[Blindmath] JAWS and Nemeth - Newbie question

Sat Feb 19 20:25:56 UTC 2011

This would be great! 

Sharon 

-----Original Message-----
From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of Greg
Sent: Saturday, February 19, 2011 1:23 PM
To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
Subject: Re: [Blindmath] JAWS and Nemeth - Newbie question

    Hello,
I am all for this.  I would definently support something like this.  The 
frustration I have with the hoops I have to go thru just to take a math 
class has nearly drove me to stop school.
Greg Wocher
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Birkir Rúnar Gunnarsson" <birkir.gunnarsson at gmail.com>
To: <SusanOsterhaus at tsbvi.edu>; "Blind Math list for those interested in 
mathematics" <blindmath at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Friday, February 18, 2011 12:34 PM
Subject: Re: [Blindmath] JAWS and Nemeth - Newbie question

> What do people think about creating a web-based petition for screen 
> reader vendors to add Nemeth support for refreshable braille? I know 
> we may only get a handful of signatures but, perhaps, we could get a 
> few dozens, even a hundred. But this would create a focus point for 
> the effort and we could give a specific action item to people who want 
> to request such accessibility upgrade. Instead of saying "please ask 
> your screen reader vendor for improved math support", we could say "we 
> are collecting signatures from those interested in improve math 
> support, please go to page x and sign the electronic petition if you 
> want to help". I know this worked well for the WayFinder refund demand 
> when Vodafone discontinued the product. They got almost 3000 
> signatures. This is an entirely different beast, but the same method 
> might work well, and might help people who confuse Susan and Steve.
> What do people think about this?
> -Birkir
>
>
> On 2/18/11, Susan Osterhaus <osterhauss at tsbvi.edu> wrote:
>> Steve,
>>
>> I have heard exactly the same line from vendors: "We have never heard
>> from
>> any of our customers that they actually want to use Nemeth braille with 
>> our
>> product." They have also told me that I am one of the few or only person 
>> to
>> request math support. I wonder how they got us confused; we don't even 
>> look
>> alike! I'm sure that many of you have heard the same quote. Every time I
>> give a presentation, I beg each and everyone in the audience to speak out
>> because of this, and I sure hope that there are a lot of "us" speaking 
>> up.
>>
>> Susan
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org 
>> [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org]
>> On
>> Behalf Of Stephen L Noble
>> Sent: Thursday, February 17, 2011 6:24 PM
>> To: blindmath at nfbnet.org
>> Subject: Re: [Blindmath] JAWS and Nemeth - Newbie question
>>
>> By the way, there's a crucial subtext to this issue which is often
>> overlooked: that vendors of assistive technology need to hear as much 
>> input from customers as possible. I often have conversations with 
>> developers about something they need to support, and I am told that I 
>> am the one of the few (sometimes they say I am the only) persons who 
>> has ever said anything about the need for math support.  Case in 
>> point, I specifically asked the product manager of a widely used 
>> screen reader about supporting Nemeth in their refreshable braille 
>> display output and I was told, "We have never heard from any of our 
>> customers that they actually want to use Nemeth braille with our 
>> product." Believe it or not, that is a quote.
>>
>> So, the moral of this lesson is none of us should be satisfied with 
>> the response that "our product cannot do what you need." I suspect 
>> everybody on this list believes that braille support for mathematics 
>> is a vital issue, so if everybody on this list started sending emails 
>> or made phone calls to tell the company that makes the products 
>> he/she uses that supporting math (including Nemeth braille) should be 
>> considered mandatory.
>>
>> --Steve Noble
>> steve.noble at louisville.edu
>> 502-969-3088
>>
>>>>> "Kodeswaran, Balaji" <bkodeswaran at air.org> 2/17/2011 3:32 PM >>>
>> Jose,
>>
>> Thank you for your response. However, I am unclear on how I get 
>> Nemeth to the RBD through JAWS? On our website, say we are rendering 
>> the content as MathML. I am told (by JAWS tech support) that JAWS 
>> cannot convert MathML to Nemeth. Also, since our users are primarily 
>> Firefox users, they won't have the benefit of MathPlayer (although it 
>> is not clear what this provides for IE/JAWS users in this regard). 
>> Our thoughts were to see if we could transcribe to Nemeth (Grade 1), 
>> stick into the web page in a hidden DIV next to the MathML and see if 
>> there are any ARIA (or JAWS specific markup tags) that we could put 
>> on the page to send this Nemeth to the Braille display.
>>
>> Thanks
>>
>>
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>>
>>
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