[nfbcs] Press Release: MathDaisy Beta Released / Accessibility

[Bruce Virga]

[corrected link]

Hi,

We are sending this message because you asked us to keep you informed
about our progress in math accessibility products and technologies.

We at Design Science are happy to announce the beta release of our
newest product, MathDaisy. MathDaisy adds support to the DAISY
Consortium's DAISY Pipeline and Microsoft's Save As DAISY, to convert
documents with equations to the accessible DAISY format.

MathDaisy is currently undergoing beta testing, with final release
expected around the CSUN Conference in March. If you would like to try
out the beta version of MathDaisy, please send email to beta at dessci.com.

The press release has been published on our website, and included below.
http://www.dessci.com/en/company/press/releases/090128.htm

Best Regards,
--Bruce

Bruce Virga
EVP of Sales & Business Development, COO
brucev at dessci.com

Tel: +1 (562) 432-2920
Fax: +1 (562) 432-2857

Design Science, Inc. -- www.dessci.com
140 Pine Avenue, 4th Floor
Long Beach, California 90802 USA

~ Makers of MathType, MathFlow, MathPlayer, MathDaisy, WebEQ, Equation
Editor ~

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For Immediate Release

MathDaisy Adds Math Support to DAISY Production Tools

MathDaisy, now in beta, adds math support to the DAISY Consortium's
DAISY Pipeline and Microsoft's Save As DAISY products

Orlando, Florida - January 28, 2009 - At the ATIA 2009 Conference today,
Design Science announced the release of the MathDaisy beta, an add-on
for the DAISY Consortium's DAISY Pipeline and Microsoft's Save As DAISY
products, which are also expected to be released as betas at ATIA.
MathDaisy adds support for mathematical equations, making them
accessible to students, teachers, engineers, and scientists with
disabilities.

DAISY (Digital Accessible Information SYstem) is an XML standard for
producing accessible and navigable multimedia documents, including
Digital Talking Books (DTBook), digital text books, and synchronized
audio/text books. DAISY is a globally recognized standard for accessible
content. It is used by NIMAS (National Instructional Materials
Accessibility Standard) for accessible K-12 textbooks and by ePub, a
widely used standard for digital books. The latest version of the DAISY
standard requires that mathematics be represented in MathML, the World
Wide Web Consortium's standard for representing math notation in XML.

MathDaisy is Design Science's add-in for both the DAISY Pipeline
software and the Save As DAISY add-in for Microsoft Word. These products
both convert documents into DAISY's DTBook format. If the original
documents contain mathematical equations, then users of those products
will need MathDaisy to handle them and make them accessible.

Save As DAISY is an open source software package developed by Microsoft.
Once installed, it adds a "Save As Daisy" command to Microsoft Word XP,
2003, and 2007. This command converts an open Microsoft Word document
into DAISY's DTBook format, making use of the DAISY Pipeline. MathDaisy
installs into Save As Daisy adding math support.

The DAISY Pipeline and Save as DAISY work just fine for many user's
needs. However, organizations with their own publishing workflow, or
those wanting to create a more automated or more powerful DAISY
production facility, should be interested in Design Science's MathFlow
line of products.

About Design Science
Founded in 1986 and headquartered in Long Beach, California, Design
Science develops software used by educators, scientists and publishing
professionals, including MathType, Equation Editor in Microsoft Office,
WebEQ, MathFlow and MathPlayer, to communicate on the web and in print.
For more information please visit www.dessci.com.

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