Adding haptic feedback to web applications towards improving end-users' cognitive capabilities

Abstract

The use of haptic technologies has great advantages, as it can offer realistic and intuitive interaction with virtual objects, increase the usability and accessibility of applications, improve end-users' cognitive and perceptual capabilities and also make the human-computer interaction more entertaining. Currently, there are many haptic toolkits available. However, existing haptic toolkits are too complex and do not directly support adding haptic feedback in web applications. Moreover, some of the existing toolkits have been developed by companies that sell haptic devices supporting, thus, only their devices. This paper presents the P4A Haptic Toolkit developed in the context of the Prosperity4All FP7 project that enables adding haptic feedback to web applications by also supporting a variety of the most common existing haptic devices. Through this toolkit, a 3D scene containing virtual objects with haptic feedback can be easily integrated in a web application requiring almost no programming skills. Haptic feedback in web applications can significantly improve end-users' cognitive capabilities, especially in cases of visually impaired users.