30.06.2013 Views

2007 PhD Thesis Final Revised.pdf - Curtin University

2007 PhD Thesis Final Revised.pdf - Curtin University

2007 PhD Thesis Final Revised.pdf - Curtin University

SHOW MORE
SHOW LESS

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.

products can be broken up into four categories: seeing, hearing, keyboard and mouse<br />

The mouse options were also similar to Windows, providing a variety of options for<br />

alerts were also included in the Mac OS 10 platform for the hearing impaired. The<br />

similarity between Mac OS and Windows demonstrated that, until<br />

recently, the<br />

accessibility<br />

of mainstream GUI platforms has been similar.<br />

The main features that separated the Mac OS 10 platform from products such<br />

resulting in vastly improved accessibility. Mac OS 10.2 provided a full-screen<br />

zoom<br />

been further refined and in the current version of Mac OS, 10.4,<br />

it provides a stable<br />

fully-featured<br />

product incorporated into the operating system.<br />

The other standout accessibility feature on the Mac OS 10.4 platform was the<br />

similar to other third-party text-to-speech applications discussed earlier in the chapter<br />

limited market share of the Apple Macintosh, it is expected that these additional<br />

computer users and make it a more affordable and competitive choice on the PC<br />

market.<br />

Like the accessibility features in Windows-based platforms, the Macintosh<br />

accessibility features. The initial release of Mac OS 10 featured similar keyboard<br />

options to Windows including Sticky keys and other keyboard customisation options.<br />

presenting the mouse arrow and MouseKeys to provide alternate access. Visual<br />

as Windows was the implementation of the magnification and speech facilities.<br />

Since the original release of Mac OS 10, there have been four major refinements<br />

feature, similar to the third-party products discussed earlier in the chapter.<br />

Additional keyboard shortcuts were also provided to adjust the desktop instantly,<br />

such as the ability to change to a high contrast colour scheme. The zoom feature has<br />

use of voice recognition and text-to-speech. The original release of Mac OS 10<br />

featured benefits such as speech recognition for GUI navigation and talking alerts for<br />

speech output. The initial talking alerts and text-to-speech functionality was limited<br />

until 10.4 where the new fully integrated VoiceOver program was implemented. This<br />

endeavoured to provide full text-to-speech functionality into the OS. VoiceOver was<br />

but with the added benefit of being included in the operating system. Given the<br />

accessibility products in the OS will increase the awareness of the Macintosh<br />

119

Hooray! Your file is uploaded and ready to be published.

Saved successfully!

Ooh no, something went wrong!