We had a conversation recently about Internet accessibility for our friends who are blind or have visual impairments. This necessitates having a screen reader loaded onto their computer so they can surf the web, handle e-mail and other activities using the Internet.
While incredibly helpful, one of the biggest drawbacks to screen readers is they are loaded onto the machine locally which limits a person with a visual impairment to accessing his or her own computer only. Most libraries don’t have readers loaded onto them and nearly all readers are unable to read Java-script. Unless a friend has a reader loaded onto their machine, popping on to check e-mail or a movie time is not possible. That’s about to change.
Well, here’s a new totally accessible screen reader called WebAnywhere. Developed by University of Washington computer science graduate student, Jeffrey Bigham, WebAnywhere is unlike software that has to be installed on PCs. WebAnywhere is an Internet application that can make Internet access available on almost any Web enabled device or computer. It is also an OpenSource project so it can be tweaked and modified freely.
For more details you can visit the WebAnywhere site.
Way cool!
Many thaks to DJB for pointing this out to me.
