Apple Education and Screen Readers

[MacRumors]

Businessweek (http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/nov2003/tc20031112_9773_tc056.htm) explores the strategic importance of Screen Reader software for the Mac platform. Screen Reader software allow the visually impaired to more effectively utilize computers by translating both text and images into speech.

When the only developer of such Screen Reader software for the Mac announced that it would no longer support or build new versions of its software, it left both Apple and users concerned about Apple's future in the educational market. According to Businessweek, "School systems buying Apple products today are knowingly purchasing systems that can't be used by all their pupils, which runs counter to the Americans with Disabilities Act."

This event is what prompted Apple to hire programmers in September (http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2003/09/20030922122609.shtml) to develop their own Screen Reader application. While the article goes on to suggest that Apple should release the Screen-reader software as open source, even by providing the software for a discounted price to Mac users, it would represent a significant savings advantage for consumers purchasing Macs. The same software costs between $800-$1,300 for licenses on Windows.

[Dippo]

Yea, I think this would be necessary for the education market.

Making this product open source would be nice, but not practical.

[gopher]

Universal Access in Panther also reads text aloud if you move the mouse pointer over it. Very much like how screen readers have worked in the past under Mac OS 9. They obviously missed that feature and probably why the third party stopped developing it for the Mac.

[SeaFox]

While the article goes on to suggest that Apple should release the Screen-reader software as open source, even by providing the software for a discounted price to Mac users, it would represent a significant savings advantage for consumers purchasing Macs. The same software costs between $800-$1,300 for licenses on Windows.

If those figures are true that would obliterate the up-front cost difference between Macs and PC's for school use. :D Assuming the school was required to buy screen reading software for the PC's, which I don't know the exact term of the law (wasn't it section 502 or something like that) but maybe they're required to now.

Actually, if we're talking about eMac that would make the Mac cheaper. No total-cost-of-ownership presentations or IT support opinions would be needed to show schools the value.

[dukemeiser]

I would offer it for free and open source to canabalize Screen Reader sales. Give 'em the finger I say!:mad:

[pbooktebo]

Although this is an important issue, I think this was one of the crappiest articles I've read in a long time. Just poorly put.

First, there's this quote:
"VERY ANNOYED."_ Equal-access advocates are up in arms. "I think it's horrible," says Curtis Chong, president of the National Federation for the Blind in Computer Science. Giving blind students Apples will "further isolate blind kids who are already isolated from the basic school population. I'm very annoyed at Apple," says Chong.

It is the software developer who quit Apple, and there's no information that Apple has anything do do with this decision.

Then, the article suggests that the solution is for Apple to create something open-source and release it to the world in some kind of altruistic gesture. While this sounds nice, it might make much more sense for Apple to make it and not release it outside the platform, thereby making Apple machines ADA compliant and furthering their attractivness to education buyers. They suggest that the software is over $1,000 on a PC, so providing it for free to Mac users might prove Apple to be a significant choice.

They also note that Apple has been on this for awhile and, as we all know, Apple does have a demonstrated commitment to Accessibility (just check system preferences, or try pressing ctrl-option-cmd-8 for a quick switch to white-on-black).

What I wish the reporter had done is asked for an official response from Apple for what consumers can do. After reading this article, I would have hoped to know at least the following:
1. Although the developer has ceased development, what versions of the Apple OS does it run on, and is it at least still for sale? No comment in the article.
2. If it doesn't run on OS X, can it run through Virtual PC?
3. What does Apple suggest to education consumers who might have blind clients? There has to be a company response, but this article makes it seem as if Apple missed the boat, dropped the ball, and said c-ya!

That rant over, I do hope that Apple finds a way to address this, and I do hope they release it as a free or low-cost piece of software. If they want to make it open source, that's fine by me. If not, that's OK, too.

[ennerseed]

Originally posted by gopher
Universal Access in Panther also reads text aloud if you move the mouse pointer over it. Very much like how screen readers have worked in the past under Mac OS 9. They obviously missed that feature and probably why the third party stopped developing it for the Mac.

it does in Jaguar also, and prob olders, but does it read things like the text on a Safari webpage or iChat messages, when moused over?

[TomSmithMacEd]

It makes sense to me. A great thing Apple could put in their sales pitches to the schools. I would love it if our school district would get us each an iBook to do work on!

[sethypoo]

Originally posted by dukemeiser
I would offer it for free and open source to canabalize Screen Reader sales. Give 'em the finger I say!:mad:

Hear hear! This was really mean of them. The educational market needs this!

[mrsebastian]

get 'em apple, get 'em!

[the_dalex]

You have to realize that sometimes people with agendas will demonize the very people they want to help them... it's underhanded, but obviously it's effective. The article portrays Apple in a negative light, and suddenly Apple is on the defensive and is responsible for picking up where a third-party vendor left off. They are now required to act or their reputation will suffer.

It's funny that the person quoted isn't mad at Microsoft for forcing them to spend $1000 per seat, but I guess they think that's ok because the PC world doesn't see the same level of accountability Apple experiences... the downside of being so vertical is that you need to provide a total solution and can't leave it up to other vendors.

[achmafooma]

Originally posted by ennerseed
it does in Jaguar also, and prob olders, but does it read things like the text on a Safari webpage or iChat messages, when moused over?
You know, I would swear that right after I installed Panther I was playing around with the accessibility options and found a setting that made it read everything under your mouse.

It seemed to work just about anywhere... menu items, buttons, etc. And this wasn't just in the preferences, I was clicking around in other places.

I only had a second to check on my iBook just now, but I can't seem to find the setting anymore. I'll try it when I get home.

Regardless, speech technology and the guts behind a screen reader are already built into Mac OS X... if it doesn't already do what a screen reader does, it would be an easy thing for Apple to adapt what's already there to that function.

I used to work on an accesibility helpdesk for a government agency, and--frankly--most of the Windows screen reader programs charge you a fortune and aren't very impressive. They're mostly very basic, in fact. They also usually come with a zoom feature (which is definitely built into Mac OS X).

Such an easy thing for Apple to implement... a screen reader should be a feature in the accesibility pane. Free with the OS. Make it so anybody can use a Mac, out of the box, even those who are visually or otherwise impaired.

[zim]

Originally posted by dukemeiser
I would offer it for free and open source to canabalize Screen Reader sales. Give 'em the finger I say!:mad:

I have always thought that readers for the blind should be an aspect of the os and should be free, you could almost make a case of discrimination out of it by saying that blind people are treated unfairly because they have to purchase extra equipment to make their computer usable. In terms of accessibility I strongly feel that the mac offers the best support for all types of users and that they should push the fact that the os already can do a lot of things that are beneficial to people who are in need of assistance.

[Lancetx]

Originally posted by the_dalex
You have to realize that sometimes people with agendas will demonize the very people they want to help them... it's underhanded, but obviously it's effective. The article portrays Apple in a negative light, and suddenly Apple is on the defensive and is responsible for picking up where a third-party vendor left off. They are now required to act or their reputation will suffer.

It's funny that the person quoted isn't mad at Microsoft for forcing them to spend $1000 per seat, but I guess they think that's ok because the PC world doesn't see the same level of accountability Apple experiences... the downside of being so vertical is that you need to provide a total solution and can't leave it up to other vendors.

It's funny how in instances like this that Microsoft almost always gets the benefit of the doubt while Apple almost always doesn't. And you're right, with their vertical structure, it just means that this is yet another issue Apple will again have to solve on their own...and probably end up doing a much better job than the 3rd party was doing before as well.

[finelinebob]

Originally posted by gopher
Universal Access in Panther also reads text aloud if you move the mouse pointer over it.

Rather a hit-or-miss process, if you're blind. Sarcasm aside, I do know people with limited vision for whom this might work, but it's not enough for someone totally without sight.

Still, it seems like Apple already has much of the software technology it needs in WebCore and Text-to-Speech. Would/Could Apple possibly release this to the KHTML folks?

Hmm... I wonder if Safari has any support for aural style sheets....

[Doctor Q]

Darwin is open source, as are certain applications that run on Mac OS X. The Finder itself is not. A screen reader wouldn't be part of Darwin, since the screen reader would be a GUI feature, not a Unix-level feature. Would a screen reader that worked everywhere really be just an application running on Mac OS X, or would it be something built into Mac OS X itself, and therefore not even be a candidate for open source?

No matter what the answer, I can see the advantages to Apple to make it cheap or free, and the advantages to using any open standards that exist, and the advantages in using existing open source code if any exists, but I don't see the advantages to Apple in writing their own screen reader and making it open source unless they expect the open source community to significantly enhance it.

[andyduncan]

The federal guidline is section 508 (http://www.section508.gov/) and it covers more than just screen readers/vision impairments, it is essentially a more general version of the Web Accessibility Initiative (http://www.w3.org/WAI/) guidelines.

With regards to the article, a screen reader is precisely the type of functionality Apple should be doing in house. If the article is correct, this is fantastic.

As was said before: yeah, its sort of pointless to speak the text under your mouse when you're blind :-)

As to where this app would function, it would no doubt function in the os x cocoa/carbon application layer, not on the low level BSD layer. There are already some accessibility frameworks built-in to os x that provide hooks for assistive technologies "for free" as long as the application uses default widgets.

Such a screen reader would need to access those, and ideally would be integrated with Safari as well. That would really be a killer app (in this space anyway). And make sure it works with iTunes :-)

[gopy]

Originally posted by Doctor Q
Darwin is open source, as are certain applications that run on Mac OS X. The Finder itself is not. A screen reader wouldn't be part of Darwin, since the screen reader would be a GUI feature, not a Unix-level feature. Would a screen reader that worked everywhere really be just an application running on Mac OS X, or would it be something built into Mac OS X itself, and therefore not even be a candidate for open source?


Turn on Personal Web Sharing. Presto, you've just used a GUI feature to activate a Unix-level feature.

[andyduncan]

Originally posted by gopy
Turn on Personal Web Sharing. Presto, you've just used a GUI feature to activate a Unix-level feature.

Yeah, but it's a much different thing to go the other way around.

It's possible you could make a unix-level/cli app that controls a gui app. But such a tool would not be portable, as it would be entirely dependent on the windowing system and accessibility APIs, which, as we all know, are only available with an Apple Logo.

[digidoodle]

The business week article is really kind of misinformed. Title II of the Americans With Disabilities Act (which applies to public schools) does not have specific requirements for the purchase of accessible computing systems, but basically says State and Local Government programs must be accessible to individuals with disabilities. There would be no particular problem with purchasing Windows laptops (w/ screen readers for blind students) for students that needed them, as long as they could receive the same support and use similar applications to the rest of the students using macs.

Having the iLife suite as a core part of the curriculum without an accessible alternative could potentially lead to problems.

Section 508 of the Rehabiliation Act applies specifically to "federal agencies." Schools are not federal agencies, and do not have responsibilities under Section 508. Section 508 explicitly requires the procurement of accessible electronic and information technology...this is where Apple gets hit by not having a screen reader. National security entities are excluded from 508 requirements which is why business with the Dept. of Defense is okay. Basically, companies that want to do business with the federal government need to make sure they address accessibility concerns in the design of IT devices and systems...Apple is moving in this direction and I think it is not only the right thing to do, but also a good business decision.

The apple screen zoom feature, by the way, is excellent, but not necessarily the solution for individuals with visual disabilities. The commercial screen magnification products actually smooth text and make the large sizes very readable...text becomes very pixelated when you zoom in on it using Apple's built-in magnification.

Nate

[mrsebastian]

this is just absolutely rediculous, why is every article about apple so damn negative?! how is it apple's fault that software companies don't update their software?

[phatix]

Originally posted by achmafooma
You know, I would swear that right after I installed Panther I was playing around with the accessibility options and found a setting that made it read everything under your mouse.

It seemed to work just about anywhere... menu items, buttons, etc. And this wasn't just in the preferences, I was clicking around in other places.

I only had a second to check on my iBook just now, but I can't seem to find the setting anymore. I'll try it when I get home.

Your iBook probably only has 16mb video ram. 32mb vram is required for full-on speech fun.

I work in a special education school district; we're pretty stoked about the screen reader. It's got to be better than JAWS, the windows counterpart....

[centauratlas]

>Apple should release the Screen-reader software as open source...<

Apple should provide it for free either open source or not. This would completely screw the market for the Windows version.

After they left Apple in a lurch, this would even the score (if not really tip the score).

[andyduncan]

Originally posted by digidoodle
Section 508 explicitly requires the procurement of accessible electronic and information technology...this is where Apple gets hit by not having a screen reader. National security entities are excluded from 508 requirements which is why business with the Dept. of Defense is okay.

Section 508 is more of a guideline than anything. There is no section 508 "certification". It also has a pretty large "out" built into it, if the cost of providing the accessibility is too great, it is not required. Basically you have to make a "good faith" effort. If you can prove you tried really really hard, you might not be considered liable.

With regards to National Security entities being exempt, thats only partially true. They only get out of 508 in areas that actually affect national security. ie: the launch button for the minutemen doesn't have to have a screen reader, but the accounting and payroll systems that pay the person pushing that button would.

But this is where it gets hazy. 508 actually says that have to have access to the same information and functionality, not the same system. Some places get around this by actually paying someone to sit next to the user and tell them whats on the screen (I'm not kidding).

This might not seem cost efficient, but it's a decision based on the number of users with a particular disability, and the cost of implementing an accessible system.

As far as Apple losing sales for federal contracts because they don't have a screen reader, yeah, they probably do. If they bundle this one with the OS, maybe their ad campaign could be something like: "OS X, cheaper than paying someone to read to you"

[Macco]

Originally posted by zim
I have always thought that readers for the blind should be an aspect of the os and should be free, you could almost make a case of discrimination out of it by saying that blind people are treated unfairly because they have to purchase extra equipment to make their computer usable.

Yeah, and if you're missing a hand, you have to buy something that will allow you to input without a keyboard...
True, it's hard for a blind person to use a computer without a screen reader, but that doesn't mean that it must be bundled into the OS.

[@HomeNow]

I agree that Apple should pursue writing this software. After having worked on some pilot projects with accessibility for educational publishing, and working with CAST on a similar project, I think that this is an area that is lacking on the Mac side. The solutions that are out there for the PC are also crude in my opinion. Apple could improve on the implementations of this software and bring about a big plus for the Mac platform. This has been an area in software development that Apple has accelled at in recent years.

However I disagree that this should be open sourced. This is an initiative that requires consistency in the way it works just as a GUI requires it. To achieve this Apple should keep as much control over it as possible. To allow it to be open sourced could bring about confusion in its implementation which could adversely effect the reputation of the software.

As for cost, it would be a boon for Apple to offer it for free to education. However, based on the cost of the screen readers that are on the market today I think that Apple could easily get away with charging $25-$50 for it and still attract people to the platform. This is after all a strain on Apples resources, and to do it right they would have to support both audio screen reading as well as braille screen readers put out by third parties, and this would cost Apple quite a bit of money. While I like to get "free" stuff as much as the next guy, I don't expect Apple to give everything away. The only upside to making it part of the OS is that it would make it easier, and less costly for web developers to support and develop for 508 compliance on the Mac. But the truth of the matter is that it takes considerable cost in man hours to ensure this compliance, and the majority of the developers that have to do it will cut costs by troubleshooting it for as few browsers as they can get away with, which means testing it on various versions of IE.

[ffakr]

I don't know as much about this (legally) as a few of you, but I have managed Mac labs in Edu. At my last position, the Disabilities dept. was perfectly fine with the use of OS 9's built in accessability software. We did have JAWs installed on the PCs though.

The general rule which we lived by was that we that we had to make "reasonable" accomidations for handicapped students (though we couldn't always call them handicapped).:rolleyes:
We didn't have to take any steps which were beyond our ability to provide, financially or technically, though we did our best to be as helpful as possible.
As mentioned elsewhere, we had to try to provide the same services to every student, handicapped or otherwise.. if at all possible.

Just to prove how open the relevent 'disabilities' acts are, my current employer, a University with a rather famous history and present, has areas that are pretty much impossible to access from a wheelchair. There are buildings I support where I've yet to find a ramp into or out of. The only caveat is that it isn't a public university, but it does get a LOT of federal grants.

[finelinebob]

I don't think the point of Apple open-sourcing something like this would be to expect too much development by others out there but, rather, to provide a solution for the community that may not be out there. Maybe someone in the studio audience can fill us in on the state of screen readers in the Unix/Linux world.

Either way, it's not the GUI or the features of the software that would make it a Macintosh program that would benefit Apple or others from it going open-source -- it's the underlying engine.

On second thought, Apple may have a helluva lot to gain from independent developers on this one. The English language is a beast to comprehend and there are some big disparities between how it gets written versus how we speak it. Dealing with those disparities can lead to some pretty stupid, arbitrary solutions. Case-in-point: I know of a blind lawyer who would scan correspondence sent to him then use an OCR-to-Speech program to read him his mail. Was driven to distraction at why judges were being addressed in overly-familiar terms. Well, the developers of the software made an arbitrary decision to have the software interpret these four characters -- hon. -- half the time as the word "hon" (short for "honey") and a period and half the time as an abbreviation for "honorable" (as in "the Hon. blah-blah-blah").

Sure, putting some bug feedback feature like Safari has into such an as-yet-mythical offering might be a solution, but getting this thing (much closer to) right from the start would be critical for a population already snubbed by much of the computer world.

As for giving it away to education? Sounds like "selling music at 99 cents a song in order to sell iPods" to me. The potential for recapturing market-share in education is too great not to entice educators with this. I know others have posted just how expensive individual licenses for (Windows) screen reader programs are -- often as much or more than the cost of the computer ... seen them for myself as well. Can't say what site licenses might cost for such software, but I'm sure they're a helluva lot more than "Free".

[finelinebob]

oops. Pardon my ethnocentricity....

Another big reason for open-sourcing something like this? How many languages is Mac OS X available in?

Translating menu items is one thing. Entire languages? Quite another. Localization of the software for non-English speaking countries is one place Apple and everyone else involved could benefit greatly from if they ARE doing this and if they DID open it up.

Again, it's not an issue of implementation but the underlying engine. What would that involve? Language libraries/dictionaries, rules of syntax, I dunno. But nailing the engine would allow Apple (and others) to figure out not just how to implement it right but where (in the computer, in other programs). Imagine having the screen reader in the Services menu. Yes, I know ... "Speech" is already there -- but screen readers need to be more that Text-to-Speech programs. Good ones read the "metadata" in web pages and translate that as well. Hmm ... then that might mean Apple (and other vendors, to be fair) would have to start making it's own data file storage system more metadata-rich...

[simX]

Maybe I'm missing something here, but aren't screen readers precisely for people who are only partly blind, not totally blind? Because it seems to me that even with screen reader software, using a computer when you can't see what you're doing is way too complicated. You wouldn't be able to see where the mouse is going, and you would miss out on much of the graphical aspect of an operating system. I am kind of doubtful as to whether screen reader software can usefully translate every part of an operating system into sound for a blind person who is operating the computer.

I would think that the existing zoom option built-in would be sufficient enough. You can have all interface items read themselves aloud when you have the mouse over them (System Preferences -> Speech -> Spoken User Interface -> Other spoken items -> Text under the mouse). And you can select any text in Safari or any other application that uses text and have Mac OS X speak it aloud.

Is there something I'm missing?

[andyduncan]

Originally posted by simX
Because it seems to me that even with screen reader software, using a computer when you can't see what you're doing is way too complicated.

...

Is there something I'm missing?

No screen reader could realistically give you as much information about your computing environment as a gui could. What they do is make it possible to complete tasks that would be impossible otherwise, even if it takes a little longer.

The ideal screen reader would be someone sitting next to you, who knew what you wanted to do, and could describe what was appearing on your screen (and like I said before, this does happen quite often). Even the best software can't get close to that level of speed or accuracy, but with the help of the application/web developers and the operating systems developers, it can get pretty good. And it can certainly be enough to accomplish a specific task.

If you think about the most important information on your screen, it's usually text anyway. All those extra graphics add meaning and make it easier to understand, but theres a lot of information that can still be conveyed without them.

This is really the whole point of accessibility, and the idea behind stuff like section 508 or the WAI: Go ahead and add value to your information with graphics and color and animation, but make sure that the people who don't have access to those "extras" still get the underlying data.

From an App developer's standpoint, OS X has a lot of nice capabilities that make it easier to be accessible (there's a ton of stuff on developer.apple.com if you're interested). The main glaring absense is a lack of software that hooks into that accessibility framework. It's great that Apple is taking charge and doing this in-house.

In addition, screen readers should be considered part of the operating system, not some type of third-party app. Smaller shareware (or opensource) developers aren't going to shell out $1000 for screen reading software (or even bother downloading a demo) just so they can test the next version of their app against it. They are much more likely to fire-up the screen reader if it's already included. They are also much more likely to ensure that their app works with The screen reader for the operating system instead of One Of the screen readers for that operating system.

This is A Good Thing™

[finelinebob]

Originally posted by simX
Maybe I'm missing something here, but aren't screen readers precisely for people who are only partly blind, not totally blind?...

This article at A List Apart, while on accessibility issues about Flash, has a good description about what screen readers are and what they do, as well as a few links to some of the big ones out there: http://www.alistapart.com/articles/flashmxclarifying/#srdefinition .

No sarcasm intended, but yes, Graphical User Interfaces aren't all that usable for people who are totally blind. I'm not blind myself, but I can understand mouses are being rather pointless (figuratively and literally). All the same, as a touch-typer I don't have to look at my keyboard (ok, most of the time) in order to express myself on my computer and I know how to navigate fairly well through most web pages without ever touching the mouse as well -- links and form elements, as well as the address bar, are generally well-supported by at least tabbing through them and using the return key to activate them, even if browser support for custom-coded access keys is not. The MacOS used to have fabulous support for keyboard navigation, even inside open and save dialog boxes, but from from what I've read about Panther (http://www.arstechnica.com/reviews/003/panther/macosx-10.3-13.html) this support has taken a few steps backwards ... don't have it myself, so I can't say.

The short of it is this: people who cannot see need something other than GUI software interfaces and related input devices to make use of a computer. Screen readers -- not simple text-to-speech programs -- try to provide this while making use of what input devices are available (including things like Braille displays).

[@HomeNow]

As I understand it, screen readers read the screen, and or alternate tags that are embeded into screen items. They do not translate this information, thus the hon. vs. hon (honey) would not be a problem. For 508 compliance there are both long and short descriptions that are "hidden" in the code for for graphics., a profesionaly developed and compliant site or program would most likely havespent a lot of money on writers, editors, proof readers, editors and copy editors to get these tags just right, and would not want a program "messing" them up by paraphrasing them. The big thing that is lacking on the Mac, as I understand it, is keyboard Navigation and its integration with Apples text to speech technology.

[finelinebob]

What makes things complicated, tho, is that not every task you can do on a computer can be done in a web browser. Other applications that could be accessed through screen reader technology won't have the metadata that HTML tags can bury beneath the displayed text for intelligent clients to interpret. You're not going to see support for anything like <acronym title="Honorable">Hon.</acronym> in Word or an OCR program or mail reader/writer, and most people don't want to learn HTML so that they can put such information into their writing even if the support was there.

Even with web sites, yes, well-designed, Section 508-compliant sites will have this information. But when will the Feds ever require that all commercial and private web sites be 508-compliant? They can't. So, having a screen reader rely on X/HTML + related technologies and the graces of developers/copy writers/project managers/executives with decision-making power above them to implement these measures is selling the potential of the software short and limiting the range of use where it is needed.

And screen readers DO need to "interpret" to be effective. If you read: This? or This! or even This?! you have some idea that I meant something other than This. Computers reading back text in a monotone is so cliche its a joke these days, not just because its technologically archaic but because people know well enough (intuitively, if not overtly) that voice inflection carries a lot of meaning, even more than the actual words spoken at times. In written language, we have things like punctuation to help but often have to use things like context to convey what our voices can carry. Obviously, this creates a lot of trouble for Speech-to-Text, but translating our written language devices (like punctuation) into spoken language devices (like inflection) is just as big a problem going from Text-to-Speech. Any screen reader or Text-to-Speech software that reads This. This? This! and This?! identically is not doing a good job.

[Just checked myself -- Services > Speech > Start Speaking Text. Some very minor inflections ... somewhat remarkable for one-word "sentences" ... but they are there.]

One of the things that, for me, makes the prospect of Apple screen reader software so interesting is that these days (forget Apple of the 90's and how many projects they abandoned), when Apple goes for something like this they go all out to do it right and THEN some. An article I read recently (http://www.arstechnica.com/reviews/003/panther/macosx-10.3-12.html) pointed out how with Safari Apple has done in short order something Netscape took over 4 years to accomplish, and only by opening up Mozilla to open source developers. Forget about IE, even WinIE -- as a web developer, I can tell you that WinIE6 has taken steps backwards in terms of its standards compliance. On top of how well it handles web pages, Safari has also tried to re-invent two critical aspects of browsing -- handling bookmarks (which many people think they've done an incredible job with) and handling navigation with SnapBack (which I really haven't read much about but, in trying to introduce a new navigational metaphor, is in many ways more revolutionary ... if it works).

So, what does that drive for excellence mean for a screen reader? It seems to me that Apple wouldn't just look at what the cream of the crop of screen readers today do right, but they'd also look at what they need to do or what they could be doing. If Apple is focused on raising the bar for what the user experience is like, then there is a lot of room for improvement in this area.

[Doctor Q]

Screen readers are indeed used by the totally blind, including some of the customers of the company I work for.

It will never be possible to make it as efficient for the blind to work with a typical program as for a sighted person, simply because they have less "input channels". You might make up for some of it by using tactile feedback or more varied auditory feedback, but the first goal is for total capability, not total efficiency. In other words, the starting requirement is that every piece of information be obtainable and every feature of the program be usable (excluding visual-only features of no interest, such as the color of the desktop, the pixel layout of an icon, or iTunes visualations).

To make a program equally efficient for the blind and sighted, you would have to engineer it so that the visual parts were only one alternative among many, with no efficiency benefits over the other choices. This isn't practical, because it would be too limiting for sighted users. For example, the most efficient way to invoke a menu choice is to hit a keystroke or two. Yet, for most menu selections, sighted people still prefer to drop-down a menu and pick a choice they see. A screen reader could read all the choices in the menu, which is effective but not as speedy. Having both choices benefits everyone. And we wouldn't expect a software vendor to level the playing field by making keystrokes the only way to select a menu choice.