[Blindmath] Can PDF math texts be accessed via screen reader?

[John Gardner]

Hello Richard.  The Infty Reader can do OCR of PDF and is surprisingly good
at getting both the math and text right.  It's not cheap at $900, but it is
the only game in town.

See
http://www.inftyproject.org/  
Their ChattyInfty accessible math editor has a bit of a learning curve, but
works well also.  Both these products are made by a university research team
and do not have easy user-friendly interfaces.  But they do work.

By the way, it is absolutely not true that you cannot access the graphs and
diagrams.  Look at the ViewPlus IVEO Creator Pro package.  You'll need a
ViewPlus embosser to make the tactile copy, but it also works well.  Lots of
money for software and hardware, but at least today you have really full
access to math and science.  Wasn't tru a couple of years ago.
http://www.viewplus.com

-----Original Message-----
From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of Richard Dinger
Sent: Wednesday, April 08, 2009 5:05 PM
To: BlindMath
Subject: [Blindmath] Can PDF math texts be accessed via screen reader?

Hello,

Sorry, this is a bit long.

I have spent most of my working career as a software engineer and recently I
have been looking into neural networks and linear classifiers.  That led to
support vector machines and compact vector machines, which leads to linear
algebra in general.  So my initial interest/question for this group was
where can I find an accessible text on undergraduate level linear algebra?

I took linear algebra 40 years ago at the University of Washington, but
recall very little of that course.  But then that question led to what may
be a broader question for this group, namely, what are some solid approaches
to accessing mathematics texts in PDF via computer screen reader.  I mention
PDF texts as I see many of them offered while googling topics.

When I say access I mean access to both the written text and at least some
access to any equations.  I understand that graphs and diagrams will not be
accessible, but can usually be infered from the text.

I would be completely happy if equations were in some markup language like
La Tex as that can eventually be understood.

Are there any commercial products that can convert text and equations to
some other format such as word?

Finally, is pursuing PDF a fools errand?

I will post on a different thread regarding La Tex.

Richard
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