Blind Planet

Hello blog-world!

A few days ago, Microsoft launched a new blog all about the next version of Windows, Windows 7. The blog is at: http://blogs.msdn.com/e7/. Today's post talks about the organization of the feature teams. If you're wondering where accessibility fits in, it's primarily in the User Interface Platform feature team.

Happy reading!

When I was at the ICCHP disability research conference a few weeks ago, I met a researcher who is evaluating Daisy as a potential example of universal design. However, she told me that the Office Save As Daisy XML add-on was not working properly on her machine. The install went fine, and the "Save As Daisy" menu option was showing up in Word, but then nothing was happening. I got the solution from the Office team and wanted to post it for her, and for anyone else who may run into this situation.

This problem occurs when some Office files are missing from the computer. These files are the "Microsoft Office Primary Interop Assemblies" (Office PIAs), which are part of Office installation. So, you'll need to reinstall the PIAs.

For Word 2007:<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

http://download.microsoft.com/download/e/1/d/e1df4622-5f6c-4fb9-845b-38d009cc1188/PrimaryInteropAssembly.exe

For Word 2003:

http://download.microsoft.com/download/8/3/a/83a40b5a-5050-4940-bcc4-7943e1e59590/O2003PIA.EXE

For Word XP:

http://download.microsoft.com/download/c/4/8/c4813cc0-a4d4-4bb4-b486-9cbd56f38235/oxppia.exe

If you have this problem, and reinstalling the PIAs does NOT fix it, let me know! 

The Awards ceremony was yesterday, and all the student winners were announced! The onsite 24-hour Interface Design Accessibility winners were Team JivAd, from France. Throughout their analysis of the design problem and their proposed design solution, they thoughtfully incorporated accessibility requirements. They highlighted aspects of their design that would make it easier for people to use. When more information about the design problem and their solution is published, I will post a link.

Also, WebAnywhere was announced as the winner of an online Imagine Cup competition, Accessible Technology Exceptional Achievement award. WebAnywhere is a web-based screen reader that can be used by people on any computer, like public computers. 

More information can be found at:

http://imaginecup.com/About/News.aspx

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2008/jun08/06-18imagineaccess.mspx

Congratulations to the winning teams, and to all the teams that participated in the Interface Design Challenge. It was a pleasure being the Accessibility captain and watching your creativity shine through.

The Imagine Cup kicked off this week! There are a ton of events happening, with students and judges engaged on in their compeitions. For Accessibility, there was a 24-hour competition, as part of the Interface Design competition. There are 6 teams competiting, from France, Canada, U.S., and China. Surya Vanka is the Interface Design captain, and I'm the Accessibility captain. We'll be posting an interview with Surya once we have a chance to do the final productions steps.

 For the 24-hour competition, the students were challenged to re-design a hypothetical mobile and web system. The room was full of anticipation when we handed over the problem statement. It was exciting to see the teams begin brainstorming and wrapping their heads around the problem parameters. Today, they presented their solutions and we were impressed with their talent. We announce the winner tomorrow, so I'll be able to blog more about the design problem and solution ideas after that.

If you want to find out more about the Imagine Cup overall, the main blog is at http://imaginecupfinalsinparis.spaces.live.com/default.aspx. Bonjour!

Last week, I participated in a summit on the technology needs of university students who are deaf and hard-of-hearing (“deaf/HH”). The summit was hosted by the Rochester Institute of Technology National Technology Institute of the Deaf.

The primary purpose of the summit was to collect input from various stakeholders about communication and learning issues in universities today, especially for deaf/HH students in Science, Engineering and Technology. Another goal of the summit was to brainstorm ways technology (and support processes) can help these students become even more successful in academia and in a transition to the workforce.

If you are designing features that will be used by deaf/HH people, or planning research, here are some user experience factors to consider:

-          The Deaf/HH community is diverse and likewise, their technology needs and preferences are diverse. When creating new innovations or research, it is imperative to get the perspective and input from the community along the way.

-          ASL is a language (just like a spoken language, like Spanish), not a representation of spoken English. ASL is an evolving language. There are new terms being created by the community. For example, there are several ways to sign “computer’.

-          In the various academic environments (lab, ad-hoc, etc), students have to process a lot of information coming at them visually. They have to quickly decide whether to focus on the interpreter, professor, text, visual materials, or other students.

-          Along with access to spoken language, dead/HH students also may learn concepts in different ways than hearing students. Relevant academic research points to the need to better understand the learning cognitive processes and areas of the brain used to process ASL and text.

-          Providing access to spoken language can be accomplished in different ways (captions vs ASL), but these ways are not equal in all circumstances. Reading the text captions is not the same visceral experience as communicating in ASL.

Overall, the summit was very insightful for me. It was a chance to learn from various perspectives, and a respectful dialog about different opinions. I was inspired by the dedication of the students, researchers, Dr. Hurwitz (the VP and Dean of NTID, and Dr. Diaz-Herrera (the Dean of the RIT’s College of Computing and Information Sciences), and other summit leaders. I look forward to the formal report that will compile the input and recommendations from the summit.