Accessibility & Controller Settings
Probably this will be extended in the future, but SearXR now has:
- a controller-section (see controller-button)
- it will open an accessibility screen with various toggles
For example, offline text-to-speech or offline facetracker (using webcam) can be enabled
Text to Speech
SearXR uses an offline text-to-speech engine ♥
That means it's privacy-friendly, and no audio is sent to any server.
After having tried many offline engines, the eSpeak turned out
to be the most convenient.
It's a nice, somewhat-robotic voice, which can be used for multiple (accessibility) future use-cases.
Speech input
Unfortunately after lots of experiments & research, the WebSpeechApi implementation is on hold.
Reasons:
- browsersupport of W3C WebSpeechAPI has stagnated
- the error-rate of 100% javascript speech-recognition-libraries is too high
The above has been described in greater detail in my report
Facetracking, Eyetracking, Handtracking
Below is a small demo of facial navigation using libraries like Webgazer.js and handsfree.js.
It is not meant as a turn-key solution, but as a starting point for specific accessibility needs:
The webcam detects and tracks face-movement/rotations, which get reflected inside SearXR
This allows for interesting accessibility- or exhibition (project on wall) usecases.