1.4 Tools to help users with a disability
Since the 1980’s software has been available that has helped disabled users access computers (Lazzaro, 1994). Currently there are a wide range of tools that aid a user’s interaction with a computer from magnifying tools to screen readers.
The most common tools used for people with disabilities convey the content displayed on the computer screen to something they can understand. This is commonly outputted through a computer voice or brail. The sophistication of the software is another factor helping users with disabilities use the web. The more advanced screen readers are constantly updated to give the best performance. However the majority of screen readers rely on being able to read American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) ASCII is a character encoding that computers and other digital devises use to communicate (Walsh, 2006). This disallows multi media content to be translated into audio or brail unless the designer has put into the code a description of the content that the software can understand.
There is a group of graphics-based access technologies however; these are not as reliable as their text based counterparts.
“They do not always accurately read all information. Moreover, these screen readers do not always reliably track the mouse as it is moved around the screen, causing the blind user to become lost in a tangle of information” (Lazzaro, 1994).
The accessibility tools by themselves do not solve the issue of accessibility. There are more issues arising with a websites compatibility with screen readers. Web 2.0 techniques such as AJAX do not reload a page and relies on ECMA script (implemented through JavaScript or JScript equivalent) to update information. This is usually turned off by a disabled user. As the page has not reloaded the screen reader is unable to acknowledge that the content has changed (Dunlap, 2006).