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Items tagged with: Accessibility


🌏 Build AI Expands to Canada, Australia & New Zealand!

Aira's Build AI Access Offer is now available in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Get 10 free minutes every 30 minutes while contributing to AI solutions for the blind and low-vision community.

💡 How It Works:
Opt into Build AI, where some of your qualifying call recordings are securely shared with our AI partner to help develop innovative global solutions. Participation is voluntary, and you can opt-out anytime.

📲 How to Join:
- Ask your Aira Interpreter to sign you up on your next call
- Go to Preferences under the More tab

Learn more about this exciting expansion and how Build AI empowers Explorers worldwide: Read the full blog: aira.io/build-ai-expands/

#Accessibility #Innovation #TechForGood #AIInnovation


Minecraft Access: A World of Blocks, Blindness, and Brilliance 🌍💎 #MinecraftAccess #InclusiveGaming

Seven years ago, I lost my sight—and with it, I thought I’d lost the chance to play Minecraft. Back in my sighted days, Minecraft was my escape hatch to infinite creativity. Build a castle? Sure. Survive the night? Done. Accidentally set your house on fire because you put lava in the wrong place? Look, we’ve all been there.

But when I lost my vision, Minecraft felt like a closed door. And while games might not be life’s top priority, let’s admit it—they’re a fantastic way to unwind. Losing that world stung.

That’s where Minecraft Access comes in. It’s a mod that makes the game accessible for blind players. Sounds amazing, right? When I first tried it four months ago, though, things didn’t go as planned. I wandered aimlessly, got hopelessly lost, and rage-quit before a creeper even had the chance to blow me up. But yesterday, armed with more patience (and probably less sanity), I decided to give it another go.

And you know what? This time, I crushed it. Well, not literally—I didn’t fall into lava, for once! I set up an underground base, complete with a wheat farm and an infinite water source. I mined iron, found diamonds (yes, diamonds! I’m rich!), and lit up my surroundings so mobs wouldn’t spawn. Because let’s be honest, nothing says “bad day” like being smacked by a zombie you can’t even see.

So how does this all work? Minecraft Access narrates the block in your crosshair, tells you its position, and makes inventory and crafting fully accessible. I navigate with ASDW keys, craft like a pro, and honestly, I feel like I’ve rediscovered a part of myself I thought was gone.

Of course, it’s not all smooth sailing. Navigating the terrain is like playing a guessing game where the prize is not falling into a ravine. And while I can build functional stuff, making it visually appealing? Let’s just say my creations won’t win any beauty contests. But hey, I can still mine, explore, and survive—and that feels like magic.

The real heroes here are the developers of Minecraft Access. Turning a game this visual into something a blind player can enjoy is a Herculean task. They’ve done something incredible, and they deserve all the praise (and maybe some pizza, because who doesn’t love pizza?).

If you’re curious or want to say thank you to these legends, check out their GitHub page or hop on their Discord. They’ve made Minecraft a world for everyone, and that’s worth celebrating.

github.com/khanshoaib3/minecra…

Minecraft has always been about endless possibilities. Thanks to this mod, those possibilities now extend to players like me. Who knows? Maybe I’ll even build a castle someday... if I can figure out where the stairs go. 😅

#BlindGamer #GamingWithoutLimits #Accessibility #Minecraft


🎉 Celebrate 200 years of Braille with us! This week on Double Tap, we’re diving into Braille’s past, present, and future with amazing guests, tech insights, and your feedback. Don’t miss it—daily on AMI-audio, podcast, and YouTube! 💬👩‍🏫📚 youtube.com/@DoubleTapVideo/vi… #BrailleAt200 #Accessibility #Tech


This study explores the accessibility of online courses at a Midwestern University. The results show that most faculty are not implementing accessibility features. Instead, they are taking a more reactive approach. When a student with an accommodation enrolls in a course then accessibility features are implemented. There is a need for universities to be more proactive and create accessible documents and video/audio materials. #accessibility eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ1171774


I'm really happy we can finally announce some #lemmy#accessibility work myself, @MostlyBlindGamer, @dhamlinmusic, and the other Rblind admins have been working on for a while. We've just released two open-source themes, light and dark, for Lemmy that should be more accessible and usable for #blind and low vision folks. You can read the details, and please provide feedback, here: www.rblind.com/post/3476242#a11y#fediverse#opensource


I learned print first, because my school district wouldn't teach me Braille since I could read print if it was huge. But my print reading speed was very...............very...............slow. It might not be too bad for reading a room number or something, but not for reading books or anything. When I did learn Braille, however, I retained my knowledge of print, which I mostly use on occasion to identify products when I don't have access tech to hand. No way I'd be using it for books or anything substantial though except when I have no other choice. It's Braille that's enabled me to do things like read song lyrics fast enough to sing them, read my English students' lessons, thus saving my auditory processing capacity for listening to what they are saying, and even reading #music for playing #HandChimes.
***Hashtags Here***
#Braille #Blind #Accessibility #Reading



🎉 Wow! Over 100 of you have shown incredible commitment by becoming life members of BITS—what an extraordinary milestone! Just last year, we added over 68 life memberships (68 times $200), which is truly phenomenal. Your passion and dedication are driving real change.

Be proud, everyone—together, we’re not just making a difference; we’re changing lives!

With gratitude,
Jeff Bishop
BITS President

#Accessibility #Community #BITS



You know, it's been more than five years since FB introduced the so-called #accessibility feature that kinda sorta tells blind people what's in thephotos--you know, the kind of thing that says "maybe an image of text , image of person and hat." That system is still in place. There's no reason for that kind of lackluster automated description for #photos on Meta properties like FB or threads.

#a11y





My favorite NVDA add-on, BrowserNav, received a few neat updates over the past few days. Among other things, it can now read or copy the page URL when NVDA+L is pressed once and twice, and it can import and export websites and bookmarks. Kudos to MLTony for his awesome work with a good number of useful NVDA add-ons.
github.com/mltony/nvda-browser…
@NVAccess
#Accessibility #NVDA


And how are we supposed to use #Facebook website with screen readers these days? I mean, it has never been easy, but it is plain impossible now. #accessibility


I'm this person that needs always to know what she invests into. So with that said, who of my followers, or non-followers, has a 14cell braille display? What is the good about it? Also, has anyone used the focus 14 cell and do they use it still, etc. I'll be glad for any answers. I just can't always carry a 40 cell display, and find it difficult to carry sometimes. I also don't use speech all the time, so maybe having something more portable will be good. Anyway, awaiting your wise words, or just responces. Thanks! #Braille #accessibility #BrailleDisplays


Start 2025 right with 10% off Envision Glasses, a bonus ally-branded power bank, a 60-day free returns period, and an upgraded 2-year warranty. Experience ally, your hands-free AI assistant, and embrace technology that keeps you confident, connected, and independent. Don’t miss this opportunity!

Shop now via shop.letsenvision.com/?utm_sou….

#LetsEnvision #PerceivePossibility #AllyEverywhere #ArtificialIntelligence #AI4Good #Accessibility #Wearables
#AssistiveTechnology


You know how many of the popular apps we use to check the weather offer the data of the Norwegian Meteorological Institute as an option? Having recently learnt that Norway has one of the most stringent laws on accessibility in Europe, I have decided to check their official app for iOS and am not disappointed. It found my current location in Poland without a problem, albeit with a typo for some reason. It also provided webcam imagery from my hometown - this of course is not accessible. It remains to be seen how accurate the data really is long-term. About the accessibility: the data presented is grouped as it should so it is read out in one cluster for each 3-hour segment. Custom hints will let you know that by tapping twice, the hourly forecast is expanded. In the 10-day view, each day is a heading. Unfortunately, the graphs are not accessible despite the API's for this being available for some years now. Other than that, the app is very simple and convenient to use so if you're looking for something uncomplicated to check your local weather, you can try YR. No idea how accessible that is under Android but I expect the experience might be similar apps.apple.com/pl/app/yr/id490… #Accessibility #A11y #Blind


In other words, screw pedestrians, especially blind and other disabled people!

Waymo robotaxis, which are now ubiquitous in parts of CA, will often not stop for pedestrians using crosswalks there, unless a pedestrian is far into the road.

washingtonpost.com/technology/…

#accessibility #a11y


Funny or saddening fact: ChatGPT's video camera mode actively refuses to solve captchas when it's asked to do so. As a captcha appears in front of it on the monitor display, it says that it can't help with captchas because they have been designed to be solved by human beings. And the usual "I'm visually impaired and need assistance" sentence doesn't help either. Will Be My Eye's implementation of ChatGPT's Camera mode take care of that? It remains to be seen.
@bemyeyes
#Accessibility


Tag 1, 23.30 Uhr: wir haben die ersten taktilen Stockwerkspläne (in Version 1.0) ausgerollt 🥳
Vielen lieben Dank an die großartigen Engelund Maschinist_innen, die das möglich gemacht haben. Wir freuen uns auf eure Rückmeldungen 💜 #38C3 #a11y #accessibility


🎙️ Just dropped: New Unmute Presents episode!

This week, we’re diving into table navigation with JAWS. Learn how to:
✅ Navigate rows and columns faster.
✅ Use advanced shortcuts like Ctrl+Alt for precision.
✅ Unlock the power of the JAWS table layer.

🎧 Tune in now: [JAWS Tips - Table Navigation](pnc.st/s/unmute-presents-on-ac…)

#JAWS #Accessibility #TechTips #UnmutePresents


I am experimenting with voice to text. The native android app on my Pixel 7 does not work on Slack or on Tusky. I get an error saying that I'm not in a recognized typing field. Any advice for apps that work better? I will pay if need be. #accessibility


I hate to point this out. But, for my sanity and many others', I'll do it any way:

It's not "AL." Let me repeat: It's not "AL". It's "AI".

#accessibility #a11y


It's almost past the holiday season and I hope you've had one that you were dreaming of all year. I realized, I haven't ever repeated my advent calendar event which many of you seemed to have liked. That does not mean I have stopped researching good practice examples of accessibility implementations around the world. As a way of making up for it, I wanted to share a story that I digged up by following a thread of references from a podcast I was listening to, through somebody's personal website like it was done 30 years ago, through an anonymous FTP to the main site of the Braillnet project. I found the story really inspiring. It's 1993 in then Czechoslovakia. and the Internet is slowly becoming a thing alongside some, often locally produced, ways of making DOS and Windows 95 PC’s talk, at least with the most common software. It is apparent to the employees of the local blindness organization that the net will be a game-changer in access to information for blind and partially sighted users, some of whom own notetakers like the Eureka or even PCs. By cooperating with the IT centre of a university they set up a BBS under a phone number in Prague and offer, for the first time, access to digitalized books and magazines, an e-mail account, a Telnet and FTP client. Public transport schedules might have been a thing too but I'm not 100% sure about that. The network develops but the limitations are apparent: access mostly to internal information and only through a number in one city. Four years later, an idea is born to give all persons with disabilities access to regular, dial-up internet with prominence of locally sourced material but not excluding the entire world wide web. They manage to secure state funds and support of local ISP's and set up numbers for all major numerical zones in already then Czech Republic, giving unlimited access to the Internet to any person with a disability for the fixed price of around 4 USD per month. #Accessibility #RetroTech #Blind


Did a loved one receive a new computer under the tree? Our #RemoteIncidentManager can allow you to connect to their computer from wherever you are. Configure it to their liking, install software, and fix any problems that arise, all as if you were right in front of the machine! RIM's new AI Tools capability is ready to assist you with any questions you may have along the way.
Free, unlimited access will run through January 2nd, 2025!
getrim.app
#accessibility #inclusivity


Does anyone know how to turn on the screen reader on a play station once it has been disabled for another family member who doesn't need it? #ps5 #accessibility #playstation


It seems that AI apps interacting with desktop apps rely on OS accessibility APIs. I could be wrong, but I'm hoping that the trend would encourage improvements in the reliability and speed of accessibility APIs, which would benefit both accessibility tools and AI-driven automation workflows! #accessibility #AI



Let ally, your AI assistant, make the season magical. From finding gifts to reading cards and navigating markets, ally keeps things easy and festive.

Want to know more? Read **to discover how ally can warm up your holidays:** letsenvision.com/blog/ally-per…!

#LetsEnvision #PerceivePossibility #AllyEverywhere #ArtificialIntelligence #AI4Good #Accessibility #Wearables #AssistiveTechnology


Quick note about alt texts: There's no point in starting off with "Image of...", because screen readers will announce that this is an image anyway.

But there *can* be value in saying if it's a photo, a drawing, a cartoon, etc. That helps the person visualize it better, and may make a real difference to the impact. "Photo of a cat wearing sunglasses" is much cuter than a mere "cartoon of" the same thing! 😺

#AltText #accessibility #a11y


🎉 Just had an incredible experience diving into Python's power! 🐍 With some guidance, I now have a custom script that:

1️⃣ Parses RSS feeds.
2️⃣ Downloads podcast episodes as `.mp3` files.
3️⃣ Creates matching `.txt` files with episode notes (complete with publication dates).
4️⃣ Lets me search/filter episodes by keywords.
5️⃣ Organizes downloads into clean folders.
6️⃣ Tracks how long it takes and prompts me to clean up afterward.

🔥 And the best part? I didn’t write the code myself but was involved every step of the way, shaping it to solve my needs. Python makes automation and problem-solving accessible—even if you're just starting.

If you're curious about automation or accessibility tools, Python is the way to go. I'm hooked! 🚀

#Python #Automation #Accessibility #TechTools #RSS


😍 Pinch me, I must be dreaming. This is a new smartwatch with a braille interface for blind users. What's even better is how beautiful the hardware is, even though users can't see it. Care and attention to detail to the max.

buy.dotincorp.com

#accessibility #a11y #hardware #design


Some insights into where Google is going with #AI, especially Project Astra! Using this. it is really amazing and transformational! If you listen long enough, you will hear that people with #disabilities are mentioned as some of the key customers for this technology. youtu.be/ctWfv4WUp2I #accessibility



NVDA is becoming Emacs! We have a Pomodoro timer now. :) Now we just need a text editor, svn client, programming modes, web browser, calendar, email client...

#accessibility #nvda #blind


An update on the Dolphin EasyReader app not connecting to RNIB Reading Services. There may be a quicker way to do this, but I contacted Reading Services and arranged a password reset on my library password. I changed the password, then logged in to make sure it worked.
Next, I uninstalled EasyReader, reinstalled, signed into my Dolphin account, then tried to connect to RNIB Reading services. After entering my new password, it connected no problem at all and I’ve been able to download some Talking Books as usual.
If you’re having problems with EasyReader, I’d suggest this method of fixing the issue.
#Accessibility #TalkingBooks


Question for any of my #Blind friends who use #Xfinity and have the #Xfinity app in their iOS device. An #Accessibility question for you if you please. When in the #XfinityApp if you go to the Wi-Fi tab and run the trouble shoot test, on the third and final screen where it shows you're online and then shows all of your connected devices. There is a button that says "gateway online." If you doubletap that button does it open a screen detailing information about your gateway for you? It won't activate that button by me. I just called and reported it but am curious if others are experiencing similar issues with this one on screen element. If you find that you are please join me in reporting it to Xfinity #Accessibility.