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Thread: Screenreaders and MathML
Number of posts in this thread: 9 (In chronological order)
From: Karen Sorensen
Date: Mon, Oct 31 2011 1:00PM
Subject: Screenreaders and MathML
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Hi -
We are doing some screen reader tests on Math ML. See:
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQL7Woe3hT4
- produced using tex4ht (.tex to .xht)
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIxEDl8gvdU
- produced using MSWord to .xht
Does anyone know how to have the screen reader ignore the table that the
equation is formatted with? CSS won't really work because I can't ask the
Math faculty to all learn CSS. Any other ideas?
Thanks,
Karen
--
Karen M. Sorensen
Instructional Technology Specialist
Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
Portland Community College
971-722-4720
From: Vincent Young
Date: Mon, Oct 31 2011 1:06PM
Subject: Re: Screenreaders and MathML
← Previous message | Next message →
You could try adding role="presentation" to the table.
On Mon, Oct 31, 2011 at 12:01 PM, Karen Sorensen < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >wrote:
> Hi -
> We are doing some screen reader tests on Math ML. See:
>
> - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQL7Woe3hT4
> - produced using tex4ht (.tex to .xht)
> - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIxEDl8gvdU
> - produced using MSWord to .xht
>
> Does anyone know how to have the screen reader ignore the table that the
> equation is formatted with? CSS won't really work because I can't ask the
> Math faculty to all learn CSS. Any other ideas?
>
> Thanks,
> Karen
>
> --
> Karen M. Sorensen
> Instructional Technology Specialist
> Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
> Portland Community College
> 971-722-4720
>
From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Mon, Oct 31 2011 1:12PM
Subject: Re: Screenreaders and MathML
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Hi
At least in Jaws, if you go to verbosity/settings center for IE (under
Jaws key and v), part of that dialog is called "list and table
reading".
By default (reading beginning and end of table) is checked and
"announce cell co ordinates".
If you uncheck these two, you should be able to get most of the table
related announcements removed for the purposes of the video (note,
however, in general it is adviseable to have a table aware screen
reader, andnavigating within tables gets very difficult if the co
ordinates of the cell are not announced, so I would not recommend that
general users turn this off. Jaws formatting announcements are easy to
ignore, once you get used to using the screen reader).
Great project, I do not know how this looks visually, but I'd like to
link to these demoes when I am explaining what MathML is and how it
can work with MathPlayer, with your permitionof course.
Thanks
-Birkir
On 10/31/11, Karen Sorensen < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> Hi -
> We are doing some screen reader tests on Math ML. See:
>
> - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQL7Woe3hT4
> - produced using tex4ht (.tex to .xht)
> - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIxEDl8gvdU
> - produced using MSWord to .xht
>
> Does anyone know how to have the screen reader ignore the table that the
> equation is formatted with? CSS won't really work because I can't ask the
> Math faculty to all learn CSS. Any other ideas?
>
> Thanks,
> Karen
>
> --
> Karen M. Sorensen
> Instructional Technology Specialist
> Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
> Portland Community College
> 971-722-4720
>
From: E.A. Draffan
Date: Mon, Oct 31 2011 1:18PM
Subject: Re: Screenreaders and MathML
← Previous message | Next message →
Can I say a big thank you to anyone who has examples of accessible Science, Technology and Mathematics examples, as we have also been looking into these issues and I would love to use your video as an example of how JAWS can work with MathML.
Thank you for sharing this information.
Best wishes E.A.
Mrs E.A. Draffan
ECS, University of Southampton,
Tel +44 (0)23 8059 7246
http://access.ecs.soton.ac.uk
http://www.emptech.info
From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Mon, Oct 31 2011 2:06PM
Subject: Re: Screenreaders and MathML
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For more example of accessible STEM content, head over to
http://www.access2science.com
There is a collection of links to accessible STEM content websites.
Mind you, I have found that some of them do not work as expected, for
some reason.
This could be due to the fact I have a beta version of MathPlayer 3
and IE9, and there are some transitional issues that are being
resolved.
Thanks
-B
On 10/31/11, E.A. Draffan < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> Can I say a big thank you to anyone who has examples of accessible Science,
> Technology and Mathematics examples, as we have also been looking into
> these issues and I would love to use your video as an example of how JAWS
> can work with MathML.
>
> Thank you for sharing this information.
>
> Best wishes E.A.
>
> Mrs E.A. Draffan
> ECS, University of Southampton,
> Tel +44 (0)23 8059 7246
> http://access.ecs.soton.ac.uk
> http://www.emptech.info
>
>
>
From: Karen Sorensen
Date: Tue, Nov 01 2011 8:06PM
Subject: Re: Screenreaders and MathML
← Previous message | Next message →
Thanks to Vincent, Birkir and E.A.,
You may of course link to these videos. Great to know it is the screen
reader users choice whether they hear the table formatting or not. There
are other videos on my YouTube channel of unsuccessful attempts to read
math documents if you are interested. I can also provide a summary of our
trials. These are the only two successful attempts though. I'd like to try
using MathJAX with these MathML pages, so students could use other browsers
besides IE (or at least that's what MathJAX claims).
What do folks use to make math documents like Word docs or PDFs accessible?
Math Daisy is what we are thinking is best. Anyone have an opinion on this.
Thank you!
Best,
Karen
Karen M. Sorensen
Instructional Technology Specialist
Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
Portland Community College
971-722-4720
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Karen Sorensen < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
> To: WebAIM Discussion List < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
> Date: Mon, 31 Oct 2011 12:01:42 -0700
> Subject: [WebAIM] Screenreaders and MathML
> Hi -
> We are doing some screen reader tests on Math ML. See:
>
> - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQL7Woe3hT4
> - produced using tex4ht (.tex to .xht)
> - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIxEDl8gvdU
> - produced using MSWord to .xht
>
> Does anyone know how to have the screen reader ignore the table that the
> equation is formatted with? CSS won't really work because I can't ask the
> Math faculty to all learn CSS. Any other ideas?
>
> Thanks,
> Karen
>
> --
> Karen M. Sorensen
> Instructional Technology Specialist
> Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
> Portland Community College
> 971-722-4720
>
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Vincent Young < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
> To: WebAIM Discussion List < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
> Date: Mon, 31 Oct 2011 12:04:47 -0700
> Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Screenreaders and MathML
> You could try adding role="presentation" to the table.
>
> On Mon, Oct 31, 2011 at 12:01 PM, Karen Sorensen < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> >wrote:
>
> > Hi -
> > We are doing some screen reader tests on Math ML. See:
> >
> > - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQL7Woe3hT4
> > - produced using tex4ht (.tex to .xht)
> > - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIxEDl8gvdU
> > - produced using MSWord to .xht
> >
> > Does anyone know how to have the screen reader ignore the table that the
> > equation is formatted with? CSS won't really work because I can't ask the
> > Math faculty to all learn CSS. Any other ideas?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Karen
> >
> > --
> > Karen M. Sorensen
> > Instructional Technology Specialist
> > Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
> > Portland Community College
> > 971-722-4720
> >
From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Tue, Nov 01 2011 9:06PM
Subject: Re: Screenreaders and MathML
← Previous message | Next message →
Hi Karen
I guess this is getting a little bit off topic, but I need to make
your life that little bitmore difficult *grin*.
Even if you use MathJax users are tied to Internet Explorer.
MathPlayer, which is the software that generates the math for the
users (I am assuming you are using MathPlayer, if not there is some
magic software out there I am not aware of), will not work with other
browsers. This is due to lack of development work and differences in
how these browsers handle MathML. The development staff for MathPlayer
are aware of this, and would like to get it working with Firefox,
however the staff priority now is to make MathPlayer work with
Microsoft Word directly, since Design Science, the makers of MathType
and MathPlayer, have gotten a grant to do that work (you can see some
more about this on their accessibility blog at www.dessci.com).
To make math accessible from Word, at lesat using MathML, you need to
use MathType.
Go to http://www.access2science.com (neutral website, at lesat not run
by Design Science), for articles on this, both what you need to keep
in mind and what Microsoft Word with MathType can do in terms of
accessibility (export as MathPage, convert to LaTeX on the fly, or
turn into Daisy, with the MathDaisy plug in and the save as daisy lug
in).
www.dessci.com's MathPlayer section also has info on this.
There is no accessibility solution for MathML in PDFs at this point in
time. Neil Soiffer, the main developer of MathPlayer, has done some
experimentation with PDF accessibility, but that has not advanced
beyond just initial testing with a very limited number of PDFs. It is
doable, but the problem with all the math accessibility work has been
that users are not interested enough, screen reader makers, who need
to make some development changes to accommodate MathPlayer, do not get
user request for math accessibility so it ends up at the bottom of the
long requirement lists, and there has just been general apathy, and
users avoid math,or invent their own workarounds.
There is a Blindmath mailing list you can subscribe to and participate
in discussions (I believe the info is on the www.access2science.com
page).
We need more people to be active, contriute ideas and request
necessary features, both from MathPlayer itself (version 3 , release
candidate 1 is about to be released any day now, and to help pressure
screen reader makers to adjust).
I am not saying MathPlayer is the ultimate and perfect software, it is
free but it is proprietary, but it is the best thing we have for math
accessibility right now, so do not take this as a plug for MathPlayer
or software advertizement. Neil has done good work to advance math
accessibility, and with HTML5 and epub3 standards on the horizon, I am
as optimistic as I've ever been (which is not terribly, but
reasonably), that math accessibility might take big steps forward in
the months and years to come.
Thanks
-Birkir
On 11/2/11, Karen Sorensen < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> Thanks to Vincent, Birkir and E.A.,
> You may of course link to these videos. Great to know it is the screen
> reader users choice whether they hear the table formatting or not. There
> are other videos on my YouTube channel of unsuccessful attempts to read
> math documents if you are interested. I can also provide a summary of our
> trials. These are the only two successful attempts though. I'd like to try
> using MathJAX with these MathML pages, so students could use other browsers
> besides IE (or at least that's what MathJAX claims).
> What do folks use to make math documents like Word docs or PDFs accessible?
> Math Daisy is what we are thinking is best. Anyone have an opinion on this.
> Thank you!
> Best,
> Karen
> Karen M. Sorensen
> Instructional Technology Specialist
> Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
> Portland Community College
> 971-722-4720
>
>>
>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>> From: Karen Sorensen < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
>> To: WebAIM Discussion List < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
>> Date: Mon, 31 Oct 2011 12:01:42 -0700
>> Subject: [WebAIM] Screenreaders and MathML
>> Hi -
>> We are doing some screen reader tests on Math ML. See:
>>
>> - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQL7Woe3hT4
>> - produced using tex4ht (.tex to .xht)
>> - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIxEDl8gvdU
>> - produced using MSWord to .xht
>>
>> Does anyone know how to have the screen reader ignore the table that the
>> equation is formatted with? CSS won't really work because I can't ask the
>> Math faculty to all learn CSS. Any other ideas?
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Karen
>>
>> --
>> Karen M. Sorensen
>> Instructional Technology Specialist
>> Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
>> Portland Community College
>> 971-722-4720
>>
>>
>>
>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>> From: Vincent Young < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
>> To: WebAIM Discussion List < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
>> Date: Mon, 31 Oct 2011 12:04:47 -0700
>> Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Screenreaders and MathML
>> You could try adding role="presentation" to the table.
>>
>> On Mon, Oct 31, 2011 at 12:01 PM, Karen Sorensen < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
>> >wrote:
>>
>> > Hi -
>> > We are doing some screen reader tests on Math ML. See:
>> >
>> > - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQL7Woe3hT4
>> > - produced using tex4ht (.tex to .xht)
>> > - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIxEDl8gvdU
>> > - produced using MSWord to .xht
>> >
>> > Does anyone know how to have the screen reader ignore the table that the
>> > equation is formatted with? CSS won't really work because I can't ask
>> > the
>> > Math faculty to all learn CSS. Any other ideas?
>> >
>> > Thanks,
>> > Karen
>> >
>> > --
>> > Karen M. Sorensen
>> > Instructional Technology Specialist
>> > Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
>> > Portland Community College
>> > 971-722-4720
>> >
From: Vincent Young
Date: Tue, Nov 01 2011 9:15PM
Subject: Re: Screenreaders and MathML
← Previous message | Next message →
> Great to know it is the screen reader users choice whether they hear the
table formatting or not.
Want to make sure no one is confused about the function of
role="presentation". This role essentially removes any accessibility api
related to the semantic element so that in this cause a table is no longer
read as a table, but meaningless mark-up. This is implemented by the
developer and is not a user choice. An example of the difference below:
http://webhipster.com/testing/accessibility/role-presentation/
On Tue, Nov 1, 2011 at 7:08 PM, Karen Sorensen < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >wrote:
> Thanks to Vincent, Birkir and E.A.,
> You may of course link to these videos. Great to know it is the screen
> reader users choice whether they hear the table formatting or not. There
> are other videos on my YouTube channel of unsuccessful attempts to read
> math documents if you are interested. I can also provide a summary of our
> trials. These are the only two successful attempts though. I'd like to try
> using MathJAX with these MathML pages, so students could use other browsers
> besides IE (or at least that's what MathJAX claims).
> What do folks use to make math documents like Word docs or PDFs accessible?
> Math Daisy is what we are thinking is best. Anyone have an opinion on this.
> Thank you!
> Best,
> Karen
> Karen M. Sorensen
> Instructional Technology Specialist
> Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
> Portland Community College
> 971-722-4720
>
> >
> > ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> > From: Karen Sorensen < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
> > To: WebAIM Discussion List < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
> > Date: Mon, 31 Oct 2011 12:01:42 -0700
> > Subject: [WebAIM] Screenreaders and MathML
> > Hi -
> > We are doing some screen reader tests on Math ML. See:
> >
> > - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQL7Woe3hT4
> > - produced using tex4ht (.tex to .xht)
> > - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIxEDl8gvdU
> > - produced using MSWord to .xht
> >
> > Does anyone know how to have the screen reader ignore the table that the
> > equation is formatted with? CSS won't really work because I can't ask the
> > Math faculty to all learn CSS. Any other ideas?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Karen
> >
> > --
> > Karen M. Sorensen
> > Instructional Technology Specialist
> > Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
> > Portland Community College
> > 971-722-4720
> >
> >
> >
> > ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> > From: Vincent Young < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
> > To: WebAIM Discussion List < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
> > Date: Mon, 31 Oct 2011 12:04:47 -0700
> > Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Screenreaders and MathML
> > You could try adding role="presentation" to the table.
> >
> > On Mon, Oct 31, 2011 at 12:01 PM, Karen Sorensen < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> > >wrote:
> >
> > > Hi -
> > > We are doing some screen reader tests on Math ML. See:
> > >
> > > - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQL7Woe3hT4
> > > - produced using tex4ht (.tex to .xht)
> > > - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIxEDl8gvdU
> > > - produced using MSWord to .xht
> > >
> > > Does anyone know how to have the screen reader ignore the table that
> the
> > > equation is formatted with? CSS won't really work because I can't ask
> the
> > > Math faculty to all learn CSS. Any other ideas?
> > >
> > > Thanks,
> > > Karen
> > >
> > > --
> > > Karen M. Sorensen
> > > Instructional Technology Specialist
> > > Accessibility Advocate for Online Courses
> > > Portland Community College
> > > 971-722-4720
> > >
From: Giovanni Duarte
Date: Wed, Nov 02 2011 6:45AM
Subject: Re: Screenreaders and MathML
← Previous message | No next message
Hi,
Birkir provides some excellent and accurate information about Accessible
Math. I only want to point out a couple things:
. To me Math accessibility has two aspects. The first aspect is the
device or medium access. This means that Math can be accessed from "any"
device, system, or browser. The second component is the "usability". For
example, how can a screen reader read the math in a meaningful way.
. For the first aspect of accessibility, MathJax is a great
solution. It allows you to display MathML in pretty much any browser or
device. I can see MathML equations in an Android, IPad, or any internet
browser (IE, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, etc)
. The second aspect is where I have seen only one good solution.
That is the use of MathPlayer. This means that a screen reader user will
need to use Internet Explorer plus MathPlayer so you can make usable.
However, any other user, can take benefit of the nice MathML render from any
other device or browser.
. By the end of the day both MathJax and MathPlayer can work
together and bring the best of both products.
I have implemented MathJax in our online courses so anyone can benefit from
it. For example, a user of screen magnification software can highly benefit
from this implementation using any browser - even their mobile devices. My
point is that we can reach more users implementing a technique such as
MathJax. At the same time I needed to inform screen reader users that to
fully benefit from this technology, they need to use Internet Explorer and
download the free MathPlayer plugin.
I hope this can provide some help. BTW: MathJax is supported by the people
from Design Science so this is good news for those looking to implement this
JavaScript library.
Giovanni