The Multimodal Interaction Activity seeks to extend the Web to allow users to dynamically select the most appropriate mode of interaction for their current needs including any disabilities in order to enable Web application developers to provide an effective user interface for whichever modes the user selects. With multimodal Web applications, users can provide input via speech, handwriting and keystrokes, with output presented via displays, pre-recorded and synthetic speech, audio, and tactile mechanisms such as mobile phone vibrators and Braille strips.
The goal of the Multimodal Interaction Activity is to clearly define how to author concrete multimodal Web applications, for example, coupling a local XHTML user agent with a remote VoiceXML user agent. The Multimodal Interaction Working Group is important as a central point of coordination within W3C for multimodal activities, and the group collaborates with other related Working Groups, e.g. Voice Browser, Compound Document Formats and Ubiquitous Web Applications.
The Working Group has finalized all the comments to the second Last Call Working Draft of Extensible MultiModal Annotation markup language (EMMA), and expects the Candidate Recommendation by the end of October 2007.
The group is working on the syntax for the Life Cycle Events of the Multimodal Architecture and Interfaces (MMI Architecture) and the fourth Working Draft is expected in December 2007. MMI Authoring, which suggests standard techniques for developing multimodal user interfaces on various devices using the MMI Architecture, is planned to be published probably by the end of this year. InkML is also making steady progress and the next publication as Candidate Recommendation is expected in the second quarter of 2008.
A Workshop on W3C's Multimodal Architecture and Interfaces will be held at Keio University in Fujisawa, Japan on 16-17 November 2007. This is right after the International Conference on Multimodal Interfaces (ICMI) in Japan. The group is hoping to get feedback on the MMI Architecture and recruit new participants especially to work on InkML.
Three group participants, Jerry Carter from Nuance, Rafah Hosn from IBM and Kazuyuki Ashimura from W3C, attended the W3C Track at the WWW2007 Conference in Banff, Canada in May 2007, and gave talks on "Multimodal Web to Expand Universal Access".
The group held a face to face meeting in Roncade (Treviso), Italy, on 18-20 June 2007, hosted by H-care. During the meeting the group reviewed the current version of the MMI Architecture and planned for the next version. The next Working Draft will include a definition of the format schema for Life Cycle Events and more details on protocols. The meeting was collocated with the Voice Browser Working Group face to face meeting, and there was a joint meeting on 20 June where we heard presentations from several outside speakers.
The group expects to transition EMMA to Candidate Recommendation at the end of October, while the Candidate Recommendation of InkML is planned in the second quarter of 2008. MMI Architecture is expected to be the fourth Working Draft in December 2007, and MMI Authoring should be also published in December probably as a Note.
The next face to face meeting will be held 5-9 November in Cambridge, MA, USA, hosted by W3C and collocated with W3C Technical Plenary / Advisory Committee Meetings and the Voice Browser Working Group face to face meeting,
| Group | Chair | Team Contact | Charter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Multimodal Interaction Working Group (participants) | Deborah Dahl | Kazuyuki Ashimura | Chartered until 31 January 2009 |
This Activity Statement was prepared for the November 2007 W3C Advisory Committee Meeting (Members only) per section 5 of the W3C Process Document. Generated from group data.
Kazuyuki Ashimura, Multimodal Interaction Activity Lead
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