GaCIT 2009 : Summer School on Gaze, Communication, and Interaction Technology

"The GaCIT summer school offers an intensive one-week camp where doctoral students and researchers can learn and refresh skills and knowledge related to gaze-based text entry under the tutelage of leading experts in the area. The program will include theoretical lectures and hands-on exercises, an opportunity for participants to present their own work, and a social program enabling participants to exchange their experiences in a relaxing and inspiring atmosphere."

The GaCIT workshop is organized by the graduate school on User-Centered Information Technology at the University of Tampere, Finland (map). The workshop runs between July 27-31. I attended last year and found it to be great week with interesting talks and social events. See the day-by-day coverage of the GaCIT 2008.

Topics and speakers:

• Introduction to Gaze-based Communication (Howell Istance)
  

• Evaluation of Text Entry Techniques (Scott MacKenzie)
  Survey of text entry methods. Models, metrics, and procedures for evaluating text entry methods.

• Details of Keyboards and Users Matter (Päivi Majaranta)
  Issues specific to eye-tracker use of soft keyboards, special issues in evaluating text entry techniques with users that use eye trackers for communication.

• Communication by Eyes without Computers (TBA)
  Introduction to eye-based communication using low-tech devices.

• Gesture-based Text Entr Techniques (Poika Isokoski)
  Overview of studies evaluating techniques such as Dasher, QuikWrite and EdgeWrite in the eye-tracker context

• Low-cost Devices and the Future of Gaze-based Text Entry (John Paulin Hansen)
  Low-cost eye tracking and its implications for text entry systems. Future of gaze-based text entry.

• Dwell-free text entry techniques (Anke Huckauf)
  Introduction to gaze-based techniques that do not utilize the dwell-time protocol for item selection.

Visit the GaCIT 2009 website for more information.