I might add that I also demonstrated John's Accessible Graphing Calculator to
the lecturer I referred to in my previous email who found the longer
descriptions of the JAVA applets more valuable for ALL his students as a
supplement to the visual material. Although he could not see an immediate
application for such a tool within his particular subject, he was inspired by
the potential that such additional auditory information could bring to several
fields closely related to his discipline. Yet another example of universal
design principles in operation. Many of these accessible techniques enhance
learning for all students and acknowledge that all of us have different
approaches to learning. By extending the range of modes of stimulation we
provide our students, we ensure that we cater for a truly diverse student group
regardless of whether or not the student has a disability.

Denise


-----Original Message-----
From: John Gardner
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: 25/06/2004 3:00 AM
Subject: Re: Fw: Fw:      Announcement: article on online accessibility inthe
Chronicle of              Higher Educa

It may be true that there are some things that people with disabilities
cannot do, but I get touchy when people without disabilities start
explaining that to me.  I damn well know what I cannot do, and it's a
lot
more than most sighted people believe.  And many blind people can do
lots
of things that I cannot.  There are lots of people without disabilities
who
cannot fly a plane or drive a car.  So what?  A person who never learned
to
drive a car won't be denied an office job if they have other means of
transportation.

As for those diagrams, I certainly know how to make those accessible.
The
new ViewPlus Chameleon technology is now in beta test and should reach
market later this year.  One just needs to create graphics or convert
them
to SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) format, take a few moments to open the
file and add labels in the "title" attribute  of important graphical
objects, and then make these files available for all users.
Descriptions
of the whole graphic and the various objects can be helpful, and these
can
be included (in the optional "description" attribute) if the author
wants
to make them really extremely accessible.  But descriptions aren't
usually
necessary when the diagrams are presented in the context of the full
document or unless they are horribly complex.

Such accessible SVG files will be better for everybody, not just blind
people.  A sighted person can click on an object or a text label and
hear
it spoken.  One can also display and hear the description field if
desired.  It has never been possible to do research to learn just how
helpful this will be to people with learning and/or cognitive
disabilities,
but many experts in these fields believe it can improve access
considerably.  A blind user needs to make a tactile copy on a Tiger
embosser, place that copy on some surface (ViewPlus will offer desktop
access units, but other things such as tablet PC screens work well too)
that permit the blind user to locate objects and "click" to hear the
labels
spoken.  In some future time, it should be easy for authors to create
graphics in an automatically accessible form, and only rarely will such
a
graphic need to be "made accessible".   Until that time comes,
inaccessible
graphical information will need to be made accessible, but Chameleon
should
make the effort far easier and faster than it is today.

John Gardner

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