If you would have told me a decade ago that one day there would be a law requiring virtually all text communication, mobile phone Web browsers, TVs, and broadcast emergency alerts to be fully accessible to people who are blind or visually impaired, I would likely have told you to keep dreaming. But if you also told me that this same legislation would be stronger than any communications law for people with disabilities previously enacted, that it would result in more than 60 hours a week of described video programming, and, amazingly, that it would permanently make up to $10 million per year available to put expensive communications equipment in the hands of people who are deaf-blind, I might have told you that you have a rich, albeit nerdy, fantasy life.

As incredible as it sounds, such legislation is now the law of the land, thanks to the passage of the Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act, or CVAA. While readers of AccessWorld are no doubt some of the more savvy and connected folks who follow developments in technology policy, this brief rundown of what the CVAA does was written to provide a better understanding of the changes people who are blind or visually impaired can and should expect from the communications, consumer electronics, and video programming industries.

Communications

Long before the CVAA became law, telecommunications equipment manufacturers and service providers had some limited responsibilities for ensuring that people with disabilities could independently make phone calls and use both traditional and mobile phone technologies. Under these long-standing rules, the equipment and services provided need only be accessible when doing so doesn't require a company to invest much money or effort to make it happen. What's more, with some exceptions—such as caller ID and address book functions—the old rules were limited to phone call accessibility. The many common functions people use their phones for today, such as text messaging, email, and browsing the Internet, were not covered. That's where the CVAA comes in. Now, companies that make communications equipment or offer related services must make advanced functions such as electronic messaging accessible unless it's simply not possible to do so. In effect, the CVAA raises the bar considerably in terms of what companies are expected to do for communications accessibility, and goes a long way to clarify accessibility standards and responsibilities.

Any time a member of Congress talks about regulating something related to the Internet, people get skittish. So when access advocates made it clear that full accessibility, including Internet accessibility, was required if people with vision impairment were to have full use of the devices and services they pay for, both industry and Congress got a bit nervous. Nevertheless, advocates insisted that any law lauding itself as a twenty-first century accessibility law had to deal with the Internet. As a result, the CVAA does cover Internet access, but in a bit of a limited way. The CVAA states that whenever electronic messaging is offered—whether it's on a mobile phone, a desk phone, a desktop computer, or some other device—it must be accessible to people with disabilities. In the case of Internet browsing, however, the law is a bit narrower. Only the browsers on mobile phones need to be accessible, and the CVAA, rather unusually and disappointingly, limits this accessibility requirement to those who are blind or visually impaired. Those with other disabilities are not covered.

Though the electronic messaging and Internet browser access requirements are already considered to be in effect, noncompliance complaints will not be heard by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) until October 2013. Why this strange timeline? The law was signed by President Obama on October 8, 2010, and the FCC was required to issue regulations implementing the new law one year from that date. As part of the process for developing those rules, the FCC heard from industry that at least a two-year transition period would be required to adequately prepare for the new mandates. The accessibility community raised strong objections to the two-year delay, so the FCC compromised by requiring that the new access obligations begin immediately, but that complaints about noncompliance won't be entertained until the two-year window has passed. So, starting in October of 2013, a complaint can be filed with the FCC concerning equipment or service inaccessibility experienced at any time, including retroactive complaints dating back to the start of the law's implementation. In other words, if you buy a mobile phone in 2012 that doesn't offer you accessible text messaging or e-mail functionality, you can complain to the FCC about it—in October of 2013. In any event, once the complaint is filed, the FCC will work with you to resolve the complaint with the company. If the complaint is not resolved, the FCC will make a final determination—which could involve anything from a finding that your complaint is without merit or that the company violated the accessibility law—within six months. If a company is found to have violated the CVAA, it may be liable for financial penalties (payable to the United States), and/or maybe required to a change in behavior on the company's part to ensure accessibility going forward. The FCC is also empowered to make the consumer whole, meaning that complaint resolution should include putting an accessible phone in the hand of the consumer at no additional cost, even if the accessible phone is a higher priced, more feature-rich device.

Video Programming

As exciting as the CVAA communications requirements are in terms of their potential to revolutionize our personal and workplace inclusion and competitiveness, the CVAA video programming provisions are sure to be among the new law's most popular features. First and foremost is the CVAA unambiguous requirement that greatly increases the availability of video description of prime-time and children's programming. While PBS has offered described programming for years and a couple national broadcast networks have described a few programs here and there, the commercial broadcasting, cable, and motion picture industries have fought tooth and nail to prevent video description from becoming a right of the blind and visually impaired television audience. The CVAA unambiguously establishes that the four national broadcast networks, ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox, as well as the top-ranked channels' USA, the Disney Channel, TNT, Nickelodeon, and TBS, must describe at least 50 hours of their prime-time and/or children's programming during each calendar quarter. That's an average of at least four hours per week.

These new video description regulations make a bit of a distinction between the obligation of the CVAA-covered networks to provide description and the obligations of your local station or rural cable company to pass that description on to you. There are some protections in the CVAA for small cable providers and for local stations that would experience a serious technological and/or financial burden in order to provide the service. That said, since passing through description shouldn't be a big technical or financial deal for almost every station and cable provider in America, we should assume that description will be very widely available.

So, beginning next July, what do you do if your favorite show isn't being described or you can't seem to get your hands on a description? You of course can contact your local station or cable provider and ask them how to receive their pass-through of the described programming. You can also contact the national networks to request that a given program be described. If your local station or cable provider tells you that they do not pass description through or that they don't know how to make it happen for you, you can lodge a complaint with the FCC. While the station or cable provider might reply that they don't have to guarantee description and/or that passing description through would constitute prohibitive cost, the FCC needs to determine whether either of those claims is true. As a side note: the disability community asked the FCC to set parameters for stations and cable providers who might claim that getting technically up to speed to pass description through would require more than a modest cost, and the FCC declined.

A related issue is how to tune into a program if our TV and/or cable box or satellite equipment is itself inaccessible. The CVAA states that digital TVs and other devices that receive and play broadcast and cable programming must have controls that allow people with vision loss to use all programming-relevant menus, to scan channels, to easily turn on description for programs offering it, and to manipulate any and all features related to these functions. Gone will be the days when simply using the volume control requires sighted assistance.

As always, there are a few provisos. While equipment like digital TVs will have to provide accessible controls and menus out of the box, cable and satellite providers need only make their equipment accessible upon the request of a customer. Why the difference? Well, some tech experts have pointed out that the set-top box's days are numbered in terms of being the primary way for cable and satellite companies to securely deliver their programming, so including them in the law would be legislating a dying technology. Regardless, whether access is built into the device or provided upon request, it's clearly required by the CVAA. Implementation of this requirement is still being defined, but will certainly take place over multiple years. AFB is playing a leadership role in this process, joining industry and advocates to set the direction the FCC will follow in issuing the next major set of regulations to make all this possible. It's a slow process, but in the end it will result in substantial improvements to accessibility.

Other Key Benefits of the CVAA

As mentioned earlier, the CVAA will break down enormous barriers for those of us who are deaf-blind by establishing, for the first time, a clear and substantial source of funding for the often incredibly expensive equipment needed to communicate interpersonally and via the telephone or the Internet. This $10-million program, administered by the FCC through an array of agreements with organizations and consortia from around the country, will provide both equipment and training in the use of equipment. Methods for procuring equipment and receiving training will depend on location. As of this writing, the FCC is still setting up various agreements with regional organizations and agencies, but the bottom line is that the CVAA will fill a huge gap by creating a reliable resource pipeline.

The CVAA also fills a gap in the way emergency information is broadcast to those of us who can't see on-screen text. The status quo simply alerts the viewer with vision loss about emergency information through a simple tone. The CVAA says that the FCC will establish more meaningful ways for viewers with vision loss to access emergency information, particularly through audible messages containing the text of the displayed emergency alert. AFB is leading advocacy efforts as the FCC hammers out the specifics of this element of the law.

Future Issues

Of course no single law can anticipate every contingency or address every problem—particularly a law concerned with communications accessibility—but the CVAA does tackle a wide array of barriers to access. Devices that aren't yet covered by the CVAA but that will clearly need to be addressed in the future include:

• Hand-held gaming devices that also allow users to text each other.
• TVs that connect to the Internet and allow phone calls.
• The increasing number of devices that can connect to the Internet but are not within the communications and entertainment realm, such as the kitchen appliance or the thermostat that can be manipulated from the cloud.

With respect to multi-function devices, like the gaming device that also offers text messaging, the CVAA regulations state that the FCC will look both to the way a device is designed and how the device is marketed to determine what the primary purpose of a given device really is. If that primary purpose is not a communications function covered by the CVAA, the device need not be accessible. So, does the gaming device that offers text messaging need to be accessible? If the device is designed to allow the user to send and receive text messages between individuals and is at all marketed for its ability to do so, it should be covered by the CVAA. That said, the CVAA allows industry to petition the FCC for a waiver of coverage for mixed-function devices that they argue have a primary purpose other than CVAA-covered communication. We'll have to watch for any such petitions and respond accordingly. We also need to do a much better job in our community with complaint generation and follow-through. While it's true that the FCC doesn't have a very good track record of aggressive enforcement of communications accessibility laws, it's equally true that the disability community has generated precious few complaints to hold industry accountable for the uniformly bad job it has done to make traditional and mobile phones accessible. If the vast array of new expectations created by the CVAA are going to have any meaning, individual consumers must refuse to put up with unusable technology and be willing to make their voices heard through the complaint process. Remember that if you think that a device you're using is noncompliant, and you're willing to take action, AFB stands ready to help as you navigate your way through the complaint process.

Comment on This Article

For more than a decade now, products designed to assist people who are blind or visually impaired with way-finding and landmark identification have been at the forefront of the assistive technology arena. HumanWare has been a leader in the development of such products, and its Trekker Breeze was developed as a direct response to feedback from blind and low-vision customers. As its name implies, the Trekker Breeze is lightweight and simple to use, but delivers torrents of valuable information to the traveler.

The Trekker Breeze Way-Finding Device

No device will take the place of solid orientation and mobility skills, acquired by effective use of a long white cane or guide dog. Your cane or guide dog, however, can't tell you the name of the intersection ahead, the location of a church or coffee shop, or when to turn into your own driveway. The Trekker Breeze uses global positioning satellites and current maps to provide critical navigation and orientation information while you are out and about. If you are out for an exploratory stroll, for instance, and know that you must walk four blocks north and two blocks west to get to the neighborhood park, the Trekker Breeze can confirm your direction for you and tell you the names of streets as you approach them. The Trekker Breeze can help you find a favorite bench or tree in the park if you've added the location into the device as a landmark. In an unfamiliar environment, the Trekker Breeze can help you learn the route from your hotel to a recommended museum or restaurant, and even give you information about the various types of intersections you encounter along the way.

Physical Description

About the size of a chubby remote control and weighing about eight ounces, the Trekker Breeze is lightweight and portable. Although small enough to fit in a pocket, the unit receives the strongest signal and functions most efficiently when carried in the hand or worn over the shoulder. Worn over the shoulder with the included strap, the unit hangs within easy reach of the right or left hand for pressing buttons as needed.

The device's thoughtful construction includes only nine buttons on the face of the unit, each one large and easily distinguished by touch. The buttons are of varying shapes and colors, spaced well apart, and provide immediate audible feedback (beeping or speaking) when pressed. The on/off switch is on one side of the device and a thumb wheel volume control is on the other. The AC adapter port and SD/USB ports have protective rubberized covers. Although the unit does have a built-in speaker, I typically made use of the 2.5mm earphone jack on the top of the unit for connecting the external speaker mounted on the shoulder strap. (Earphones, of course, can also be used, although this configuration is not recommended during independent travel for obvious safety reasons.) Supplied with the unit is a DVD containing all US maps and a 2GB SD card. Up to four maps can be stored on the SD card for use on the Trekker Breeze at any given time.

Using the Device

When you power up the Trekker Breeze, it emits a single beep (it beeps twice at power off) and the words "Initializing Breeze" are spoken along with the battery status. Pressing the information button at any given time, you can find out the power of the GPS signal (low, medium, or high), compass direction in which you are heading, number of feet you have traveled, and the rate of speed at which you are moving. Pressing the "Where Am I" button will announce your nearest address or landmark. As you walk, you can set the Trekker Breeze to announce each intersection as you approach it, along with identifying information about that intersection. Heading north on Main Street toward Sixth Street, for instance, the Trekker Breeze might say, "Sixth Street on the right in 300 feet" or "Sixth Street on the right and left in 300 feet" and pressing the "Where Am I" button will give you the additional information that your nearest address is 526 Main Street or the name of a landmark located at that address.

You can customize the Trekker Breeze easily by using the Record button to record routes or landmarks. Standing at a favorite park bench, for example, you simply press the Record button and say "Park bench" and when you are next in the vicinity of that bench the Breeze will announce it for you. Routes are recorded in the same way. Walk the route and record turns as you go. Trekker Breeze will then guide you through the route when you next select it from your list of recorded routes. If you select a landmark as destination or enter an address, the Trekker Breeze will create a route for you. The Breeze will announce the segments of the route as you travel, saying, for instance, "Get ready to turn right on Maple Ave in 200 feet" or "Stay on Cedar Street." If you have missed a step in your directions, you can always hear previous steps repeated. Another nice feature is the ability to review a route indoors before beginning your adventure.

The Trekker Breeze works well in vehicles as well as in pedestrian mode, and will automatically adjust itself to vehicle mode (detecting the change by the speed at which you are traveling) and shift gears to provide information accordingly.

Accuracy

Like all GPS guidance devices, the Breeze is accurate to about 30 feet. It can tell you when you are almost at the corner of Fifth and Vine but it's up to you and your mobility skills to know when to stop for traffic. In addition to this standard margin of error, the Breeze required a considerable warm-up time of about 30 minutes to orient itself properly. I got in the habit of turning on the device a half-hour before departure, making sure to leave it close to a window where it could get a good signal. Even with this advance preparation, the device sometimes would begin by properly identifying the street on which I started, but would announce an incorrect direction of travel. Similarly, the Breeze once told me that it could not create a route because I was not yet on a street, when I was, in fact, driving down a major city road in bright mid-afternoon sun with no tall buildings around to impede GPS reception. Ultimately, though, the Breeze got the direction and all other information sorted out correctly and, once oriented, the device performed admirably.

The user's guide for the Breeze is quite clear and reasonably concise.

The Bottom Line

The Trekker Breeze is an easy and intuitive product to use. While waiting for the Trekker Breeze to warm up or wake up is sometimes decidedly annoying, once it has done so, it's a joy to use and a great support for independent navigation.

The Trekker Breeze sells for $929, including one regional map, and can be ordered by visiting the HumanWare website or by calling (800) 722-3393.

Comment on This Article

If you use any type of assistive technology, or work with anyone who does, you may already be familiar with the more common speech and magnification programs— like JAWS, MAGic, and ZoomText—that have been on the market for several years. In the last few years, a number of assistive technology solutions have emerged that focus on the needs of an ever-growing and diverse population, including senior citizens and war veterans, who are blind or visually impaired. CDesk COMPASS, developed by the California-based company AdaptiveVoice, is a low-cost ($395) screen reading and magnification solution for Windows that includes 14 applications designed specifically to help people who are blind or low-vision complete common computer tasks.

Installing CDesk

CDesk can be downloaded as a 15-day trial, or purchased directly from the AdaptiveVoice website. The CDesk interface uses a high-contrast color scheme, with white text on a black background. After you download the program, the installation wizard provides both screen magnification and speech output. After installation, a high-contrast icon is placed on the desktop and the program is added to the Start menu for easy access. You can elect to have CDesk launch at startup, and you can always press Ctrl + Shift + C at any time to launch CDesk.

Documentation and Help

AdaptiveVoice provides an installation video and an overview video on its homepage. During the installation process, the CDesk user is encouraged to call the AdaptiveVoice technical support number if any difficulties arise with the program. The Help option within CDesk consists of a series of text files and videos that provide detailed information on the use of specific applications. The Help option can be accessed at any point within CDesk by pressing Alt + H. If technical issues can't be resolved over the phone, AdaptiveVoice technical support is able to remotely access CDesk on your computer in order to problem-solve any issues.

Caption: Screen shot of CDesk User Interface

Color Scheme and Magnification Features within CDesk

The high-contrast, white-on-black CDesk color scheme can't be modified. While white-on-black is an effective and commonly preferred color scheme, it would be nice to have the option to adjust the interface display for those who have a different preference. The main user interface, along with all available menus and some essential shortcut keyes located in the top-right corner of the screen, use very large white letters. The size of the menu items can't be modified, but the text size within specific applications can be effectively increased or decreased by pressing F12 and F11, respectively. A very large white pointer is used as the default mouse pointer throughout the CDesk applications. This extra-large pointer size is a valuable feature, since one of the most frequent complaints for people with low vision using the computer is the inability to locate and track the mouse pointer.

Screen Reading Capability

When you launch CDesk, it searches your system for the available SAPI voices on your computer. Microsoft Anna is the voice used with Windows Vista and Windows 7. Microsoft Anna will sometimes mispronounce common words (for example, the word "header" is pronounced as "heater"). AdaptiveVoice lists the text-to-speech readers by IVONA on its website as other optional voices to add. If you are new to using a screen reader and are having difficulties understanding the speech output of Microsoft Anna, investing in a higher-quality IVONA reader is well worth considering. The additional cost of an IVONA reader is approximately $75.

Word Processing

Not to be confused with Microsoft Word, the CDesk WORD application is a word editing processor that allows you to create a basic document and apply basic text formatting. Navigation within this application is straightforward. WORD contains a spell check option that is easy to use, both visually and audibly. The menu items listed can be accessed by either pressing the Tab key or the Alt key. For those familiar with some of the shortcut keys used in Microsoft Word and other Windows-based applications, such as Ctrl + I to italicize text and Ctrl + E to center text, these same shortcut keys also work in the CDesk WORD application. WORD allows you to save a file in one of three formats: Rich Text (.rtf), Word document (.doc), and MP3 (.mp3). By default, files are saved in Rich Text format.

There are a few glitches with the WORD application. The default size of the viewable text on the screen is quite small, especially in comparison to the rest of the user interface. For most low-vision users, it will be necessary to press the F12 key in order to increase the viewable font size. It is not possible to change the actual font size itself. When the Select Font menu item is accessed, the Windows Font dialog box is opened and the CDesk reader is not able to read any of its contents. The size of the dialog box itself reverts back to the original Windows size and color scheme, and therefore renders it difficult or impossible for a person with low vision to read it. The Invert Text option listed under the Font menu is also a little misleading. This feature simply selects all of the unselected text in the document (if no text is selected when you choose Invert Text, all of the text in the document is selected).

E-mail

Compared to other e-mail applications such as Outlook, the CDesk EMAIL application is very basic in design. It allows you to effectively carry out most of the essential e-mail related tasks—such as sending and receiving e-mails, sending and receiving attachments, forwarding, and replying to e-mails—with ease. When receiving e-mails from recipients for the first time, it also conveniently asks if you wish to add the new e-mail recipient to your Contacts List. The only criticism that I have with this application is the potential confusion that can ensue when receiving e-mails as HTML (which is not accessible via the CDesk screen reader or screen enhancement features) versus plain text. This situation is easily remedied by pressing Alt + T, which effectively converts an e-mail from HTML to plain text.

Contact List

CDesk CONTACT is a straightforward application for entering and retrieving essential information for your contacts. It replicates the basics of the Contacts option in Microsoft Outlook. Press the Tab key to cycle through the various edit fields available, and type in the necessary information for each entry.

Browsing the Internet

Using the CDesk INTERNET application is fairly complex, from both low-vision and speech-user perspectives. For low-vision users, the F12 and F11 keys increase and decrease the viewable area, respectively. However, the extra-large mouse pointer within CDesk reverts back to the Windows default size when hovering anywhere within the browser window, and none of the screen enhancement effects of CDesk are applied to the browser window itself. It's possible to partition the screen so that both the Web browser and various elements of the website itself are displayed, but the viewable area of the Web browser becomes so small at that point that it can defeat the purpose of visually accessing a website within CDesk.

It can be a little daunting to rely on the screen reader to access CDesk's INTERNET application, particularly if you are new to using a screen reader. When using the screen reader with the INTERNET application, a grasp of the various elements of a webpage are required, including a solid understanding of headers, text elements, link elements, image elements, and form functions. All of the available links on a given webpage can be displayed in a list, and can be accessed either with the Up and Down Arrow keys, or by pressing the first letter of the desired link. Specific elements of a webpage can also be displayed, or removed, within a list using a series of shortcut keys.

In light of the fact that CDesk is marketed as a product designed to "carry out activities simply and easily," the INTERNET application may disappoint some users who were hoping to freely surf the Internet with relative ease.

Phone

The CDesk PHONE application is designed to interface with Skype. In order to use PHONE, Skype must be installed and fully functioning on your computer. Contacts from your Skype account will transfer over to the PHONE application. Skype requires third-party applications such as CDesk to be authorized by the user once per session. This authentication only appears on the Taskbar, and is not accessible via the screen reader or the screen enhancement features of CDesk. Unfortunately this renders the PHONE application inaccessible to people who rely solely on the screen reading and screen enhancement features of CDesk.

Document Reading and Scanning

The READ/SCAN application allows you to read and scan documents. The Normal Scan option within this application essentially takes an electronic photocopy of the document or image exactly as it appears on the bed of your scanner. The OCR Scan/Read option does a reasonably good job of converting a document into an electronic format. After the file is converted to text, a number of editing options are available within the application such as adding bullets, adjusting paragraphs, and spell checking. This application also allows you to save the file as a Rich Text file, Microsoft Word document, or an MP3 file. Unfortunately, this scanning feature does not autocorrect the direction of the text if the document itself is placed on the scanning bed incorrectly. If you are unable to see the direction of the print, this limitation puts you at an obvious disadvantage when trying to convert documents into an electronic format.

Calendar

The CDesk CALENDAR application allows you to easily look up a specific date, insert appointments, and review them at a later time. The calendar view can be easily changed to day, week, or month, and can also list any tasks that have been entered. The various views can be easily accessed using the Tab and Enter keys, or shortcut keys. This application does exactly what an accessible calendar should do; it provides easy entry and retrieval of appointments on specific times and dates.

Calculator

The CDEsk CALCULATOR application effectively repeats the numbers and functions of the calculator as they are pressed, and reads aloud a running total as calculations are entered. A loud chime occurs immediately after pressing every function or number. For a person not used to using a screen reader, the additional information pressed after every key such as the chime and the ongoing running total may take a little getting used to. From a visual perspective, the numbers and functions of the calculator are clearly laid out. However, for low-vision users, the extra-large, high-contrast mouse pointer reverts back to its default size when hovering over the numbers and functions of the calculator. This may pose a challenge when tracking the mouse pointer.

Spreadsheet

Depending on the task at hand, the skill level required to use the CDesk SPREADSHEET application can quickly move past that of a novice computer user. CDesk requires that the Open Office spreadsheet application be downloaded and installed on your computer in order for the SPREADSHEET application to work. Essentially, you use the Open Office spreadsheet application within the CDesk user interface. A firm understanding of cells, rows, and columns is required for this application, especially if you are relying solely on the screen reader. Also, an understanding of formulas is required in order to perform basic functions such as adding a column of numbers. With the use of shortcut keys, you can insert rows and columns, delete rows and columns, and move the focus of attention to a specific cell or series of cells. Several other options are available, including the ability to change the foreground and background colors. However, these color changes are not actually displayed on the screen after they have been carried out. Only after the spreadsheet is sent to a color printer, or is accessed via a spreadsheet application outside of CDesk such as Excel, will the color changes be displayed. Additional format changes can be carried out such as bolding or italicizing text, but these changes can only be applied to selected rows or columns, not individual cells.

For a novice computer user unfamiliar with creating and editing spreadsheets, this application can very quickly become overwhelming. However, if you are simply entering basic information, this application can be a valuable tool. As an example, you could create a list of medications you use in one column, with the number of times that particular medication needs to be taken in the adjoining column. For low vision users, the F12 and F11 keys will allow you to readjust the viewable size of the spreadsheet as needed.

Books and Periodicals

If you are registered with NLS BARD or Bookshare, the BOOKS AND PERIODICALS application will allow you to seamlessly download your books after the necessary credentials have been entered in the Media Setup section within CDesk. The application will automatically detect the media device to download to, whether it's a USB drive used with an NLS talking book player for instance, or a Victor Reader Stream. For additional information on this powerful application, read Deborah Kendrick's article, An Evaluation of CDesk for Media, in the February 2011 issue of AccessWorld.

Music/Audio

CDesk MUSIC/AUDIO gives you access to your music and audio files via the CDesk user interface. A good understanding of folder and file structures will be helpful when searching for various music and audio files on your hard drive. This application does not automatically import any of these files for you, but it does give you the option to create your own playlist of music and other audio files.

Games

When the CDesk GAME ARCADE application is accessed, it opens with a qualifying statement that lets you know that the games do not have any visual interface, and that "AdaptiveVoice does not guarantee the workings of these games." Indeed, several of the games listed did not work. When attempting to access some of the games such as Hangman Word Game, for instance, a small dialog box appears on the screen that gives a run-time error message.

Streaming Radio

The CDesk INTERNET RADIO application is simple to use, and highly effective. Using only a few keystrokes, you can access a wide selection of radio stations locally, nationally, and internationally. The application also allows you to add your favorite Internet radio stations to a list that is saved for future reference. All of the options available within this application are easily accessed by using the Tab and Arrow keys. The one criticism I have with this application is that the radio station is often louder than the screen reader itself, which makes it challenging to navigate within the application. It's possible to independently control the volume level of the radio via the Shift + Page Up and Shift + Page Down shortcut keys, but it would be useful if the default volume of the radio were set to a lower level.

News Reader

The CDesk NEWS READER application seamlessly retrieves news stories from over 100 news sources in an accessible format. With the menu-driven style of navigation, the options within this application are easily accessed using a combination of the Tab and Arrow keys. The available news sources include both national and international news such as CNN, Reuters and BBC. For low vision users, the F12 and F11 keys increase and decrease the viewable text respectively, and the application effectively wraps the text within the viewable window, thereby allowing you to simply scroll up or down as opposed to maneuvering left and right in order to see the entire line.

The Bottom Line

Bundling both a speech-enabled and screen-magnification software solution, along with 14 applications, into a single interface is an ambitious undertaking for any company. Although there are still some glitches that need to be ironed out with specific aspects of a few CDesk applications, most of the applications do a good job of simplifying tasks that would otherwise be difficult in the typical Windows environment. For example, sending an e-mail, adding a new e-mail recipient to your contacts list, creating an appointment, and accessing multiple Web-based news sources are all easily carried out in CDesk with just a handful of keystrokes. CDesk is not designed to handle more sophisticated or complex online tasks such as online banking, making purchases at various online retail outlets, or spending a lot of time on social media sites like Facebook. If you want to carry out basic computer tasks on a regular basis, though, CDesk might be a viable solution.

For people with limited experience using a screen reader, the reader that CDesk relies on within the Windows system may take some time to get used to. It's possible to slow down and speed up the speech rate, but if understanding the screen reader is the primary barrier to accessing the features that CDesk provides, purchasing a higher-quality text-to-speech reader, like the voices that IVONA provides, should be considered. Even with higher-quality synthesizers, there is a significant learning curve involved in becoming comfortable with synthesized speech. A basic understanding of the keyboard layout will also be needed in order to use CDesk effectively. This is less of an issue those who have enough functional vision to see the keys.

The high-contrast color scheme and increased text size used in the CDesk suite, along with the extra-large mouse pointer, may work well for many low-vision users. However, individuals with field-loss may prefer smaller-size fonts, and there are some individuals who may function better with a color scheme other than CDesk's white-on-black. Although CDesk provides options to increase or decrease the size of the viewable text, the color scheme and size of the user interface can't be changed.

Product Information

Product: CDesk Compass

Price: $395 (In addition to a 15-day free trial version, AdaptiveVoice also provides a free, fully licensed copy of CDesk to non-profit organizations.)

Available From:
AdaptiveVoice
25286 Adelanto
Laguna Niguel, CA 92677
(949) 436-7760

Comment on This Article

Dear AccessWorld readers,

Two hundred years ago, a blind child or adult had no effective way to read and write independently. Today, thanks to the invention of Louis Braille and advancements in technology, children and adults throughout the world can read and write as well as their sighted counterparts. Braille's invention—a system of raised dots representing letters, numbers, and punctuation—truly revolutionized independent communication for blind people.

This month AccessWorld celebrates the anniversary of Louis Braille's birthday, January 4, 1809. We also celebrate the braille code, named after its young inventor, and the expanded possibilities for literacy and independence Louis Braille created for blind people everywhere.

In celebration, the AccessWorld team invites you to visit The Louis Braille Museum on the AFB website, which illustrates the life and legacy of the creator of the braille code. Using photographs, engravings, and illustrations from books preserved in the AFB Archives and Rare Book Collection, the museum traces Louis Braille's life from his childhood in Coupvray, France, through his student years in Paris, to his invention of the braille code and the recognition of its importance throughout the world.

We also invite you to read The Reading Fingers, the full text of Jean Roblin's classic 1952 biography of Louis Braille, and Braille, the Magic Wand of the Blind, Helen Keller's essay on Louis Braille, written around 1924. In this essay, Helen Keller describes how the braille system works and relates how she benefited from learning and using braille. She describes the reading systems that existed prior to braille and the debates of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries over competing embossed systems.

Today, braille has made the leap into the increasingly fast-paced world of technology via braille notetakers and braille displays. The following braille-related articles from the AccessWorld archives will be interesting and useful to those who are interested in, or users of, braille and braille technology.

The Device That Refreshes: How to Buy a Braille Display

She Rules the Braille Domain: An Interview with Judy Dixon

Product Evaluation: Braille Sense OnHand Notetaker and PDA from HIMS, Inc.

Refreshabraille Portable Braille Display and Keyboard: A Product Evaluation

The Touch That Means So Much: Training Materials for Computer Users Who Are Deaf-Blind

The AccessWorld team hopes you enjoy this issue, and we wish you the best in the new year!

Lee Huffman

AccessWorld Editor-in-Chief

Braille Bug News

In classrooms across the country, school children are learning how to read and write braille with the help of a ladybug. AFB's Braille Bug website and teaching materials help to raise awareness of braille literacy by introducing sighted children in grades three through six to basic braille concepts. The site also provides teachers with the tools they need to bring braille into the mainstream classroom. The curriculum mascot is a ladybug who shows how her dots can be arranged into a trail of meaningful language and communication.

The Braille Bug website is designed for use by children, parents, and teachers. It includes games, secret messages, a reading club, and information about Helen Keller and Louis Braille. Children can change the colors of the site to learn how people with visual impairments use technology. Visitors to the website can also request a free Braille Bug Alphabet Card.

Braille Bug classroom materials can be purchased in the AFB Bookstore.

• Braille Bug Alphabet Cards are colorful, 9 by 3 inch cards embossed with the braille alphabet, numbers, and commonly used punctuation.
• The Braille Trail: An Activity Book and its companion, The Braille Trail Parent/Teacher Guide, offer games, graphics, activities and a wealth of information on braille.
• The Braille Trail Activity Book with Slate and Stylus gives children a tool to write braille and allows them to learn to create their own "secret messages."

The Braille Bug materials were developed and written by Frances Mary D'Andrea and Anna Swenson. For more information, contact AFB Press.

American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) Scholarship Program 2012

AFB administers seven post-secondary education scholarships for up to 11 deserving students who are legally blind:

Delta Gamma Memorial Scholarship—One scholarship of $1,000

• Undergraduate or graduate study in the field(s) of rehabilitation and/or education. of people who are blind or visually impaired.

Ferdinand Torres Scholarship—One scholarship of $3,500

• Undergraduate or graduate study in any full-time program in any field.
• Applicant need not be a U.S. citizen, but must reside in U.S. Preference given to New York City metropolitan area residents, and new immigrants to the U.S.

Gladys C. Anderson Memorial Scholarship — One scholarship of $1,000

• Undergraduate or graduate study in classical or religious music.
• Applicant must be female.

Karen D. Carsel Memorial Scholarship—One scholarship of $500

• Graduate study in any full-time program in any field.
• Applicant must submit evidence of economic need.

Paul W. Ruckes Scholarship—One scholarship of $1,000

• Undergraduate or graduate study in engineering or in the computer, physical, or life sciences.

R. L. Gillette Scholarship—Two scholarships of $1,000 each

• Undergraduate study in a four-year degree program in literature or music.
• Applicant must be female.

Rudolph Dillman Memorial Scholarship—Four scholarships of $2,500 each

• Undergraduate or graduate study in the field of rehabilitation and/or education of people who are blind or visually impaired.

Visit the AFB scholarships website for further information and to fill out the application.

Please direct questions and comments to: American Foundation for the Blind Information Center, (800) 232-5463, afbinfo@afb.net

The National Federation of the Blind Offers 30 National Scholarships

To recognize achievement by blind scholars, the National Federation of the Blind (NFB) annually offers blind college students in the United States the opportunity to win one of thirty national scholarships worth from $3,000 to $12,000. See the NFB scholarship website for the rules on eligibility, requirements for documentation, and an online application form. Membership in the NFB is not required. The 2012 NFB Scholarship Program begins November 1, 2011. Application deadline: March 31, 2012.

Oehm Electronics offers DTV Radio

The demise of radio tuners that can receive TV broadcasts has resulted in the introduction of a specialty product to address the interest in an audio-only HD TV receiver, the DTV Radio.

The device is sold directly by Oehm Electronics. The shipping package includes a braille manual, the DTV unit, and its power cable. In addition to the braille documentation, an electronic version of the manual is e-mailed immediately when the order is placed.

The DTV Radio is not based on an FM tuner; it's an HD TV without a screen. This is revealed by the permanently mounted remote control attached to the right-hand face of the DTV cabinet, the approximate dimensions of which are 14 by 12 by 3 inches.

Because the unit is a conventional digital TV tuner, speech output isn't part of the interface. Instead, sequences of button presses on the control panel perform specific functions. To assist with this process, a braille diagram of the controls is included.

If the intent of the DTV Radio is to provide a custom product to a select group of individuals who desire complete and accessible documentation for a television receiver that can be operated in a convenient and predictable manner, the DTV Radio succeeds in meeting this goal.

The DTV Radio costs $175 plus shipping and is available from Oehm Electronics, (408) 971-6250, or oehmelec@comcast.net.

TV Speak, Software-Based TV Access

TV Speak is a new offering from Code Factory intended to provide access to television. According to Code Factory, TV Speak allows the blind or visually impaired user to use the most common functions of digital television in an accessible way. These functions include: Channel up and down, change volume, configure both television and TV Speak parameters, view and navigate Electronic Program Guide (EPG), record television programs (image + audio, or audio only), and use parental controls.

Options to optimize TV Speak for low vision use are provided in addition to speech.

TV Speak software operates on a personal computer running Windows 7, Vista, or XP with a TV tuning card or USB tuner. Several hardware devices available from Best Buy for $40 to $80 are supported. For a more complete discussion of suitable hardware, visit the TV Speak website. These tuners and TV Speak are limited to High Definition (HD) broadcast channels only.

Documentation and support are available ont the TV Speak website. Handy Tech North America sells the product in the US. An audio demonstration is available on the Handy Tech website.

TV Speak is priced at $245 without a software synthesizer or $295 with an Acapela Voice.

Dear AccessWorld Editor,

I noticed your holiday issue didn't include the more affordably priced talking MP3 players from Accessible Electronics. I am the owner of Accessible Electronics and happen to be a totally blind person. I developed this idea and have sold well over 1,000 talking MP3 players around the world since 2009.

This is not a product which is in conflict with the higher priced-blind-only players, as they do not have a text-to-speech engine built in or have the ability to play the specialized formats used by the national Library Service and such. They are, however, useful for those visually impaired [or] blind individuals who simply wish to use a more affordable MP3 player to listen to music files just like sighted folks do. Most of our customers already have some sort of "blind-only" player such as a Victor Reader Stream, BookSense, Plextalk Pocket, [or] BookPort, but use our talking MP3 players for listening to their MP3 books and music files instead.

It would be great if AFB showed interest in helping the blind/vision-impaired small business community as well as the big hitter companies who don't necessarily need the added promotion and advertising afforded them in articles such as the Holiday Gift Ideas for People with Vision Loss article.

AccessWorld readers can join our mailing list by sending us a blank e-mail. They can also download our presentation and see our current special.

For more information, I can be reached by e-mail at accessibleelectronics@gmail.com or by phone at (727) 498-0121.

Thank you for your attention.

Laz Mesa
Accessible Electronics

Dear AccessWorld Editor,

As I observe many guide dog users, two things happen that, in my estimation, cause the public to feed the misconception that it's the dog that is doing the thinking and all these wonderful things they think guide dogs can do.

My two examples are these: First, I can't tell you how many times at conferences I have heard the guide dog user say to the dog, "Find the elevator," "Find the door to go outside," or "outside."

Shouldn't the user have the proper orientation skills to be cognizant of where the elevators or the doors to the outside are located? I'm not being negative, but I find myself [thinking,] "No wonder the general public, and blind people to some degree, think the dogs are so amazing and are the ticket to freedom." It seems to me the dog should be treated as a useful tool, and the handler should be the one always in charge and cognizant of his or her surroundings.

Am I wrong in my thinking?

Thanks,

Michael

Janet Ingber responds:

Perhaps consider the following:

Instead of being considered a tool, a guide dog may be better thought of as a living, breathing member of a team, with the handler being the team leader. The truth is, not everyone is blessed with excellent orientation and mobility skills, and many have not had access to good O&M training, Therefore, the guide dog commands for finding escalators, steps, elevators, exits, and entrances are especially useful in unfamiliar surroundings.

Many guide dog users have excellent skills but still prefer to use a guide dog and the kinds of commands you mention, even in some familiar surroundings.

The handler should do what he or she feels is appropriate in a particular situation. If someone asks a question or makes a statement about the dog's ability, the handler should be prepared to answer the question with suitable, accurate information to alleviate misconceptions.

Dear AccessWorld Editor,

I read Janet Ingber's article, "Things to Consider When Thinking About a Guide Dog." As a former guide dog handler, I'd like to add additional items to the list Janet so eloquently presented.

The first topic relates to people with low vision. If someone with low vision is considering a guide dog, he or she should carefully consider how much vision he or she has and how functional that vision is in travel situations. I say this because I have low vision and I did not consider this when applying for a dog. I was told I did not have sufficient travel vision by my optometrist as well as staff from the guide dog school. Several years later, I received extensive training on how best to use my vision while travelling. This lead to my dog's eventual retirement. My decision to retire the dog was not only because of my improved functional vision though. There were many more issues that lead to this decision.

The final topic leads to the actual choice to partner with a guide dog. In hindsight, I realize I made the decision to partner with a guide dog for the wrong reasons. Peer pressure was a significant reason in my decision to partner with a guide dog. I was 25 years old when I made my initial application to the guide dog school. At the time, I was living with a woman who had her third guide dog. Many of my friends also had guide dogs. Therefore, I was surrounded by people with guide dogs. As a result, I did not consider everything as carefully and thoroughly as I should have. Had I considered everything carefully and methodically, I do not believe I would have reached the decision to apply for a guide dog.

Peer pressure is an issue everyone, blind or sighted, must deal with in their lives. As a result of peer pressure, I made a decision that ultimately proved to be an incorrect decision for me. If someone is considering applying for a guide dog, he or she should make this decision based on his or her own needs and lifestyle rather than the convincing arguments friends or acquaintances might make in favor of a guide dog.

Thank you for publishing an informative and resource packed publication each month. I deeply appreciate the information presented in Access World.

Kind regards,

Alexis

Dear AccessWorld Editor,

Reading the article on the HoverCam T5V from Serotek I was left wondering why indeed anyone would pay six times more for this product than one mentioned, the CanoScan at $80. I'm thinking, well, there must be a reason.

In our search for something that will read print to us instantly, it's as though we wander about in a world with products in it that almost do the job, but issues of lining up, proper lighting, optimal distance, and ability of the software to make sense of the strange world of print makes for a situation in which there might be perfect instances where each of the various devices works wonderfully, but a general use product still tends to be nonportable, expensive, or both. That solutions are being sought is encouraging, because one of these days we will be thrilled and delighted; I'm optimistic.

Mike

Deborah Kendrick responds:

Dear Mike,

Like you, I am optimistic and, like you, many of us are still seeking that "holy grail" of the perfect OCR product.

On one hand, it occurs to me that we live in an incredible era because there are so many choices on the market—both computer-based and portable—that enable us to read that ubiquitous and pesky print. On the other hand, it does seem that finding the right product is something akin to finding a pair of shoes: one size does not fit all!

A product that is perfect for one blind or low-vision person may be rejected by another because it requires a computer. Another product, while portable, may be too difficult for someone who finds aligning the image to be too challenging.

The more feedback developers and distributors hear from consumers, the closer we will come to that perfect solution. Meanwhile, here at AccessWorld, we'll keep evaluating products as they appear on the market and continue to depend on feedback from readers like you.