[blindlaw] Re JAWS scripts as a remedy for inaccessible workplace software

[Susan Kelly]

I totally agree with the greater ease of use for VoiceOver on PDFs...unfortunately, our county  / office IT refuses to even consider using and Apple or Mac products.  I have thus been using (more like abusing) my personal iPad for a great deal of my work and also have downloaded Adobe e-pub's latest reader on the desktop of my office computer in the hopes of something that might work a bit better.  My assistant and I have gone to great lengths on our own to find software to make it easier to re-format the PDFs which court reporters compile in the most bizarre patterns to something that will easily drop into the Adobe e-pub reader program.

As for the requirement that offices vet accessibility before purchasing, it is routinely brought up by my supervisor and ignored by the higher powers.  For those of us in public sector employment, especially in areas that seem to view the ADA as applicable only to disabilities of physical movement, it is a constant battle that usually has to be waged on one's own time, at one's own expense.   

-----Original Message-----
From: blindlaw [mailto:blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Elizabeth Rene via blindlaw
Sent: Sunday, January 25, 2015 2:36 PM
To: blindlaw at nfbnet.org
Subject: [blindlaw] Re JAWS scripts as a remedy for inaccessible workplace software

When dealing with inaccessible workplace software, I wonder whether we lawyers shouldn't be using more than one screen reader tool.  We're always talking about whether JAWS will do this or do that.  What about Apple OSX and iOS?

I find, for example, that working with PDF files in JAWS is a headache, while opening a PDF document in iBooks lets me breeze right through it.  In fact, Apple reads PDFs better than it does Word documents!  But Apple does something else better than JAWS.  Now I have a tiny, tiny bit of eyesight.  I can read the Apple screen with a 10X magnifying lense.  So if something isn't readable with VoiceOver, I can turn VO off and use the Zoom utilities to enlarge the print as much as I need to, and scroll through text that VO somehow isn't flexible enough to accommodate.  A simple click of the home button allows switching back and forth, or, if you want to, switch back and forth to reverse from white on black to black on white.  And you can flip between portrait and landscape orientations.  No extra software needed!  And you can do all of this at your desk, at a cafe or a pub with something good in front of you, or on your backyard deck with the kids outside.

 For that matter, maybe WindowEyes does some jobs better than JAWS or Apple.

I think we should be skilled in every tool we can find and afford, to make our lives what we want them to be, and not be held hostage to office programs that one tool can't handle.

And even as I say this, our offices may have a duty to vet their software for accessibility before they buy it.To me, that seems to be part of the "reasonable" in "reasonable accommodation."

Elizabeth Rene




 
  

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