Some comments and instructions in this page are for audio browsers and users who browse this site with screen readers. If you can see this paragraph and you are not using a text-only or screen reader browser, either the style sheet for screen viewing didn't load (if so, click on "refresh" to reload the style sheet), or you need to use a World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) standards-supporting browser that has full HTML 4.0.1 Strict and cascading style sheet (CSS) level 2 support. (For information about these browsers, see Standards-supporting browsers.) The Society for Technical Communication is a W3C member: http://www.w3.org/
For additional information, see the Accessibility Design and Features page.
If your browser supports hotkeys, the following hotkeys will move you around the page:
0 to return to the top of the page.
1 to skip navigation links and go to the main content.
2 to move to the top navigation links.
3 to skip the Introduction section.
4 to move to the side navigation links.
5 to move to the bottom navigation links (these include both the top and side navigation links).
6 for the search query input field.
7 to submit search query.
8 to use the Screen style sheet.
: to use the Negative style sheet.
9 to use the Text style sheet.
r to use the Text in large font style sheet.
# to print this page.
l to use the Aural style sheet.
& for Link Suggestion.
n for Name.
s for Subject.
m for Message.
p for Home Phone.
w for Work Phone.
d for Wireless Device / Pager.
x for Contact Preference.
e for E-mail.
f for Fax.
y for Company.
t for Street.
i for City.
a for State.
/ for Post or Zip Code.
o for Country.
u for URL.
b for Membership.
h for Membership Number.
z to Send the message.
c to Clear (reset) the form.
Access keys are activated by pressing Alt (for Windows) or control (for Mac) and the access key character (in some browsers, the access keys are activated by releasing the Alt or control key, then pressing the access key character, then pressing the Enter key). The Tab key will also get you through the page.
Because Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) positioning rules are used in the style sheet, you may find that only Alt 1 (top) works in the latest visual browsers. All four keys should work in older browsers that don't support CSS positioning standards.
Pull browser window out or in to widen or shorten line length.
Introduction
Recent and Relevant
Screen Reading Software
Fonts and Web Accessibility
Additional Resource Information
This page contains information about visual accessibility for blindness, low vision, and color-blindness.
PDF Note: Some hypertext links may take you to Portable Document Format (PDF) files. See the PDF File Information in About This Site for how to download and install the free Acrobat® Reader™ plug-in for your browser.
Offsite Links Note: All offsite links open in a new browser window.
There are several excellent books related to vision. See the suggested reading list for general information and detailed reference books for your library.
See the Resources page for links to Sight / Vision Loss resources on the Web.
The AccessAbility SIG does not diagnose, prescribe, or endorse. We simply provide information to those who want it. For more information about product endorsements and other disclaimers, please see our Legal Information page.
"UCSB Studies Link Alzheimer's Disease, Macular Degeneration", by Josh Braun, Staff Writer. Published Wednesday, May 28, 2003. Issue 135 / Volume 83 New
"Retina shift restores sight: Duke Eye Center performs surgery to help people with macular degeneration see again", by Sarah Avery, Staff Writer. Published by the Raleigh News & Observer - Friday, January 2, 2004 New
The Blind Eye is a hybrid audio game, like The Curb Game and Terraformers. The game is the result of The Blind Eye Research Project, developed in Denmark in 2000, where the participant has the opportunity to experience the virtual world in a manner similar to being visually blind. Conceptually, The Blind Eye examines the idea of seeing in relation to the world. Update: The game is now abandoned and not available for download through the original website (which also has disappeared). A back-up copy of the game is available through a download link, however. All rights remain with the original developer.
February 2005: An accessible phone designed for blind users. – The Owasys 22C mobile phone uses speech synthesis technology that allows you to make and take phone calls and text messages without the use of a visual display. http://www.rnib.org.uk/xpedio/groups/public/documents/PublicWebsite/public_wel0205owasys.hcsp [United Kingdom / Spain]
The Owasys 22C is now available in the U.S. See http://www.screenlessphone.com/index.html
The American Federation for the Blind (AFB) evaluated 11 of the top cell phones on the market to determine the accessibility of today's cell phones for people who are blind or visually impaired. They provide several research reports including a report about three types of cell phones that have speech output for the blind: the Owasys 22C, Nokia 3650 with TALKS Software, and the Nokia 3660 with TALKS Software. This article also describes the 16 features that survey respondents rated as the most important for accessibility for cell phones / mobile phones. http://www.afb.org/afbpress/pub.asp?DocID=aw050406
There is a book published by the American Council of the Blind titled A Guide to Making Documents Accessible to People Who Are Blind or Visually Impaired. This document is available online, in regular print, large print, braille, or on cassette tape. http://www.acb.org/accessible-formats.html
Wednesday, 15th June 2005 – By Gez Lemon. An article about creating alternative stylesheets for people with low vision. This discusses zooming text and color contrast. http://juicystudio.com/article/zoom-low-vision.php
January 21, 2005: Victor K. Wong, a Cornell University graduate student from Hong Kong who lost his sight in a road accident at age seven, is helping to develop innovative software that translates color into sound. "Color is something that does not exist in the world of a blind person," explains Wong. "I could see before, so I know what it is. But there is no way that I can think of to give an exact idea of color to someone who has never seen before." The inspiration for using image-to-sound software came in early 2004 when Wong had problems reading color-scaled weather maps of the Earth's upper atmosphere—a task that is a necessary part of his doctoral work in "space weather," which attempts to predict weather patterns high over the equator for use by Global Positioning System and other satellite communications." more...http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/Jan05/Wong.software.to.html
January 5, 2005: State libraries for the blind in Colorado, Delaware, Illinois, New Hampshire, and Oregon, along with the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (NLS), part of the Library of Congress, have partnered to launch an innovative digital audio book service for visually impaired users.
Unabridged (http://www.unabridged.info/) enables blind patrons to check out and download digital spoken word audio books directly to their computers. The digital audio books can then be played back on a PC, transferred to a portable playback device, or burned onto CDs.
Update: Source: University of Montreal news release, June 2, 2004: Tongue Display Unit (TDU) perfected. More... http://radio.weblogs.com/0105910/2004/06/03.html
2001—A Danish study found that people who were born blind can learn to see by having electrical impulses applied to their tongue. This research may also benefit other groups of disabled patients with brain injuries or diseases such as epilepsy, dementia, blood clots in the brain or patients who have had surgery where a portion of the brain has been removed. Researchers at the University of Wisconsin–Madison are developing a tongue-stimulating system that translates images detected by a camera into a pattern of electric pulses that trigger touch receptors. That people can decode nerve pulses as visual information when they come from sources other than the eyes shows how adaptable, or plastic, the brain is, says Wisconsin neuroscientist and physician Paul Bach-y-Rita, one of the device's inventors. "You don't see with the eyes. You see with the brain," he contends. An image, once it reaches an eye's retina, "becomes nerve pulses no different from those from the big toe," he says. To see, people rely on the brain's ability to interpret those signals correctly. More... See also November 28, 2004: BehindTheMedspeak: BrainPort – See with your tongue and hear and touch as well.
We recently received an inquiry from a student about the shape of the human field of vision. The following Web sites provide information about this.
Anthropometric Methods: Designing to Fit the Human Body (Monographs in Human Factors and Ergonomics) by John A. Jr. Roebuck
BSR/HFES100 Human Factors Engineering of Computer Workstations The 2002 draft is undergoing canvass review in order to be considered as a new American national standard and is available to interested parties.
November 19, 2003: TODAY'S WORD: Web-Braille
See our complete definition with hyperlinks at
http://searchsoa.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid26_gci828599,00.html?track=NL-34
Web-Braille is a data file format that can be read on a Braille display or transmitted to a Braille embosser. Web-Braille files typically have the extension .brf. The Braille codes in Braille-ready files allow blind people to read electronic documents from computer disks or from the Internet.
Web-Braille files generally contain 25 lines per page, with each line holding up to 39 characters. A single printed page translates into several Braille pages; the exact ratio depends on the nature of the document. Mathematical expressions and symbols, as well as graphics, can be converted into words before being translated into Braille-ready files. Complex mathematical documents have the highest Braille-to-text page conversion ratios.
Several thousand Web-Braille books are available for downloading from the National Library Service (NLS) in the U.S. About 40 new books are published online in this format every month. The NLS Web-Braille material is available only to citizens or residents of the United States, or to qualified institutions.
Related terms: Braille display
http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/0,,sid9_gci823441,00.html?track=NL-34
There are several Braille computer codes in the U.S. See About Braille by Liz Gray, Braille Transcriber, Certified by the Library of Congress in Literary Braille.
A universal Braille computer code for technical documents was introduced in 1991. See A Universal Computer Braille Code For Literary And Scientific Texts by Durre, Karl P.; Tuttle, Dean W. and Durre, Ingeborg.
U.S. National Library Service (NLS) Factsheets: Web-Braille
Each year, the National Federation of the Blind grants thirty scholarships to legally blind persons in higher education from college freshmen to doctoral candidates for academic excellence, community service, and financial need. The scholarships range in value from $3000 to $12,000.
Applications for the coming year are due: 31 March 2008.
At a September 2001 STC meeting, Maureen Hogg of the Rocky Mountain chapter (shown at right), demonstrates the use of the Optacon and her other assistive technologies that allow her to communicate and perform her job.
Some fonts are good for reading text in print and others for reading text on a screen. Examples of how some popular fonts look on the screen are shown in the Font Comparisons table. The following resources discuss how font size can impact the readability of web pages.
Dan Brown, , who is blind, sent us the following information.
First, there are several programs that enlarge the print which appears on the computer's screen. Notable among these are the programs Zoomtext Xtra, LP Windows, and Magic. In addition to print enlargement, many of these programs are now providing limited speech, although it is assumed that the user will not be completely dependent on this oral output.
Second, there are programs, usually known as screen readers, which
attempt to read all of the pertinent information which appears on the screen. Notable programs here are Job Access With Speech (JAWS) for Windows®, Window-Eyes, and Outspoken for Windows. Some screen readers can, in addition to the speech which they produce, also display the screen's contents in refreshable Braille on a display device specially designed to show Braille dots.
Third, several Optical Character Recognition programs have been designed
which allow the blind or visually impaired user to scan in text, and have
it recognized and spoken aloud. Kurzweil 1000 and Ruby are two of the
primary OCR programs now being produced.
Fourth, their are specially designed handheld computers, usually
referred to as notetakers, which give the blind/visually impaired person a portable method of writing down and storing information. Most of these devices use a speech interface, but there are also a few which use Braille. The keyboards are sometimes designed around the standard computer qwerty keyboard, and, in other cases, a Braille keyboard is used. Blazie Engineering produces the Type 'n Speak, Braille 'n Speak, and Braille Lite. Another company called Pulse Data produces a notetaker called the Keynote Companion.
"My privately owned business provides training of adaptive technology to
blind consumers of the Texas Commission for the Blind, some private
individuals, and some businesses such as Hilton Worldwide Reservations.
I provide setup, training, programming where needed, and learning materials
in large print, Braille, or cassette."
For information about the products mentioned, see the Resources pages.
AbilityHub has been added to the Resources list under Adaptive Technology. AbilityHub is an assistive technology related web site for people with a disability who find operating a computer difficult, maybe even impossible.
The Video Eye, made by the Video Eye Corporation (10211 West Emerald, Boise, ID 83704; 800-416-0758). This machine videos and projects onto a 27-inch television whatever you place in front of the camera. It magnifies up to 50 times and is designed specifically for persons with reduced vision. Reading, knitting, writing, and so forth can all be facilitated. (Source: Small Farmer's Journal, Spring 2000)
Vischeck is a site that demonstrates different types of color blindness.
British Telecommunications (BT) Age & Disability Action: "Safe web colours for colour-deficient vision" Information and design tools for designing sites so that color cues are not lost.
Color Blindness: NEWMAN Services Corp., which specializes in database and Web application development, offers free tools that let you see how the colors in a Web page or graphic will appear to a person with color blindness. The site includes links to other pages with information about color blindness.
Send comments, questions, and suggestions to the . Or contact the A-SIG Co-Managers directly:
Karen Mardahl
A-SIG Co-Manager:
international issues
E-mail:
Lisa Pappas
A-SIG Co-Manager:
strategic planning, administration
E-mail:
Karen Mardahl
A-SIG Co-Manager:
international issues
E-mail:
Lisa Pappas
A-SIG Co-Manager:
strategic planning, administration
E-mail:
Send link suggestions and Web comments to the .
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