User Interface for Low Vision Access to Structured Documents

描述（由申请人提供）：本申请寻求对探索性研究的支持，以开发专为中度至重度低视力设计的用户界面（UI），该界面将允许改善对结构化文档（例如，以超文本标记语言（HTML）或可扩展标记语言（XML）编写的文档）的访问。该UI将结合智能的，公认的原则和经验知识，从视觉和康复科学，并将最初体现在一个网络浏览器的低视力。为了强调简单性和易用性，用户界面的可配置功能将限于对易读性和阅读性能影响最大的功能，并且将被设计为一旦配置，无论用户正在查看什么文档，都不需要进行任何调整。用户界面将允许用户同时访问作者所希望的网络文件的全局特征，沿着根据用户需要定制的放大文本;这将允许访问所有网页，而不需要网站具有特殊标记或创作。该设计将受到现有的基于健康科学的低视力心理物理学研究的语料库的激励，并将利用最新的软件工程进展，包括基于XML的用户界面语言（XUL）和可扩展应用程序标记语言（XAML），可扩展样式表语言（XSL）和XSL转换，文档对象模型（DOM），以及电子文档中内容和结构分离的总体趋势。在这个项目中开发的技术和研究预计将导致一般的用户界面，可能会被纳入操作系统设计，以及电子书籍和网络文档的低视力。该项目更广泛的影响是，它可以帮助缩小数百万中度和重度视力丧失用户的数字鸿沟，这些用户在获取信息方面处于相对劣势。此外，该技术如果被广泛采用，可以减轻大多数结构化文档作者在创作无障碍内容时未能遵守最佳实践的情况，因为现在可以更容易地欣赏视觉无障碍性降低的文档页面。该项目旨在为越来越多的不愿学习使用大型功能丰富的软件的老年视障人士提供网络和文档的无障碍环境。由于这项技术可以很容易地扩展到任何语言，假设有计算机、电子文件和网络接入，这种解决方案可以改善全世界数千万用户的生活。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This application seeks support for exploratory research to develop a user interface (UI) specifically designed for moderate to severe low vision, that will allow improved access to structured documents such as those written in hypertext markup language (HTML) or extensible markup language (XML). The UI will incorporate intelligent, well-accepted principles and empirical knowledge from vision and rehabilitation sciences, and will be initially embodied in a web browser for low vision. With an emphasis on simplicity and ease of use, the configurable features of the UI will be limited to those that have the highest impact on legibility and reading performance, and will be designed so that once configured, no adjustments will be needed, regardless of what document the user is viewing. The UI will allow users simultaneous access to both the global features of web documents as the author intended, along with enlarged text tailored to the user's needs; this will allow access to all web pages without requiring that sites have special markup or authoring. The design will be motivated by the corpus of existing of health sciences based psychophysical research in low vision, and will utilize recent software engineering advances including XML-based User Interface Language (XUL) and eXtensible Application Markup Language (XAML), eXstensible Style Sheet Language (XSL) and XSL-Transform, the Document Object Model (DOM), and the general trend toward separation of content and structure in electronic documents. The technology and research developed in this project is expected to lead to general user interfaces for low vision that might be incorporated into operating system design, as well as electronic books and web documents. The broader impact of this project is that it can help close the digital divide for millions of users with moderate and severe vision loss who are at a relative disadvantage in access to information. In addition, the technology can, if widely adopted, alleviate the failure of most authors of structured documents to comply with best practices for authoring accessible content, because document pages with reduced visual accessibility can now be more easily appreciated. This project is intended to enhance web and document accessibility to the growing number of older visually impaired people who are reluctant to learn to use large, feature-laden software. Since the technology can be easily extended to any language, such solutions can, assuming computers, electronic documents and web access are available, enhance the lives of tens of millions of users worldwide.