Access For All » Accessibility

Android 4.0 – designed for accessibility?

admin — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 18:32:49 +0000

A variety of new features greatly enhance the accessibility of Android 4.0 for blind or visually impaired users. Most important is a new explore-by-touch mode that lets users navigate without having to see the screen. Touching the screen once triggers audible feedback that identifies the UI component below; a second touch in the same component activates it with a full touch event. The new mode is especially important to support users on new devices that use virtual buttons in the System Bar, rather than dedicated hardware buttons or trackballs. Also, standard apps are updated to offer an improved accessibility experience. The Browser supports a script-based screen reader for reading favorite web content and navigating sites. For improved readability, users can also increase the default font size used across the system.

The accessibility experience begins at first setup — a simple touch gesture during setup (clockwise square from upper left) activates all accessibility features and loads a setup tutorial. Once accessibility features are active, everything visible on the screen can be spoken aloud by the standard screen reader.
Source: Android

Madrid Meeting Kicks Off European CLOUD4all Project

admin — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 06:21:52 +0000

CLOUD4all, the European Commission funded program to develop a cloud-based accessibility architecture, started on 1st of November 2011. The project began with a meeting of the 30 partners and collaborators in Madrid, at Technosite/ONCE. Technosite is a member of the Raising the Floor Consortium and the coordinator for the project.
Raising the Floor – International is the technical coordinator for CLOUD4all. CLOUD4all will be carrying out research on some of the key core technologies of the Global Public Inclusive Infrastructure (GPII) and creating some of its first implementations. The 4-year, $3 million/year project is funding the European efforts of the Consortium to build the GPII.

2nd open workshop on European Accessibility requirements in public procurement of ICT products and services

admin — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 05:15:29 +0000

CEN, CENELEC and ETSI are organising a 2nd open workshop on “European Accessibility requirements in public procurement of ICT products and services” to be held in Brussels on 28 October 2011. This is the second of a series of three workshops that give stakeholders an opportunity to learn about the work, to discuss the latest drafts of the standards and reports and to give feedback about the work being done.
Participation is free of charge, but registration is required. Palentype and sign language can be made available upon request.
Source: http://www.mandate376.eu/

Focus Group on Audiovisual Media Accessibility (FG AVA)

admin — Sun, 18 Sep 2011 09:51:00 +0000

The main objective of the Focus Group on Audiovisual Media Accessibility (FG AVA) is to address the need to make audiovisual media accessible for persons with disabilities. The Focus Group encourages participation of all standards development organizations (SDOs) working in this area. The FG AVA is open to ITU Member States, Sector Members, Associates and Academia. It is also open to any individual from a country which is a member of ITU and who is willing to contribute to the work. This includes individuals who are also members or representatives of SDOs as well as other interested stakeholders. The third meeting will be held on 17 November 2011 in Barcelona.
More information.

Dynamic Coalition on Accessibility and Disability

admin — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 05:11:40 +0000

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) established a Dynamic Coalition on Accessibility and Disability.
Users of telecommunications and information technology have a varied capability of handling information and the controls of their presentation. The source of this variation lies in cultural and educational backgrounds, as well as on age-related functional limitations, in disabilities, and in other natural causes.
The Dynamic Coalition on Accessibility and Disability will facilitate interaction between relevant bodies, and ensure that ICT accessibility is included in the key debates around Internet Governance in order to build a future where all sectors of the global community have equal access to the Information Society. We are convinced that the entire community can benefit from an “accessible ICT world,” as people can be permanently or temporarily disabled due to personal, environmental (e.g., a phone call in a noisy environment) or cultural (e.g., spoken language diversity) conditions. Moreover, we will all grow old and lose abilities that we take for granted now, thus enlarging the part of the population that would benefit from accessible communication. We cannot allow isolation of a part of the population due to lack of appropriate functionality that prevents the use of ICT resources by everybody to the fullest possible degree.
The coalition is open to any organization entity or individual working on the field, including Standard Developing Organizations (SDOs), and i coordinated by Andrea Saks (TDI Telecommunications for the Deaf Inc.)

Official Web site: Dynamic Coalition on Accessibility and Disability

1st International Conference on Age-Friendly Cities

admin — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 08:13:48 +0000

The 1st International Conference on Age-Friendly Cities will be held in Dublin on 28th-30th September 2011.

Conference Programme
Participants will gain an insight into critical thinking on the issue of age-friendly cities from a broad spectrum of internationally recognised practitioners and speakers. Experts come from a diverse range of perspectives including spatial planning, leadership studies, social gerontology, anthropology, transport, city transformation, psychology, architecture, health, technology, city administration, education, and evaluation studies. The conference will also capture geographically diverse age-friendly initiatives from the developed and developing world including Ireland, the UK, the USA, Eastern Europe, Africa, Canada, Japan, Singapore, China and India. World renowned speakers include Gary Lawrence, Chris Phillipson, Charles Landry, Michael Mehaffy and Etienne Wenger.

Networking Opportunity
400 leaders and senior managers from existing members of the Age-friendly Cities Global Network, CEOs and senior managers of municipal authorities including planners, architects and elected representatives will share insight on age-friendly city initiatives. As the conference brings together experts involved in a broad range of age-friendly initiatives internationally, it provides a forum to meet people actively implementing age-friendly programmes at the Global Village exhibition. Participants will include senior professionals across the public, private and voluntary sectors in areas such as transport, health care and housing, research and academia, and key older people’s organisations.

Another centre piece of the conference is the Dublin Declaration on Age-Friendly Communities. This will be launched at the conference by the Lord Mayor of Dublin and signed by a core group of mayors and leaders from across the world. If you would like your municipality to endorse the Declaration please bring this important element of the conference to their attention. We’ve also developed a process whereby cities don’t have to travel to Dublin to endorse the Declaration. Further information is available by emailing us at hilary@ageingwellnetwork.ie

Planning for the Global Village exhibition is also well underway. This informal exhibition space is an integral part of the conference programme and will provide opportunities for delegate representatives to present and showcase developments in their cities and communities throughout the three days of the conference. Already New York, Manchester, New Delhi, Lyon and Hong Kong have decided to be involved in the Village. You can get additional information about the Village at cbyrne@ageingwellnetwork.ie

Full information on the conference, including the programme and the registration process is available at www.afc-internationalconference.ie.

The Web of Data and Web Accessibility – Co-Located with the Twenty First International World Wide Web Conference, in Lyon, France

admin — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 07:24:58 +0000

9th International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility – 16/17th April 2012 – Lyon, France

The World Wide Web has changed the way we search, access, consume and produce information. While existing superficial content allows us to browse and interact with the Web, we are far from taking full advantage of it. Laying beneath the surface of the Web there are a number of phenomena such as trends and patterns in information structure and in user behaviour that do shape the way we communicate, consume and browse. As far as accessibility is concerned, Web content plays a central role in an ecosystem where user agents, authoring tools, crowd-sourcing frameworks and testing tools determine how accessible is the Web. As these components are moving to the cloud, their mere activity and interplay produces large amounts of data. For instance, thousands of testing reports are being generated every day by automatic tools and auditors. Moreover, crowd-sourcing tools are facilitating a myriad of accessibility fixes and providing guidance to users.

In parallel, announcements made by UK and US governments, amongst others, to make public data available are contributing to adding enormous amounts of data to the Web. While some of these data repositories consist of raw data, some other are explicitly structured and semantically annotated set of documents. However, users still find it difficult to access to these data mainly because of information overload and access barriers. So even if the major goal of Open Government initiatives is to foster transparency, the reality is that citizens struggle to access.

So we can find data produced by the accessibility ecosystem -users and tools- and intentionally uploaded data. The former, if adequately exploited, can yield invaluable knowledge to better understand web accessibility as a phenomenon. The latter provide us mechanisms to arrange these data on the web so that they are accessible for machines although not for humans. As a result, topics of interests include (but are not limited to):

Intelligent processing of the massively produced reports by accessibility testing tools.
Web mining and AI techniques for accessibility testing and repairing.
Usage patterns of accessibility tools on the cloud.
How to use data produced by means of crowd-sourcing accessibility fixes.
How data produced while interacting and traversing the Web can improve accessibility.
How to create user profiles from log data.
The characterization of the Web at a macro and micro-scale.
Accessibility of Linked Data repositories.
Using Linked Data to better organise knowledge on Web accessibility.
Web authoring guidelines and tools
Mobile accessibility
User modeling and the adaptive web
Adaptation and transformation of existing Web content
Design and best practice to support Web accessibility
Technological advances to support Web accessibility
End user tools
Accessibility guidelines, best practice, evaluation techniques, and tools
Psychology of end user experiences and scenarios
Innovative techniques to support accessibility
Universally accessible graphical design approaches
Accessible graphic formats and tools for their creation

More information on the event website.

eAccessibility2020

admin — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 11:55:25 +0000

The study on eAccessibility2020 (“Study on Implications from Future ICT Trends on Assistive Technology and Accessibility”, SMART 2010/0077) aims to provide the EC with recommendations on future research policy, especially regarding FP8 (ICT & FET) and the next Competitiveness & Innovation Programme (CIP).
Also, the study will make suggestions on relevant standardisation issues and on EC policy activities for the wider mainstreaming and adoption of eAccessibility. To do so the study team will elaborate and validate specific use and technology-scenarios for 2020. These scenarios will result from vigorous interaction with eAccessibility-related stakeholders and experts, which will involve among other the identification and assessment of ‘Drivers of Change’ affecting the course of eAccessibility (i.e. key-trends, micro-trends and weak-signals).
The study approach adopts a variety of methodologies, tools and activities and it is presented at www.e-accessibility2020.eu together with news, e-surveys and eventually the study results.
All interested individuals or organisations are invited to register in the study’s website so as to stay informed and/or participate in the study activities.
The study is conducted for the European Commission, DG Information Society & Media, Unit ‘ICT for Inclusion’.

National Workshop on FOSS Desktop Accessibility & National Workshop on FOSS Adoption in Education

admin — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 14:52:20 +0000

CDAC, Mumbai is organising two workshops titled “National Workshop on FOSS Desktop Accessibility” & “National Workshop on FOSS Adoption in Education” during August 26-27, 2011 as a part of National Resource Centre for Free/Open Source software (NRCFOSS) – Phase II initiative.
“National Workshop on FOSS Desktop Accessibility” on August 26, 2011 will focus on exploring the current trends in the field of accessibility particularly in regard to FOSS. This workshop intends to work as a platform to encourage the use of FOSS tools and techniques in creating assistive technologies that are free-of-cost, available to all, easily maintainable etc. for such a large portion of population in country like India. The workshop will also like to leverage the experiences of all stakeholders to identify and address the issues of those areas of accessibility that are still untouched.
Similarly, “National Workshop on FOSS Adoption in Education”, on August 27, 2011 is intended to explore the benefits, role, developments of technology, specifically FOSS, in education. FOSS provides software that are free of cost, easily maintainable, community support, customizability freedom, etc. Various FOSS tools in education will be demonstrated in the workshop. The participants will also get to experience the work of C-DAC Mumbai in promoting technology/FOSS in education. The workshop will provide an opportunity to interact with participants from different organizations and industry practitioners.
The workshop will involve keynote and invited lectures by distinguished researchers and/or professionals. We take this opportunity to extend you an invitation for participation in the above said workshops. Looking forward to see you or your representative at the event.
Kindly use the following URLs to access more details about the workshops:
- National wrokshop on FOSS Desktop Accessibility
- National Workshop on FOSS Adoption in Education

Roadmap for research on accessible user interfaces

admin — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 08:48:44 +0000

A roadmap is being developed for research on accessible user interfaces. If you are interested in contributing to this roadmap, please go to http://www.cardiac-eu.org/user_interfaces/.

The roadmap will include: (a) Clear proposals on what technologies need to be supported (e.g. eye tracking, voice/gesture reckoning, wearable devices, smart displays); (b) Clear inputs on what methodologies have to be investigated (e.g. adaptive UI design, accessibility evaluation guidelines for devices, services and applications); (c) Clear contributions on what kind of tools should be developed (e.g. automatic accessibility verification/design tools, accessible user interface description languages).

This is a unique opportunity to shape the thinking and direction of future research funding by the European Commission in this area, and the aim is to gather input from a diverse range of stakeholders. A Wikispace has been set up to collect as much input as possible, visit
http://userinteraction-sdd-cardiac.wikispaces.com/Round+1-Generation.

Vodafone Foundation launches EU Smart Accessibility Awards

admin — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 09:51:45 +0000

14 June 2011 – Brussels – In the week of the first EU Digital Assembly in Brussels, Vodafone Foundation launched the Smart Accessibility Awards. This is a new competition to promote the development of IT applications designed to improve the lives of people with disabilities and older people to help them become more actively involved in society.
The programme is supported and co-organized by AGE Platform Europe, the European network of around 160 organisations of and for people aged 50+, and the European Disability Forum (EDF), the NGO that represents the interests of 80 million Europeans with disabilities.
Launched in Brussels, the competition will award the best smartphone application across four different categories as follows:

Social participation: This refers to applications which help users to participate actively in today’s society and benefit from the facilities that the new technologies can offer, whatever their age, disability and/or capacity (E.g. use the web and social media through mobile devices, contact people using mobile devices to the same extent as everyone, etc).
Independent living: This refers to applications which help users to be more autonomous and perform daily tasks independently (E.g. using domestic appliances such as washing machine or refrigerator, opening doors safely, etc).
Mobility: This refers to applications which enable users to move around more freely and safely using the whole range of transport modes. It can also refer to the use of mobile devices to be guided in unknown environment (e.g. using GPS option, etc).
Wellbeing: This refers to applications which improve the users’ health and as well as overall feeling of wellbeing.

The competition is open from 14 June 2011 to 15 October 2011. All qualifying entries will be evaluated in November by a jury, consisting of representatives from AGE Platform Europe, European Disability Forum and Vodafone Foundation. Twelve finalists will be selected and requested to present their application before the final jury in Brussels in early December 2011 at a live final, where the four overall winners will be chosen. The total prize fund of the €200k will be split equally between the four winners.
Vodafone Foundation Director, Andrew Dunnett said “The Vodafone Foundation is keen to help as many people as possible benefit from new technologies. The Smart Accessibility Awards will help developers create apps that can really make a difference to people’s lives – we are thrilled to be able to support such an important initiative.”
Anne-Sophie Parent, AGE Platform Europe Secretary General, said “We are pleased to be involved in a project that supports our efforts towards building a more inclusive society. Digital inclusion is key to ensuring as many people as possible remain actively involved in their communities and we should make sure every citizen is empowered to do so, whatever their age or capacities. We hope this competition will help reach that goal and also contribute to the ‘European Year 2012 for Active Ageing and Solidarity between Generations’ where the objective is to increase older people’s active participation in society and promote independent living in old age. ”
Rodolfo Cattani, EDF Executive Member, said; “Being part of this competition is very important for us. Communication technologies are vital to making possible the inclusion of persons with disabilities. When the mobile applications are not accessible, it can create new obstacles and can lead to new forms of discrimination. We look forward to seeing accessible apps.”
For more information on the contest and submit your entry: http://developer.vodafone.com/smartaccess2011/+

Mobile Accessibility Workshop

admin — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 09:05:37 +0000

Mobile Accessibility Workshop will be held at INTERACT 2011, in Lisbon, Portugal, on 5-9 September 2011.
Mobile devices pervade our daily lives. We are on the cusp of a fundamental change in how we relate to information and others, accessible at all times and places. Alas, this change might be barred to a large number of people, suffering from a wide range of disabilities. Mobile devices are increasingly visual, making them hard to use by the blind or other vision-impaired people. Keyboards are steadily being replaced by touchscreens, without tactile feedback, introducing additional barriers. Tetraplegic users have limited mobility of their limbs and hardly are able to pick up the devices or use their fingers for precise pointing. Moreover, the mobile aspect often creates situational impairments where those interaction modes are cumbersome or socially unacceptable, even for non-impaired people.
These are problems studied by the nascent area of Mobile Accessibility, where researchers focus on solving accessibility problems in mobile devices and settings. Bringing together Mobile Computing and Accessibility, it is the source of synergistic works that have the potential of deeply transforming how we look at mobile devices, and to shape the ongoing mobile revolution. This workshop will bring together researchers and practitioners in the area.
The topics of the workshop include but are not limited to:

Mobile interaction accessibility
Situational impairments
Assistive Mobile Technologies
Mobile Web Accessibility

More information can be found at the conference website.

RAatE – 28th November 2011 – University of Warwick conference centre

admin — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 08:37:04 +0000

The Call for Papers for RAatE 2011 (Recent Advances in Assistive Technology & Engineering) is now open. You are invited to submit papers, case studies or posters on a range of topics, including:

Services – Aspects of Service Delivery
Developments & Challenges in Wheelchair Services
New Service Demands: Commissioning of Re-ablement & AT Services
Emerging Technologies & Recent Advances in AT
Case Studies of Innovative AT in Practice

In addition to research papers or new innovations this year RAatE welcomes offers of presentations on how specialist aspects of assistive technology are delivered within services. With an ever expanding range of technology, how do services meet the increasing needs and expectations of their client groups? In particular RAatE welcomes hearing how services provide specialist aspects of assistive technology such as specialist wheelchair controls, integrated access, communication requirements or environmental controls. Challenges and solutions that have worked locally can be presented in the form of case studies or group presentations.
The deadline for the call for papers is 8th July 2011 and submissions can be made via the RAatE website.
RAatE 2011 is being held on Monday 28th November 2011 at the University of Warwick conference centre, and is the only UK conference focused on the latest innovations and developments in assistive technology. This conference will be of interest to everyone who uses, works with, develops or conducts research on assistive technologies.

Accessibility of Social Networking Services

admin — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 09:32:01 +0000

Technosite published last year (December 2010) an interesting analysis on the “Accessibility of Social Networking Services“. A pity the analysis does not address the actual technicalities (e.g. RIA, Java, etc. usage).

M-Enabling 2011 – The Global Forum on Mobile Applications and Services for Seniors and Persons with Disabilities

admin — Thu, 26 May 2011 07:45:51 +0000

G3ict and E.J. Krause & Associates (EJK) announced a cooperation agreement to convene the first mobile industry event exclusively dedicated to accessibility and assistive applications and services for seniors and persons with disabilities. “M-Enabling 2011 – The Global Forum on Mobile Applications and Services for Seniors and Persons with Disabilities” will be held at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in Washington, D.C., December 5 and 6, 2011.

Designed to attract a global audience of mobile service providers, telecom regulators, disabled persons organizations, applications developers and accessibility experts, M-Enabling 2011 will also provide governments, community services, health and private sector information and communications professionals with innovative solutions to leverage mobile platforms to better serve seniors and persons with disabilities.

“Mobile devices processing power and networks bandwidth support many innovative solutions for greater accessibility and assistive applications and services for seniors and persons with disabilities. The versatility of handsets and operating systems, cloud-based applications and global economies of scale of the mobile industry all point towards a growing opportunity for developers to bring innovative life-enhancing solutions for hundreds of millions of seniors and persons with disabilities around the world,” said Axel Leblois, Executive Director of G3ict.

While handset manufacturers and third party applications developers are already offering leading edge accessible and assistive applications and services, mobile service providers and their distributors are becoming new and vital participants in promoting and making those applications and services available to seniors and persons with disabilities around the world.

“Bringing the core mobile industry eco-system to adopt and promote accessible and assistive solutions and services for seniors and persons with disabilities is essential to their success,” said Ned Krause, CEO of E.J. Krause & Associates. “We will contribute our many years of experience in the mobile industry to ensure that developers, service providers, handset manufacturers, assistive and accessible technology experts from all horizons can further expand their opportunities by interacting with a global audience of motivated decision makers. We are very pleased that G3ict decided to partner with our firm for this very significant opportunity to promote mobile solutions for seniors and persons with disabilities.”

The first edition of M-Enabling will be organized in cooperation with international organizations of telecom regulators, mobile service providers and organizations of persons with disabilities. It is expected that the first event will attract decision makers participating in the mobile industry from around the world, as well as leading organizations promoting mobile applications and services for seniors and persons with disabilities.

More information.

Launch of Vodafone Foundation Smart Accessibility Award

admin — Wed, 25 May 2011 09:44:07 +0000

Vodafone Foundation, AGE Platform Europe (AGE) and the European Disability Forum (EDF) will launch the joint initiative “Vodafone Foundation Smart Accessibility Awards” on Tuesday, 14 June 2011, 10:00 – 12:00.
They will be asking researchers and developers to create mobile applications to improve the lives of older users and users with disabilities: we want the smartphone revolution to benefit everybody.
During the launch event they will debate how the smartphone platforms can enable low cost and rapid innovation and ensure the widespread distribution of new functionality to users who may otherwise be excluded from the benefice of today’s digital society.

Agenda
Panel 1
Andrew Dunnet, Foundation Director, Vodafone Group
Anne-Sophie Parent, Secretary General, AGE
Javier Güemes, Acting Director, EDF

Presentation of the contest
Sanjeet Matharu, Principal Developer Marketing Manager, Vodafone Group
Nena Georgantzi, Research Project Coordinator, AGE
Nadège Riche, Policy Officer, EDF

Q &A

Panel 2
Paul Timmers, ICT addressing Societal Challenges, DG INFSO confirmed
Adam Kosa, MEP, Member of Social and Employment Committee confirmed
Richard Howitt, Member of Social Affairs Committee TBC

Chaired by Eirini Zafeiratou, Head EU Affairs, Vodafone Group

If you would like to join the launch please send a mail to Cindy De Koninck.

Accessibility, an ongoing struggle in every domain of daily life

admin — Tue, 10 May 2011 19:09:01 +0000

Following presentation “Accessibility, an ongoing struggle in every domain of daily life” was given at the ATTRACT workshop in Madrid, Spain on 10 May 2011.

IRU and EDF publish recommendations to taxi drivers to improve accessibility to people with disabilities and reduced mobility

admin — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 04:31:21 +0000

The International Road Transport Union (IRU) and the European Disability Forum (EDF) have jointly developed an Accessibility Checklist including recommendations to help taxi drivers improve the quality of the services they provide to customers with disabilities and reduced mobility.
Based on the existing detailed voluntary IRU Guidelines, the checklist contains recommendations for taxi drivers offering services to people who are blind or partially sighted, including customers with assistance dogs, are hard of hearing or have speech impairments, have mobility impairments, including customers using wheelchairs or have hidden disabilities.
“In order to guarantee the equal right to transport for persons with disabilities, and their increased possibilities for participation and social inclusion, EDF also calls for future developments of taxi services to ensure they become increasingly accessible. In Europe, taxi services are the most important means for ensuring spontaneous transport for many persons with disabilities or reduced mobility,” highlighted Stig Langvad, EDF executive member and the chairman of the EDF transport expert group, in a joint IRU and EDF press release
The Taxi Accessibility checklist can be downloaded in English, French and German.
Read more on IRU taxi accessibility policy.
Source: AGE Platform newsletter April 2011

ACCESSIBLE tools now available on SourceForge

admin — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 13:53:33 +0000

ACCESSIBLE has launched a dedicated page at SourceForge from where you can download all latest versions of the tools developed by the project:

The triggering idea behind ACCESSIBLE is to contribute for better accessibility for all citizens, to increase the use of standards, and to develop an assessment simulation environment (including a suite of accessibility analysing tools as well as developer-aid tools) to assess efficiently, easily and rapidly the accessibility and viability of software applications for all user groups.

Clarity Theme for BlackBerry

admin — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 06:09:31 +0000

RIM has launched the Clarity theme for BlackBerry theme for customers with vision loss, colourblindness, seniors and even those new to smartphones. The free theme is available for download from BlackBerry AppWorld in the US, UK and Canada and supports 10 devices running BlackBerry Device Software v5.0.
For more information, please visit this website.