[Accessibility] FW: RESNA SIG-11 Distribution List - Disabled to Get Greater Access to Linux

[John Goldthwaite]

We got some press:

-----Original Message-----
From: David L. Jaffe [mailto:jaffe at roses.stanford.edu]
Sent: Thursday, May 20, 2004 8:17 PM
To: RESNA SIG-11 E-mail Distribution List
Subject: RESNA SIG-11 Distribution List - Disabled to Get Greater Access
to Linux


Disabled to Get Greater Access to Linux
From: SiliconValley.com - 01/21/2004
By: Dean Takahashi

The Free Standards Group says it has established a task force to develop
accessibility standards for Linux. Scott McNeil, executive director of the
Free Standards Group, says a standard version will make it easier for Linux
developers to develop software and hardware for disabled people; Linux
developers have already created speech synthesizers that read aloud text.
The
strategy should encourage the development of keyboards and other devices
that
would be compatible with any Linux operating system software or
applications.
The Bay Area group wants to make Linux as accessible to people with
disabilities as is Windows from Microsoft, which has introduced add-on
features for the disabled since the mid 1990s. IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Sun
Microsystems, Red Hat, and a number of universities support the efforts of
the Free Standards Group. Janina Sajka, the American Foundation for the
Blind's director of technology research and development, one of the
estimated
10 million Americans who are visually impaired, has used a special version
of
Linux for five years and says, "When this technology works, it changes
people's lives profoundly."

Read the full article at:
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/7759814.htm