Martin, I agree with you for the most part.  I just went through the stove issue
and it took some serious looking to find an accessible stove.  However, my point
in all of this is that we contact manufacturers and ask for better software etc.
rather than access which brings manufacturers to the conclusion that computer
accessibility is acceptable.

An interesting thing about all this is that all these digital gadgets could be
made accessible with a port.  There could be a universal box that just plugged
into them all as you needed or wanted and most of the problems would be solved.
Again, this requires an external gadget to make them work but a far less
involved and expensive one than a computer.

Tom


Tom Brennan  KD5VIJ, CCC-A/SLP
web page http://titan.sfasu.edu/~g_brennantg/sonicpage.html

On Sat, 18 Sep 2010, Martin McCormick wrote:

> Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2010 17:37:04 -0500
> From: Martin McCormick <[log in to unmask]>
> Reply-To: For blind ham radio operators <[log in to unmask]>
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: D-star?
>
> 	My take on this is that equipment these days presently comes in 3
> flavors. The rarest of them are the few electronic gadgets that
> tell us in some way everything we need to know to use them and
> don't cost any more than devices of the last flavor which I will
> get to in a second.
>
> 	I have seen talking scales and thermometers that cause
> us no problem at all and give us as much information as they
> give anybody else.
>
> 	The next category of stuff is what we were all talking
> about before, namely things you can work through a computer that
> would otherwise be useless due to their profusion of menus.
>
> 	Then there is the last flavor. This is the stuff that
> has no plan B at all built in to it. There is this stupid shiny
> glass pannel that is the sole output channel.
>
> 	This is the stuff that isn't in compliance with any sort
> of accessibility standards. We just bought a brand new Whirlpool
> gas stove in which the burners are perfectly normal. They are
> controlled by rotary knobs that turn valves. You can hear the
> spark light the gas and adjust the flame the way people have
> done it for literally centuries except for the electric spark,
> of course.
>
> 	The oven, however, has electronic controls and I think
> the company actually must have hired somebody to design it to be
> as inaccessible as possible. There is this oval flat touch
> pannel with absolutely no clue as to where you can press to make
> things happen. One of the buttons from Hell is an up arrow to
> raise the oven temperature by a few degrees per push. It beeps
> the first time you press it, but makes no other sound so you
> don't know if you pushed it twice or didn't push it at all.
>
> 	The timer portion of the controller is the same way. You
> could burn either a lot of food or even your house down by just
> one or two fat-finger mistakes. The oven does beep when it
> reaches operating temperature. The smoke alarm tells you when
> you reached the kindling point of whatever was in the oven.
>
> 	My computer is two rooms away. Even if there was some
> way to tap in to the brains of this controller, it wouldn't be
> practical. This is unacceptable but I don't know of any other
> model of stove that has anything better.
>
> 	I have not seen one hand-held transceiver that I would
> feel comfortable using since the days of the ICom2AT. I own a
> HTX202 and 404 I bought at a ham fest but they are boarder line
> accessible or inaccessible. You can set them up if you are
> patient.
>
> 	I whole point to all this is that the ultimate goal is
> equipment we can use without hooking it up to a computer. The
> stuff we can work with a computer is better than nothing and the
> stuff like that oven controller and a lot of modern ham gear is
> just no good at all.
>
> Martin
>
> Tom Brennan writes:
> > Martin, I'm 57 so we're about the same age.  I remember when pretty much
> > nothing
> > was accessible and the world was all about using readers.  My problem with
> > things at present is that people get all excited about being able to
> > access
> > something with their computer rather than directly and that's what we are
> > now
> > pushing manufacturers to provide.  There are some great exceptions like
> > that
> > Omnimate bar code reader but more and more what people are telling
> > manufacturers
> > is "make the computer program accessible.  The standard response that I
> > now get
> > when talking to manufacturers is "you can access it with our computer"
> > which is
> > not access and does not comply with the ADA but rather than require that
> > manufacturers spend $.50 to put a speech chip in something like they've
> > done
> > with that Hamelton-Beach microwave we're just wanting it computer
> > accessible.
> > So long as we call that accessible it will never change and we will have
> > acknowledge ADA or 504 compliance.
> >
> > Tom
> >
> >
> > Tom Brennan  KD5VIJ, CCC-A/SLP
> > web page http://titan.sfasu.edu/~g_brennantg/sonicpage.html
> >
> >
>