Eye-controlled computer operation
EYE-CONTROLLED INTERACTION (EYCIN) is a computer system that will be used to facilitate the assembly or maintenance of industrial equipment by technicians: a worker can click his way through the maintenance menu with eye movements while holding the respective parts in his hands.
The system could also make it easier for paraplegics to work with a computer.
Tracks eye movement
It tracks the human user's eye movement and transmits it to the mouse pointer on the monitor.
EYCIN has been developed by researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering IAO in Stuttgart in cooperation with industrial partners.
A camera observes the movement of the pupils from a distance of up to one metre; a software program calculates and transfers the coordinates of the area viewed. It all happens so quickly that the mouse pointer moves smoothly.
Calculating the motion is comparatively easy, but clicking presents a real challenge. The mouse has to be guided accurately to the required `button,' which then has to be activated by means of eye movements, according to a Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, Munchen, press release.
Since the mouse cannot be controlled as accurately with the eyes as it can with the hand, one of the most important tasks of the research team led by IAO project managers Wolfgang Beinhauer and Fabian Hermann was therefore to develop a functional user interface.
Its elements must not be too small. Clicking a button, too, is more difficult with the eyes.
To solve this problem, the researchers have developed sensitive areas that can be activated by fixing the eyes on them for a certain length of time. The button changes colour twice before it goes `click' — important feedback for users, who can thus tell whether or not the computer has understood their commands.
Filter function
If the pupil movements were transmitted to the monitor without first being filtered, the pointer would dash around all over the monitor.
This is because of the miniature jerk-like movements, or microsaccades, that the eye constantly makes.
The software must first suppress these microsaccades by means of a filter function, then determine the main direction of movement. Another challenge is that of finding the best way of subdividing the monitor.
— OUR BUREAU
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