http://magnifiers.org/thenews/magnifiers.orghome.rss This RSS feed was generated out of the newsdatabase of Magnifiers.org Home website. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=368 With Nuance TALKS and ZOOMS, blind and visually impaired users are able to take advantage of the many features found on todays popular mobile phones, including contact directories, caller ID, text messaging, help files, access to Web browsers, and other screen content. And TALKS and ZOOMS 4.0 enables consumers to choose the TTS software they want to use to power all updated features, including Nuance trusted Vocalizer Mobile and ETI-Eloquence. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=367 iPhone 3G S provides new accessibility features including VoiceOver, a screen reader that speaks what appears on the iPhone 3G S display, enabling visually impaired users to make calls, read email, browse web pages, play music and run applications. The new universal Zoom function magnifies the entire screen, and the White on Black feature reverses the colors on screen to provide higher contrast for people with low vision. iPhone 3G S also supports Mono Audio which combines left and right audio channels so that they can be heard in both earbuds for those with hearing loss in one ear. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=366 Dolphin has released version 11 of their screen reader and screen magnifier software. In this release support for Windows 7 public beta has been added and the control panel is redesigned. What we miss in this new release, is support for new technology! http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=365 Touchscreen handsets may be the talk of the town, but they are useless to the visually impaired. Software developed by Jussi Rantala and his colleagues at the University of Tampere in Finland attempts to address that by bringing Braille to touch-enabled mobile devices. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=364 virtually impossible for somebody who is vision-impaired to use the phone. Other touchscreen smart phones suffer from the same problem, so a few smartypants engineers at Google have come up with a clever way of dealing with the problem. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=363 The Reading Rights Coalition, which represents people who cannot read print, will protest the threatened removal of the text-to-speech function from e-books for the Amazon Kindle 2 outside the Authors Guild headquarters in New York City at 31 East 32nd Street on April 7, 2009, from noon to 2:00 p.m. The coalition includes the blind, people with dyslexia, people with learning or processing issues, seniors losing vision, people with spinal cord injuries, people recovering from strokes, and many others for whom the addition of text-to-speech on the Kindle 2 promised for the first time easy, mainstream access to over 245,000 books. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=362 Issist Assistive Technologies, manufacturer of the worlds most portable professional screen magnifier and reader is pleased to announce the availability of iZoom 3.1 Beta. After a tremendous response to iZoom 3.0 in January at ATIA 2009, iZoom now includes high quality IVONA male and female voices. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=361 Serotek Corporation, the leading provider of internet and digital information accessibility software and services, today announced that it will no longer require a fee to upgrade or maintain any software in its product line. Software companies traditional have charged fees under a contract, commonly known as a Software Maintenance Agreement (SMA), to upgrade to newer versions of their software packages. Serotek will continue to provide regular upgrades and software improvements but will offer them free of charge to all Serotek customers. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=360 Michael Bernstein, is a Microsoft development lead on the User Interface Platform team where he focuses on accessibility. In a Blog on MSDN he announced, that Windows 7 includes a screen magnifier supporting full-screen and lens mode. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=359 LittleGems.Admin has released version DesktopZoom 3.2. DesktopZoom is the most popular free screen magnifier for Windows XP and Windows 200. It also seems to work on Windows Vista with Aero disabled. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=358 iZoom 3.0 represents a leap in screen magnification technology with support for 64 bit operating systems, crystal clear font smoothing at all zoom levels, SmartAlign and much more! iZoom 3.0 raises the bar in screen magnification technology, offering complete portability, ease of use and revolutionary new features not found in any other magnifier. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=357 In early 2005, Apple introduced VoiceOver, a screen reader that is built into the Macintosh operating system. The latest release of this accessibility tool, included with Apples Mac OS X 10.5, nicknamed Leopard, features refreshable braille support, vastly improved navigation commands, and an extensive help system. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=356 Dolphin Computer Access today announced the release of the Worlds first and only combined Hindi screen reader and screen magnifier, with integrated Braille display support. The Hindi edition of Supernova has been developed by Dolphin Computer Access in partnership with Mumbai based disability experts BarrierBreak International. It is immediately available on portable USB pen edition, on CD, or to download as a 30-day trial. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=355 Web designers and developers create sites that better meet the needs of users with disabilities and older users. Drawing on extensive experience and community feedback, the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 improve upon W3Cs groundbreaking initial standard for accessible Web content. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=354 Optelec announced the release of FarView, a portable and powerful magnification solution that redefines how low vision users are able to access, store, review and share information. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=353 Serotek released the first full-featured screen access product with support for 64-bit operating systems. This support is not only an essential breakthrough for IT professionals working in 64-bit environments in the course of their employment, but for the average consumer as well. Blind individuals can now walk in to any of the increasing number of retail stores who stock their shelves exclusively with machines running 64-bit operating systems, and purchase a new computer without wondering whether or not the machine will be accessible when they take it out of the box. From the smallest Netbook to the most powerful server, System Access delivers fast, reliable, and easy to use accessibility. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=352 Dolphin Computer Access Limited, the UK software company responsible for delivering independence to vision and print impaired people, announced its acquisition of Software Express Distribution Limited. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=351 Dolphin Computer Access announced the official launch of the Dolphin Scripting Zone at www.YourDolphin.com/Scripts. This dedicated mini-site is now available and open to all Supernova, Hal, Lunar and LunarPlus users, 30-day demo customers and budding script writers. Visitors can download and rate a free script, find a script writer, contribute to the scripting forum or learn more about Dolphin Scripting. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=350 Google has started an experiment to improve access to Google search by visually impaired. By only using the keyboard you can navigate through search results. Google also added a magnification lens that highlights the users selected search result. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=349 Freedom Scientific today announced the English release of JAWS version 10, the worlds leading screen reader for visually impaired computer users. This new release includes new features that will expand employment, training, and educational opportunities for users at all levels. These new features include AutoForms Mode, JAWS Tandem, and RealSpeak™ Direct Solo. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=348 During the Accessible Worlds Tek Talk online event this week, attention was focused upon how the latest update of Dolphins screen reading, screen magnification and reading and writing tools opens the world of information to those with vision loss. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=347 Dolphin has released version 10 of Lunar (screen magnifier), Lunarplus (screen magnifier with speech support), Hal (Screen reader with speech and braille support) and Supernova (Screen reader with screen magnifier, braille and speech). http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=346 Code Factory has announced Windows Mobile GPS software intended for visually impaired users. Mobile Geo supports blind or low-vision users by using a combination of voice synthesis and vibratory alerts, and runs on Windows Mobile 5.x, 6.x, or 6.1 devices, the company says. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=345 Freedom Scientific today announced the new SAPPHIRE™ portable video magnifier. This new product offers features for on-the-go low vision users and is an companion to the companys current line of desktop video magnifiers, distance viewing solutions, and screen magnification software. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=344 The American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) has applauded Apples move to make iTunes and iPods accessible to blind and visually impaired people, saying, The iPod nano, which was virtually unusable for people with vision loss, is now equipped with talking menus and large font options. Apple has also made improvements to the accessibility of iTunes. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=342 The Ipod Nano 4th generation from Apple, is now accessible for the visually impaired. It now supports spoken menus and the ability to enlarge the font size. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=341 Touch Sight is a digital camera for visually impaired people. Easy to use, it includes a unique feature which records sound for three seconds after pressing the shutter button. The user can then use the sound as reference when reviewing and managing the photos. Touch Sight does not have an LCD but instead has a lightweight, flexible Braille display sheet which displays a 3D image by embossing the surface, allowing the user to touch the image. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=340 Lighthouse International, a leader in advocating accessibility for people with low vision, is announcing an innovative new add-on software tool that will enable millions of people worldwide with low vision to access previously inaccessible web pages. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=339 IBM has launched a new initiative that it hopes will vastly improve the web browsing experience for visually impaired users. The Social Accessibility Project is a service that aims to make web pages more accessible for screen readers without altering the code of the page, the software for which is available in beta form today through IBMs AlphaWorks. If enough people participate in the project, then IBMs software could become integral to blind users' everyday surfing. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=338 HumanWare expands its low vision product line with the announcement of four new video magnifiers at Vision 2008, an international conference on low vision being held in Montreal this week. With these new products, HumanWare is better able to serve the needs of the growing number of people with low vision, those whose vision cannot be completely corrected even with the most powerful prescription glasses. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=337 Faculty and students at Marshall University are working to help the people who have trouble seeing the small digital screens found on everything from cell phones to microwaves. A device developed by university physicist Thomas Wilson and engineered by faculty and students is designed to measure the contrast of digital displays. It was unveiled Wednesday morning at the American Foundation for the Blind Technology and Employment Center in Huntington. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=336 National and European Union regulations require that public transit operators across Europe to provide more information for blind and visually impaired riders. A Swiss public transport agency, the Verkehrsbetriebe St. Gallen (VBSG), is rolling out an RFID-based system that allows blind riders to check transit information at bus stops, determine the destination of passing buses and flag them down. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=335 University of Washington experts say that they have written new software, WebAnywhere , which can enable blind and visually impaired people to surf the Internet at any place. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=334 DesktopZoom is the most popular free screen magnifier for the Windows platform, that you can run without any installation and from a USB stick. DesktopZoom version 3 now includes basic speech support! http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=333 Last year, Microsoft reaffirmed its support for DAISY, the talking book standard developed for the visually impaired. Today, the ability for Word to save files in that enabling format has been unveiled. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=332 At the moment, most TVs and telephones must be outfitted with special features for people with hearing, vision, and speech impairments under U.S. law. Now an influential Democratic congressman wants to expand those requirements to their Internet counterparts. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=331 Bones is proud to announce the release of Milestone 312, an enhanced version of the successful Milestone 311. Milestone 312 offers the unparalleled benefits of portability, usability and reliability that the Visually Impaired relies on. Milestone 312 has a multitude of new functions, including variable playbackspeed, Text-To-Speech, Audible.com playback, Daisy 3.0, integrated RFID reader, integrated FM tuner and direct connection of stereo microphones. The hardware includes 1GB internalFlash memory, USB 2.0 OTG High Speed connectivity, a clock and the proven strong, crystal clear speaker. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=330 Technology and training have improved to the point that blind people can adeptly perform a dazzling array of jobs - soon to include the governorship of New York. The biggest obstacle still in their way, advocates say, is the negative attitude of many employers. http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=329 Pocket or Round-the-Neck Electronic Magnifier Allows Visually Impaired to Enlarge Print from 5X to 20X on Menus, Cans, Prescriptions, Newspapers etc. Portable electronic magnifiers have been available for several years, but this is the smallest, lightest, and most flexible one on the market http://magnifiers.org/news.php?action=fullnews&id=328 PDF files often are difficult to access by visually impaired. With the free Accessible PDF program for Windows PDF files, if they are not a scanned image, are now also accessible for visually impaired.