Hawking's speech software goes open source for disabled

Hawking's communications system will be made available to researchers on the Internet as "open source", although it would still have to be adapted for individual users. - AFP

The system that helps Stephen Hawking communicate with the outside world will be made available online from January in a move that could help millions of motor neurone disease sufferers, scientists say. 

The wheelchair-bound theoretical physicist, who shot to international fame in the 1980s with his book A Brief History of Time, hailed the decision by US tech giant Intel at a press conference in London.