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，以开发专门为中度至重度视力低下而设计的用户界面(UI)，该用户界面将允许更好地访问以超文本标记语言(HTML)或可扩展标记语言(XML)编写的结构化文档。该用户界面将结合智能的、广为接受的原则和来自视觉和康复科学的经验知识，并将最初体现在低视力网络浏览器中。由于强调简单性和易用性，用户界面的可配置功能将仅限于对易读性和阅读性能有最大影响的功能，并且将被设计为一旦配置，就不需要进行任何调整，无论用户正在查看什么文档。用户界面将允许用户同时访问作者希望的网络文件的全球特征以及根据用户需要量身定做的放大文本；这将允许访问所有网页，而不需要网站有特殊的标记或创作。该设计将基于现有的基于健康科学的低视力心理物理学研究的语料库，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)以及电子文档内容和结构分离的总趋势。在该项目中开发的技术和研究预计将导致用于低视力的通用用户界面，这些用户界面可能被纳入操作系统设计以及电子书和网络文档。该项目更广泛的影响是，它可以帮助数百万中度和严重失明的用户缩小数字鸿沟，这些用户在获取信息方面处于相对不利的地位。此外，如果被广泛采用，这项技术可以缓解大多数结构化文档作者未能遵守创作可访问内容的最佳实践的问题，因为现在可以更容易地欣赏视觉可访问性降低的文档页面。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可访问性。由于这项技术可以很容易地扩展到任何语言，这样的解决方案可以改善全球数千万用户的生活，前提是电脑、电子文档和网络访问都是可用的。

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.