On Thu, 10 Nov 2011, Alan Bell wrote: > On 10/11/11 15:11, Hugh Sasse wrote: > > > > OK, added a couple of things. I don't have a CCTV magnifier at home, and > > I don't use a web cam, so maybe someone can add something about: > > > > Can present day CCTVs input to computers pretty much as standard? > > Can you use Web cams (maybe with photography macro adaptors) as CCTV > > magnifiers? > > > > With Image Magick, etc that might be a good use case for Simon. > what is the CCTV for? Is this a security camera of some kind?
:-) No, it's for magnification. First non-advertising one I found on the web was this: http://www.afb.org/Section.asp?SectionID=4&TopicID=31&DocumentID=221 They'll magnify, change the colours, increase the contrast, and some even do more processing on what is placed on the tray underneath the TV/camera unit. People use them for close work, reading, etc. A good description is from Abilitynet. http://abilitynet.wetpaint.com/page/CCTV+and+Video+Magnifiers (Not sure about the wetpaint in the domain name. http://www.abilitynet.org.uk/edu_sensoryhardware#cctv might be better for that reason. ) Personally I find hand magnifiers easier, but they are less of interest for this topic. > > OK, so it's a good enough model of visual impairment, until we need > > something > > better. That's a sensible engineering decision. I was concerned that the > > experience of RP will be quite different from Macula Degeneration etc. > it probably would be, but I am guessing the options we can provide on the > computer for assistance are pretty much the same, magnification, speech or > audio cues and tweaks to colours and contrasts. OK. > > > > I would like to raise the flag for a deafblind persona, though. In > > the UK, for example, there are about 24,000 deafblind people, but > > they so often seem to be batted like tennis balls between the > > organizations of/for [dD]eaf people and those of/for blind people, > > but the solutions offered usually rely on having the other sense > > intact. There are widely varying stats for the USA > > http://www.aadb.org/FAQ/faq_DeafBlindness.html#count > > > > Thank you, > > Hugh > totally agree, but I am not sure what we can do from an Ubuntu desktop > perspective, to use a computer a deafblind person will require a braille > output device (which is supported, but I don't have the hardware or skill to > use it). In theory it would be the same as the blindness profile, but using > braille rather than speech dispatcher. It would be massively hard to use the > desktop that way, but probably not technically impossible. I am not sure there > is much we can do to optimise the desktop for that persona which would be in > any way different to the blindness profile. I'm not in regular contact with deafblind people these days, but when I was I was left with the impression that braille use is greater among deafblind people as a proportion than it is among blind people. But there are other modes of communication which are more unusual, and I don't know how difficult they are to cater for, or how common they are now. As two examples: Circa 1980 there was a deafblind radio amateur who successfully used morse code by touch. Circa 2002 there was a project called Dexter which was a robotic hand producing the US one handed Deaf fingerspelling alphabet to be read by touch. Maybe that was driven by RS232, I can't remember now. So some of the needs will be distinct from those of blind people and deaf people. It might be worth asking AADB if they'd like any input. I think they are probably the biggest deafblind organisation in the world, or at least the anglophone world. At a wild guess, anyway. It might generate some interesting ideas, anyway. Hugh -- Ubuntu-accessibility mailing list Ubuntu-accessibility@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-accessibility
