ABSTRACT
This chapter draws together information from three main sources: experience, as reported in journals and other publications; technical details provided by researchers and manufacturers, and advice and opinions from workers in this field. A fair number of published reports now exist about experience of use of new information technology by physically-disabled children and adults. Besides the record of experience, researchers and manufacturers quite freely provide details of new devices and systems, some of which are only at prototype stage. A few firms publish evaluation reports or at least case studies of use of their products. Against the background of this experience, workers in the field are critically analysing new theoretical developments, such as applications of artificial intelligence. They also offer much practical advice, an example of which follows. The hardware can be divided roughly into input devices, processors and output devices.
