[Blindmath] [Blind math] Somewhat positive yet disappointing press release

Fri May 27 14:00:55 UTC 2011

Well, my take on it is that we will never be able to reasonably expect
all those who generate math content to understand the needs of print
disabled users and to spend a lot of time creating formats,
descriptions and other solutions just for them.
There is a gigantic amount of math being generated every day, and the
only way we will be able to access it is if we can access the same
files and formats that other users can with little to no human
intervention.
This leaves technology as the go-between between content creators and consumers.
The more technology can do and automate, the larger portion of math we
can access.
Currently, even if Pearson wanted to make a math text book accessible,
most likely they would wait to see if any blind student wanted a copy
(my guess is that for over 90% of their math text books, they probably
will never get special requests from blind students for a braille or
advanced audio copy).
I, as a student or professional, won't know I need the book until days
or weeks before I have to use it.
Creating specialized content is expensive and slow, so I may end up
getting said books weeks or months late, despite their best efforts,
by which time it may have become useless to me.
I prefer a 90% access to any book instantly to 100% access to a book
with a month wait time.
I also prefer to not have to rely on special processes and people to
put in a lot of hours to make things work for me.
It would not be economically possible for publishers to manually
encode all math equations text and graphics to suit everyone's needs.
Therefore we need to rely on standards such as MathML, that benefits
not only blind users, but also the learning disabled community and
people using PDAs and small screens.
I talked to a representative from a big publisher in February at a
conference, and they said they are excited about MathML and as soon as
it is supported in end user devices such as Kindle, iBooks on the iPad
etc, they'll switch over to it, since it saves them a lot of money and
effort.
But standards are a tricky thing. Everyone has to use them to make
them effective.
It's not enough for publishers to use the standards. A.T. companies
must implement solutions that take advantage of that those standards
as well. Otherwise the material that is inherently accessible, cannot
make it all the way to the end users.
I think the responsibility of publishers and content creators is to
put their work into standardized format that can be renderred for
everyone. But it has to be the responsibility of the company
specializing in rendering formats for a group of users, to transform
it from the standard format to the interface that works best for their
targetted user group.
Math can never be translated by mapping one print symbol to one
braille symbol, for instance. The fact that location matters and math
is a two-dimensional notation means that some intelligent translation
has to take place between printed math and braille or speech, things
that are linear in nature.
We should not expect publishers, who have no knowledge of how a blind
person operates, let alone professors, teachers, magazine editors and
so on, to understand speech, braille, math codes, synchronized speech
and braille etc. Again, that comes down to the Assistive Technology
industry. If they do not do this, what are they good for?
I applaud the DSI efforts in this area and I look forward to seeing the results.
I just have to stress the importance of a flexible braille support
architecture, and not just commit to Nemeth or UEB, but to allow
different organizations to plug in the braille codes they want to use.
Liblouis offers this, as far as I know.

Thanks
-B

On 5/27/11, Ken Perry <kperry at blinksoft.com> wrote:
> See that is the problem I don't think access should have to depend on any
> screen reader.  With the way active content can be done now and speech can
> be transmitted online it would be much better to make the content talk.
> While I sometimes argue the point that is made with a system like Emacspeak
> there is something to accessible content without a screen reader having to
> be involved.
>
> For example can you imagine what it would be like if the Movie companies had
> said we will make it possible for screen readers to make our movies
> accessible but it will be up to the companies who make them to implement the
> our api to make them talk?  It would be much better if the publishers make
> their tests and books accessible without depending on software the user is
> using.  For example if you have a graph or a it would be better to put it in
> several formats that different access technology can deal with.  For that
> matter maybe even recorded spoken word for some of the descriptive.  If each
> publisher did it then the access comes default.
>
> In sina's example a company like Pearsons could use math player to have
> access to the equations spoken  and maybe in the future brailed if they need
> it but that should work no matter the screen access program.
>
> So I guess what I would like to see is accessible content not content that
> someone needs to make accessible.
>
>
> Ken
>
> Ken
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
> Behalf Of Stephen L Noble
> Sent: Friday, May 27, 2011 8:03 AM
> To: 'Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics'
> Subject: Re: [Blindmath] Somewhat positive yet disappointing press release
>
> The work in question is not designed to limit math usage to any
> particular screen reader. Any screen reader can modify their product to
> support math. Indeed, JAWS already supports math speech when using IE
> plus MathPlayer. The grant in question takes this work much further,
> however. Let me quote what Neil Soiffer said: "Freedom Scientific did
> not want to participate in the grant, GW Micro did."
>
> Nothing will stop JAWS, NVDA, or any other screen reader from
> implementing the same functionality that will be in Window-Eyes as a
> result of this research project. It simply means that they have to make
> math access a priority and devote the necessary development resources to
> make it happen. It certainly isn't the fault of companies like ETS or
> Design Science that the folks that make JAWS do not see math support as
> all that  important. The quickest way to get screen reader vendors
> interested in math support is for customers (including big customers
> like state service agencies) to tell them that this is a priority and
> you know it can be done.
>
> I have had countless discussions with vendors for years about the need
> for better math support. What they usually tell me is that there is not
> enough demand for increased math functionality to warrant expending
> development time to make it happen. Often, they tell me that I am the
> only person who ever mentions it. Here's a quote copied and pasted from
> an email I received a vendor not too long ago:
> "...we choose features based on the scenarios they complete and on the
> customer feedback we here. We've heard your feedback loud and clear and
> we will take it into account. At this point there's nothing further we
> need from you."
> So, the point is that vendors need to hear from customers, large and
> small, that they need to put in the work to get better math support in
> their products.
>
> --Steve Noble
>
>
>>>> Ken Perry <kperry at blinksoft.com> 5/27/2011 7:14 AM >>>
> No iI said they should use standards like html 5 to make it work there
> are
> all kinds of things they could do from using flash to control the
> reading of
> text or html descriptive recordings that can be controlled by the web
> page
> and not by the screen reader.  What I am trying to say is this should
> not be
> geared to one or another screen reader.  GW being involved may not be
> the
> greatest way to go.  What I mean is if we are all forced to use
> Window-eyes
> just to read math that would be silly.
>
> Ken
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org
> [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
> Behalf Of Sina Bahram
> Sent: Friday, May 27, 2011 1:04 AM
> To: 'Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics'
> Subject: Re: [Blindmath] Somewhat positive yet disappointing press
> release
>
>
> Ok, now let's discuss some real mathematics, not highschool
> arithmetic.
>
> Please state a standards compliant, AT agnostic,  way of stating the
> reamon
> zeta function?
>
> Here's the function
>
> zeta(x)=1/(Gamma(x))int_0^infty(u^(x-1))/(e^u-1)du
>
> I'd like that read outloud sensibly please.
>
> Several techniques exist, but you say there's a standards compliant way
> to
> do this, without freedom's intervention. What would that
> be?
>
> Take care,
> Sina
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org
> [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
> Behalf Of Ken Perry
> Sent: Friday, May 27, 2011 12:46 AM
> To: 'Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics'
> Subject: Re: [Blindmath] Somewhat positive yet disappointing press
> release
>
> Well from talking to the Pearsons coders they are trying to make the
> subject
> matter accessible no matter the access difficulties. For example in
> the
> chapter I have in front of me right now if you go to a diagram that is
> a bar
> chart.  Or how about a parabola it has access in two ways one is a long
> desc
> like alt that works in any screen reader but another for a better
> description is you click on the picture and it brings up a full
> description
> of the graph in question as if a person was describing it to you.  They
> are
> using math player to read the functions and things and the test I took
> as a
> sample was accessible whether I be totally blind, visually impaired, or
> a
> regular sighted user.  I just think if things are designed correctly
> it
> doesn't matter the access software.
>
> Ken
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org
> [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
> Behalf Of Steve Jacobson
> Sent: Thursday, May 26, 2011 10:41 PM
> To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics;
> patti at 4dewitt.com
> Subject: Re: [Blindmath] Somewhat positive yet disappointing press
> release
>
> Maybe Neil will feel like explaining more, but the odds are that
> whatever GW
> Micro does will likely benefit Freedom Scientific.  I must say that I'm
> a
> little surprised that people would feel that Freedom Scientific was
> wronged
> here when they chose to not put anything into this project and to sit
> back
> and benefit from the work of others.  I'm not sure there is any way to
> interpret math in a way that is so standard that screen readers won't
> have
> to do some work.  In addition, the model of how software is made
> accessible
> is changing and screen readers are having to make some adjustments.  We
> are
> very much moving away from MSAA toward UI Automation, and this does
> require
> some effort on the part of screen readers.  Over time, there will be
> more
> standard ways of handling this, but it does worry me some that there
> seems
> to be a significant amount of work that screen readers have to do to
> make
> individual software accessible.  Time will tell how it all works out.
>
> Best regards,
>
> Steve Jacobson
>
> On Fri, 27 May 2011 01:26:06 +0000, patti at 4dewitt.com wrote:
>
>>In addition, as a technology teacher of the blind in nj, most kids are
>
>>at the mercy of the commission or the schools for their technology.
>>They get them
> jaws most times.
>>Universal access is my dream. It should all be interconnected On the
>>other hand, Jaws users have a huge underground of script writers who
>>may already have solved my problem
>
>>Sent on the Sprint. Now Network from my BlackBerry.
>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: "Ken Perry" <kperry at blinksoft.com>
>>Sender: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org
>>Date: Thu, 26 May 2011 20:57:31
>>To: 'Blind Math list for those interested in
>>mathematics'<blindmath at nfbnet.org>
>>Reply-To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
>>	<blindmath at nfbnet.org>
>>Subject: Re: [Blindmath] Somewhat positive yet disappointing press
>>release
>
>>See this is where I have to ask.  If you use standards like html 5 and
>
>>make sure that things are more than just accessible to screen readers
>
>>it won't be hard for companies like FS to keep it accessible.  This
>>shouldn't be a war against companies it should be a war to make Math
>>accessible whether a person uses sight or sound or smell to read math.
>
>>If standards of the world are followed rather than making up a
> standard
>>just for the blind then it won't be an issue.
>
>>Ken
>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org
>>[mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Neil Soiffer
>>Sent: Thursday, May 26, 2011 4:13 PM
>>To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
>>Subject: Re: [Blindmath] Somewhat positive yet disappointing press
>>release
>
>>We are adding new functionality (eg, navigation for math and being
> able
>>to read math directly in a word doc without saving to a web page
> first).
>>Unless JAWS or other AT adds code to their product to take make the
>>appropriate calls to the new interfaces that get defined, it won't
> pick
>>up that new functionality.
>
>>Neil Soiffer
>>Senior Scientist
>>Design Science, Inc.
>>www.dessci.com
>
>
>>On Thu, May 26, 2011 at 12:32 PM, Patti Mitchell <patti at 4dewitt.com>
> wrote:
>
>>> Is Jaws using something else?
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org
>>> [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org]
>>> On
>>> Behalf Of Neil Soiffer
>>> Sent: Thursday, May 26, 2011 3:08 PM
>>> To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
>>> Subject: Re: [Blindmath] Somewhat positive yet disappointing press
>>> release
>>>
>>> We would like as many screen readers as possible to be part of this
> work.
>>> Freedom Scientific did not want to participate in the grant, GW
> Micro
> did.
>>> I've said it before and I'll say it again, if you want math support
>
>>> in
>>your
>>> AT, you need to make it very clear to your AT vendor that if they
>>> don't support math well, you'll use a different product that does.
>>>
>>> Neil Soiffer
>>> Senior Scientist
>>> Design Science, Inc.
>>> www.dessci.com
>>> ~ Makers of MathType, MathFlow, MathPlayer, MathDaisy, Equation
>>> Editor ~
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thu, May 26, 2011 at 10:30 AM, Jose Tamayo <jtblas at hotmail.com>
> wrote:
>>>
>>> > In the press release below, JAWS is not mentioned at all.  This is
>
>>> > such a significant press release yet a market player such as JAWS
>
>>> > is not even mentioned, any reason?
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > http://www.dessci.com/en/company/press/releases/110524.htm
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > http://www.
>>> >
>>> > dessci.com/en/company/press/releases/110524.htm
>>> >
>>> > >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > _______________________________________________
>>> > Blindmath mailing list
>>> > Blindmath at nfbnet.org
>>> > http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
>>> > To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info
>
>>> > for
>>> > Blindmath:
>>> >
>>> >
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/neils%40
>>> > des
>>> > sci.com
>>> >
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Blindmath mailing list
>>> Blindmath at nfbnet.org
>>> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
>>> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info
> for
>>> Blindmath:
>>>
>>>
>>http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/patti%404dew
>
>>itt.c
>>>
>>om<http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/patti%404
>
>>dewit
>>t.c%0Aom>
>>> -----
>>> No virus found in this message.
>>> Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
>>> Version: 10.0.1375 / Virus Database: 1509/3661 - Release Date:
>>> 05/26/11
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Blindmath mailing list
>>> Blindmath at nfbnet.org
>>> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
>>> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info
> for
>>> Blindmath:
>>>
>>>
>>http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/neils%40dess
>
>>ci.co
>>m
>>>
>>_______________________________________________
>>Blindmath mailing list
>>Blindmath at nfbnet.org
>>http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
>>To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
>>Blindmath:
>>http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/kperry%40bli
>
>>nksof
>>t.com
>
>
>>_______________________________________________
>>Blindmath mailing list
>>Blindmath at nfbnet.org
>>http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
>>To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
> Blindmath:
>>http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/patti%404dew
>
>>itt.com _______________________________________________
>>Blindmath mailing list
>>Blindmath at nfbnet.org
>>http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
>>To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
> Blindmath:
>>http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/steve.jacobs
>
>>on%40visi.com
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Blindmath mailing list
> Blindmath at nfbnet.org
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
> Blindmath:
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/sbahram%40nc.rr.c
>
> om
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Blindmath mailing list
> Blindmath at nfbnet.org
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
> Blindmath:
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/kperry%40blinksof
>
> t.com
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Blindmath mailing list
> Blindmath at nfbnet.org
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
> Blindmath:
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/steve.noble%40lou
> isville.edu
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Blindmath mailing list
> Blindmath at nfbnet.org
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
> Blindmath:
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/kperry%40blinksof
> t.com
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Blindmath mailing list
> Blindmath at nfbnet.org
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
> Blindmath:
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/birkir.gunnarsson%40gmail.com
>