Advanced Modeling and Optimization

Abstract for Paper 3 of Volume 5, Number 1, 2003, pp. 39-50

An alternative method of distance measurement walked by the blind

Mounir Bousbia-Salah, Mouldi Bedda
Universite Badji Mokhtar, Annaba,
Faculte des sciences de l'ingenieur,
Departement d'electronique,
BP 12, Annaba 23000,
Algeria.

 


Abstract
The blind person cannot often take advantage of skilled learned, such as taking care of day to day needs without the capacity to successfully travel. Therefore, there is a need for navigation aids to help the blind to be independant from the help of a normal sighted person, and to be able to walk journeys which have not previously been rehearsed.
As part of this, there is a particular need for a device to enable the distance travelled by a blind walker to be determined continiously as the journey progresses.
In this paper, the proposed method of measuring distance is to use the acceleration of a moving body which in this case is the blind person. The technique well known in air-craft navigation systems of using an accelerometer and double integrating its output gives a measurement of distance travelled. This method suffers from drift of the integrators and offset of the accelerometer. An innovation in the present paper is a suggested way to overcome this problem by the use of a footswitch when the blind walks.

Keywords: Navigation, Accelerometer, Footswitch, Blind.