A Tiger with a Voice

Today, Apple has released a major upgrade to their Apple Macintosh computer line. Now, if you're wondering why I'm mentioning this here, since Mac's have typically not been real accessible for the blind, well its because Apple has done their homework and included some tools for us.

The new Voice Over set of tools provide keyboard shortcuts, magnification, and a screen reader like interface, all built into the operating system. Microsoft tried a minimal approach to screen reading some years ago when they included Narrator in their Windows 2000 and XP operating systems when they first came out. However, this is a minimal approach, and they even admit to the fact that Narrator was never meant to be a full screen reader. The difference with Apple, is that they apparently have strived to make Voice Over as full a screen reading package as possible.

This is very exciting to see from a computer/operating system manufacturer, and hopefully, since its won't be another year and a half or more until Longhorn comes out, Microsoft will make a concerted effort to overhall their Narrator so that its comparable to Voice Over.

Read more about Voice Over from the link above, or you can listen to a demonstration, recorded at last year's American Council of the Blind's convention last summer on their 2004 Convention Archives page. You will want to choose the Wednesday broadcast, and if you have the ability to jump to a specific time in your media player (such as Winamp), then the program item begins at the 195:40 point.

Though it's likely too early to tell if Apple's move will be an effective screen reading solution, it's terriffic to see a mainstream developer, much less a company like Apple, take up the challenge of reaching out to an under served population like the blind. Besides all that, we now have a potential alternative to the Windows environment. And, since Voice Over is built-in, that automatically eliminates the extra $600-$1000 that blind people often have to pay to get additional screen reading software. Therefore, this is awesome!