
How to Do This?

Consider Field/Gauge
Theory
• Objects/things exchange
‘hard data’ & ‘soft data’
• How is the data
received?
• Objects/things obey
interaction rules

How Does That Differ
From This?
• B, C, & D in coverage
range of A - when A
sends a message who
gets it?
• A, B in range of C -
when C sends a message
who gets it?

Self-Organizing Mesh
Networks
• Societies of cognitively cooperating devices “growing
from the edges”
• Artiﬁcial life,“swarm intelligence”
• Mutual security, group-aligned self interest
• Network as memory
• Emergent sync - they will decide how we interact
with them most efﬁciently - new interfaces -
correlation discovery - this is where the negotiable
interfaces happen

Making this happen - social
computing & social machines(1)
• Rather than planning for certain properties
(e.g., interfaces) and functions at design
time, create a platform that achieves them
at run time
• Social computation = social behavior +
algorithmic computation

Making this happen - social
computing & social machines(2)
• Social machines are integrated systems of
people and computers
• Unprecedented involvement about user
behavior, intent, goals, motivations, etc. into
the software system’s structure
• Interaction between a user and the system
is mediated by the aggregation of explicit
and implicit data from other users/objects

Scenario (1)
• User enters a supermarket with smartphone (which acts
as their agent into the IOT)
• Location, time, etc. suggests the need for a shopping list
• Context-aware mobile applications connect to home
appliances, family members, family budget information, etc.
• Negotiated interface yields display of items that are
required, desired, affordable, available in the supermarket
and identiﬁes their speciﬁc location
• Question: Does the computing occur on the smartphone or in
the cloud? Does it matter?

Scenario (2)
• “Learning at the ‘speed of need’”
• Location and context determines that user is
in a workshop
• Skills are recognized via user personalization
• State of objects in workshop are recognizable
• Negotiated interface uses augmented reality
to guide required task

Summary
• Widespread implementation of Cloud and Mobile technology in
the Internet/Web ofThings forces a new deﬁnition of accessibility
• All networked objects have accessibility requirements
• Accessible interfaces will be deﬁned during run time rather than
during the design phase
• A whole new generation of user interfaces needs to be
explored driven by object features and behaviors
• Accessible interfaces between objects can be negotiated using
social computing
• There are greater Accessibility challenges than ever before!

About ACM
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dialogue, share resources and address the ﬁeld’s challenges.
ACM strengthens the computing profession’s collective voice through strong
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ACM supports the professional growth of its members by providing opportunities for
life-long learning, career development, and professional networking.
With over 100,000 members from over 100 countries, ACM works to advance
computing as a science and a profession. www.acm.org

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Maraming salamat !
Questions? Comments?
bebo@slac.stanford.edu

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