[gps-talkusers] one person's take on Wayfinder Access

Wayfinder Access Preliminary Evaluation
From: Mike May
 
As I constantly preach, in order to maximize the strengths of a product, you 
must understand its weaknesses. This applies to all adaptive technology. 
 
I applaud Wayfinder for producing their first accessible GPS for the blind. I 
have been talking and meeting with them over the past 3 years since GPS on a 
cell phone seemed the ultimate wave of the future. Having introduced the first 
accessible GPS for a laptop in 2000 and then for the BrailleNote in 2001, I am 
intimately familiar with the evolution of accessible GPS. You most certainly 
have to have a version 1 before you have a version 2 and the first Sendero 
version wasn't nearly as powerful as this first version of Wayfinder Access. 
 
Seven versions and seven years since we introduced the first Sendero GPS 
product, we have the benefit of time and feedback from thousands of users with 
the upcoming  Sendero GPS version 4. With all due respect, I would like to 
present my initial impressions of Wayfinder Access as I try to understand its 
weaknesses in an effort to maximize the strengths of this very powerful and 
portable technology. I stress that these are initial impressions and that some 
issues with the use of Wayfinder may be screen reader dependent. I am sure some 
features will improve over time. Other fundamental aspects of the Wayfinder 
approach are simply the trade offs of having a small portable system.
 
The number 1 benefit of Wayfinder is that it runs on a mobile phone, meaning 
you don't have to have any other devices in order to get location information. 
Having the maps on a server rather than locally on the device is both good news 
and bad news. Maps on POIs on a server can be easily updated. The turn-by-turn 
instructions on Wayfinder are excellent like telling the driver when to get 
into the left lane or when to exit the highway. The graphics are quite good as 
well. The routing and re-routing are very fast. I have encouraged sighted folks 
to purchase Wayfinder since I began testing it 3 years ago.
 
There are a couple of fundamental issues to consider when designing wayfinding 
access for a blind person. One hand of the user is always occupied with a cane 
or a dog so the blind user has just one hand while moving to implement 
commands. On the output side, the user has to be able to hear the information 
without headphones, which would obstruct environmental cues. Braille output is 
an expensive but very useful option for obtaining location information.
 
The best way to deal with these interface issues is to have information 
announce automatically or at the least to be able to issue simple one-handed 
keystroke commands. In the Sendero GPS system, one can prepare a walking or 
riding trip so it is completely automatic. As you approach an intersection, the 
name is announced whether you have a rout open or not. The name of the street 
you are on can be announced. As you pass nearby points of interest, they are 
announced. You can use a turn-by-turn route to reach your destination or you 
can use the getting warmer method to get there as the crow flies. All of this 
and a lot more can be accomplished without touching a keypad or keyboard.
 
Wayfinder Access Observations 
    * On Wayfinder Access, almost all functions are manual. If you want to hear 
the nearby cross street, you have to arrow right several times to pull down the 
list of cross streets. Another pull down gives the nearby points of interest. 
Neither POIs nor cross streets announce automatically. The cross streets are 
given in order of proximity and not necessarily along the street upon which you 
are traveling. The nearest cross street may be behind you. The cross street 
view is useful if you are stationary at an intersection but not so much when 
you are moving in a vehicle. 
 
2. If you are in the POI vicinity view, the POIs are not refreshed until you 
arrow out and then back again. POIs seem to be very scarce when traveling at 
vehicle speeds. The POI content is descent but not nearly as rich as the 
Sendero POI data in the U.S. If you are in any of these Vicinity views, the 
Guide instructions are not spoken although the human voice telling you when to 
turn will announce if it is not muted.
Note: Some of the lists studded. You hear three quarters of the message and 
then it starts over again and repeats the entire message. This may be the 
screen reader or particular phone I am using. These are the quirks of the 
combined new technologies. 
 
3. Once you calculate a route, you can use the Guide view to hear about your 
next turn. You can use the Itinerary view to arrow through subsequent turns, 
one at a time. There is too much information given this view. You hear two 
distance numbers, the cross street and the street you are on and the heading in 
degrees to that turn. This is way too much information for the average user to 
process, especially through a small speaker and in a noisy outdoor street 
environment. It is easier to handle with headphones on and sitting in a vehicle.
 
4. Currently, all information is presented using absolute headings in degrees. 
Jones street is at 172 degrees. This is an absolute heading and not a heading 
relative to your direction of travel. For this to make sense, you have to also 
know what your direction of travel heading is and then understand how to 
compare the positions. If you are heading 139 degrees and your intersection is 
at 172 degrees, that means it is slightly south and to the right of you. 
Combine this degree number with the two distance numbers being given in the 
same string and the information is extremely confusing for most listeners. This 
is in contrast to the Sendero system which gives absolute or relative headings 
to all information with the clock face, left/right or compass orientation and 
each piece of information can be heard individually.
 
5. When you first register the Wayfinder software, the registration and license 
screens are confusing to navigate with a screen reader. 
 
6. If your receiver is not found, it may still show as connected in the options 
menu. You must disconnect and then connect it again to establish a connection.
 
7. The bad news about the data residing on a server is that you have to pay $25 
to $40 per month for a data connection in the U.S. above and beyond your 
monthly voice minutes fee. The cost is around 7 pounds per month in the UK. If 
the connection is lost as often happens with mobile phones, you lose your GPS 
data flow. This can be rather critical if you have a route loaded and you are 
depending on that route to guide you to the next turn or destination. It may be 
an option to download maps from a PC and put them on the phone in that fashion 
but this seems to defeat the point of a server based system.
 
8. It is common for users to want to switch regularly between vehicle and 
pedestrian route following. In Wayfinder Access, you have to change to your 
desired mode by going into the Settings and choosing Passenger, Taxi or 
Pedestrian mode. Then you calculate your route. If you need to change the type 
of route you wish, you have to go back into Settings. Currently the human voice 
is muted when switching to Pedestrian mode. 
 
9. Searching for a nearby business or address is pretty straight forward but it 
does take a lot of keystrokes. If you are good at text messenging on a cell 
phone, this isn't too bad but it isn't something easily done while standing on 
a street corner. You really need to have headphones on and that isn't advisable 
when walking.
 
10. I like having a vicinity view for Favorites the equivalent of User POIs on 
the Sendero system. However, if you wish to add a point, this takes several 
keystrokes. Arrow to the main menu, arrow down and press the Options key. Arrow 
down to Manage and select it. Arrow down to Add New and Select it. Tap in the 
letters for the name of the POI and press the Options key to confirm the 
selection. It is certainly not easy to add User points in this way. You can 
more easily add favorites from the MyWayfinder web site and then synchronize 
those favorites with your phone although this takes some preplanning and cannot 
obviously be at specific points, only at addresses, which are approximate 
positions.
 
11. I am having stability problems on the Nokia N95 running Wayfinder Access. I 
am mostly using a Bluetooth headset as this is the only way I can hear all the 
instructions. I have at least one lock-up on every outing and I have to remove 
the battery at least once a day. This is not necessarily Wayfinder but probably 
something to do with the combination of the phone, Wayfinder, the headset and 
Talks. The battery drains a lot when using both the GPS receiver and Bluetooth 
headset. 
Note: If Talks is speaking the Wayfinder information, or any information for 
that matter, your phone cannot ring. You may miss a phone call.
 
12. Besides no automatic announcement of information other than turns, there 
are no virtual or explore capabilities with Wayfinder Access. The Explore mode 
is a major tool used by Sendero GPS users for preplanning a trip and exploring 
areas outside your GPS position.
 
13. A user should consider the following when evaluating the cost of Wayfinder 
Access. You have the cost of the phone and it must be a Symbian phone. In the 
U.S., this means AT&T or T-Mobile are the carriers that use Symbian phones. 
Sprint and Verizon do not. In addition to the phone, one has the following 
costs:
a. A screen reader, either Talks or Mobile Speak for around $300
b. Wayfinder Access for $300 to $400.
c. A GPS receiver for around $100.
 D. Optionally a Bluetooth headset for $100.
e. $300 to $460 per year for a Data plan.
 
When it is all said and done, the cost after a couple years is around $1600. 
One need consider what else they would use the data service for like Internet 
and Email. For GPS alone, $460 per year is prohibitive. If you use the Internet 
regularly while on the road, it may be worth it as it is for me.
 
In summary, I like having Wayfinder Access on my phone as an adjunct to my 
Sendero GPS for the BrailleNote. The visual map view may occasionally be 
helpful to my driver and of course I love everything GPS. I expect the product 
will become better over time. Its greatest weakness is the lack of automatic 
announcements for cross streets and POIs. I believe this too can be improved 
over time. I haven't yet tried a Braille display with my phone but this might 
help a lot in understanding the street names and turning instructions that are 
pretty hard to follow with speech alone. The fact that the data connection can 
be lost is definitely a concern. I believe it will be some time before this is 
more reliable in the U.S.

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