Visually Impaired SL users?

Hi,
Over the last 6 months or so I've had niggling clues occassionally that my vision was not right, but last week whammo woke up with a headache and thought somethings not good, too big a weekend perhaps during the wek narrowid it down to a loss of vision in my left eye, so off to the docs then specialists who diagnosed me with glaucoma in both eyes, (my eyeballs were going to explode from pressure buildup), so a weekend on tablets and drops and they are down to a reasonable level but the damage is done, I have lost 50% vision in my left eye, now I am looking for a Braille keyboard and other ideas that may help continue my use of computers as I use one 50% of the time at work, but am struggling to do so now, the drp[s etc are effecting both eyes.
Abyone got similar problems and suggestions for good purchasses or color schemes even, my colours sight still seems ok at least.
Even a half blind person can misstype a stack of words without typing "teh"

wow, sorry Teg I have narrow eye tunnel something or other that is a sign that glaucoma might be in my future, I hope it never happens.

Sorry I don't know the answers to any of your questions.

That's terrible news Tegg, sorry it's happened to you. I can't help with your queries either. I think I'm losing some of my hearing, I probably need a hearing aid soon and I'm avoiding going to check it, I know I should.

I've been visually handicapped all my life. You can get various aids that make working on a computer easier but usually, it is a very individual thing. What works wonders for me, won't affect you at all. For example, one aspect for me is a strong sensitivity to brightness so my computer is set to work with a black backround and orange text. Works for me, may not work for you.

Some other things:

Bigass monitor - the bigger, the better.

Good chair that makes a forward-leaning position (you'll do that a lot) more comfortable.

A keyboard or mouse with zoom keys. Programs like Mozilla or Word can be zoomed easily in part, you wanna do that a lot.

For SL: Lenghten the time chat remains on screen, that helps. Also, chat text can be made larger, that helps too. Large group conversations will be a pain from now on though.

Depending on where you live, you can get money from the state or some charity organisations to help you with some of this sutff. At one point - waaaay back - social welfare financed me a larger monitor screen, for example

I also have lifelong vision issues and am blind in one eye, Marcus' suggestions are all good. A big monitor, smart mouse and browsers/viewers customized to your needs really help. There is actually a lot of work being done out there keeping virtual worlds accessible (and fun!) for visually disabled and blind people.

Inworld, check out Virtual Ability:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%204/159/5/25

Here's a few links (that lead to other links) of some of the work being done, stuff out there already.

http://secondlifeaccessibility.edublogs.org/

http://www.blindsecondlife.blogspot.com/

Alternate Viewers: http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Alternate_viewers
and this: http://sirslab.dii.unisi.it/research/haptic/projects/second_life_haptics/
(very cool)

Tegg, very sorry to hear this. The only thing I have to add to Doomsday's excellent post is that I notice that IBM's student project on blindness (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6993739.stm) managed to hook a text-to-speech reader for inworld chat into Active Worlds. Their initial focus was on SL though.

Supposedly they passed the work on to a group in Texas. Let me know if you would like me to ask a very active IBM employee in SL whom I know of to try to find the group and put you in touch with them.

Best luck with the eyes!
.

I am on the board of Virtual Ability, Inc, and we ARE a good resource to point Tegg toward. Another good resource is Wheelies sim. While sounds like it is only for wheelchair users, Wheelies actually is very involved in resources for visually impaired, as well. They are developing Max, the SL guide dog. Max is pretty amazing already and he's not even fully developed yet. Hope to talk with Tegg inworld, feel free to IM me or any Virtual Ability member.

I use zoom on the Mac occasionally, but I don't know how to do it on Windows. It seems to be a per-application thing there, not built into the UI. I would like to know how to do it, if it's not too much to ask.

using ctrl and the mouse wheel you can make a website larger and smaller (on windows, not sure about mac)

I do this on firefox, not sure about ie.
not sure if it works on all sites, but it works for me here.

Indeed. I know how to do it in a number of applications. "It seems to be a per-application thing there, not built into the UI."

Actually, I'd like to disable that... having different windows at different magnifications gives me what is technically known as "collywobbles".

I want to know how to do it for the whole UI, regardless of the application, like I can on the Mac with CMD-OPT-+.

Tegg, I haven't any advice either, but wanted to wish you well. That's such bad news, but sounds like you're getting some good resources. Good luck.

I've got eye issues, though different from yours. One of the things I ordered a couple of days ago, at the suggestion of a friend that is visually impaired, is a backlit keyboard. This one is actually a really decent one and currently on sale at an awesome price, with free shipping:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16823175103&nm_mc=TEMC-RMA-Approvel&cm_mmc=TEMC-RMA-Approvel-_-Content-_-text-_-

She says she loves it - I have no opinion yet, as I expect it to arrive this Fri or Sat.

Cool thanks people for all the cool contacts and ideas I will have to follow up when I can get online next, unfortunately my eyes tonight aren't good, the drops stuff my vision for an hour or 2 completely but then it takes about 12 hours of no drops to get sight as good as I had before treatment, but this is all necessary in the short term to bring the pressures down ubfortunately, another battery of tests on Friday and probably a change in medication. I'm lucky I can still drive other than the 2 hours after drops. THis is not a great thing for me to go through at only 40yo either, but I'm finding support places out there and work seems to be cool with letting me work around what I need to to keep going at least.

I'm really sorry this has happened to you, Tegg. I managed a clinic of glaucoma specialists for 10 years, and unfortunately, I've seen cases like yours way too many times. Sounds like you had acute angle closure in your left eye? The only suggestion I have to add to everyone else's is to ask your doctor if there are any low vision clinics in your area. The ones I've dealt with in the San Francisco area require you to be referred but they can educate you about what is available as far as low vision tools and how to use them.

Also, it will most likely get better as they get everything under control and figure out what medications work best for you. Best of luck to you.

Virtual Ability has moved. They have their own island now.
http://slurl.com/secondlife/VAI%20Sanctuary/168/105/28

There is not much here right now, just the hang out spots and a basic building tutorial, but, I guess they'll get their orientation and information goodies back up soon.

I own a mainland sim and recently come across an avatar who was "blind" and he complained that my automated detector kicked him out.
he was using SLIM, a text only viewer.
my detector automatically warns and bans users using text only viewers for the purpose of eliminating camp bots and users who, in an attempt to try and log on multiple alts, to gain more camp money.
as such, all text only viewers including bot programs are detected.
this user complained that i was "vicitmizing" him because he is using a text only viewer since he is blind.
i had explained to him that the detection method (based on LIBSL) cannot tell who is behind the viewer, only whether the viewer is text only or not.
i have a notecard that is automatically given to any avatar teleporting into the sim with a dialog message that indicates to "please read the notecard before performing any tasks here".
in the notecard is a lengthly message along with "text only viewers are not allowed to be used here, their use will be detected and the user will have 60 seconds to logoff & logon to a graphical viewer or get banned".
this avatar explained later on that he was part of a "LL group to test SLIM for the blind".
this avatar was also with another avatar and claimied he "was his guide".
my question(s) are as follows here:
1) can SLIM be used as an assisting tool for the blind ?
2) is there such a group that is "testing SLIM" for the blind ?

Yeah, there definitely is work going on to make SL work better for that community.

For work on a directly targeted client, also see http://textsl.org/

Hi; we are not allowed to name names here. I am private messaging you to provide the name of the person who is developing this tool in SL. Don't know who your avatar was who was there using it but I can guess as only a few are testing it right now. But I will provide you with the name and sim name of the person who is developing it.

ok.
but i would like to let those who are visually impaired to know that there is no way to code LIBSL to tell who is behind the viewer, only whether the viewer is text only or not.
so in that respect, visually impaired persons are welcome in my sim, but since they are using a text only viewer, the detector may ban them as a result.
this is nothing personal to these users, all i ask is that you message me and i will turn the detector off so you can explore my sim if you wish, however, i cant leave the detector off indefinetly and there is no way at this time to "exclude" certain agents from being detected as i have not coded that into the program and this would require rebuilding the entire code from the ground up, that would take extensive time to do at this point.
as far as i know and i am aware, my sim is the only sim with this type of detection in place, so could you please let the visually impaired community know about my detection system in my sim, they may need to avoid going there until i rebuild the code to "exclude" certain avatars from detection.
again, this is nothing personal to the visually impaired community, the detection system i have in place is very sucessful at eliminating bots and users who try to log on multiple alts to earn more camping lindens, but i did not consider the visually impaired community using text only clients and i will investigate a way to have those avatars in the community excluded from detection - thanks

I really think that you should let them know that, as it is your sim and your system. I am not part of that sim or that program, and am not visually impaired myself; I am just part of the disabled community in general and so know these people. I did private message you with the information on who to contact.

This is probably the key.
There is no formula. It's attitude towards what you are able for.

I happened to be travelling in the past few days, and for whatever reason I noticed groups of people who were communicating in sign language. This was on three separate occasions. Maybe I don't get out much? These people were getting on with their lives, using what they had.
I particularly remember a young girl who it seemed was profoundly deaf. She could make sounds, but clearly had nothing to copy or compare against. Despite being aware of her disability, she was permanently on the point of exploding with delight. Nobody seeing her could fail to experience an uplift in optimism.

Getting back on topic ..
What does a level of visual impairment mean in SL in practical terms?

I've had meaningful discussions with clouds. (I'm talking unrezzed avatars here. I'm not smoking)
In a way, seeing them as clouds can be more interesting. Once you accept the cloudiness, all prejudices are cast aside. Gender / noobiness / kinkiness is gone. You are left with the person behind the cloud.

Torley probably sees everyone as brightly coloured blobs.
He used to be a she.
Does it really matter?

I don't mean in any way to appear to be downplaying the very real agony of losing abilities...
But
If you have to wind down the definition of the visual aspects of Sl..
..You'll get less lag

My eye issues sprang up about 1 1/2 yrs ago and I am in my mid-40s. The hardest part was learning to adapt and dealing with the initial diagnosis / treatment period. I had quite a bit of sick leave accumulated with my company and ended up using it all up because of the number of days that I just could not manage to see well enough to drive or use the computer. It was a pretty sucky time, but once the treatments started working and I started to adjust, things got better and my attitude towards it improved a bit too. I did spend a lot of time angry about having to deal with it, but I think that is part of the process also when something unexpected hits us like that.

Just go with the flow, realize there will be good and bad days, but the good days outnumbering the bad will again return.

Yep, I have good days and bad the initial treatments did their job in lowering my eye pressures, but those drops left me shortsighted, near blindness for 2 hours after every dose every 4 hours, but now I am back to twice a day on different drops which don't cause that loss of vision, still my eyesight isn't as goos yet as it was before treatment started, it does get that good for a few hours in evenings before I put the next dose of drops in.

Tegg, I wish you all the best-maybe it'll get better in a while if you can keep the pressure down? I know that with my extremely myopic eyes I will encounter problems when I get older, too-and I find that a scary thought as I am an extremely visually oriented person.

I am very interested in this. If there is a text to chat developed for specific inworld use, it would be such a benefit for so many blind and visually impaired sl users. I have a friend who uses JAWS but a specific inworld reader would probably be easier for him to use than running an off world reader.