Two Apps to be Presented at Winston Salem Chamber of Commerce Tech Briefing on September 15th

Smartphones in the U.S. are expected to overtake feature phones by the end of 2011 (Nielsenwire, March 2010); therefore, it is no wonder that “there’s an app for that” can be said for virtually everything. At the 2011 Tech Briefing on September 15th, audience members will get to hear about two different apps, locally created and developed.

The Treks in the City™ mobile application, created by Winston-Salem based technology company, Small Footprint, uses geo-location technology to identify the users' current location in proximity to a host of other mapped locations. Users who download the application are able to experience the following functionality:

• Select a Trek and tour the area using particular area of interest, such as Architecture, Entertainment or the locations of four annual scavenger hunts held in the downtown area.

• Easily find downtown locations and get walking directions from the current location.

• Share pictures and comments on various Trek locations.

• Visit a related Web site or place a call to a destination directly from the Treks in the City™ mobile application.

Verbal Victor, an iphone app created by Wake Forest University Assistant Computer Science Professor Paúl Pauca, is designed to help children with development disabilities communicate better. Paúl’s son Victor was born with a rare genetic disorder that causes delays in cognitive abilities, motor skills, and social development and language skills. Paúl wanted to find a way to help Victor communicate better but found that the available therapeutic tools were very primitive, difficult to use and costly. With the help of students in his computer science class, he developed an application that with a touch of the screen allowed Victor to communicate such things as “I want to play” with a graphic image of toys or “I want to eat “ with an image of food.

Learn more about these apps and how they came to be at the Tech Briefing on September 15 at 8 a.m at the Benton Convention Center.

Treks in the City™: Winston-Salem

Scene in Winston-Salem (the folks who put on the Downtown Winston-Salem Scavenger Hunt) and Small Footprint, Inc. (a software development services company headquartered in downtown Winston-Salem) have joined forces to build great new iPhone and Android apps focused on Winston-Salem's downtown features. The apps, called Treks in the City™: Winston-Salem, use geo-location to help visitors and locals alike tour Downtown Winston-Salem based on areas of interest such as Architecture, Entertainment, or Scene in Winston-Salem's previous Scavenger Hunts. Users can also share comments and pictures about the locations they discover with the apps. Small Footprint and Scene in Winston-Salem say to expect more features in the apps soon! Learn more about the apps at http://treksinthecity.com.

App Helps Those with Communication Disabilities Find a Voice

Professor Victor Pauca and computer science students at Wake Forest University have developed an app that can be used on an ipod or iphone to help those with verbal disabilities communicate. Pauca's five year old son Victor, has a rare disorder that severely hampers his development including language skills. The app, called the Verbal Victor, has a series of pictures that can have audio recorded onto them. When the child wishes to communicate something they simply push on the picture and their aim is understood. Because the app uses recording as opposed to a robotic sounding voice, the children become much more comfortable using the app to communicate in the first place. The Verbal Victor app is available at Apple stores for $10 a download compared to other communication devices that might cost thousands of dollars.

CNN captures the Verbal Victor in action at home with Victor Pauca and his family

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2011/01/17/dnt.ipad.helps.boy.talk.WFMY?hpt=C2