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I am very impressed with the text-to-speech software offered by this company. It offers support for English Language Learners as well as those with physical challenges and other disabilities that slow down their ability to learn to read and write.

It's great to hear from someone who has had experience with it. I know this link isn't exactly what Carmin wanted for this assignment because it didn't specifically mention it would help with Web 2.0 tool barriers but I wanted to share it because it can help people read websites and so much more. Thanks, Tina.

Kathleen, I had to spend a few minutes searching the site, but I found a page in the site that lists reading Web content as a Kurzweil feature. So it does meet the requirements. http://www.kurzweiledu.com/ki-3000-v12-windows-features.html I highlighted the related text in the page. If you turn on your diigolet -- you will see the highlighted text.

Get started today working with all your Microsoft and IBM Lotus® Symphony™ applications using JAWS®, the world's most popular screen reader. Developed for computer users whose vision loss prevents them from seeing screen content, JAWS reads aloud what's on the PC screen.

" Assistive Technology " " Assistive Computer Devices Information provided by Disabled World - Published: 2009-02-17 A screen reader is a software application that attempts to identify and interpret what is being displayed on the computer screen. This interpretation is then represented to the user with text-to-speech, sound icons, or a braille output.

How People with Disabilities Use the Web The following scenarios show people with different kinds of disabilities using assistive technologies and adaptive strategies to access the Web. In some cases the scenarios show how the Web can make some tasks easier for people with disabilities.

Thank your for posting this article Sherry. It gives us a view into the lives of people who had to find a way to function in the world of business as well as in the classroom. The reporter who after years of working normally, had to finally resort to the use of voice recognition in order to continue doing his job. The student wiht dyslexia who had to find a way to keep up with the rest of the students. The student found text to speech software helplful. This student found sites with graphics helpful, however, there were still some limitations. If the graphics were animated it was difficult to focus. These details are impereative to the function of independency to the person who is experiencing the disability. We need to remind our selves that the world is not black and white...there is a lot hidden in between what we are able to see.

It is amazing how we take web accessiblitity for granted. Being color blind is a disability that is not talked about often but is a hindrance for people searching the web. We find that things that are highlighted or pointed out show up in red for an attention getter, but for those who can not see reds, some websites could not be utilized by color blind people. Style sheets is something I am not familiar with at all, but this article made me aware of something that is available for color blind individuals.

Enabling an Accessible Web 2.0 is a paper written by Becky Gibson IBM Emerging Technologies . I was unable to highlight (not sure why). I found that this article is very similar to a lot of the assigned reading. The article discuss key points:" The original Web was not perfect but with some work by Web developers it could be used by all. Now we are entering the next generation of the Web - Web 2.0. It is all about interaction, collaboration, and social networking It is more dynamic and fluid and no longer just static pages of information. This presents yet another challenge for people with disabilities. These new interaction models are pushing the limits of the technologies of the Web and the ability of assistive technologies to interpret the changing face of the Web. This paper describes new technologies and tools being developed to help enable accessibility for Web 2.0." " Such as : Ajax interactions, data binding, graphic effects as well as rich, customizable user interface components [13]. Examples of such toolkits include: * Dojo http://www.dojotoolkit.org/ * Google Web Toolkit - http://code.google.com/webtoolkit/ * Open Rico- http://openrico.org/ * Prototype - http://www.prototypejs.org/ * TIBCO General Interface (available via an open source license) http://www.tibco.com/software/rich_internet_application/default.jsp * Yahoo User Interface Library - http://developer.yahoo.com/yui/ * Zimbra Kabuki AJAX Toolkit (http://www.zimbra.com/community/kabuki_ajax_tool kit_download.html)