Usability & Design of English to American Sign Language Translator¶
A web-based application that translates arbitrary English text into American Sign Language glyphs using the Gallaudet font, evaluated with the System Usability Scale (SUS).
Abstract¶
We present a font-rendering approach to translating English text into American Sign Language (ASL). The system uses the Gallaudet font to render ASL glyphs from arbitrary English input, providing a visually consistent translation without stitching together individual images. We describe the implementation, conduct a usability analysis, evaluate the application using the System Usability Scale (SUS), and report our findings.
Key Contributions¶
- Designed and implemented a Flask-based web application that translates arbitrary English text into ASL using the Gallaudet font, rendered server-side via Python's font-tools and font-preview libraries
- Demonstrated a font-rendering approach to sign language translation that generalizes to any pictographic writing system (Chinese, Arabic, Hebrew), avoiding the inconsistencies of stitching together individual images
- Conducted a structured usability evaluation using the System Usability Scale (SUS) with quantitative metrics including error rate, task completion time, and qualitative user feedback
- Applied core usability principles -- learnability, robustness, predictability, familiarity, consistency, recoverability, and responsiveness -- throughout the design process
- Built a responsive, Bootstrap-based UI that provides a clean, accessible interface requiring only a text input and a translate button
Links¶
- PDF: to be hosted
- arXiv / TechRxiv: to be added