/2018-stack-calculator

OtherNOASSERTION

Stack Calculator

The idea of this project is to create a flexible workflow that allows a student with limited vision and limited motor coordination to succeed in school.

To make the problem tractable, we focused on one math problem for this sprint.

This idea is to provide programming-like tools to the student, who can use them to create lists of numbers to use as a scratchpad.

This is intended to be a voice interface, but may include physical buttons as needed. Our feeling is that physical buttons will be most useful for:

  1. Initiating a voice command
  2. Rejecting a voice recognition result
  3. Confirming a recognition result.

Commands used in the dialog below are:

  1. Start (name): Start a new named list, and make it the output list
  2. Insert: Add an item to the current output list
  3. YES: Confirm a voice recognition result
  4. NO: Reject a voice recognition result
  5. Read (name): Read the named list, or the current input list if no name specified
  6. Iterate (name): Read the named list, or the current input list if no name specified. After each item, listen for an item to be added to the current output list.
  7. Done: Complete the current step, and make the output list(s) input

Other commands that are like needed include:

  1. Repeat: Repeat last utterance
  2. Start (name): Go to the start of the input list and read the first item (this collides with start above - need to rename one of them)
  3. Next: Go to the next item of the current input list

We also need some affordance to look at the overall problem - to see the starting list and the intermediate lists, both for a teacher to "check the work" and for the student to review if they get distracted and lose track of where they are.

Example dialog

The dialog below is an example of adding three two-digit numbers. The user's input is right-aligned, and the system's responses are left-aligned.

Input list called ‘start’

52, 49, 32

Start tens

Inserting to new list ‘tens’

Iterate

52

50

Inserted 50

YES

49

40

Inserted 60

NO

Trying again. 49

40

Inserted 40

YES

32

30

Inserted 30

YES

BING - End of list

Start ones

Inserting to new list ones

Iterate

52

2

Inserted 2

YES

49

9

Inserted 9

YES

32

2

Inserted 2

YES

BING

Done

Two lists of numbers

Input list ‘tens’ with 50, 40, 30

Input list ‘ones’ with 2, 9, 2

Read tens

List with tens is: 50, 40, 30

Insert 120

Inserted 120

Read ones

List with ones is: 2, 9, 2

Insert 13

Inserted 13

Done

List of numbers 120, 13

Insert 133

Inserted 133

Done

List of numbers 133

Done