Real-time Text: An Essential
Accessibility Feature
Arnoud van Wijk, ISOC
vanwijk@isoc.org
Raymond Kruyer,
raymond@4Ctelecom.net
Overview
 Information Society, the Internet in Daily Life
 Text Telephony, the past and present
 What is Real-Time text
– Explained
– The technology
– Part of Internet Telephony (move pstn to IP)
– Transcoding gateways for interworking
– Real-Time Text as mainstream allows freedom
of communication and new services (relay and
remote interpreter and mobile text telephony)
Overview
 R3TF, taskforce to promote real-time text
(end july launched)
 ISOC
 4C Telecom
Information Society, the Internet in Daily Life
 Internet started as a field for scientists and hobbyists.
 But now it is everywhere in daily life.
–
–
–
–
Information and communication
Online banking
Video and TV over Internet
Booking Travel (How did you come
to vancouver?)
– More then 50% of all telephony
is using the internet and that is
increasing at a breakneck pace
– Remote Healthcare and security (fridge that orders new
milk; health monitoring at home instead a Hospital)
Information Society, the Internet in Daily Life
 So, this means we all depend more and more on the
Internet in our daily life. And not just on a computer.
 It also opens new possibilities in communication for
people who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing
 But most people who build
all the technology will not
design for users with a
disability.
 Most technology is
designed for the
general public.
Communication is peoples power
 We all need to communicate every day without
limitations and hurdles.
– Communication from Deaf and Hard of Hearing (deaf) people with
other people is mostly done in sign language, assistive sign, lipreading and text (or combination thereof)
– The ability to communicate determine chances for people in
modern society
– Internet made the world smaller, but it also increased remote
communication. The telephone is an essential communication tool
today!
 For last decades deaf people used fax / text
telephony
– Fax is message based, not very interactive but was widely spread
(you just hope that the person gets the fax in his/her hands in time)
Text Telephony
 Advantages
–
–
–
–
To be able to make a call at a time desired by the caller
Very interactive due to character by character transport
Much more efficient than fax, SMS or MSN
Basically similar to the way hearing people make calls 
conversational text telephony
 Disadvantages
– Different standards in different regions sometimes even within one
country  no international calls
– Hardware very expensive for hearing people
– Not widely spread only calls within own regional deaf community
with other deaf people (island forming)
Text Telephony
 Deaf people are a small user group and not the
general public no innovation and real
improvements.


Text communication is popular!
All people are using text (e-mail, SMS and MSN/AIM/Yahoo/ICQ) more
and more
Text communication is popular!
 Text communication is becoming a mainstream
form of communication
 Everybody is using text now, both deaf and
hearing people
 Because deaf people also want to be able to
communicate with everybody (this is including
hearing people), they are also adapting to
message based forms of communication
 “it’s better to have half an egg than an empty shell”
Conclusion
 The internet is everywhere in our daily life
 Text communication using the Internet is used by
hearing and deaf alike
 Text telephony is a superior way of text
communication compared to message based
forms of text communication (MSN/IM), because
it’s CONVERSATIONAL!
 For hearing people text is “a great fun extra” but in
case of need for realtime conversation they will
use the telephone and place a call!!
 For people who are deaf a voice call is not an
alternative.
Internet Telephony
 Telephony is moving to the Internet using Voice over
IP (VoIP).
 All focus and technology is again going to the general
public, and all sound through internet is for human
voice optimized.
What about text telephones?
Text Telephones do NOT Work
over Internet
Real-Time Text
 Put the advantage of text
telephony plus the all
availability of Internet
and the popularity to use text
itself (MSN/IM) to create
Real-Time Text over internet
 The text is sent and received in
a fraction of a second between
2 or more people.
 It is the closest you get
to voice using text!
Real-Time Text
 The disadvantages of old text telephony have
disappeared. This is “Text Telephony” over Internet
 TOIP
 Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) like techniques made
this possible
 We also discovered that hearing people, who didn’t know
about the better way of text communication, are also very
enthusiastic about this way of conversational text
communication
 Allows conversations for deaf and hearing users both.
MSN/IM for a comment here and there while you do other
things at same time, Real-Time Text is for good direct
conversation! (no need to use the telephone!)
Real-Time Text
 So now we have a good chance of hearing people
adapting to the superior way of communication that
deaf people have been using for a long time
 This would be very good for deaf people all around the
world because there is no longer an excuse for
hearing family, friends or colleagues not to be able to
make or receive a text telephone call. If you can use
MSN/IM, you can also use Real-Time Text.
 At the same time hearing people can benefit from all
the advantages of conversational text communication
The Technology
 Real-Time Text is designed around the ITU-T T.140
real-time text presentation layer protocol.
 T.140 allows real-time editing of text e.g. by using
'backspace' and retyping. T.140 is based on the ISO
10646-1 character set that is used by most IP text
specifications and uses the UTF-8 format.
 Transport of Real-Time Text uses the same Real-time
Transport Protocol (RTP) as VoIP and Video-over-IP.
The text is encoded according to IETF RFC 4103
“RTP Payload for Text Conversation”. And is also
called Text-over-IP (ToIP)
The Technology
 Control of ToIP sessions has been defined using
the standard Session Initiation Protocol (SIP)
(RFC 3641) and the Session Description Protocol
(SDP) (RFC 4566) protocols.
• SIP is used without any alteration.
• Real-time text encoding is identified by using the
SDP media definition 'm=text‘.
• The 3GPP IMS defines the features of SDP that
ToIP uses in 3GPP TS 26.114 v7.4.0 A5
 See IETF RFC 5194 “Framework for real-time text
over IP using the Session Initiation Protocol
(SIP)”.
Nice that technology but what does it mean?
 SIP is used to connect telephones over Internet
 Real-Time Text used by SIP is also called ToIP
 ToIP is 100% standard (which is called RFC4103).
No more proprietary and incompatible text
communication!
 If voice telephony is possible on the internet
network, Real-Time Text (ToIP) will also be
possible.
 ToIP allows the old Text Telephones to connect as
well via a translation gateway since T.140 is used
for both.
 So implementing ToIP/Real-Time Text on Internet
is cheap and easy. No need for additional
investments.
Real-Time Text: Internet vs. Text telephone
 Old hardware text telephony
(fixed & national calls only)
 Text Telephone - Text Telephone
 Text Telephone - Text Telephone relay service & vice versa
 ToIP/Real-Time Text (anything that uses Internet)
(mobile, fixed & international calls)
 Real-Time Text PC – Text Telephone & vice versa
 Real-Time Text PC – Text Telephone relay service & vice versa
 Real-Time Text PC – Mobile Real-Time Text
 Mobile Real-Time Text – Text Telephone & vice versa
 Mobile Real-Time Text – relay service & vice versa
 Mobile Real-Time Text – Real-Time Text PC
 Real-Time Text PC – Real-Time Text on VoIP & Video-over-IP
 Any Internet device with keyboard can use Real-Time Text.
RFC4103
PSTN text phone
Overview
Proprietary
Real-Tme text
Transcoding gateway
Real-Time Text
RFC4103
(T.140/RTP/UDP)
ToIP
IP Network
non RFC4103
Real-time text
Real-Time Text: Conclusions
 Real-Time Text offers freedom never seen on the
old Text telephones!
 Real-Time Text can be stand-alone, or be used
with voice and video  “Total Conversation”
 RFC4103/ToIP real-time text ensures that the old
text telephones can still connect. No-one left
behind!
 Mobile text telephony is really possible as never
seen before!
 Deaf and Hard of Hearing people are NOT left
behind with old and tired technology anymore!
This is possible now!
This is possible now!
911/112 easy to reach with Real-Time Text
 When there is an emergency, you must
always be able to call the emergency
call center.
 Real-Time Text will allow deaf users to call directly
without special textphone only numbers or special
routed calls.
 Possible with Mobile, with video and voice.
 The European Commission acknowledges
the need for Real-Time Text for 112
Stop talking; act now!
 Standardisation is very important, interoperability is
key to create a user base that provides economy of
scale to ensure future developments unlike with the
old text telephone
 These future developments should be based on and
influenced by user experiences
 Therefore users are needed and an extensive roll-out
of Real-Time Text is required and in the meanwhile
people will be communicating!!
 Real-Time Text Taskforce will do this!
Mission of the Real-Time Text Task Force:
The overall mission [purpose] of the Real-Time Text Task
Force is to create a clear roadmap for the testing,
deployment and use of a unified, Real-Time Text
framework that can be used across mainstream platforms
and IP networks, thereby promoting interoperability and
avoiding fragmentation caused by incompatible protocols.
The Real-Time Text Task Force will also:
• Act as centre of excellence for the promotion of Real-Time
Text, its user requirements and the available
implementations
• Act as an educator and awareness raiser in the field of
Real-Time Text, making information available to the public,
industry, and policy makers
Supported by the
•The R3TF Web site comes soon at:
http://www.realtimetext.org/.
•Starts end of July 2008
About the Internet Society
(ISOC)
Arnoud van Wijk
Disability Projects Coordinator, Internet Society
IFHOH Vancouver
July 2008
http://www.isoc.org
What is the Internet Society?
• Founded in 1992 by Internet Pioneers
– International not-for-profit organization
– 80+ organization members
– 28,000+ individual members
– 90+ chapters worldwide
– Dedicated to ensuring the open development, evolution
and use of the Internet for the benefit of all people of the
world.
– Conscience of the Internet
– addressing issues that endangers the future of the Internet
– Censorships, net neutrality (all traffic is equal)
– organization home for the groups responsible for Internet
standards
– Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)
– Internet Architecture Board (IAB).
http://www.isoc.org
About the Internet Society
July 2008
29
What is the Internet Society?
– Acts as a center for Internet information and education
– Coordinates and enables Internet-related initiatives
around the world.
– For over 15 years ISOC has run international network training
programs for developing countries and these have played a vital
role in setting up the Internet connections and networks in
virtually every country connecting to the Internet during this time.
– Main offices in Reston Virginia, USA, and Geneva,
Switzerland
– Regional Bureaus:
– Africa (Addis Ababa, Ethiopia)
– Latin America and the Caribbean (Buenos Aires, Argentina)
– South and Southeast Asia (Suva, Fiji)
http://www.isoc.org
About the Internet Society
July 2008
30
What is the Internet Society?
- serves the needs of the growing global Internet community.
From commerce to education to social issues, our goal is to
enhance the availability and utility of the Internet on the
widest possible scale.
- ISOC’s motto: The Internet is for everyone!
• At the start of 2008, ISOC launched a set of longer term,
strategic activities, called "initiatives". The initiatives which
will drive ISOC's activities in 2008-2010 are:
• Enabling Access
• InterNetWorks
• Trust & Identity
http://www.isoc.org
About the Internet Society
July 2008
31
Enabling Access
• Under-served communities
– people that use non-Latin language e.g. Chinese, Russian, Arabic etc
– people with disabilities, for example Deaf and Hard of Hearing people
– geographically remote and dispersed communities
• face additional challenges in accessing and use the
Internet.
• ISOC will work towards enabling access to the Internet for
people with disabilities
– Advance the development of technologies and the business case
for facilitating the use of the Internet by people with disabilities.
– Educate policymakers and industry on the challenges, needs,
technologies, and opportunities of increasing Internet access and
usage for people with disabilities.
http://www.isoc.org
About the Internet Society
July 2008
32
Conclusion
• ISOC is the organisation that creates and
maintains internet standards.
• ISOC wants Internet for everyone..that means
YOU too!
• ISOC fully supports Real-Time Text
• ISOC and the local Chapters want to work together
with IFHOH/EFHOH and all members to make the
internet accessible for us all TOGETHER.
– Deaf and Hard of Hearing people can now be involved
in the current and future development of the Internet!
– We can together make technology and internet work
with your requirements and needs at first place
http://www.isoc.org
About the Internet Society
July 2008
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