Accessibility

About Accessibility

Persons with reading disabilities have access to little more than 10% of the yearly book pubications. The EPUB 3 format is a one of many tools and attempts to create “born accessible” ebooks. Several best practice guidelines have already been published to help guide platform developers and publishers. Some examples are:

• Accessible Publishing Best Practice Guidelines for Publishers – EDItEUR, Wipo, Daisy, 2013 (translated in several languages
• BISG QuickStart to Accessible Publishing
• IDPF Accessibility guidelines – IDPF
• EPUB Accessibility FAQ – IDPF, 2016
• Conformance and Discovery Requirements for EPUB Publications – IDPF, 2016
• EPUB Accessibility Techniques – IDPF, 2016

The Daisy Consortium is currently working on an important project called Daisy Baseline for accessible EPUB 3. It is comprized of the following efforts:

• Developing an EPUB accessibility specification and certification for publishers.
• Developing accessibility checking tool to assist publishers in implementing the specification for baseline accessibility.
• Evaluating reading systems for accessibility at epubtest.org
• Developing an inclusive publishing information hub on inclusivepublishing.org.

Readium SDK and Readium.js

Readium based e-reading applications provide accessibility by facilitating the following tehcnologies

• Text to speech/ Media Overlay : a speech synthesis system is included in the readers allowing blind people to "read"
• Diagrams description : Speech synthesis system can precisely describe the diagrams thanks to data representation storage
• Math ML integration : Text to speech function can read the formula which is not the case when the formula is displayed in a bitmap.
• Customizable rendering: text spacing options for dyslexia and reading mode for color blind people

VoiceOver

VoiceOver is a gesture-based screen reader that lets you enjoy the simplicity of iOS even if you can’t see the screen. With VoiceOver enabled, triple-click the Home button to access it wherever you are in iOS. Voice Over is an accesibility feature of Apple prodcuts. If you’re using a Multi-Touch trackpad or iOS devices, you can use VoiceOver gestures. VoiceOver provides a set of standard gestures for navigating and interacting with items on the screen. You can’t modify this set of gestures. Hear a description of everything happening on your screen, from battery level to who’s calling to which app your finger’s on. You can adjust the speaking rate and pitch to suit you.
Find out more here.

Navigation

In VoiceOver mode, you can use a simple set of gestures to control your iOS device. For example, touch or drag your finger around the screen and VoiceOver tells you what’s there. Tap a button to hear a description; double-tap to activate. Swipe up or down to adjust a slider. Flick left and right to move from one app to the next. When you interact with an element on the screen, a black rectangle appears around it, so sighted users can follow along. When you prefer privacy, you can activate a screen curtain to turn off the display so no one can see it, even as you’re controlling it.

Text Input (Barcode, PIN, and Search)

VoiceOver echoes each character on the keyboard as you touch it, and again when you enter it. VoiceOver can speak each completed word. A flick up or down moves the cursor so you can edit precisely. To help you type more quickly and accurately, iOS supports multiple character input methods — including handwriting — and corrects misspelled words. Enable Speak Auto-text and you hear a sound effect and the suggested word spoken. Keep typing to ignore it, or tap the space bar to have your iOS device type it for you. Pair up an Apple Bluetooth keyboard, and VoiceOver talks you through inputting text in the same way.

Gestures

1 Finger Gestures

Gesture	Action
Touch or move around the screen	Speaks and select the item under your finger
Tap 2 times fast	Activate the selected item. (open app, press button)
Tap 2 times and hold	Activates "drag-mode" (move icons, swipe-delete)
Tap 3 times fast	Double presses a button (see tip below)
Swipe left or right	Selects the previous or next item
Swipe up or down	Preforms or move to the selected rotor option

Note: Tap 2 times on the clock in status bar to scroll to top in any app.

2 Finger Gestures

Gesture	Action
Hold 1 finger & tap with another	Select when dragging, activate with tap (aka split-tap)
Tap once	Pause/resume speech
Tap 2 times fast	Preforms special action
Tap 2 times and hold	Add label to selected item
Tap 3 times	Open Item Chooser for current area
Swipe up	Read all from first object in selected area
Swipe down	Read all from selected item
Scrub back and forth	Go back, cancel, close pop-up
Pinch out/in	Select/deselect
Hold and twist left or right	Select the next or previous rotor item

Note: You can use the scrub gesture to split/merge keyboard when it's selected

3 Finger Gestures

Gesture	Action
Tap once	Speaks the current page number and position
Tap 2 times fast	Toggle speech on/off (good for braille use)
Tap 3 times fast	Toggle screen curtain on/off (VO works but screen is off)
Swipe left or right	Move to previous or next horizontal screen/page
Swipe up or down	Move/scroll down or up (like moving a paper)
Swipe up or down	Move/scroll down or up (like moving a paper)

Note: To open notification center select the status bar and swipe 3 fingers down. Also 3 fingers up/down works for pulling down to refresh in many apps. (but can be a problem in some. (like Facebook side bar)

4 and 5 Finger Gestures

Gesture	Action
Tap the upper half with 4 fingers	Select the first item in the area
Tap the lower half with 4 fingers	Select the last item in the area
Swipe left or right	When in an app, switch to next or previous app
Swipe up or down	Move to previous or next horizontal screen/page
Pinch in	Go to home screen