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OS X Businesses Operating Systems Apple

Apple to Add Free Screen Reader to Mac OS X 284

Posted by pudge from the accessibility-good dept.
Joe Clark writes "Screen readers for blind Mac users have been nonexistent since 2003 when development was halted on the only one in existence. On Windows they cost up to $1,295. This week, Apple announced the upcoming Spoken Interface for Mac OS X, the long-rumoured Apple screen reader and more, we are told. Apple is looking for beta-testers for this technology preview. Already, a developer muses that IBMs accessible Java software could work with the screen reader. No mention of Braille-display support yet, which many blind and deaf-blind people need and want."
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Apple to Add Free Screen Reader to Mac OS X More

Apple to Add Free Screen Reader to Mac OS X

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  • You know what this means, folks... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    This is a call to all able programmers.
    Grab a Jolt or a coffee and get cracking on an even freer Linux screen reader!

    • Re:You know what this means, folks... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Lane.exe ( 672783 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @03:48AM (#8619639) Homepage
      Forcing blind people to install, configure and maintain a Linux distribution is tantamount to a human rights violation.

      And I say this as an avid Linux user.

      • Re:You know what this means, folks... (Score:5, Informative)

        by drdink ( 77 ) * <smkelly+slashdot@zombie.org> on Saturday March 20, 2004 @04:01AM (#8619683) Homepage
        I am a legally blind FreeBSD (and former Linux) user. What is the problem? Yes, it takes some adaption, but that is no reason not to do it. If all else fails, you SSH to the machine from Windows using a screen reader.

      • Not hardly (Score:3, Insightful)

        by iamacat ( 583406 )
        Linux configuration (and use) can be mostly done from the command line, which is nicely amendable to a screen reader interface. Windows and OSX configuration on the other hand...

      • Why? They're only blind. (Score:5, Insightful)

        by glenalec ( 455692 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @04:53AM (#8619811) Homepage
        Being blind does not automatically exclude you from being tech-literate. You would be amazed at what 'disabled' people can do in the face of narrow-sighted prejudice and stereotyping.

        (Why was parent modded insightful? Since when has denegrating the intelectual capabilities of blind people [even in poor jest] been considered insightful?)
        • The grandparent wasn't referring to their intellectual capabilities, he was pointing out that installing and configuring Linux is hard enough when you can see, and that it would be very difficult for someone who couldn't see. The key here is sight. Command-line installation is all text. Do you realize what the issue is there?

          Even if Linux did have a screen reader, the task of installing and configuring it would be such a hassle to a blind individual that it would be better for them to buy a Mac. Many peo
        • Seconded. At least one kernel developer is blind, and I never found this out until we met in person. Sun in particular have done a ton of work on Linux accessibility - screen readers, input alternatives for people with physical impairments. Not currently any accessibility for audio (which isnt that daft an issue - consider a deaf quake player and presenting them with an 'audio radar' HUD)

          Also wonderful stuff like dasher, which I'm still not sure isnt really a game disguised as an access tool 8)

          Good to see
      • I call bullshit, And if I had mod points I would mod your ass down as a troll.

        The average end user distro requires the same level of knowledge as the average windows install. Not to mention the potential difficulty behind trying to find a braille friendly license key.

        I know several blind people (legally blind, and completely blind) who use linux/BSD both as a main operating system and as a hobby system.

        Think about what your saying before you go off on some "linux is not user friendly" tangent, p

      • Re:You know what this means, folks... (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Oniros ( 53181 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @07:53AM (#8620202)
        The best programmer I paired with for labs at the university was blind. He was running Linux with a text to braille gizmo under his laptop. The fact all was text based was a boon for him (he didn't use X, he probably used screen.)

        Most students had a hard time following his lead because he knew all the code of the projects he worked on by heart (I think he has a perfect memory), so be jumped left and right in the code (going directly at the right line number) at an amazing speed. We worked on his box simulatenously through kibbitz.

    • Unlikely to happen (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Canberra Bob ( 763479 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @04:03AM (#8619688) Journal
      Unlikely to happen any time soon

      Why?

      The same reason documentation is lagging in FOSS, its not "cool". Everyone wants to be in on the latest desktop environment / compiler / kernel because it gets the publicity. A screen reader will not give you the cool factor that submitting a patch for the kernel would.

      And unlike commercial software, there is no profit motive.

      This is why Linux will struggle for a while to gain mainstream desktop acceptance. Linux offers an excellent mainstream desktop, as long as your requirements arent slightly different. If they are, have fun trying to find something to satisfy your requirements. If people are going to switch, they need that bit extra - something they wont find on a commercial OS. Which is why it is rather annoying that the major desktop environments are trying to follow the Windows methodology rather than finding what Windows doesnt offer, and filling the niche.

      • Re:Unlikely to happen (Score:5, Informative)

        by unapersson ( 38207 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @05:54AM (#8619956) Homepage
        "The same reason documentation is lagging in FOSS, its not "cool". Everyone wants to be in on the latest desktop environment / compiler / kernel because it gets the publicity. A screen reader will not give you the cool factor that submitting a patch for the kernel would."

        Sorry, but that's absolute rubbish:
        http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gap/
        http://leb.net/blinux/

        I can't believe the uninformed postings in this thread. Just because you're not aware of it doesn't mean it isn't happening. You can use a screenreader within Linux right now, try Gnopernicus within Gnome. A lot of accessibility work is taking place and access to this technology is all free.

      • Re:Unlikely to happen (Score:3, Insightful)

        by 00420 ( 706558 )
        Unlikely to happen any time soon

        It's already happened. Read the other posts in this thread.

        The same reason documentation is lagging in FOSS, its not "cool". Everyone wants to be in on the latest desktop environment / compiler / kernel because it gets the publicity. A screen reader will not give you the cool factor that submitting a patch for the kernel would.

        If you develop OSS to be "cool" then you must have a very boring life.

        And unlike commercial software, there is no profit motive.

        That's prett

    • Unfortunately it's precisely what OS/Free developers have proved themselves crap at producing time and time again: It's User Interface *and* of no use to the developers. It has no chance.

    • Re:You know what this means, folks... (Score:5, Informative)

      by kundor ( 757951 ) <.kundor. .at. .member.fsf.org.> on Saturday March 20, 2004 @05:25AM (#8619882) Homepage
      It's already in the kernel...

      You can replace your text consoles with speech consoles in make menuconfig.

    • Like Speak Up [linux-speakup.org] you mean?
    • Something like KSayIt [kde-apps.org] perhaps?

  • Cue the jokes (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    The story mentions people who are different from most others. The trolls will feast today.

    Hurrah for Apple.

  • Macs for the blind (Score:5, Insightful)

    by zackeller ( 653801 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @03:46AM (#8619631)
    If Apple wants to get into a new market, this is it. Give out a free screen reader, make it work with major applications like Office and Safari, and you've just cornered the entire blind market.

    • Re:Macs for the blind (Score:5, Funny)

      by Hektor_Troy ( 262592 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @04:44AM (#8619794)
      In other words - blind-siding the likes of Microsoft?

    • Re:Macs for the blind (Score:5, Interesting)

      by BWJones ( 18351 ) * on Saturday March 20, 2004 @11:26AM (#8621108) Homepage Journal
      My research is in retinal degenerations, but where I work, we have patients who lose their vision for a number of reasons from trauma to corneal problems to diabetes and other pathologies. One of our most valuable services we have is helping people make the transition from the world of the sighted to living without vision cues. I am currently looking at this code for OS X (have known about it for some time) and I will push hard to make it the de-facto standard for our patients as it simplifies their life (try dealing with all the various security problems and stability problems of Windows without using your eyes) and will be easier on their budgets as it will come free with OS X.

  • Braille? (Score:5, Funny)

    by DanThe1Man ( 46872 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @03:50AM (#8619647)
    No mention of Braille-display support yet, which many blind and deaf-blind people need and want

    If little glass bumps come shooting out of my monitor, I'm going to be scared.
    • Maybe not the monitor, but it seems I've read about a system where the mice have tactile feedback. As you move the mouse across certain features of the screen (open space, title bars, window borders, etc), you get different kinds of tactile sensations with the mouse... eg, a "bump" when you cross a border.

      It would be interesting to see if this has been used to help blind computer users.

    • Re:Braille? (Score:5, Informative)

      by Bitsy Boffin ( 110334 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @06:25AM (#8620000) Homepage
      You jest, but braille "displays" do exist. Infact you can even get braille notebooks [cnn.com].

      I had a quick play with the technology at a demonstration once (I live in Christchurch, where this is developed), quite interesting for a sighted person.

      • Re:Braille? (Score:2, Interesting)

        by waynelorentz ( 662271 )
        I had a legally blind friend who had a braille notebook. This was back in the DOS days, before windows. It didn't have a screen -- just the braille keyboard, and a floppy drive, and a speaker. I guess it looked more like a long black brick than a notebook.

        The thing that always amused me about it was that it was from Australia, and the speech synthesizer spoke with an Australian accent. I would have thought that computers would make accent-less speech, but I was wrong.
    • Why not something like a medium resolution LCD screen but instead of pixels of light have pixels of small metal posts (like those "pin art [google.com]" toys). Of course translating text in to braille. Each pixel could be pressure sensitive for user feedback. Cover it with a removable gel surface to smooth things out.

      Could this be done?

  • Linux has free screenreaders too (Score:3, Informative)

    by MooKore 2004 ( 737557 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @03:56AM (#8619668) Homepage Journal
    Checkout Gnpernicus [www.baum.ro]. Free screenreader for GNOME and GNOME compatible desktops.

  • Beta testing (Score:4, Funny)

    by Killjoy_NL ( 719667 ) <slashdot@@@remco...palli...nl> on Saturday March 20, 2004 @04:11AM (#8619718)
    Ok, to become a betatester, do I have to poke my eyes out ??
    • Ok, to become a betatester, do I have to poke my eyes out ??

      No. Push the power button on the monitor ;-)

      Or for iMac users and the like, you can buy the iSheet from Dr. Bott...a piece of super-thin semi-opaque fiberous wood material(made from only the best wood, mind you) complete with space-age fasteners(strips of plastic with adhesive on them!)

  • Windows ... up to $1,295 - Linux - $0 (Score:3, Interesting)

    by ErichTheWebGuy ( 745925 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @04:15AM (#8619737) Homepage
    I have a blind friend who has been using kSayIt [kde-apps.org] for a while and loves it! He also loves the freedom in being able to choose his distro, desktop environment, window manager, e-mail client, yada yada yada. Chalk up another win for Free/Open Source Software, cuz last I talked to him (earlier this week) Ronnie sez he is never going back to Windows.
    • I support open-source and all, but please don't give its users a bad name. This would be a great "Interesting" or "Informative" post if you had said "My friend uses the OSS kSayIt and he says it works great <more detailed review here>" and left it at that. You don't need turn it into some rude "I'm better than you because I use OSS" post.

  • Buzz already (Score:5, Informative)

    by gordguide ( 307383 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @04:36AM (#8619780)
    I was having a drink with a legally blind Teacher's Assistant friend of mine Friday (the day before this hit Slashdot) after work. He's a die-hard Windows user, precisely because of the (yes, this is the right price) $1200 application mentioned briefly in the article, which he uses.

    I was inundated with questions; the news was out so fast amongst those who need this functionality that they caught me off guard. I had heard a bit. He knew far more.

    Trust me, there is real interest in this. He wanted to know what hardware to buy that would support OSX. He knew the beta was out and knew people running it, and liked the feedback he'd heard so far.

  • What is blind? (Score:4, Informative)

    by thogard ( 43403 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @05:16AM (#8619861) Homepage
    Most of us that can see well don't consider the real question of what is a blind person? It turns out that is more than people who can't see anything. It also includes people who can't see very well, people with issues involving clear vision except directly where they are looking, people that can't look at one spot for very long and people who's vision is just so poor that they can't a 144 point font a foot away. Many of the people that fit into the groups I've listed used to be able to see clearly. The were never taught brail and many of them are in their 60's or older and attempting to learn brail is very hard for them.

    My mother just had her eyeballs sewed back together so once again she can see enough to read a screen (with the right magnifications) but that was a short term fix. In another decade she won't be able to see anything that isn't fuzzy.

  • future poll? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by ubugly2 ( 454850 )
    this has me now wondering how many slashdot readers have disabilities and how they adapt to using the computer and what modifications they did,

  • My Mother (Score:5, Insightful)

    by captnitro ( 160231 ) * on Saturday March 20, 2004 @05:59AM (#8619964)
    My mother is blind. She had failed cataract surgery in 1996, and unfortunately, her and my brother have had a combined total of 13 surgeries. (Whereas I got off easy with one detached retina in 1989.)

    We can muse all we want about how Linux needs a screenreader, but I don't care if Microsoft and SCO made a screenreader made out of DRM'd GPL source dipped in goatblood.

    My mother needs something better than Zoomtext. She needs a screenreader. And all politics aside, I'll buy her a fucking iMac if she gets a free screenreader because of it. I love her more than politics.

    Open source is not just about free-as-in-beer, it's not just about free-as-in-speech, it's about free-as-in-people. Too often as open source developers we think, "this is what's good for the GPL" or "this is what's good for a feature list," not "this is what's good for some guy's mother."

    Thar's what opensource is about; not feature lists, not the efficiency of inetd, it's about users. We are their servants. May we serve them honorably, so they may have sight -- may we give them gifts, that we may be invisible.
    • Too often as open source developers we think, "this is what's good for the GPL" or "this is what's good for a feature list," not "this is what's good for some guy's mother."

      Surely (and I'm not meaning you necessarily) we need a developer who says "this is what my mother needs, so I will code it myself". I have no idea how difficult coding this thing is, I'm just trying to say that developers for these products may often be someone for whom it is personally a need, rather than a developer for whom it is

    • I think this is one of the better cases where software agnosticism comes in handy.

      No "holy war" and no single platform will fill everyone's needs. Very few geeks have the skill, motivation and the need to start and maintain such a project as F/OSS.
    • Quite right.

      There seems to be some kind of twisted logic among companies who make any device or softwae for the dissabled that if you're deaf or blind, then you must be wealthy, right? everything i see that was made to make a person with dissablilities life better/easier costs an arm and a leg.

      My girlfriend is deaf. My phone cost me $20 at walmart.. hers cost $500 (TTY).. we live in a security building with a buzzer entrance.. guess how she knows someone is at the door? she cant.. the system we'd need to

      • Re:My Mother (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Wateshay ( 122749 )
        The problem is that by and large things tailored for the disabled are more expensive to design and manufacture than mass market items. There are also fewer people with disabilities than without. These two things unfortunately combine to mean that the things your girlfriend needs are going to be more expensive.

        Think of it this way, if a product takes 10 developers (making $40K / year) six months to develop, then I have to make $400,000 before I can even think about making a profit. If 20,000 people want

  • This is useful for non-blind as well (Score:5, Interesting)

    by cerberusss ( 660701 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @06:17AM (#8619993) Journal
    For my job, I have to commute at least 2 hours every day, so I use Festival [ed.ac.uk] to convert text to wav, which I burn on a CD. That way, when I'm fed up with news or music, I put on the CD and 'listen' to this new article which I saw online but didn't have the time to read.

    Any others who do this as well? Any tips for better software for this purpose than Festival? It's not too bad, but it's not terrific either.

    • News to iPod (Score:4, Informative)

      by JohnsonWax ( 195390 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @01:00PM (#8621595)
      There are a number of utils for converting RSS from apps like NetNewsWire to MP3 playlists and stuffing it on your iPod. One such app:

      http://www.tow.com/software/read_it_to_me/

      Basically, use NNW to manage the news you want (TONS of sources - BBC, CNN, weblogs, etc. but not all include the full article text) and a click or two will take all your unviewed feeds, text-to-speech them to MP3 and sync them to your iPod.

      You can later just click through the ones you heard (or everything from the day), and the next day it'll only sync across the new content.

      Lots of options on OS X, but not sure about Windows + iPod.
  • how about open minded software products for blind mac users ;P ...ok, I'll shut up and go back to sitting in the corner now.

  • O'Reilly on existing Speech in MacOSX (Score:5, Informative)

    by Etcetera ( 14711 ) * on Saturday March 20, 2004 @09:58AM (#8620650) Homepage

    I'm surprised no one's posted a link to this yet... O'Reilly's Mac Dev Center has a nice article on "the often misunderstood world of talking to your Mac" [macdevcenter.com] that goes over the existing speech (and speech recognition) interface.

    A good overview of past and present, with a little bit of technical information there for AppleScripters too.

  • Keyboard navigation? (Score:3, Informative)

    by jfengel ( 409917 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @11:53AM (#8621260) Homepage Journal
    There's more to operating a computer blind than just having a screen reader. Reading a web page is the easy part; if you have to see an icon and point a mouse at it, you can't even open the browser.

    It needs to be operated either solely by keyboard, or have special modifications to support a force-feedback mouse.

    The Macintosh has always supported accelerators, but when I last looked I couldn't find any way to access non-accelerated menu items without a mouse. Windows has supported mouseless operation from the beginning (not out of compassion for the blind, but because Windows 1.0 couldn't assume that you even owned a mouse.)

    I'm a huge fan of the section 508 guidelines [section508.gov]. Even non-disabled users can benefit from a display which is clear enough to be used by blind users. It forces the developer to think out a bit further ahead, but the end-user gains.

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