Software Express are happy to announce they have set up a Mailing List for all Guide customers. The Guide Mailing Lists offers a free and easy way of communication via email that allows you to:

• stay in touch with news from Software Express
• keep-up to date with product news and software updates
• exchange opinions about our products with other users and our Technical Engineers
• seek advice to most common questions about Guide/Guide Handsfree
• or simply meet other Guide/Guide Handsfree users

What is it?

By joining our mailing list, you will automatically receive all emails from all group members and if you wish to reply or comment, you simply email back. For your convenience, Guide Mailing list is advertising and spam free and it is displayed in a text-only format.

How does it work?

To join the Guide Mailing List, simply:

Optelec have extended their Clearview range to include a 22" widescreen LCD. The screens have a glossy finish which help lift text off the screen and increased readability. Clearview electronics units have also been updated to further enhance viewing quality. Tas Living Tech can offer the 22" model immediately, so call for more info. The Clearview page has more information

US Company ELIA have been developing the ELIA Alphabet, an alternative to Braille. It is based on roman character shapes and aimed at an older low vision audience. Currently only 1 in 35 severely vision impaired people in the US can read braille with 85% using it predominantly for labelling and note taking.

ELIA claim their alphabet can be learned in under an hour and is much more usable for users with low tactile sensitivty as it can be scaled and relies on familar letter shapes.

The ELIA Life Technologies page has more information.

Project Gutenberg is an effort to encourage the creation and distribution of books in the public domain. It is a fantastic resource for users of screen readers as most books in the public domain can be found there in plain text formats. Gutenberg's text files do have some problems with screen readers though. The text is wrapped at 65-70 characters and paragraphs are separated by a double-line break which causes a synthetic voice to ad pauses at the wrong moments. We can fix these issues by using some handy steps found at lifehacker. Perform the following actions in a program like word or openoffice.org.

Paragraph Marks
1. Ctrl+H opens the search and replace dialog box
2. Tab to where it says 'Find what:' and type in ^p^p. The symbol ^ is pronounced by JAWS as caret and can be inserted by pressing shift + 6 on a US international keyboard)
3. Tab to where it says 'Replace with:' and type in "((New Paragraph))"
4. Tab and OK on 'Replace All'. Paragraphs are now marked

There's been quite a buzz online lately about the ID Omni Mate, about both the benefits and cost. I investigated a few other alternatives to the ID Omni Mate and discovered QR codes.

QR stands for "quick response" and it has a similar function to a bar code but holds more information. They are also optimised for use with mobile phones which in theory would enable a phone with Talks software installed to pickup the labels and read out content.

The Kaywa reader will work on all phones that have Nuance Talks installed. This article includes a QR code containing my phone number at work. On a phone with Kaywa installed you can take a picture of the screen and it should call me!