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New Technology for the Blind?
Posted by
Cliff
on Mon Dec 20, 2004 04:44 PM
from the not-just-for-the-sighted dept.
from the not-just-for-the-sighted dept.
Recently, quite a few questions surrounding technology for the visually impared have dropped into the Ask Slashdot in-box and I'd like to take the time to share these questions with you. Please read on for more.
Gaming Accessibility Recommendations?
openSoar asks: "I work for a company that makes and runs a virtual online world called SecondLife. One of the most inspirational stories I've heard recently has been about a group of people with extreme physical challenges and limitations who are using our software to great effect including (to quote from the original forum post) - 'the chance to be on an equal playing field for once, to not have to have folks get past what they look or sound like... to be warmly received... to play and have fun the way their peers do.' - I want to make things even better and provide a broad range of accessibility features and options. Time constraints mean I can't tackle everything so I'm trying to hit the really useful ones first. Of course, we're going to ask the users what they think but I figured that the folk here would also have some great ideas and suggestions."Blind Friendly Open Source Software?
scubacuda asks: "A friend of mine is blind, yet he effortlessly navigates through his Windows XP box (installing programs, buying stuff on eBay, reading web-pages, etc) using JAWS. When I asked him what open source resources were available for him, I was surprised to hear him say, 'Almost nothing.' Is this true? Are we just not looking at the right places, or do blind-friendly resources tend to be Microsoft-centric? I tried to get him to switch over to Firefox, but he says that it doesn't work as well with JAWS as IE does."MP3 Players for the Visually Impaired?
holden caufield asks: "As the geek-in-residence for my circle of friends, I've been asked the 'Which MP3 player should I buy?' question repeatedly, and I'm yet to offer an answer to them that doesn't rhyme with 'iPod'. Now I've been asked this very same question from a good friend who is blind (only *very* limited vision in one eye), and I'm thinking the iPod is still the way to go? Can anyone tell me their visually impaired experiences with MP3 players? Keep in mind, I don't mean 'can you now use it without looking at it?', since the learning curve would have been flattened for you by being able to study it originally. Any suggestions? A few reasons why I think the iPod will work for him:- Simple user interface
- Cursor changes can be heard with (or without) headphones on
- Bright back-lighting may be helpful for him.
- He uses a screen reader (JAWS for Windows), so compatibility with that is possibly more important than nearly any other feature.
- He is looking for an MP3 player. Ogg and FLAC compatibility is not a consideration, and will not weigh in favor of any device.
- Sorry, but switching to Linux is not an option, however open-source that is Win32-compatible is fine."
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OS X works for me (Score:5, Informative)
I like OS X since it also has a bunch of other features for the handicapped, like zoom, contrast and grayscale adjustments. If you're not completely blind, this is quite useful. Check out the Universal Access preferences pane to see the hearing and keyboard and mouse stuff too.
mp3 player for the visually impaired? Hmmm, maybe a laptop running iTunes and the spoken interface enabled. I set it up to read any highlighted text when I hit F8. The only minor problem is that it reads the whole line in the playlist, the name, time, artist, album, genre, etc. That would make quick browsing kind of hard.
Re:OS X works for me (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
The Mac, speaking English since 1984 (Score:4, Interesting)
A historical note:
I wasn't here, but I heard that the first Mac did, or was supposed to, introduce itself using MacIntalk. If true, in 1984 this would've had a lot of *ooh* *ahh* potential.
Parent
More history on Macintalk - Apple Technote PT22 (Score:4, Interesting)
Macintalk, the Final Chapter [apple.com] You can find some more tidbits on google's groups, search for Macintalk with a date filter of 1990.
Parent
Texas Instruments - speaking English since 1980 (Score:3)
I find it shocking that technology that was available as early as 1982 has progressed so little and isn't widely available.
Re:OS X works for me (Score:5, Interesting)
Of course Apple was having to work on their accessibility issues for federal approval, but not only are they are going far beyond the absolute base requirements, they have made the same OS a productive work environment for scientific research as well. Therefore, I am more than happy to try and integrate OS X into patient education and use as well as in my basic science research in the lab.
P.S. There is a movement within the National Library for the Blind to replace all of their "books on tape" with a digital format compatible with
Parent
Re:OS X works for me (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:OS X works for me (Score:2, Insightful)
At some point or another, we have all (most likely) had an original tape walkman.
Could you operate that from your pocket without pulling it out?
An iPod is designed to be held in your hand and played with - like a modile phone or a deck of cards, its not designed for use whilst tucked away.
It seems like styling and design has overtaken functionality.
Maybe, it could be recaptured by allowing a simplified clicker interface on the pod, sacrifice extra
Re:OS X works for me (Score:3, Interesting)
So si
Blind + Linux = BLINUX (Score:4, Informative)
Don't forget KDE (Score:3, Interesting)
The KDE Accessibility team is in the process of integrating speech synthesis into KDE. Not only does this mean better support for visually-impaired and speech-impaired users, but the new features should also prove for a fun desktop experience overall.
Seems very relevent!
POPFile (Score:4, Informative)
He did all three and I have heard from users that POPFile works well with screen readers. I'm not sure about JAWS in particular.
It wasn't particularly onerous to get the Bobby AA mark for the software and I'm always happy to have another satisfied user.
John.
Re:POPFile (Score:3, Interesting)
"If you want to work on it then you need to do that PLUS you need to make it pass the Bobby Accessibility Guidelines".
Beware that just because something passes Bobby, it doesn't necessarily mean it's completely accessible. As the W3C [w3.org] themselves point out, there is no automated test that can prove or disprove that your site is accessible. Several people have come up with accessibility checklists [google.co.uk], however, which are a good place to start (as is Bobby, for that matter; it's just not a good place to finish)
Interactive Fiction (Score:5, Informative)
For diversions, how about Interactive Fiction [ifarchive.org]? It has a textual interface that lends itself well to speakerbox usage, shell [shelltown.com] accounts, and there's a vast library [ifarchive.org] of free titles available.
Re:Interactive Fiction (Score:2)
AFAIK both NetHack [nethack.org] and CConq [xconq.org] (the console version of XConq) are fairly hard to play through screen readers because of the way terrain is represented.
Your milage may vary, though.
Interactive Fiction [ifarchive.org] has no such problem, however.
Phison mp3 player (Score:3, Informative)
US Govt contracts requires good tools (Score:2, Informative)
These tools are also the future of computers. We all want to speak to and hear our computers, we all want to use small interfaces that are low resolution and high contrast.
Re:US Govt contracts requires good tools (Score:3, Insightful)
The unfortunate rider is "except where it is illegal". Eg I can't use decss to make a DVD player for epileptics that filters out flashing video, or various other similar things. Apparently the right of the MPAA exceeds the rights of the epileptics.
And then we have ebooks..
"Bitkeeper doesn't pirat
Sad truth (Score:4, Informative)
As far as the Ipod goes, that's a terrible idea. He needs one with tactile controls. Ideally, it needs at least 6 control buttons on it, Play/pause, next, previous, volume up/down and power. The Ipod is about the last place you want to look, as the wheel thing will do him absolutely no good.
Re:Sad truth (Score:2, Interesting)
Itch & Scratch (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, as they say, open source software is written when someone has to scratch an itch. Sounds nice, but it has that one unpleasant consequence: the open source community satisfies primarily the needs of the open source community, while the commercial & proprietary software developers at least try to pretend they actually satisfy the need of their customers. Since there's not much blind people among the open source community - there's not much free software writting for them. But since blind people have money and are able to buy a piece of software - there is some commercial software written for them. I think it's as simple as that.
RockBox (Score:5, Informative)
Rockbox is an open source (GPL) firmware project for the Archos Recorder MP3 player (among others). They've done great work, which included Talkbox - extra code which can allow the MP3 player to 'talk' to the users.
Now the problem is that the actual hardware itself is terrible - that is not the Rockbox teams fault, of course, though.
I've seen on the mailing list some blind users who've written in just to comment about how helpful and useful the Talkbox features of Rockbox are. So it seriously does help people. It is an amazing project, and I really wish I had worked on it myself.
Anyway, check out the manual or something to check that it is suitable.
Re:RockBox (Score:4, Informative)
For those not bothered to click the link, an interesting cut from it:
The Archos Jukebox is an embedded device and as such there are space limitations to what can be done to support blind accessibility within Rockbox. All of the configuration options have voice prompts, and Rockbox can speak directory and file names, but in general informational messages displayed on the screen and detailed debugging information are not available to blind users. For the Recorder, specifically, the quick settings menus are not spoken - although they can still be used by memorising what each key does while in these modes. Sorry.
Rockbox is however fully usable and configurable by the blind, and many sighted users are using the voice user interface by preference so they can operate their Jukebox without looking at the screen - while driving, for instance (isn't that reassuring?).
Parent
Gnome has screen reading support (Score:2, Informative)
iPod?! (Score:4, Interesting)
Using the iPod in the car is *infruriating*, because with a WHEEL it is difficult to select one of 311 artists, or one of 520 albums.
Spin-spin-spin...backspin, backspin, click click click.
It is *difficult* to *impossible* to select an album, artist or song when confronted with 35GB of music.
Wheel-selection is only somewhat practical to select a playlist (since I only have 2 dozen or so). A wheel interface is impractical unless you can constantly look at it / see it, and you have a limited number of items to select from.
The iPod interface is *overrated*.
Re:iPod?! (Score:2)
I've never had a problem with the iPod interface. Infact I find it piss-easy, and would be hard pressed to find another way to find something faster that didn't involve a live search-as-you-type feature, as like iTunes.
Exactly what would be a better interface, BTW? You do realise that the iPod interface was designed to be looked at while opperated, right? It may not be suited to the visually impared, but that doesn't mean it's in anyway over
Clarification (Score:3, Funny)
You're saying the iPod is a bad choice for a visually impaired person, because you have a hard time using it while *driving*?
Just wondering...
Re:iPod?! (Score:2)
The iPod has a "on the go" playlist
simply hold down the button on a song/artist/whatever and it adds it to the "on the go" playlist
KDE 3.4 Will Talk to you (Score:2, Offtopic)
night blind? (Score:2)
Re:night blind? (Score:2)
Using iPod for talking books (Score:3, Interesting)
iPod (Score:2)
Here's one to ponder - voting system for the blind (Score:3, Interesting)
My hope here is that some of you folks interested in this topic might have some insight on a related issue with the US voting systems.
I've been a spectator in a recent discussion regarding the best approach to delivering a secure voting system to the blind. It was an offshoot of some discussions on the current US voting systems, their serious shortcomings, and solutions. So far, I haven't read what any proposal that made much sense to me - they are all either extremely expensive (ie: everyone gets a special $3k reading wand) or otherwise highly impractical (ie: convoluted, multi-step, off-the-cuff type procedures to supposedly ensure a secure vote for the blind citizen).
I'm no expert in this area, and I want to understand it a bit better. Can anyone suggest a practical solution that could be reasonably implemented across the US ?
Re:Here's one to ponder - voting system for the bl (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Here's one to ponder - voting system for the bl (Score:2)
Accessibility is a main selling point of the electronic voting machines that worry so many of us Slashdotters. They have screen readers, large fonts, high contrast, and support multiple languages. This is a good thing for those who need these features.
Of course, a system we could trust would be a good thing for everyone.
The Screen Magnifiers Homepage (Score:3, Informative)
I have tried ZoomText and it is excellent. I have also tried almost every freeware/non comercial screen magnification software listed at magnifiers.org, but to be honest with you, none have even come close to being usable. Most of them offer no more functionality than the magnifyer bundled with Windows. I have not tried freeware/opensource screen readers, so I cannot comment on them. I would suspect that nothing would even come close to JAWS.
Regarding you friend's experience using Firefox with JAWS, I have run into several programs that wouldn't work with ZoomText. FireFox was one, Putty was another. The software could not track the cursor properly. These Programs seem to be mostly compatible with very popular software packages.
emacspeak (Score:2)
Command Line is Best for Blind Users (Score:2, Informative)
inspired me to try it: unplug my monitor and go.
http://www.eklhad.net/cli.html [eklhad.net]
Virtual Worlds for the blind (Score:2, Interesting)
More on AI [geocities.com]
Non-GUI UI (Score:5, Insightful)
Building computers that focus on whole-system TTS interfaces via CLI apps seems to be a much better approach. Has anyone done anything like this that is explainable to a computer-illiterate blind grandmother?
ZoomText is better than JAWS (Score:3, Interesting)
ZoomText is available from AI Squared [aisquared.com] and works great with Mozilla Firefox. Unfortunately at $395 the price tag is pretty hefty and there's no Linux version. Blind charities can usually sell the software at a discount, however.
The sysadmin in my CS dept is blind (Score:5, Interesting)
I have no idea what he uses, but he is completely blind. He has an audio output that reads what I assume is the output from the terminal at an incredible speed. I have never been able to understand what it is saying, but he is quick about the whole thing. Probably the fastest typist I know.
Emacspeak (Score:2, Informative)
I'm kind of surprised nobody has brough up Emacspeak [sourceforge.net] yet. Since Emacs is already a complete text-based replacement for everything anyone could ever want to do with a computer system, making it blind and visually-impaired accessable is a no-brainer.
Plus, it's written by the blind, for the blind, and is it's own development platform. Is there anyone out there using Emacspeak that would care to comment on it?
bright? (Score:2)
The iPod's backlight is bright!
I use it as a flashlight (seriously), and the first time I turned it on at night I had to scream "AAAH! MY EYES!" (because I'm a dramatic sort of fellow
Now I wisened up: I turn it on facing away from me so my pupils have time to adapt.
how about character-based linux on a speech synth? (Score:2, Informative)
Why is everyone perfect in game-world? (Score:2, Interesting)
Depends on the person I guess.... (Score:3, Informative)
sh &>/dev/ttyS0
And he was up and running. I will admit though that he is a bit of a *NIX guy, and already owned a shell account (was new to Linux, but had used UNIX before). He's not a wizard granted, but he knew what he had to.
JAWS *IS* the unfortunate standard. (Score:3, Informative)
The project was sponsered to a large extent by Microsoft. They threw millions at it. Not surprisingly, the entire infrastructure around it consists of MS technology (interfacing with the legacy CNIB user data). We're talking W2K3 Servers, IIS, SQL,
The sole browser/screenreader combo targeted is IE/JAWS.
I can tell you, JAWS was not chosen for any sort of advanced features or (percieved) usability. From an implentation POV, it's a nightmare. It's archaic software that is very picky in what/how it reads. It predates browsers and does not play well with pages that are not specifically designed for it. That said, the only reason it was targeted for the project is that it is the de-facto standard screenreader for the blind community. It's been around so long that it's ubiquitous. And as bad as it is, the kids use it intuitively and to it's fullest extent. I couldn't believe how fast they had JAWS cranked up (it was reading the screen at something like 10x speed) and they jump around the page using the keyboard controls faster then I (a sighted person) could read what was on the screen! Really something.
Anyway, love it or hate it, it seems like JAWS will stick around for at least a while yet.
Rockbox Thread by New Blind User (Score:3, Interesting)