[3611] in comp.os.os2.announce archive
PR: IBM Creates New Java Technology to Help the Blind
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Timothy Sipples)
Sat Nov 29 18:58:06 1997
To: os2ann.DISCUSS@bloom-picayune.MIT.EDU
Date: 29 Nov 1997 18:04:00 -0400
From: tsipple@us.ibm.com (Timothy Sipples)
Reply-To: tsipple@us.ibm.com (Timothy Sipples)
Reply-to: tsipple@us.ibm.com (Timothy Sipples)
[Followups directed to comp.os.os2.misc]
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Building on IBM's years of experience with special needs products (including
the new Screen Reader/2 Version 2.01), and recognizing the needs of many
companies (trying to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act) and
users, IBM now brings new access technology to Java...
PRESS RELEASE: IBM CREATES NEW JAVA TECHNOLOGY TO HELP BLIND COMPUTER USERS
ACCESS THE 'NET'
MINNEAPOLIS, October 23, 1997 . . . Demonstrating its continuing
commitment to computer users who are disabled, IBM today unveiled prototype
software aimed at helping people who are blind keep up with their sighted
colleagues as the workplace embraces the Internet.
The new software "reads" aloud the information on the computer screen in a
synthesized computer voice through small speakers attached to the computer.
It is the first screen-reading software built using Java**, the rapidly
emerging Internet technology from Sun Microsystems that IBM is aggressively
supporting. Inventors have code-named the new Java-based screen reader
prototype "Java Jive."
IBM demonstrated *&Java Jive*8 here at the Closing The Gap conference, a
three-day meeting expected to draw 2,000 disabled people, educators,
therapists and business people. IBM also demonstrated products from its
Independence Series that help people with a range of disabilities. Those
products include ViaVoice*, a speech recognition program that allows people
with limited mobility to talk to their computer; SpeechViewer III*, a speech
therapy tool that turns speech into visual patterns to help deaf people learn
to speak; Screen Magnifier/2*, a tool that enlarges computer text for people
with vision impairments; and Screen Reader/2*, which reads information on the
screen for computer systems that run the OS/2* and DOS* operating systems.
Representatives of both IBM and Sun gave a collaborative presentation
outlining their initiatives to make Java accessible to workers who are
disabled. Traditionally, when a new computer technology sweeps American
workplaces, disabled computer users are left behind, until product developers
can catch up and build adaptive solutions. For example, when computer
systems evolved from text to windows and graphics, it took half a decade
until screen readers reached the marketplace that could describe those
innovations in synthesized speech to blind users.
Today, Java is the fastest-growing computer language, and 500,000 software
developers are using Java to write the most innovative new Internet
applications. Disabled computer users could now face the same roadblocks
with networked computing they once faced with their desktop computing
systems. For example, the colorful icons and animations that guide a sighted
user around the Internet must be recognizable by the screen readers that
translate the graphics for computer users who are blind. New Internet
applications must be compatible with the speech systems, joy sticks and other
alternative devices used by people with limited mobility who can't use a
mouse or a keyboard. And the video clips that hearing users find so
informative and entertaining must be adaptable to captioning for computer
users who are deaf.
Sun Microsystems, which invented and licenses Java, is specifying
accessibility interfaces in the basic Java code. IBM is working with Sun to
help define and validate those interfaces and apply them in adaptive
products. In addition to developing Java code that can be easily adapted,
Sun and IBM are making special 'tool kits' and guidelines available to
developers to help them make new applications accessible as they're first
brought to market.
With accessibility features built into Java early, it will be easier for the
developers of assistive technology to make networked applications accessible.
So computer users who are disabled will be able to keep pace with their
coworkers as Internet applications are adopted broadly in business. And the
features will help maintain accessibility as corporations build their own
networks that deliver standard banking, insurance and other business
applications to the employees' desktop computers from a central server.
"Because Java is becoming so popular, we need to take action now to make it
accessible," said Dennis O'Brien, product manager of IBM's Special Needs
Systems. "If we don't, computer users with special needs will once again be
left behind."
O'Brien expects that these early efforts to make Java and network computing
accessible will result in Java-based adaptive products reaching the
marketplace as early as next year.
More information on IBM*,s Java initiatives can be found on the Web at
http://www.ibm.com/Java. More information on IBM Special Needs Systems can be
found at http://www.ibm.com/sns.
* Indicates trademark or registered trademark of International Business
Machines Corporation.
** Java is a trademark of Sun Microsystems, Inc. All other trademarks are
the property of their respective owners.
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