[Blindmath] MathJax Accessibility: math/STEM universal access/design

Tue Nov 8 18:31:42 UTC 2011

Hi Birkir,

As an advocate, I have these kind of discussions with vendors all the time...including Microsoft. But I cannot force Microsoft, Adobe, Freedom Scientific or any other vendor to do anything...all I can do is make convincing arguments, which they generally ignore by essentially saying "you are the only person who feels this is an issue." It will take concerted organized efforts by the accessibility community and advocacy groups to push this issue forward.

A number of us in the advocacy/accessibility field met last month with the Obama administration to talk about these issues and to bring STEM accessibility to a higher level of visibility. I think we made some headway, but it will take continuing follow-up discussions with key federal agencies to move this forward. But this is the kind of action that will be needed to make real substantive change. There are many pieces of the puzzle, some of these are found, others are still in waiting. As one person, I cannot fix all of these problems. But, I am doing my part. Last month I took 10 days off without pay to work on STEM accessibility issues. I simply cannot sustain that level of interaction on a continuing basis, but I am doing what I can. We all need to work together and find all the puzzle pieces, one piece at a time...but hopefully, with increasing speed.

--Steve Noble
steve.noble at louisville.edu
502-969-3088

-----Original Message-----
From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2011 12:23 PM
To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
Subject: Re: [Blindmath] MathJax Accessibility: math/STEM universal access/design

Steve
(the following are merely my thoughts, if some of them are inaccurate I'm free to be corrected)

first the negatives:
True, but this is also been the message from DSI for 5 or 8 years, and it hasn't worked either.
I think there are very few blind people who pursue math or STEM subjects (well, I know this for a fact), if we further fragment this group by screen reader used, then expect them to try and figure out the MathType vs MathPlayer setup, understand the inherent issues with braille support and the interplay between the braille display, the screen reader vendor, the browser, and MathPlayer, and then give constructive feedback to screen reader vendors, I just don't think it'll ever happen, way too few users to have an impact, and most people either just learn LaTeX and get by with it .. because it is linear, it is supported by braille devices, you can use the same language for reading and writing math, you can use any text editor in theory.
I, as a blind user, have major issues with not being able to even get to the MathPlayer menu in IE without using some Jaws cursor and routing keys. If this is an  application intended for me as a blind user, why do I need to go the extra mile to accessits menus, by all standards that would be defined as inaccessible. As far as I know, there are also no blind users involved with internal development or testing of MathPlayer,, though the blind community is willing, and working with Neil is always a pleasure.

Of course once we have public releases of MathPlayer we, as a community, can help out, and I sure intend to do my best in that regard.

The other issue is that the one source, core accessibility environment for creating accessible math is Microsoft Word with MathType, but accessing math in that environment itself is not even accessible to me. I have to choose between a variety of partial solutions to read the output, such as to emboss via other software (if I have an embosser), get MathPlayer feedback by exporting to IE and lose braille support but get voice reading (at least once I adjust the security options in IE and get it to work), or I can revert back to LaTeX so I can work within the document itself (toggle TeX).
It's hard to sell a product that works if and only if (insert work arounds here to get things to work). Also, as a user, I feel a bit weird asking my screen reader vendor to make a product by some other company accessible.
However technically valid the standard design science answer is, it is frustrating to get the "I know this doesn't work, talk to the other company and ask them to get our product to work" response all the time.
Just try that if you had, say, a browser that didn't work, but you ask users who are unhappy with it to talk to Microsoft, because it's really their fault. It may technically be true, but the user stil feels short changed.

Due to the reasons noted above, I don't think we'll ever see a significant influx of new users with the current situation. When math accessibility is this hard and this fragmented, there is no reason why we should see more students pursuing STeM subjects this year or next year, than we've seen in the last 5 years. Something has to change in order for them to come in and succeed.

the good:
Fortunately there are changes coming:
What is happening that is positive?
With the update to MathPlayer and its compatibility to all pages created with MathJax, the amount of material that it makes available in an accessible format has the potential to increase by hundreds or thousands of percentage points, bringing something truly new, innovative and impressive to the blind community interested in math.
(build it and they will come, if you will).
I am excited to see MathPlayer 3, and test it out with pages made by MathJax. If we can get it to work with all MathJax created pages, we truly have a game changer in terms of the amount of material available to users. This will increase math interest in the group, I believe.
I also know that MathPlayer within Word should become accessible (at least according to the ETS grant that was posted on the DSI blog a few weeks back) though it is still a couple of years away, which is a very long time in the computer world. What is still missing from this picture is accessible MathType input, which I really think will impress, but, as far as I understand, that is not on the table. This means blind users will still have to learn LaTeX if they want to write math, and once they've learnt that, why not just use it for reading math as well, due to the advantages listed above and the difficulty of getting any meaningful refreshable braille in any other format.

MathML is becoming a core technology in HTML5 (I believe the official "release" of HTML5 is scheduled for 2014or 2015, so it's still a few years away, but this time around there is a comprihensive set of browser compatibility tests, which should imply that browser support for MathML, given that they pass the HTML5 tests, will be more uniform and widespread. MathML is also a core technology of EPUB3, and hopefully that will convince device manufacturers such as Apple (iPad) and Amazon (Kindle) to stop relying on graphics for math and, instead, create client software for parsing MathML and generating the graphics themselves .. which incidentally makes the information available to software that wants to convert MathML into something else (sound, braille, anything really). Add to that on-going research into turning touch screens into braille input devices and braille or tactile feedback through touchscreens, that really has the possibility of revolutionizing math accessibility, by giving users an idea of the spatial layout of math for the first time, granted this is probably still a few years off at best.

The other idea, which probably is not going to happen in the short term, is to utilize the open source resources out there. There is NVdA, which still does not work with MathPlayer (may be us users can push for it), there is LibLouis with MathML to Nemeth translation capabilities, that has to be integrated (again it seems like NVDA is a logical choice here, seeing as its braille support is built on LibLouis already).
Given what I have read about how little it would take to add MP support to NVDA, and to add LibLouis braille support to MathPlayer, it seems these could be relatively small steps with relatively large payoffs (both of these things are mentioned in articles on www.access2science.com, though no technical details are given).
Once you can point to a free and open source, high quality solution that provide free and superior math access, you really have something in hand to "bother" the screen reader vendors with, and NVDA can offer a unique functionality that will make it a clear choice over the traditional screen readers for many universities and other academic settings, which may improve their standing and their cashflow.

What would, of course, be best, is if MathPlayer was open source, or we had a similar open source solution to push. With open source code, it's easier to get users involved, to get research and acaademic funding and support, and to migrate solutions for application or platform x to other areas. I think MathJax being open source was brilliant, and the benefits of it are becoming more and more obvious.

Obviously there are downsides too. I have seen very badly supervised and executed open source projects that fizzled out completely, it really takes a good central planning and organization to make open source work, and a large enough community of testers and developers, and this might be difficult with mathematics. Though I would hope that university researchers and students could be involved .. after all there is a lot of people in computer science, engineering and math, that are looking for big projects for their degree completions. I think working around a commercial product to increase its user base is not something that you can easily do as an academic, or as part of an academic project, at least your funding resources will be severely limited. Working on an open source project however, such as how to best turn MathML into speech, definitely has the sound of a successful PHD project to it.

I am not suggesting that this solution is even on the table, or that there aren't a myriad of arguments against this. Design Science owns MathPlayer, and they are, of course,  free to do whatever they want with it. Neil has worked hard on it, and really made a huge difference for anyone interested in math as a blind student. My posthere is simply to underline that it could be taken even further, not to criticize what has been done, because this product has revolutionized access to mathematics for blind students, no questions about that.

I just really think it needs the leverage other open source developments, and that would be most easily done if it were open source itself.
It would require smart and dedicated community of blind developers to help it along. I know I don't have the time, or very little time, though I would help as I could.
I'd imagine the same applies to other people on this list.

I hope that MathPlayer3 and the accessible MathPlayer Word integration will provide significant upgrades, and that hopefully NVDA integration can happen, and then we could see a connect between NVDA, MathPlayer and LibLouis to provide better braille support, both through refreshable braille, and through the Braille Blaster project for a free and open source embossing of mathematics.
That would be the next step in the revolution, and would change this status quo, that really has gone on for too long.
Cheers
-B

On 11/8/11, Noble,Stephen L. <steve.noble at louisville.edu> wrote:
> Of course, one has to remember that the original concept behind 
> MathPlayer was to turn math into speech so that screen reader 
> applications (like JAWS) could read the math. The only way to turn 
> math symbols into speech is to use words to convey that information. 
> The only way to provide any additional layout or spatial information 
> in speech is to use more words, for instance to announce the column 
> and row location of a data element in a table...but again, all of that is done with words.
>
> Now, I will add that getting Nemeth support in refreshable braille out 
> of MathML content has been "potentially" possible for many years, but 
> the vendors who implement this technology have not bothered to invest 
> the development time into their applications. If you want to see this 
> happen, then lots of customers need to start complaining to places 
> like Freedom Scientific (just an example since I mentioned JAWS) and 
> tell them this is a priority. Otherwise, we'll still be having this 
> same discussion five years from now.
>
> --Steve Noble
> steve.noble at louisville.edu
> 502-969-3088
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org 
> [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Kevin Chao
> Sent: Monday, November 07, 2011 5:06 PM
> To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
> Subject: Re: [Blindmath] MathJax Accessibility: math/STEM universal 
> access/design
>
> Will MathPlayer 3 address the fact that all the math/STEM 
> symbols/operators in 2.2 are converted into words, all spatial 
> layout/structure/relations not being conveyed due to all information 
> being converted into words, and there not being proper braille support 
> (Nemeth)? Each and every one of these three key points are absolutely 
> essential and critical to proper and truly accessible math/STEM readable content.
>
> I think that the work that Design Science, MathPlayer has done is a 
> great start, but it doesn't provide a great experience, especially 
> when it comes to being able to have an overview, drill down, and 
> navigate/review. Not to also mention the inability to create/edit work 
> in an integrated/imbedded way, such as homework, notes, and exams 
> within the same environment that is already being used by education or work, such as a LMS/CMS of some kind.
> Also, the very restrictive system requirement of MathPlayer 2.2 
> plug-in only working with IE, what about Windows Firefox and Chrome or 
> Mac Safari, Webkit, Chrome, etc.? This is where I think it would be 
> great if MathJax has a standard specifying accessibility, which would 
> work across platforms and browsers.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Kevin
>
> On 11/6/11, Neil Soiffer <NeilS at dessci.com> wrote:
>> MathJax works with MathPlayer to provide accessibility if you use IE.
>> There are some issues with MathJax and MathPlayer 2 if people didn't 
>> configure their site to allow users to choose the renderer, but most 
>> of those have been resolved with MathPlayer 3 (which might be 
>> available next week).
>>
>> MathJax is a great solution which has already greatly increased the 
>> amount of math that is accessible on the web.  Design Science is one 
>> of the founding sponsers for MathJax work and we are working to make 
>> sure the math rendered by it is accessible.
>>
>>  Neil Soiffer
>> Senior Scientist
>> Design Science, Inc.
>> www.dessci.com
>> ~ Makers of MathType, MathFlow, MathPlayer, MathDaisy, Equation 
>> Editor ~
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Nov 6, 2011 at 3:19 PM, Kevin Chao <kevinchao89 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> MathJax is an open source JavaScript display engine for mathematics 
>>> that works in all modern browsers.
>>> No more setup for readers. No more browser plugins. No more font 
>>> installations... It just works.
>>> Accept following sources:
>>> LaTeX
>>> MathML
>>>
>>> http://www.mathjax.org/
>>>
>>> Unfortunately, there's not an MathJax accessibility API, which web 
>>> browsers can use, which will allow assistive technologies, such as 
>>> screen readers to work with beautiful math in all browsers. As far 
>>> as I'm aware, there's no MathJax accessibility in Windows IE9/8, 
>>> Chrome 15-17, Firefox 4-10; Mac OS X Safari, Webkit, Lightning, 
>>> and/or Chrome; iOS 5 Safari; Android Mobile Accessibility Web 
>>> browser or Ideal Web Reader.
>>>
>>> MathJax has the potential to make math/STEM accessibility truly 
>>> universal and not speicific to MathML and IE8, MathPlayer 2.2, and 
>>> JAWS 12.
>>>
>>> It has the potential to completely revolutionize math/STEM 
>>> accessibility for all, but I would like to know what's the best 
>>> approach in MathJax including universal access/design, and it 
>>> working for all? Perhaps, it should be a community effort, where we 
>>> all contact MathJax, create a petition, or some other campaign effort?
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>>
>>> Kevin
>>>
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>>
>
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