Feed: CNET News.com
Posted on: Friday, November 02, 2007 12:01 PM
Author: CNET News.com
Subject: Leopard looks great. But what if you can't see?
Despite new accessibility features in Leopard, people with
disabilities are
still likely to choose Windows computers over Macs.
View article...
<http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9808510-7.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547
-1_3-0-20>
November 2, 2007 12:01 PM PDT
Leopard looks great. But what if you can't see?
Posted by
Elsa Wenzel
Leopard is Apple's best-looking operating system
yet, from its breezy Cover Flow file browsing to the starry-
looking Time
Machine
backup. It's no wonder visual artists love Macs.
But how well does Leopard work for blind users?
"[Vision-impaired] people who use Macs are mostly in the
category of, "My
boss says
we have to use Macs," or "I'm a teacher and that's what I'm
stuck with,""
said Crista
Earl, director of Web operations at the American Foundation
for the Blind.
Among 10 million visually impaired people in the United
States, at least 1.5
million
use computers, according to the American Foundation for the
Blind. To serve
this
population, Windows machines have traditionally offered more
baked-in features
and compatibility with third-party software
and devices
than Macs.
Earl, who is blind, only uses computers running Microsoft
Windows. She edits
documents
in braille and relies upon a screen-reader application to
"read" text and
links aloud
in Internet Explorer and other programs.
However, to serve users such as Earl, Apple has made
17 Universal Access
enhancements within Leopard.
Leopard is the first operating system that can be installed
using a braille
display.
It also supports the forms of braille used both for reading
and editing.
There are
enhancements to the VoiceOver tool, which reads aloud text on
a page in a
male or
female voice. Users can now move VoiceOver's preferences from
one Mac to
another,
so they don't have to waste time configuring each new machine.
In addition,
VoiceOver
can recognize misspelled words and jump to chunks of a Web
page instead of
forcing
a user to wait while it reads one word at a time.
Earl said these changes are a step in the right direction, and
she hopes to
check
them out on a friend's Mac. Mac OS X also offers
some advantages
over Windows for people with limited vision, such as the
capability to
display the
screen in black and white.
"I don't mean I'd give up my Windows computer," she said. "I
have work to
do. It's
gonna take a lot from the last time I saw VoiceOver."
Accessibility features from any vendor are usually more
frustrating to use
than advertised,
Earl added. Part of the problem is that instead of integrating
essential
tools within
their operating systems, Microsoft and Apple have left it up
to third
parties to
fill in the gaps with extra, paid software.
For example, the screen readers within Windows and Mac OS X
pale next to
applications
like
JAWS
or
Window-Eyes
. Earl wonders why the tech giants don't just buy one of the
better tools,
then weave
it into their operating systems.
"One of the reasons things haven't gotten very far is that the
companies
making screen
readers are constantly fighting the next battle," Earl said.
Blame the ever-evolving nature of Web site designs. Once
screen-reader
makers figured
out how to make Adobe Acrobat accessible, for instance, Adobe
Flash rendered
Web
pages mute to blind users. Now that more Flash sites work with
screen
readers, the
AJAX coding of the Web 2.0 era poses new challenges.
Both the challenges in making accessibility tools and the
market for them
are poised
to expand. More young people are suffering repetitive stress
disorders such
as carpal
tunnel syndrome, while aging Baby Boomers grapple with
diminished vision,
hearing,
and mobility.
People whose hands and arms suffer keyboard fatigue, or worse,
can use
speech-to-text
software that types what they speak. For them, Windows builds in
voice-activated
dictation and commands. Leopard enables voice-activated
commands only. The
rich
Dragon NaturallySpeaking
from Nuance runs only on Windows. For Macs, the equivalent
ViaVoice
(or iListen, which I haven't tested) are considered less robust.
I find each of these dictation applications awkward to use.
Just spend an
hour with
one for a few laughs as it garbles your speech.
Nevertheless, hardware and software manufacturers
appear to be paying more attention
to the needs of an affluent, aging population.
"A newcomer to visual impairment tends to expect, rightly, for
things to be
a whole
lot easier than they are," Earl said. "That pressure of lots
of disappointed
users
might make things better for everybody."
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