DAISY News

Our new Associate Member, the Belarusian Union of the Visually Handicapped (OO BELTIZ) represents Belarus in major international organizations for the blind. It is a non-governmental organization providing various services for the blind and partially sighted people of Belarus. The total number of visually impaired people they serve is approximately 20,000. Their main activities include vocational rehabilitation of the blind and visually impaired persons through employment and their integration into the social life as well as providing them with different technologies, including DAISY. More information is provided in the Member entry on the DAISY Consortium website.

The 2012 CSUN Conference will be held in San Diego, California between February 27 - March 3, 2012 at the Manchester Grand Hyatt Hotel. The General Sessions Schedule for the 27th Annual International Technology and Persons with Disabilities Conference is available online.

The Directory of Exhibitors is also available online.  Take some time to visit the following DAISY Consortium Members and Friends:

American Printing House for the Blind

Bones AG

Bookshare

Dolphin Computer Access

Duxbury Systems

HIMS, Inc.

HumanWare

IVONA Software

Learning Ally

Planman Technologies

Plextalk

Pyxima

Solutions Radio

ViewPlus Technologies

XML-Tekst

Digital content is only as accessible as the foundation it's built on, and often the foundation is weak. With the introduction of EPUB 3, publishers now have the means to create a single rich data source for audiences of all reading abilities.

Through practical tips and examples, Accessible EPUB 3 takes digital content creators inside the EPUB 3 format and explores how they can enrich and enhance content for all readers. Author Matt Garrish demystifies the process of making content easier to access, demonstrating how accessible practices are intertwined with standard content best practices.

Among many techniques, this guide will teach readers how to:

• Add structure and meaning to publications to make them more usable by accessible technologies
• Tailor EPUB Navigation Documents for readers requiring either full or reduced navigation
• Create media overlays to synchronize human narration with text display
• Improve text-to-speech playback by adding SSML, PLS lexicons, and CSS3 Speech functionality.

Accessible EPUB 3: Best Practices for Creating Universally Usable Content by Matt Garrish is available for download from the O'Reilly website.

The W4A 2012 Organizing Committee has announced that two awards, each of up to US$1200 (including registration), are available to support students to enable them to attend W4A 2012 in Lyon, France.  Application deadline is February 28, 2012.

Students with interests related to this year’s topic Web of Data and Accessibility are encouraged but it is certainly not a requirement as all students with an interest in accessibility and assistive technologies are welcome to apply.

Eligibility

This award is open to any student in a postgraduate position (part time or full time Masters students and above – however, we would mainly expect Doctoral candidates) at a University or other Higher Education institution, AND who is carrying out research that is directly relevant to the field of web accessibility. Organizers particularly encourage applicants from under-represented parts of the world. More information is provided on the W4A 2012 Conference website.

HIMS announced the release of Sense Notetaker Version 6.2. This release features support for NLS content, the ability to read / write documents in Spanish, and support for the optional “Sense Dictionary”. Please see the Release Notes for a complete list of features, changes, and fixes in this release.

Special notice to Braille Sense OnHand, Braille Sense PLUS, Braille Sense PLUS QWERTY, and Voice Sense QWERTY users:

After upgrading to Version 6.2, you must reformat your flash disk due to the creation of a partition for housing the NLS key. Please make sure to back up your data before formatting. Voice Sense and Braille Sense Classic users do not need to reformat as NLS content playback cannot be supported on these models due to the limited size of the internal flash disk.

Please visit the HIMS resource center to access Release Notes, download Version 6.2 Firmware and user manual from the corresponding link for each product.

This Webinar will provide an overview of present capabilities on both mobile and PC-based readers, cover e-text formats and future developments. With the emergence of the Kindle, the Nook, and other commercial products, the availability of electronic books and reading devices has exploded.

Date and time: February 9th at 11 AM Pacific, noon Mountain, 1 PM Central and 2 PM Eastern

Presenter: Ken Petri from Ohio State University

As we know, the accessibility of some e-reader devices has been poor, resulting in complaints and law suits. Seeing a large new market being closed to them, vendors and publishers have begun to make their products at least partially accessible. This Webinar will provide an overview of the current status of e-reader accessibility and point to some activities toward improving these technologies.

Follow the link to register for the February 9th Free Webinar.

ICCHP organizers invite you to participate in the International Conference on Computers Helping People with Special Needs (ICCHP) Special Thematic Session (STS) on Creative Design for Inclusion to be held in July 2012 in Linz, Austria: http://www.icchp.org/node/360.

Presentation proposals are due Wednesday, February 1st, 2012.

Papers are encouraged on the following topics but please feel free to make other suggestions and contact the STS Chair david.crombie(at)kmt.hku.nl if you have any questions.

• Approaches to human-centered innovation
• Creative approaches to providing accessible information
• Encouraging Inclusive Design Processes
• Mainstreaming creative and inclusive solutions
• Creative partnerships between key stakeholders
• Shaping inclusion policy and framework conditions
• Establishing communities and centres of interest
• Motivating institutions to demand specific solutions (creative pull)
• Teaching students to start thinking from use cases to technological solutions
• Helping institutions to combine both creative and technological educational cultures (such as science & interactive design or applied art & computing).

For general conference information, see the ICCHP Conference website.

The open source validator tool EPUBCheck 3.0 Beta for validating EPUB 2 and EPUB 3 content is now available at validator.idpf.org. The EPUBCheck contributors and DAISY Consortium technical team members coordinated the hosted deployment. Users creating commercial EPUB files in volume must install EPUBCheck instead of using this site.

The American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) has announced the 2012 winners of the Migel Medals, the highest honor in the blindness field. The 2012 recipients are George Kerscher, Ph.D. and Kathleen Mary Huebner, Ph.D.

"It is an honor to present these medals to George and Kathleen for their outstanding achievements in the blindness and low vision field," said Carl R. Augusto, AFB president and CEO. "In dedicating their professional lives to ensuring that people with vision loss can live healthy and independent lives, the 2012 Migel Medal awardees are truly worthy of this special recognition."

The AFB Migel Medal was established in 1937 by the late M.C. Migel, AFB's first chairman, to honor professionals and volunteers whose dedication and achievements improve the lives of people who are blind or visually impaired.

The Migel Medals will be presented to the recipients at the 2012 AFB National Leadership Conference at St. Petersburg Beach, Florida, in early May.

More information about the Awardees is provided in the AFB press release.

Accessibility conference and exhibition "Techshare India 2012 - Bridging the Barriers" will be held on February 6th and 7th, 2012 at the India Habitat Centre in New Delhi, India. Techshare India 2012 will build awareness, identify needs, and provide solutions and implementation strategies to create an inclusive environment for people with disabilities. To register, please fill in the Techshare India 2012 Conference Registration form.

Stephen King is the new President of the DAISY Consortium. He started his four year term on January 1st, 2012.

Stephen leads one of RNIB's three strategic priorities: preventing people from losing their sight unnecessarily. Stephen also heads RNIB's work with global business, government and non-governmental organisations (NGO's). Since joining RNIB in 1990, Stephen has been instrumental in helping RNIB to establish their reputation as a world leader in supporting blind and partially sighted people. He has played an important role in developing RNIB's customer service, products, publications and library, and their work of improving access to TV, ICT and books, magazines and newspapers.

Stephen King was one of the six founding members of the DAISY Consortium in 1996. He has demonstrated an exceptional, ongoing commitment to the DAISY Consortium. Stephen holds an MBA from the Scottish Business School at Glasgow University and is also a Fellow of the Chartered Management Institute. Stephen's story will be published in the January 2012 issue of the DAISY Planet newsletter.

Adobe® Digital Editions 1.8 preview 2 (Version 1.8.1) is an update to the Digital Editions electronic book reader that adds support for accessibility. It is designed to work with Windows and Mac operating system accessibility features, including high contrast, and voice reading software – JAWS or NVDA on Windows and VoiceOver on Mac.

This preview enables assistive technology users to read protected eBooks, including books offered via Overdrive and books purchased through online book sellers such as Barnes and Noble. Digital Editions 1.8 is not a full replacement for Digital Editions 1.7. Currently, the Digital Editions 1.8 preview does not support 1.7 features for printing and device support (the ability to load eBooks to USB-connected eReader hardware). The focus of this release is to add accessibility support. Future releases will incorporate more of the Digital Editions 1.7 features as well as maintain accessibility improvements introduced in Digital Editions 1.8. More information is provided on the Adobe Labs website.

Today’s unprecedented growth in the adoption of smart phones and tablets along with the ubiquity of high speed wireless connections have increased the possibilities for building more sophisticated and meaningful customer interactions. SpeechTEK 2012 Conference will take place in New York, August 13-15, 2012 and will expand its focus to include smart phone and tablet applications.

These applications now provide engaging and useful means of accessing information and performing transactions, which is available to individuals from any location. New connected devices in cars and homes give instant access to desired products and services. Multiple input and output modalities such as voice, touch, text, and graphics have the potential to provide convenient and intuitive multichannel interactions.

Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and smart phone applications should provide the customer easy access to live agents for extra help and allow the customer to interact across channels without starting from scratch each time. SpeechTEK 2012 [Meet New Customer Demands with Speech] addresses the challenges of building intelligent multichannel customer interactions and is asking individuals, companies and organizations to share their stories. The SpeechTEK 2012 call for participation is open - deadline is January 25, 2012. More information can be found on the SpeechTEK 2012 website.

e-Accessibility is gaining momentum, as demonstrated by the increase in governmental initiatives and commercial interest in the field. The domain of a few dedicated specialists until a few years ago, it is today a regular preoccupation in the ICT sector.

This achievement must not, however, be overstated. e-Accessibility is still often considered costly add-on to the development of information systems although integrating e-Accessibility at the core of information systems is a technological, economical and sociopolitical necessity.

It is in this context that the Institute of e-Accessibility (IAN) is organizing the 6th European Forum on e-Accessibility on March 26th, 2012 on the theme: “Putting e-Accessibility at the Core of Information Systems”. The first confirmed speakers have been announced. Markus Gylling, CTO of the DAISY Consortium and the IDPF will discuss the potential of the recently approved EPUB 3 standard and its role in accessible publishing. More information is provided on the 6th European Forum on e-Accessibility website.