> > Tiny keyboards suck for productivity. So do keyboards that don't provide > > tactile feedback that lets you know what keys you're on. And such devices > > also suck for blind users. > >I don't know how many blind people you know personally, but I've a number >of blind and almost blind friends. The iPad and the iPhone has done more >for them than any computer in the two decades before.
I've been married to one for over 30 years, and I know many others. Perhaps it will make things clearer to take a long view. Text/console OSes were the most accessible to blind users. All commands were equally accessible via the keyboard, and output was always unambiguous and nearly always linear--one thing after another chronologically. Once GUIs came in, with multiple ways to do the same things, such as display a button to be pushed, the extent of access began to decline. WordPerfect 4.x under DOS was perfectly accessible to blind users using screen readers. There hasn't been a full-featured word processor that has been fully accessible to screen readers in the Windows environment yet. Software manufacturers, when they bother to make an effort to make things accessible--not often--don't really understand how to do so. Web-based applications are the same way, and the ubiquitous Flash stuff isn't accessible at all. When you buy new software it's a crapshoot whether it will work with a screenreader. Macintosh has come with a built-in screen reader for a while now, and many blind users praise it. But we're still talking tactile keyboards with individual keys here. The addition of screen reading software to the iPad and iPhone is very recent. It's pretty impressive that they've figured out how to get a touch-screen interface to speak. That does not change the fact that touch-screens are not efficient at all for blind users. Being able to move your finger over a touch screen and have it speak until you find what you're looking for is not the same as immediately being able to put your fingers where they need to be because you can feel the buttons. To make a living, blind users have to be as efficient with computers as sighted people are. Touch screens, even with screen readers, are not a step forward for blind people, they are a step backward, and the fact that some can now speak does not change that fact. Ken Dibble www.stic-cil.org _______________________________________________ Post Messages to: [email protected] Subscription Maintenance: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profox OT-free version of this list: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profoxtech Searchable Archive: http://leafe.com/archives/search/profox This message: http://leafe.com/archives/byMID/profox/[email protected] ** All postings, unless explicitly stated otherwise, are the opinions of the author, and do not constitute legal or medical advice. This statement is added to the messages for those lawyers who are too stupid to see the obvious.
