At 11:24 AM 8/6/1998 -0700, Andreas Ramos so eloquently stated:
>>From another (non-technical) list, there has been a bit of a discussion
>about blind users. One fellow is blind and participates in the online
>discussion. He wrote the following. It may be useful to some who might take
>blind users into consideration in their web site design.
>___________________________________________________
>Andreas Ramos [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.andreas.com
>
>
>I use synthetic
>speech. I run a program which results in my soundcard speaking areas of
>the screen which I can designate in a manner which best suits the occasion.
>I can set the talking speed, filter out punctuation, and, if my program is
>sophisticated enough, switch languages.
>
>In order to read books, I use a document scanner and opticle character
>recognition software to translate the scanned images into text files.
>
>I am, therefore, able to gain access to printed material, CD-ROM databases,
>the www and so on.
>
>My access is, however, not necessarily totally unrestricted. The authors
>of the software on which I depend must, from time to time, update their
>programs to take account of difficulties which their users encounter. For
>example, the design of a web page may be such that I find it difficult to
>navigate from link to link. I must make very little use of the mouse,
>because pointing and clicking is a very visual thing. In most cases I am
>able to tab from link to link, but frames are nearly impossible to navigate
>in this way. Also, an excessive use of graphics without text labels makes
>reading links very difficult.
>
The disabled is a whole new ball game on the Net. If you program
for them you need to eliminate graphics and allow a text only
site (graphics really screws up their sound boards). You also
need to be aware of visibly impaired, and have at least 16 point type.
We are working on a disabled folks site now, and are getting
quite a lesson. If you need to verify whether or not you comply,
check out Bobby at http://www.cast.org/bobby/
George
_______________________________________________________
George Matyjewicz, C.M.O. mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
GAP Enterprises, Ltd. http://www.gapent.com/
Moderator of E-Tailer's Digest http://www.gapent.com/etailer/
Your Resource for Retail on the Net
Moderator E-Marketing Digest http://www.webbers.com/emark/
Marketing Your Web http://www.gapent.com/myweb/
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