Transcript Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles Mobiles

Assistive Technology for
Information Access (Visual
Impairments) - Computers &
Mobile
SCREEN READERS AND OCR (SCAN AND READ)
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Computers – Desktop and Notebook
• Desktop Computers remain stationary, on a desk or
table.
• Laptop / Notebook Computers are lightweight and
easily carried around
Which suits best, Discuss?
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Computers – Desktop and Notebook
• Desktop offer more memory, cost less, faster
processing speed, stable, large monitor options,
keyboards, mouse handling, support external devices
like DVD Drives and USB devices, Operating Systems
and others..
• Laptop / Notebook offer easy handling, cost higher,
limited external devices support, smaller keyboard,
touchpad mouse, Operating Systems and others..
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Mobiles – Keyboard and Touch Oriented
• Keyboard offer easy to operate, spatial, tactile
information, long usage hours, limited applications
and scalability
• Touch offer more flexibility, applications, information
access, social networking, scalable, tough to orient,
less usage hours
More to be Discussed?
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Selection Criteria and Factors
• Impairment Conditions – Low Vision or Totally Blind,
Deaf Blind or associated conditions
• Environment – School, Higher Education, Daily Life,
Workplace
• Tasks – Task requirements and level (easy and
advanced) may depend on the environment
• Tools – Availability, Affordability, Reliability, Usability
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Screen Readers
Software programs that allow persons with visual
impairments or learning disabilities to read the text that
is displayed on the computer screen with a speech
synthesizer or braille display.
A screen reader is the interface between the computer's
operating system, its applications, and the user.
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Screen Readers – Computers
Commonly used
• Job Access With Speech (JAWS) from Freedom Scientific
• Non Visual Desktop Access (NVDA) from NVAccess.org
• Window-Eyes from GW Micro
• Dolphin Supernova by Dolphin
• System Access from Serotek
• ZoomText Magnifier/Reader from AiSquared
• VoiceOver from Apple
• Orca from GENOME Linux group
• Narrator from Microsoft
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Screen Readers – Mobiles / Tablets
Commonly used
• Talks from Nuance Communications – Symbion OS
• Mobile Speak from Code Factory – Symbion OS
• TalkBack from Google – Android OS
• VoiceOver from Apple – iOS
• PocketHal from Dolphin - Windows
For more info
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_screen_readers
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Text to Speech Synthesis (TTS)
Software program that converts normal language text
into speech. The quality of a speech synthesizer is
judged by its similarity to the human voice and by its
ability to be understood clearly.
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Text to Speech Synthesis (TTS)
The front-end of TTS it converts raw text containing symbols
like numbers and abbreviations into the equivalent of writtenout words. This process is often called text normalization, preprocessing, or tokenization.
Next, assigns phonetic transcriptions to each word, and
divides and marks the text into prosodic units, like phrases,
clauses, and sentences. The process of assigning phonetic
transcriptions to words is called text-to-phoneme or
grapheme-to-phoneme conversion.
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Text to Speech Synthesis (TTS)
Common TTS are
• eSpeak
• Nuance
• Festival
• Flight
• Acapala Voice Synthesizers
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Text to Braille Facility by Screen Readers
Screen readers gathers the content of the screen from the
operating system or an application, converts it into braille
characters and sends it to the Braille display when they are
connected to the computer or mobile.
A Refreshable braille display consisting of a row of
electromechanical character cells, each of which can raise or
lower a combination of six (or in some cases, eight) roundtipped plastic pins as per the converted text sent to it.
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Scanning and Reading
Scanning and reading technology works with a scanner
mechanism to scan paper documents into a computer.
Then, then OCR (Optical Character Recognition) software
will then translate it into digital format. The next process
would be the TTS (Text To Speech) synthesizer of the Screen
reader to read for editing.
Scanning and Reading Technology is available as Software
solutions as well as Independent Tools
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
OCR (Optical Character Recognition)
OCR is a technology to convert the scanned printed text,
into machine-encoded digital text. Further to which the text
to be electronically edited, searched, stored and used in
other processes like Text To Speech
In OCR, one glyph or character in the image format is taken
at a time matched by an algorithm with the font characters
and replaced to form a text, phrase or sentence. Further,
OCR accuracy is enhanced by checking the words with a
dictionary of available words for character segmentation.
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Commonly used OCR Software with Screen Readers
• Kurzweil
• Open Book
• Easy Converter
• ReadIt
• Abbyy Fine Reader
• Free OCR
• IndSenz
More Info at:
http://www.snow.idrc.ocad.ca/content/scanning-and-reading-software
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Scanning and Reading Tools
In Scanning and reading tools, the whole process of
scanning by a scanner, OCR to convert the image into text
and TTS to convert the text to sound are integrated.
The tools acts as an independent device by itself with a
components of a computer with camera replacing a scanner
Information Access for VI in Computers and Mobiles
Commonly used Scanning and Reading Tools
• SARA
• ReadEasy Move
• LexCam
• ClearReader
• Blaze
• Eye Pal Solo / Ace
Queries and Discussion