PC Accessibility Options for the Blind? 33
Kevlar Gorilla writes "I've had the privilege of working over the summer as a night time security guard and computer tech resident for the CNIB Lake Joseph Centre way up north in Muskoka, Ontario. There are many blind and visually impaired guests that find their way around computers efficiently using programs such as ZoomText, JAWS, and Window Eyes as well as memorizing plenty of keyboard shortcuts. Given a small budget, I've been charged with updating some software and perhaps some hardware too. What newfangled, affordable and recommended text-reading software should we invest in? What new hardware would be a welcome addition? Is there any decent Linux or Mac stuff? What are your experiences with helping the blind or visually impaired with computing and the internet?"
VoiceOver (Score:1, Informative)
VoiceOver reads aloud the contents of files including web pages, Mail messages and word processing files, provides a comprehensive audible description of your workspace and includes a rich set of keyboard commands that allow you to navigate the Mac OS X interface and interact with application and system controls. If you or someone you are assisting has visual or learning disabilities, you'll appreciate how VoiceOver enhances the rich set of Universal Access features in Mac OS X to provide access for everyone.
OS X and Linux are great alternatives. (Score:2, Informative)
Dissapointed with Voice Over for Tiger (Score:2, Informative)
While VoiceOver is a nice addition it really isn't up to the level of JAWS on Windows. For example if you Tab around the "Universal Access" pages of "System Preferences" it doesn't properly announce the names of any elements. All you get is the fact is that you have select "1 of 2" radio buttons. I would be deeply suspicious of any assitive technology where the dialog that turns it on isn't properly accessible.
Also VoiceOver doesn't appear to work well with Java which is a shame. Just bring up a context menu and you will see what I mean. Only a few items are actually read out.
So while I think this has promise I would promote it for day to day use yet.
Re:OS X and Linux are great alternatives. (Score:2, Informative)
Support for AT-SPI in Qt is slated for a future release of KDE/Qt.
New versions of the Gnome desktop include the built-in gnopernicus screenreader and magnifier, which supports speech, braille, and magnification (http://www.baum.ro/gnopernicus.html [www.baum.ro]), and the gok suite of dynamic onscreen keyboards too (http://www.gok.ca./ [www.gok.ca] There's also another free (as in freedom) screenreader available from ftp.gnome.org, called "orca" - it's a less full-featured offering, but it has scripting capabilities that make it interesting to hackers, and it's written in python.
There are also some speech and magnification utilities included with KDE, thanks to the "KDE Accessibility Project", though they are currently more limited in scope. When support for the AT-SPI is available for KDE apps, all the assistive technologies written to this api should interoperate nicely. I believe that there may be a talking version of konqueror already. There are also projects that provide talking plugins for Mozilla.
Since the GUI-based Linux [and Solaris
Provided the distros recognize the value in all this, we can expect improved testing and support in upcoming Linux distributions.
There is a mailing list available for early adopters of this technology: http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-acce
Several suggestions (Score:3, Informative)
Assuming that you are willing to use some sort of terminal reader for the blind, I would first suggest linux, since it runs well without a GUI, and the documentation/help also tends to be in text or easily converted to text.
Second: GNU screen. You can set it up to have a list of terminals at the bottom of the screen. So, lets say I'm running bash and w3m under GNU screen, I can have the bottom line of the terminal to say " 12:25 Jun 02 pyng : 0$* w3m 1-$ bash". (pyng is the system name). What is displayed is configurable.
Third: A bunch of CHUI apps. 'w3m' for web browsing. 'slrn' for newsgroups. 'emacs' for editing, or for all of the above. ;) Emacs also has an emacs speak, which is supposed to be nice. There is even CHUI/TTY IM clients and IRC clients.
Fourth: Man doesn't live by bread alone. Telnet and MUDs. Try www.mudconnect.com to find a good list of them. The roguelike 'nethack' (and probably slash'em as well) has instructions on configuring it for the blind. However, roguelikes are incredibly frustrating.
Fifth: Some people claim festival is nice for reading text. I'm not sure. But there is always Project Gutenburg with its text files. Don't forget the many shoutcast servers out there as well. XMMS can be setup to be controlled by keyboard shortcuts, look at xmms-shell.
Disclaimer: I'm not blind. Perhaps the blind prefer voice software. Perhaps there are specialized solutions that work better. But in the end, the only way to know which solution is better is to let the end user try it out.
Re:GUI for visually impaired (Score:3, Informative)
Under Linux, there are also a number of tools for visually impaired users, some completed, and some in development:
Until KDE 4 is released, no ideal Linux solution for partially sighted users exists. For some partially sighted users, the best choice is KDE because of the more flexible colour and theme settings. Other partially sighted users prefer using a console screen reader, or the screen reader and magnifier Gnopernicus, although it does not offer all the magnification modes known from Windows screen magnifiers.
The good news is that in the future, users will be able to use most Linux applications independent of the toolkit, because GNOME and KDE are closely cooperating on defining and standardising a common system for these assistive technologies.
Olaf Schmidt, KDE Accessibility Project
Re:Ethics (Score:3, Informative)
I support some blind users, many using various Freedom Scientific products. These products definately provide a level of freedom and productivity that make a huge difference in their quality of life. That said, if you've ever felt even a little trapped or restricted by MS, then depending on these products is 100X worse. Jaws for example costs nearly $1000 which means that most of these people have to depend on state assistance to even begin to afford this stuff. Many of these products have very restrictive licenses and PITA product locking schemes that personally I find degrading. Lost your activation floppy? Better call and beg FS for a replacement and you'd better be nice to them because if they won't send you a replacement you're back in the jail of not being able to work or communicate with the outside world. Want to upgrade from your old Win98/ME box to a WinXP one? Your old Jaws isn't licensed for that so you have to beg the state to drop another $1000 for a new Jaws license. Want to use Open Office or Mozilla instead of MSware? Too bad, they're not supported and FS doesn't care. Have a sighted friend who'd like to help you from time to time? Too bad, the demo license doesn't allow for that usage so your friend has to come up with another $1000 just to get familiar enough with it to help you. It's not unethical to help people and make a living doing it but using someones disability to exert control and drain public coffers doesn't earn a lot of good will from the likes of me.
Sorry for the rant but this has been bugging me for a while and in addition I'm still smarting a bit from a recent encounter with an arrogant FS support person.