Technology giant, IBM, is soon to launch a multimedia browser to make audio and video content accessible to people with vision impairments.
Codenamed the Accessibility Browser - or A-Browser - the software was created by a blind employee in Japan.
The A-Browser will give blind and partially-sighted people the same control over multimedia content that sighted people have using a mouse.
IBM says it will be available later this year and hopes it will be free.
The A-Browser is the creation of Dr Chieko Asakawa, a blind employee at IBM's research laboratory in Tokyo.
Dr Asakawa was becoming increasingly frustrated by the amount of web content that she was unable to access.
For the time being, she and her team are concentrating on content that is compatible with Real Player and Windows Media Player.
Cross-talk
Screen readers and self-talking browsers are not able to deal with video and animation, some of which starts playing as soon as a page is loaded.
This often interferes with the synthesised speech output from the screen-reader software.
Using the A-Browser, a vision-impaired person can control media content by using predefined shortcut keys, rather than having to look for the control buttons using a mouse.
The browser also allows video to be slowed down, speeded up and can accommodate an additional audio description or narration track that is often included to make films and television programmes more comprehensible to blind people.
The volume controls also allow the user to adjust the sound of various sources independently - for example the main audio track, an audio description track and output from a screen reader.
"We're beginning to look at accessibility as a very important business area," said Frances West, director of IBM's Human Ability and Accessibility Centre.
"This is not just from a social responsibility standpoint, but with ageing baby-boomers we think that such technology could really benefit the population in general because all of us will be on this ageing journey."
The company plans to "open source" its new accessibility software in order to make it available to the largest possible number of people.
It is estimated that there are more than 160m blind and partially-sighted people around the world who could benefit from such a development.
IBM has not yet decided whether the A-Browser will have a worldwide launch or whether it will be introduced in selected countries first.
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Monday, March 26, 2007
LAPTOP
A laptop computer, or simply laptop (also notebook computer or notebook), is a small mobile computer, which usually weighs 2.2-18 pounds (1-6 kilograms), depending on size, materials, and other factors.
While the terms laptop and notebook are often used interchangeably, "laptop" is the older term, introduced in 1983 with the Gavilan SC. "Notebook computer" is a later coinage, which was used to differentiate smaller devices such as those of the NEC UltraLite and Compaq LTE series in 1989, which were, in contrast to previous laptops, the approximate size of an A4 or letter size paper sheet.[1] The terms are imprecise: due to heat and other issues, many laptops are inappropriate for use on one's lap, and most notebooks are not the size of typical letter or A4 paper notebook. Although some older portable computers, such as the Macintosh Portable and certain Zenith TurbosPort models, were sometimes described as "laptops", their size and weight were too great for this category.
As of 2007, most manufacturers use the term "notebook" (or some variant thereof) for what most end-users call a "laptop".
Laptops usually run on a single battery or from an external AC/DC adapter which can charge the battery while also supplying power to the computer itself.
As personal computers, laptops are capable of the same tasks as a desktop PC, although they are typically less powerful for the same price. They contain components that are similar to their desktop counterparts and perform the same functions, but are miniaturized and optimized for mobile use and efficient power consumption. Laptops usually have liquid crystal displays and most of them use different memory modules for their random access memory (RAM), for instance, SO-DIMM in lieu of the larger DIMMs. In addition to a built-in keyboard, they may utilize a touchpad (also known as a trackpad) or a pointing stick for input, though an external keyboard or mouse can usually be attached.
Many schools have taken in laptop based programs in which every student receives a laptop for school use only. The operating system is configured (or a third party program is installed) to limit the student's access to perform administrative tasks such as hardware or software installation, or operating system modifications. Students are generally permitted to use these systems to take notes, write papers, and perform other school-related activities.
While the terms laptop and notebook are often used interchangeably, "laptop" is the older term, introduced in 1983 with the Gavilan SC. "Notebook computer" is a later coinage, which was used to differentiate smaller devices such as those of the NEC UltraLite and Compaq LTE series in 1989, which were, in contrast to previous laptops, the approximate size of an A4 or letter size paper sheet.[1] The terms are imprecise: due to heat and other issues, many laptops are inappropriate for use on one's lap, and most notebooks are not the size of typical letter or A4 paper notebook. Although some older portable computers, such as the Macintosh Portable and certain Zenith TurbosPort models, were sometimes described as "laptops", their size and weight were too great for this category.
As of 2007, most manufacturers use the term "notebook" (or some variant thereof) for what most end-users call a "laptop".
Laptops usually run on a single battery or from an external AC/DC adapter which can charge the battery while also supplying power to the computer itself.
As personal computers, laptops are capable of the same tasks as a desktop PC, although they are typically less powerful for the same price. They contain components that are similar to their desktop counterparts and perform the same functions, but are miniaturized and optimized for mobile use and efficient power consumption. Laptops usually have liquid crystal displays and most of them use different memory modules for their random access memory (RAM), for instance, SO-DIMM in lieu of the larger DIMMs. In addition to a built-in keyboard, they may utilize a touchpad (also known as a trackpad) or a pointing stick for input, though an external keyboard or mouse can usually be attached.
Many schools have taken in laptop based programs in which every student receives a laptop for school use only. The operating system is configured (or a third party program is installed) to limit the student's access to perform administrative tasks such as hardware or software installation, or operating system modifications. Students are generally permitted to use these systems to take notes, write papers, and perform other school-related activities.
Know Your System
The first preventive step you need to perform is to take an inventory of your computer system. This information will be vital if you later have to contact technical support or have your system serviced.
Start by noting your serial number and model number. With this information, your system manufacturer can determine the components of your system. If you've added components to your system, note the model and version numbers of the components. You'll find this information in the documentation that accompanies add-on hardware.
A definite must-have program to complete a system inventory is Belarc Advisor, a free program showing a detailed profile of your installed software and hardware, missing Microsoft hotfixes, anti-virus status, CIS (Center for Internet Security) benchmarks, and displays the results in your Web browser.
Start by noting your serial number and model number. With this information, your system manufacturer can determine the components of your system. If you've added components to your system, note the model and version numbers of the components. You'll find this information in the documentation that accompanies add-on hardware.
A definite must-have program to complete a system inventory is Belarc Advisor, a free program showing a detailed profile of your installed software and hardware, missing Microsoft hotfixes, anti-virus status, CIS (Center for Internet Security) benchmarks, and displays the results in your Web browser.
Beyond these basics, you need to get details of your system's configuration. On Windows PCs, this means copying and printing a few important system files that will come in handy if you later have a problem or need to speak to a tech-support person. The simplest way to preserve your system configuration files is to run the Sysedit program. With Windows 95/98/ME, click on Start, RUN, type SYSEDIT in the blank window, and click OK. It will bring up all your system files -- from AUTOEXEC.BAT to SYSTEM.INI -- in Wordpad windows. From there, you can save them to a floppy disk and print them out. In Windows 3.1, you'll find the Sysedit icon in the Main group. With Windows XP/2000, you can go into Accessories, System Tools, System Information to find and print this important data.
If you own a Mac, you don't need to copy system files, but you should make a list of all the INIT and CDEV files -- collectively called system extensions -- that load on start-up. Conflicts among these files are a common source of program crashes on Macs. You can see a list of these files using the Extensions Manager Control Panel, which also lets you turn off one or more extensions so that, by process of elimination, you can identify which one is causing you problems. One limitation of Extensions Manager is that it doesn't let you print a list of extensions. If you want a list, you have to print the Screen.
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