Quick News: Access World, Firefox And Macs

Access World: This issue focuses on CSUN, Electronic Audio and the Sense View’s Hand Writing camera accessory.

http://www.afb.org/aw/main.asp

Firefox 3 RC1: Ars has a look at what seems to be a great update to Mozilla’s Flagship product.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080519-atantalizing-taste-of-firefox-3-release-candidate-1.html

Apple: The world is a scary place when you can buy a Windows based computer with your Assistive Technology of choice for the same price as a Macbook. Fortune notes in the article below that Apple is selling 66% of the computers/notebooks in the +$1,000 category.

http://apple20.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2008/05/19/report-apples-market-share-of-pcs-over-1000-hits-66/?source=yahoo_quote

Audio Dramas: Audible For Kids

Changes from the Amazon buy out haven’t really taken effect yet, however, you have to give it to Audible for finding new and exciting ways to market their services. Audible for Kids is a great initiative that not only promotes reading for the younger generation, one Y Split cable for your headphones later, it allows you to journey back to some classics that you may have read in your childhood. Some of these selections are in Radio Play format as well. Hence me putting them in the Audio Dramas category this month. And better yet some of them are Free. So there is a great way for you to test out your Audible Manager and a Victor Reader Stream without paying a cent. To learn more hit the links below.

Audible For Kids Main Page

http://kids.audible.com/adkd/site/k/homepageGuest.jsp?BV_SessionID=@@@@1302116427.1210019189@@@@&BV_EngineID=cccfadedmmhhdgfcefecekjdffidfml.0

Free Books Page

http://kids.audible.com/adkd/site/k/hp/LandingPgTemplate.jsp?BV_UseBVCookie=Yes

Press Release: Trade in HumanWare Notetakers with Freedom Scientific's Open Plan

***
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Media Contact: Brad DavisBlind/Low Vision Group800-444-4443 or 727-803-8000http://www.freedomscientific.com/Sales: info@FreedomScientific.com
Trade in HumanWare Notetakers with Freedom Scientific's Open Plan
Trade in any proprietary HumanWare notetaker and get the features you want today with Freedom Scientific’s PAC Mate Omni
(St. Petersburg, Florida — May 13, 2008) Freedom Scientific’s Open Plan, announced today, will help blind users of VoiceNote, BrailleNote, mPower, and BrailleNote PK notetakers upgrade to an open platform that uses the familiar Windows® interface and runs mainstream applications.
Until October 31, 2008, users in the United States and Canada can trade in one of the aforementioned HumanWare products and save more than 50 percent on a PAC Mate Omni™ accessible Pocket PC. Purchase prices after trade-in are:
PAC Mate Omni BX400 and QX400 speech-only units: $995
PAC Mate Omni BX420 and QX420 20-cell braille units: $1,795
PAC Mate Omni BX440 and QX440 40-cell braille units: $2,545
Those taking advantage of the Open Plan will be able to choose from more onboard applications, read from more braille cells, and access mainstream applications and peripherals. Students learn the Windows operating system as they use the PAC Mate Omni, knowledge they will draw from for the rest of their lives.
PAC Mate Omni users can communicate via Windows Live™ messaging, synchronize with their Microsoft Outlook® e-mail inbox, calendar, tasks, and notes, balance their checkbook, and manage spreadsheets. The PAC Mate Omni supports Office 2007, including access to PowerPoint® presentations. BrailleNote owners are still waiting to get in touch with those features. While they wait, PAC Mate Omni users are working with a host of other features BrailleNote doesn’t have. Features like bar code scanners that identify and describe many common household items, support for all Word documents, Skype™ Internet telephony, reference materials like encyclopedias, dictionaries, and recipe databases, virtual private network access, and support for a broad range of network cards and other peripherals.
“Since I became a PAC Mate user, I've used numerous exciting features that the closed nature of the BrailleNote prevented me from being able to deliver to customers when I managed that product,” said Jonathan Mosen, formerly of HumanWare, now Vice President of Blindness Hardware Product Management for Freedom Scientific’s Blind/Low Vision Group. “My PAC Mate Omni has become an essential tool for me. Not only am I more productive on the job because of features like the full synchronization and VPN support, but it's my accessible remote control for all our appliances that use a remote.”
Mosen also said he likes how the PAC Mate Omni gives him such a vast selection of entertainment options and supports all common streaming media formats.
“A closed platform can't possibly keep up with all of the innovation being unleashed by Microsoft and the many third-party developers that write software for Pocket PC devices. I have no doubt that once BrailleNote and VoiceNote users get their hands on a PAC Mate Omni, they'll be amazed at the world of possibilities on offer,” Mosen said. “I can even do high quality audio recordings on it!”
Find out more about the PAC Mate Omni by visiting the Freedom Scientific Web site. If you have questions or wish to take advantage of the Open Plan, Contact Freedom Scientific.
This program applies only in the US and Canada and cannot be combined with any other discounts. The trade-in units must be in good working condition, as determined by Freedom Scientific. Freedom Scientific reserves the right to refuse any trade-in or to change or cancel any aspect of this program at any time at its sole discretion.
About Freedom Scientific
Freedom Scientific is the world's leading manufacturer of assistive technology products for those who are vision impaired and products for the special education and learning disability markets.
Freedom Scientific® and PAC Mate Omni™ are either trademarks or registered trademarks in the United States and/or other countries. The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

http://www.freedomscientific.com/news/pressroom/2008/PACMate-Open-Plan-Trade-in.asp

Feedback: Catching Up With Comments

I've been a bit remiss in responding to some comments. But no more. Today I am taking the time to respond to some of the comments over the last .. um.. few months. Wow that looks worse in print. Okay let's get started.

Computer World Article On  AT: Last month I, and many others, posted an article from Computer World on AT and general web access. Here's one comment from that post.

Ron Graham said...
Thanks for that article Ranger. I noticed it in an email alert last week, but the link Google had in the email would not load the page, no matter what I tried.

I think it touches on several issues we blind computer users regularly face and is a at least a good primer for anybody, such as a webmaster or potential employer, not familiar with screen readers. It describes pretty much what screen readers do, but also what they don’t do, as well as suggesting alternative methods for problem areas such as CAPTCHA and giving a site which employs an accessible alternative.

The Blind Access Journal copied this article into text for easy reading. So you may want to keep it around for better reference.

http://blog.blindaccessjournal.com/2008/04/computerworld-article-blind-users-still.html

Matt Campbell and I had a long discussion on some of the article's points. And my general feelings are that it is still very difficult to explain AT in mainstream terms but this article did better than most at trying to do so. It didn't touch on everything though and that can be a challenge in and of its self. For instance, explaining Screen Magnifiers and Graphic User Interfaces to a Sighted World without screen shots or other visual aids is a fun brand of torture that I don't recommend to AT nOObs. Especially in the current Office Ribbon and Windows Sidebar environments. The pitfalls of the Java Access Bridge, embedded video controls like those used by Hulu and over the page Macromedia ads are also troublesome. However the most ironic part of it all is most of the people the article is trying to reach more than likely have poor eyesight already. That is, take away their contacts and thick glasses.. If I had a nickel for every time I heard an I.T. Director dream about not using their contacts, glasses or remark about some laser surgery..  

The bigger issue is always the comments in these articles. Those well thought out posts from educated individuals scare me more than the rantings and mis-spellings of others. Here is an older article from the Wall Stree Journal that demonstrates it with better effect.

http://blogs.wsj.com/independentstreet/2008/01/11/is-your-web-site-blind-friendly-how-to-avoid-a-lawsuit/

Audio Dramas: Here's a comment from April's Audio Drama post.

Aaron said...
Hey Ranger1138, it was great meeting up with you the other day. Had a good time talking to you and learning more about the industry. These audio dramas seem really cool. Have you come across any of these in a podcast or free download format? Take it easy sir.

Some of the links tagged under the Audio Drama label do indeed offer podcasts or free samples. Big Finish has not only a podcast with snippets of upcoming productions, moreover, they have trailers for just released stories as well. And they just put up a neat thing for their downloads. You can listen to part one of a story for a small price and then if you like it you can buy the whole thing. The earlier cost is applied to the overall cost of the download. Since most of the Doctor Who audios are about 2 hours in length you get a good idea for a small price if you want the whole story after hearing part one. If you focus over to the right, or check your links lists, you will see that I added a Big Finish "Pick of the Month". This month's pick introduces the 6th Doctor's Companion that is exclusive to the audio series. And she plays a big part in the Big Finish extended universe as well.

Also, ZBS tends to post an entire audio play in ten minute intervals. They released "The 4th Tower" that way back in October 07.  

Trekker Breeze: Back in March I posted a bit more on the upcoming Humanware all in one GPS. 

Anonymous said...
I've just read about the trekker breeze in Access IT, a UK based magazine. It said the breeze will be afordable. Afordable is one of those words which should never be used. I've heard it said that a car is afordable at the cost of thousands, or a can of beans for a few uk pence.

Rumor is, and don't quote me on this at all, that the Breeze is between $500 and $850. We should know more on that as we near Convention season. When you look at the prices of accessible cell phones, add ons to existing note taking devices and over the counter brands of GPS a unit that runs around that price range could be argued by some to be "affordable". Remember that most Assistive Technology is not sold to the individual buyer. It is sold to Governments and that business model has its own symbiotic relationships. So "affordable" is mostly going to be used either loosely or in a comparative way here at TRS. Your mileage and size of pocketbook will always vary.   

Zoom Text USB: Going back to February now for this comment.  

Jessica said...
Too bad I read your review after purchasing ZoomText USB. I chose this product due to its portability. However, the admin right requirement really throw the wrench into its usefulness. As a result, I can't use it at the library or internet cafe.

Anything out there that runs the magnifier program directly from the flash drive? Want to avoid leaving a footprint on the guest computer system.

How about Dolphin Pen or Magic USB?

Jessica

Well.. At the time of this post both Freedom Scientific's Magic and the Dolphin Pen require a Video Interceptor be installed. You may or may not run into the exact same thing again as far as Admin rights goes. However, barring a full lock down on the system, you could use System Access To Go as an alternative Screen Magnifier to all three. You don't have the same features such as pointer, focus or cursor enhancements but you do have some darn good speech going if you rely on that for screen navigation. Best part is that you can try it at your local cafe for free to see if this will work for you.

www.satogo.com

October Poll Comment: This came in from a post in November about the October 07 poll results. That poll was on Operating Systems by the way.

Darrell said...
I am actually a bit concerned that, at this time, there is absolutely no support by any screen reader for any of the 64-bit versions of Windows. What happens if one's job for some reason requires the ability to run on that platform?

This recently came up in some of my dealings with an AT company. Costcos placed a system on sale for dirt cheap that came pre-loaded with Windows Vista.. 64 bit edition. In a short period of time they took four calls from people who had purchased this system from around the country. And all, naturally, could not run the software due to the OS being 64 bit instead of 32 bit.

Most of the major players in the industry are aware that this is an issue for some of us in I.T. departments, call centers or big business where high level security is manditory. And many of these players have x64 support on their Roadmaps. At the same time we have a large number of newly Blind, older Blind and wounded Veterans all coming into the world of AT. These populations traditionally don't need this level of support in their product of choice. What bothers me is the rubber bands that the Developers face from Blind Professionals needing more high tech application support falling down the list of those Roadmaps because more product is being sold to the growing non technical audience. Development teams will be stressed and stretched to provide support to all. 

I don't have a witty or humorous remark to make here because I am very worried about this subject seeing how I fall under my own definition of Blind Professional. All I can say is that I urge you to NICELY! provide feedback or feature requests to the product teams that you use or rely on daily for work. I've found that only a polite well laid out request, with bullet point lists, is one of the only ways to convince the management of these companies to move development cycles in another path not projected on the Roadmap. And remember too that these product releases are sometimes in a 18 month cycle. Which means if you are using 1.0 and you request now the request may not come until 3.0 as 2.0 maybe feature complete. Depending on the company's cycle of development added support can come sooner than a feature request or User Interface change. Oh! I've been doing this too long if I can type that out all at once and not have to spell check it.. 

The overall point I am trying to make is that you need to be active in how you use your AT products. Saying that one product *sucks* just doesn't help much. If you say, however, that you need support for the next version of Windows or Office on day one though.. And give some credit where credit is due. We did see support, beta or no, for Vista on day one. And some have even started on IE8 in their latest updates. We as Users have to remain polite and vocal in what we need as the next five years will be the most interesting time we have ever seen in Assistive Technology.

Humanware PR: FREE Oxford Concise Dictionary And Thesaurus!

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FREE Oxford Concise Dictionary and Thesaurus!

Transplant or Trade in a Classic BrailleNote for a Braillenote mPower and receive a FREE Dictionary/Thesaurus (offer good thru June 30th)

The Concise Oxford Dictionary on BrailleNote gives the meaning of a word, speaks it aloud with correct pronunciation, and much more. It includes the full definition of 240,000 entries, synonyms and antonyms with additional advanced search features. The Dictionary and Thesaurus combination is available in either a US or UK Version.

From any KeySoft application, whether you are in the KeyWeb Internet Browser, the Book Reader or Word Processor, the Dictionary and Thesaurus is easily accessed in one easy key stroke.

For more information contact:

HumanWare
800-722-3393
www.HumanWare.com

Windows XP Service Pack 3 Now Officially Online

Sound the fanfare because Windows XP Service Pack 3 has finally arrived. It is a 15+ MB download. And it installs in a Windows session. You may see one or two restarts though before things settle down to normal. Also you will get one of those nice boxes that tells you what will and will not work well if you upgrade. So installing this update should be fine if your AT is compatible, you aren’t running IE8 beta and you don’t have the ability to control your NAT routing. See how simple that is???

Okay it isn’t all that bad but you should read some of the articles out there on the update before you run it for yourself.

Windows XP SP3 Download Site

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=5b33b5a8-5e76-401f-be08-1e1555d4f3d4&displaylang=en

XP SP3 Release Notes Article From Ars Technica

http://arstechnica.com/journals/microsoft.ars/2008/05/06/windows-xp-sp3-release-notes-updated-to-final-version

Random Goodness: The Truly Random Collection

Here's some highlights of the giant pile of links I have trolled though this week.

ATT iPhone Data Plan: Shortly after the iPhone launch AT&T got into a flap with Deaf customers who wanted a data only plan. It looks like the issues have been resolved according to Ars Technica.

http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2008/04/30/att-finally-offers-data-only-plan-for-deaf-iphone-users

Speech Recognition In Vista: I heard at CSUN 07 that Nuance was considering dropping the consumer level of Dragon if Vista's Speech Reco was indeed that good. Then half a billion people didn't run right out and buy Vista. But Microsoft is still committed to this AT because it has so much spin off potential like Microsoft's Sync. Ars talks about a new technical preview build that will update the recognition in Vista.

http://arstechnica.com/journals/microsoft.ars/2008/04/30/wsr-macros-extend-windows-vistas-speech-recognition-feature

Crave's 8 Worst Microsoft Promos: Last month the net went crazy looking at an internal MS video celebrating Vista. It was all in jest, however, Crave was inspired to do an article showing that Microsoft has a history of releasing the same quality of video to the public.

http://crave.cnet.com/8301-1_105-9920796-1.html?part=rss

Helpdesk Launch Pad Or Doorstop?: That Screen Reader nightmare known as Computerworld has posted a interesting article on the debate of Helpdesk support being a good starting point or the beginning of the end or your IT career.

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9080699

GOOG-411 Sounds: Anyone who has used the GooG service has heard that "bitti-bitti-boop" sounds while waiting for your information. The article below explains just what those sounds actually are..

http://gigaom.com/2007/11/10/goog-411s-biddy-biddy-boop/

Cradle Point: Quite simply .. I want one of these things.

http://www.cradlepoint.com/

Another Update.. This Time It Is Magic!

Freedom Scientific has updated Magic 11.0. To get the low down on this update go to the link below..

http://www.freedomscientific.com/downloads/magic/MAGic11-whats-new.asp#Enhancements03

Polls: April's Poll Results And May's Poll Added

This one was over before it began. Take a look at last month's results.

April's Poll Question: Which Computer Based OCR Program Is Your Favorite?

Open Book 3 (10%)
Kurzweil 1000 18 (60%)
Cicero 0 (0%)
System Access's Document Scan 0 (0%)
Other 9 (30%)

I'm not trying to persuade anyone on this topic at all. But the new Open Book is worth a look and I have used the System Access Document Scan on the road a few times with good results as well. If you don't have an Eye Pal or another portable OCR on you.. having OCR on a pen drive is a great thing. Well as long as you can find a computer with a scanner. Then Zoom EX and Eye Pal are very helpful.

This month's poll question is one that some of you have been all waiting for...

Poll Question Of The Month: Which Note Taker/Accessible PDA Do You Want To Own?

PAC Mate Omni
mPower
Icon
Braile Sense Plus
A new Smartphone with Access Software
Other

I imagine some out there have plans for all those refund dollars coming to you this month. And some out there may be thinking of a new gadget. So this is why I worded the question with "want" rather than "have". But feel free to answer any way you *want*.

Press Release: Would you like to participate in our survey?

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For your chance to win one of two $50 American Express Gift Cards, please fill out and submit the following survey by 4:00 pm PST Thursday May 1, 2008. Your feedback is invaluable to us, and we thank you in advance for your help.

Take this survey

The ShopLowVision.com Team
866-999-9188