SYMBERED - a Symbol-Concept Editing Tool

Abstract

The aim of the Nordic SYMBERED project - funded by NUH (the Nordic Development Centre for Rehabilitation Technology) - is to develop a user friendly editing tool that makes use of concept coding to produce web pages with flexible graphical symbol support targeted towards people with Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) needs. Documents produced with the editing tool will be in XML/XHTML format, well suited for publishing on the Internet. These documents will then contain natural language text, such as Swedish or English. Some, or all, of the words in the text will be marked with a concept code defining its meaning. The coded words/concepts may then easily be represented by alternative kinds of graphical symbols and by additional text representations in alternative languages. Thus, within one web document created by the author with the SYMBERED tool, one symbol language can easily be swapped for another. This means that a Bliss and a PCS symbol user can each have his/her preferred kind of symbol support. The SYMBERED editing tool will initially support a limited vocabulary in four to five Nordic languages plus English, and three to four symbol systems, with built-in extensibility to cover more languages and symbol systems.

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