++E-ACCESS BULLETIN.
- ISSUE 66, JUNE 2005.

Technology news for people with vision impairment
(http://www.headstar.com/eab/).
Sponsored by RNIB (http://www.rnib.org.uk).

NOTE: Please forward this free bulletin to others (subscription details
at the end). We conform to the accessible Text Email Newsletter
(TEN) Standard:
http://www.headstar.com/ten/ .

If you are a journalist interested in access technology issues and would
like to be added to our specialist press list, please email Mel Poluck on
mel@headstar.com .

++Issue 66 Contents.

Section One: News.

01: Many Blogs 'Impossible to Access'
- Online journals suffer from poor design.

02: Frustrated Consumer Launches Product Review Site
- Service collects product feedback and promotes discussion.

03: World's First Working Group on Accessible Biometrics
- Technology could boost access to banking.

News in Brief: 04: Discussion Forum - technology debate; 05: Twenty
Questions - intelligent game; 06: Talking Macs - natural speech.

Section Two: 'The Inbox' - Readers' Forum.
07: Electronic Sorcery - Tolkien e-book request.; 08: Microfilm Query
- how to convert? 09: Tactile Intervention - digital maps.

Section Three - Seminar Report - Accessible Biometrics.
10: In the Public Eye: The UK government's plans to introduce
identity cards has focused attention on biometrics. Mel Poluck finds
such technologies have a potential to boost social inclusion, but only if
designed properly.

Section Four: Technology - JAWS Scripting.
10: The Language of Flexibility: The leading screen-reader software
JAWS for Windows may not be the cheapest around, but the fact it has
its own scripting language allows it to interact with all kinds of other
standard software packages. Nick Apostolidis reports.

[Contents ends].


++Sponsored Notice: QAC Sight Village 2005
- Birmingham, July 19-21, 2005

Ink My Dots and Blog Your Podcast: The latest in cutting edge
technology for people who are blind or partially sighted will be on
show this July at Sight Village in Birmingham. Celebrating its twelfth
year, Queen Alexandra College's major international exhibition is
gearing up for its best show yet.

Show sponsors ViewPlus Technologies will be showcasing their
unique 'Ink My Dots' Braille embosser, developed with Hewlett
Packard. The machine produces Braille and standard print or ink-
enhanced tactile graphics on one document.

Other displays include podcasts; digital radios; accessible mobile
phones; Braille note takers; and ultrasonic and GPS navigation
systems. QAC Sight Village also welcomes organisations that provide
information, advice and support, from accessible holidays to talking
newspapers. See:
http://www.qac.ac.uk/sightvillage/ .

[Sponsored Notice ends].


++Section One: News.

+01: Many Blogs 'Impossible to Access'.

Internet users with impaired vision often find it impossible to access
weblogs or 'blogs', the American Foundation for the Blind (AFB -
http://www.afb.org/) has warned.

Blogs, which are spreading across the internet like wildfire, are online
publishing systems allowing individuals or groups of people to publish
journals or snippets of news and others to respond to them to create
interactive discussion.

The problem for vision-impaired users is not just that blogs often suffer
the same kinds of problem that make mainstream sites difficult to use,
such as a failure to provide descriptions of images or poor page layout,
says the AFB in a new report
( http://fastlink.headstar.com/afb1 ).

Blogs raise additional access barriers of their own, the federation says.
For example, they often ask users to identify graphics as part of a
registration process. Originally designed to deflect automated
spamming software, the process usually requires a user to identify a
visually distorted word or phrase displayed as an image, but this
usually means that people with impaired vision cannot register without
help from a sighted person.

The widely-used 'Blogger' product became the latest piece of blogging
software to include these steps in its sign-up process, to the concern of
many web users (see for example a discussion on
http://fastlink.headstar.com/blog1 ).

The move was criticised because apart from the signing up procedure
Blogger has won a lot of support because it is easy to use. "It took the
need for technical knowledge out of blogging, and made it so easy,"
said Damon Rose, editor of the BBC Ouch online service
( http://www.bbc.co.uk/ouch/ ),
who also runs his own blog BlindKiss
( http://www.blindkiss.com/ ).

As part of its research, AFB has published some tips to make blogs
easier to use, at:
http://fastlink.headstar.com/afb2 .


+02: Frustrated Consumer Launches Product Review Site.

A free web site allowing people with impaired vision to submit and
read reviews of consumer products has been launched by partially
sighted internet enthusiast Dave Goodwin.

VIP Consumer (http://www.vipconsumer.com) claims to be the first
online service of its kind. It collects feedback from users on how
accessible and usable products and services are, and provides a forum
where these issues can be raised and discussed in more depth.

The service is available in a test version at present, with a full launch
planned for early August. Goodwin told E-Access Bulletin he decided
to launch the service after a particularly frustrating experience: "I
bought a multi-function remote control, the kind with a screen. I found
it impossible to use because the characters were too small and no
customisation of the display was possible. I'd read plenty of reviews,
but none covered the vision aspects, not even the manufacturer's
information," he said.

The discussion area of VIP Consumer may turn out to be as valuable as
the individual reviews, Goodwin said. "What do you do if you come to
the site and a review of the product you're interested in isn't available?
You can go to the discussion area to raise the issue. I don't want people
to just leave if they can't find the information they need," he said.

Goodwin has little experience in running an online service, beyond
setting up web sites for friends, and says he would welcome advice on
how to gain funding for the service through sponsorship or other
means, while keeping it free for the users. Readers can contact him on:
support@vipconsumer.com .


+03: World's First Working Group on Accessible Biometrics.

A European group has been set up to research the potential of
biometrics - the use of a body part to identify individuals and access
their personal data -  for people with a disability.

The Social and Environmental special interest group of the European
Biometrics Forum (EBF - http://www.eubiometricforum.com/ ), which
will also look at ethical and usability issues, will have its first meeting
this Summer.

Its creation was announced at a recent London conference on
accessible biometrics
( http://fastlink.headstar.com/bio4 ).

"There's a huge amount of work that needs to be done on how
biometrics could help disabled people," said Will McMeechan, head of
business futures at Nationwide building society and chair of the new
group. "I want to try and show biometrics could be useful for people
with a disability. It could be seen very much as an enabling
technology."

The group will also produce best practice guides for creating accessible
biometric systems, covering areas such as interface design.

McMeechan said he had conducted a trial at Nationwide that used iris
scans to identify users of cash machines. "That [system] would be a
boon to a lot of customers," he said.

NOTE: For more on the accessible biometrics conference see Section
Three, this issue.


++News in Brief:

+04: Discussion Forum: An online discussion forum on access
technology has been launched by the National Library of the Blind,
alongside other new forums on public libraries, books and tactile
formats:
http://forums.nlb-online.org/ .

+05: Twenty Questions: An accessible version of the game Twenty
Questions, in which players of all ages and in eight languages can
compete against a computer, has gone live online. Players win if the
object they think of is not guessed correctly in 20 questions or less.
The devisers of '20Q.net', Top Dot Enterprises, claim the more it is
played, the smarter it gets:
http://www.20q.net .

+06: Talking Macs: Text-to-speech software 'ATandT natural voices'
has been made available in English, French, German and Spanish for
Mac OS X, the operating system for Apple Macintosh computers.
According to its creators Wizzard, the software is superior to a text-to-
speech facility already built into OS X:
http://fastlink.headstar.com/wizzard1 .

[Section One ends].


++Special Notice: Techshare 2005 Call for Papers
- 17-18 November, Jury's Inn, Birmingham, UK.

The Techshare 2005 Conference is an international event for
professionals who are interested in technology and the role it plays for
people with sight problems. The conference will be arranged within the
broad themes of Learning, Work and Life.

Would you like to submit a paper to present? We are looking for
insight into innovative research, as well as case studies highlighting the
use of technology. Presentations should relate to technology but need
not be technical in content.

Speakers will be offered a reduced attendance rate of £130 for the full
conference or £95 for one day. To download the paper submission
form or simply register to attend Techshare, see:
http://www.rnib.org.uk/techshare
Closing date for papers is 1 August. If you have any questions please
email us at:
techshare@rnib.org.uk .

[Special Notice ends].


++Section Two: 'The Inbox'
- Readers' Forum.

Please email all contributions or responses to
inbox@headstar.com .


+07: Electronic Sorcery: The bulletin's esteemed Italian translator,
Margherita Giordano, writes in with a request: "One of my students is
willing to try to read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings in English,
but has no idea where to find them.

"This boy is almost totally blind but does not know Braille very well,
so the best solution will be to obtain e-books for him. Can you suggest
to me where to find them?"
[Responses please to inbox@headstar.com ] .


+08: Microfilm Query: Mark Pimm, Disability Coordinator at
Birkbeck University of London, writes in with a query about the
accessibility of microfilm.

He asks: "Where a visually impaired person wants to access materials
that are on microfilm, how would they go about getting the microfilm
documents converted into an electronic format so they could read them
on a computer?
Responses please to inbox@headstar.com ] .


+09: Tactile Intervention: Rich Caloggero writes in to respond to Allen
Hoffman's April contribution on ways of making 'LeapFrog' tactile
maps and diagrams more accessible.

Rich is an adaptive technology consultant at the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology's Adaptive Technology for Information and
Computing laboratory (http://web.mit.edu/atic/). He writes: "Allen
suggests that if the pages of the device were also embossed with raised
lines, then a blind person could use this system to read maps. The
problem is that you still need special ink, as the LeapFrog system uses
special ink and a special pen to "read" pages prepared with this ink.

"With [Allen's suggested] method, you need to emboss this same page
with raised lines. But with my approach, it does not take an extra step
to emboss the figure: all you need is your two hands.

"There is a Braille printer called the Tiger from ViewPlus
( http://www.viewplus.com/ )
which can produce raised line drawings and ink print simultaneously.
Add to this a touch tablet which is a smooth surface which sends
information about where it is touched to any computer, and you have a
system which can do the same thing as the LeapFrog, but be
completely usable by the blind.

"Using special software called Iveo Creator, also from ViewPlus, you
can create figures maps, charts or plans, print them out in both print
and in Braille with the Tiger embosser, and then place the image on the
touch tablet. When you move your hands over the figure which is
raised, and press on various spots or within certain areas on the figure,
relevant information about the image can be spoken via synthesised
speech. This information can be added when the figure is initially
created, or added or changed later via Iveo Creator."
[Further responses please to
inbox@headstar.com ] .

[Section Two ends]


++Special Notice: Web Accessibility Forum.

Accessify Forum is a discussion forum devoted to all topics relating to
web accessibility. Topics cover everything from 'Beginners' and 'Site
building and testing' through to projects such as the new accessibility
testing tool WaiZilla and the accessibility of the open source forum
software itself.

All you need to register is a working email address, so come along and
join in the fun at:
http://www.accessifyforum.com .

[Special notice ends].


++ Section Three - Seminar Report
- Accessible Biometrics

+09: In The Public Eye
by Mel Poluck.

The use of people's physical attributes such as fingerprints, irises,
DNA or facial features to identify them and access their personal
information was once the stuff of science fiction.

But now, with the UK Home Office's plans to deploy ID cards due to
come to fruition within a decade, biometrics are set to become part of
daily life. By 2013, everyone in the country will have an ID card that
uses a biometric to access the information it holds.

Creating a system that uses a biometric for an entire population means
considering accessibility on at least two levels: at the moment of
capturing the biometric and in the design of the reading device.

There are various potential problems in both areas. The sight loss
condition Nystagmus, for example, which causes a vibration of the
eyeball, means it may not always be possible to obtain a "readable"
image for scanners.

So it is important to understand the needs of all users, but when
designing a biometric accessible for all it is vital never to take
disability statistics at face value, Dr John Gill, RNIB chief scientist,
told the audience of a recent government-hosted conference on
accessible biometrics (http://fastlink.headstar.com/bio2). For example,
raw statistics do not offer any information about whether or not a task
could be undertaken in a specific time and context, he said.

System designers must also bear in mind the various possible
permutations of disability, Dr Gill said. "If you're talking about
delivering a service, it's very important to take into account multiple
impairments. It's anything but a homogenous population," Gill said.
For example diabetes, the most common cause of vision impairment,
can also affect circulation, ruling out use of Braille because the sense
of touch is affected, he said.

One possible way to enhance the accessibility of biometric readers
would be to introduce a smartcard on which user preferences such as
large print; audio information; languages; or fonts could be stored, Gill
said. This would mean vision-impaired users could have instant access
to a tailored interface when having their biometric read.

Another application for biometrics could be bank cash machines
(ATMs), according to Will McMeechan, business developer at the
Nationwide Building Society and founder of the independent,
European Union-backed European Biometrics Forum (EBF -
http://www.eubiometricforum.com/ ). "Many ATMs have cameras
built in; the facility is [there] already for facial recognition. We need a
financial impetus to get this thing working," he said.

Access to data by a biometric would remove the need for people to
remember or type a pin number or sign a form and would enhance
security. But there has been doubt over whether systems are
sufficiently mature to support a system used by everybody.

"I know a biometric system that couldn't be used because the interface
wasn't designed properly," McMeechan said. "It was nothing to do
with the [biometric] technology, it was to do with the way it was
implemented. There probably isn't enough dialogue going on between
representative organisations."

To answer this call, the EBF has recently established a special interest
group ( http://fastlink.headstar.com/ebf1 ) which aims to raise
awareness of accessibility and usability issues relating to biometrics
and address any concerns.

But accessibility goes even further than registration and identification
technologies. Peripheral aspects such as customer service must also be
accessible if a usable card is to be deployed to everyone. "We're
seriously looking at the internet as a form of interaction," said Henry
Bloomfield, of the Home Office's technology department. "It provides
an important channel for people with access or mobility problems," he
said.

Last month, the results were published of a six-month Biometrics
Enrolment Trial by the UK Passport Service which used 10,000 people
including 750 people with various disabilities to test facial scanning,
fingerprint and iris image enrolment
(http://fastlink.headstar.com/bio3). The results will feed into the final
design of the national ID card.

The trial found that for iris scan enrolment, 31 per cent of disabled
participants found positioning for the recording 'very' or 'fairly'
difficult. Success rates were around 90 per cent for all participants and
61 per cent for disabled participants.

Unsurprisingly, therefore, participants with visual impairment chose
the fingerprint as their preferred biometric. This had a success rate of
81 per cent for verification overall and 80 per cent for disabled
participants.

There is clearly room for more research and more testing. "Research to
make biometrics more inclusive may be more important than to
improve accuracy for "ideal" users," said Tony Mansfield of the
National Physical Laboratory (http://www.npl.co.uk/).

[Section Three ends].


++Special Notice: Braille Translations.

Braille Translations provides a fast, cost-effective, high quality service
of translating any document into Braille. We are able to provide Braille
menus, public leaflets and business cards in Braille and help make you
compliant with the Disability Discrimination Act. We can translate
from large print, audio tape or audio CD.

We can also help with premises accessibility including Braille Tactile
Signs for toilets and other doors.

All work is proof-read before dispatch and we are able to provide an
express 24-hour service. Please call our offices for an immediate
quotation or for further information on Freephone number 08000 190
946; Mobile: 07903 996533; email ghow@brailletranslations.co.uk or
see:
http://www.brailletranslations.co.uk .

[Special notice ends].


++Section Four: Technology
- JAWS Scripting.

+10: The Language of Flexibility
by Nick Apostolodis.

Although it is certainly not the cheapest screen reader software on the
market, JAWS for Windows is considered to be the most powerful and
flexible text-to-speech converter for home and office computer users.

One of its main strengths is that JAWS can be adapted to work with
just about any software on the market and be customised to give
tremendous power to the blind user.

Much of this power and flexibility stems from the fact that JAWS has
its own scripting language. This language is built into the screen reader
and allows users to write scripts that set the behaviour of JAWS, the
way it reads, or interacts with other applications.

A scripting language, like a human language, contains small units. In a
human language these could be paragraphs, sentences or lines, whereas
in a scripting language they can be functions or logical operators such
as 'if' statements.

So a line of written text like the following:
"Please read me the current line of text"
Would be translated in JAWS scripting as:
SayLine()

The scripting language can even make decisions based on whether
something is true or not. For example, you want to tell JAWS to speak
a help message if an application is running for the first time. Here is
how:

if (CalcFirstTime == 0) then
   SayExtendedHelpHotKey ()
   let CalcFirstTime = 1
endif

The example above is from a script written for a calculator program. It
may look a bit complicated for someone that doesn't understand the
scripting language, but you don't have to know how to write JAWS
scripts to benefit from them. All you need to know is how to download
them into the correct folder (the precise location for your scripts will
depend on which version of JAWS you use); and next time you use the
application to which they relate, they will run automatically.

The tool for creating JAWS scripts is called JAWS script manager. It
can take a source file of text instructions such as the example above
and create a binary program that JAWS can follow. This procedure is
called compilation. So you can write your scripts in text, and let the
script manager compile them for you into instructions that JAWS can
understand.

The JAWS help file contains a good scripting manual to get you
starting to write your first simple scripts, and to help you develop up to
a fairly advanced level.

There are also many web sites containing scripts to download, such as
the Blind Programming site
http://www.blindprogramming.com
which has a JAWS scripting section where one can find scripts for
many applications, as well as email lists that discuss JAWS and JAWS
scripting.

Another useful resource is the Jaws Lite web site at:
http://www.jfwlite.com .
In the programs section of this site there are numerous popular
programs along with their JAWS scripts, and also links to other pages
that offer scripts.

Finally, simply using Google to searching for JAWS scripts will bring
you more results than you can possibly look at in an afternoon, so if the
above pages don't satisfy your curiosity that could be your next step!

So if you are using JAWS and have trouble using a software package,
the chances are that the answer to your problem is a JAWS script for
this application. And if after searching you can't find one, why not set
yourself a challenge to learn the scripting language and write it
yourself?

[Section Four ends].


++End Notes.

+How to Receive the Bulletin.

To subscribe to this free monthly bulletin, email
eab-subs@headstar.com with 'subscribe eab' in the subject header.
You can list other email addresses to subscribe in the body of the
message. Please encourage all your colleagues to sign up! To
unsubscribe at any time, put 'unsubscribe eab' in the subject header.

Please send comments on coverage or leads to Dan Jellinek at:
dan@headstar.com .

Copyright 2005 Headstar Ltd http://www.headstar.com .
The Bulletin may be reproduced as long as all parts including this
copyright notice are included, and as long as people are always
encouraged to subscribe with us individually by email. Please also
inform the editor when you are reproducing our content. Sections of
the bulletin may be quoted as long as they are clearly sourced as 'taken
from e-access bulletin, a free monthly email newsletter', and our web
site address http://www.headstar.com/eab is also cited.

+Personnel:
Editor - Dan Jellinek
Deputy editor - Derek Parkinson
Senior reporter - Mel Poluck
Technician - Nick Apostolidis
Editorial advisor - Kevin Carey.

ISSN 1476-6337 .

[Issue ends.]