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[OFF-TOPIC but important] Java accessibility to disabled people





---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 24 Oct 1997 06:28:22 +0600
From: Philip N. Moos <pmoos@PLUTO.NJCC.COM>
To: DEAF-L@SIU.EDU
Subject: NJ-L News, 10/24/97 No. 4

>From the newsroom of Business Wire, October 23, 1997 ..............


Business Editors & High Tech Writers

MINNEAPOLIS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 23, 1997--Demonstrating its  continuing
commitment to computer users who are disabled, IBM today  unveiled prototype
software aimed at helping people who are blind  keep up with their sighted
colleagues as the workplace embraces the  Internet.

The new software "reads" aloud the information on the computer  screen in a
synthesized computer voice through small speakers  attached to the computer.
 It is the first screen-reading software  built using Java(2), the rapidly
emerging Internet technology from  Sun Microsystems that IBM is aggressively
supporting.  Inventors have code-named the new Java-based screen reader
prototype "Java Jive."

IBM demonstrated "Java Jive" here at the Closing The Gap  conference, a
three-day meeting expected to draw 2,000 disabled  people, educators,
therapists and business people.  IBM also  demonstrated products from its
Independence Series that help people  with a range of disabilities.  Those
products include ViaVoice(1), a  speech recognition program that allows
people with limited mobility  to talk to their computer; SpeechViewer III(1),
a speech therapy tool that turns speech into visual patterns to help deaf
people learn to  speak; Screen Magnifier/2(1), a tool that enlarges computer
text for  people with vision impairments; and Screen Reader/2(1), which reads
 information on the screen for computer systems that run the OS/2(1)  and
DOS(1) operating systems.

Representatives of both IBM and Sun gave a collaborative  presentation
outlining their initiatives to make Java accessible to  workers who are
disabled.  Traditionally, when a new computer  technology sweeps American
workplaces, disabled computer users are  left behind, until product
developers can catch up and build adaptive solutions.  For example, when
computer systems evolved from text to  windows and graphics, it took half a
decade until screen readers  reached the marketplace that could describe
those innovations in  synthesized speech to blind users.

Today, Java is the fastest-growing computer language, and 500,000 software
developers are using Java to write the most innovative new  Internet
applications.  Disabled computer users could now face the  same roadblocks
with networked computing they once faced with their  desktop computing
systems.  For example, the colorful icons and  animations that guide a
sighted user around the Internet must be  recognizable by the screen readers
that translate the graphics for  computer users who are blind.  New Internet
applications must be  compatible with the speech systems, joy sticks and
other alternative  devices used by people with limited mobility who can't use
a mouse or a keyboard.  And the video clips that hearing users find so
 informative and entertaining must be adaptable to captioning for  computer
users who are deaf.

Sun Microsystems, which invented and licenses Java, is specifying
accessibility interfaces in the basic Java code.  IBM is working with Sun to
help define and validate those interfaces and apply them in  adaptive
products.  In addition to developing Java code that can be  easily adapted,
Sun and IBM are making special 'tool kits' and  guidelines available to
developers to help them make new applications accessible as they're first
brought to market.

With accessibility features built into Java early, it will be  easier for the
developers of assistive technology to make networked  applications
accessible.  So computer users who are disabled will be  able to keep pace
with their coworkers as Internet applications are  adopted broadly in
business.  And the features will help maintain  accessibility as corporations
build their own networks that deliver  standard banking, insurance and other
business applications to the  employees' desktop computers from a central
server.

"Because Java is becoming so popular, we need to take action now  to make it
accessible," said Dennis O'Brien, product manager of  IBM's Special Needs
Systems.  "If we don't, computer users with  special needs will once again be
left behind."

O'Brien expects that these early efforts to make Java and network computing
accessible will result in Java-based adaptive products  reaching the
marketplace as early as next year.

More information on IBM's Java initiatives can be found on the Web at
http://www.ibm.com/Java.  More information on IBM Special  Needs Systems can
be found at http://www.ibm.com/sns.   -0- (1) Indicates trademark or
registered trademark of International  Business Machines Corporation.

(2) Java is a trademark of Sun Microsystems, Inc.  All other  trademarks are
the property of their respective owners.

--30--kvc/ny*

CONTACT: IBM

Joe Eckert, 914/766-1420

jeckert@us.ibm.com







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