simulating the audio experience

to follow up on what Daniel Dardailler said:

> 
> > Working with Neal Ewers on some websites, I am reminded that there
> > is a very simple evaluation method that is an effective test of
> > how convenient a site is for most blind visitors.
> > 
> > This is "close your eyes and listen to what you hear as you tab
> > through the links on the page."
...> 
> So how about a simple cgi (hosted somewhere well known) that just
> returns the list of links on the page with text/alt and url.

This list is a good simple test for "does the link text make the
results of following the link predictable?"  On the other hand, I
don't think it really measures up to the job of communicating
"sippin' cyber through a straw" such as the blind experience it.
If the CGI would feed the links to you one at a time, that might
do it.

Here is another, slightly more complicated version that I don't
yet know a cheap way to do [but it could be done with styles and
a little hacking...].

Link text of the current link is bold.  The tab order is in
textual order according to the appearance of clickables on the
page.  All other text is obscured with ROT13 transform, except
for the link text that has already been passed over and that is
greyed out.

Then, to evaluate this experimentally, this takes:

A good computer game designer with no background in adaptive
technology as the "how comparable is this" evaluator.

A trained speech-web-naut to demonstrate their experience and
methods.

Demonstrate both.  Ask the game designer to compare/contrast
the two.

Al




> Example:
>   http://cgi.w3.org/WAI/linklist?url=www.w3.org/WAI
> 
> would return:
> 
> W3C Home                        http://www.w3.org
> WAI Home                        http://www.w3.org/WAI
> new Working Draft:              http://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/WD-WAI-PAGEAUTH
> News, Events & History:         #News
> Stay Informed, Get Involved:    #Information
> Resources on Web Accessibility: #Resources
> etc.
> 
> This could also be provide as a standalone tool.
> 
> Note that this kind of service is already supported as part of the ETH 
> Proxy service at http://www.inf.ethz.ch/department/IS/ea/blinds/
> (currently down but I remember it listing all the link up front)
> and could easily be added to Kynn Bartlett's
> http://www.cgu.edu/degrade/.
>

Received on Wednesday, 23 September 1998 20:01:34 UTC