Visually Impaired and Want to Use PC? Here are some Visual and Voice Aids

Your visual impairment need not come between you and your PC and there are many specialized and customized software programs available.

That can aid you in seeing the letters enlarged on your computer screen. However, such software end with abrupt termination in a networked environment, but work seamlessly in a standalone mode.

With the aid of such programmes, visually impaired people can read from computer screen without any difficulty. The software are basically made to enlarge the font size with adjustable size and contrast provisions.

Even people who have got a very low visual acuity can use these software and you can even have hands-on experience before making your purchase decision.

Before you could buy the necessary software, make an assessment and get to know the features and other hardware related requirements.

The letters and the numbers on the keyboards are normally bold and bigger and they also come in black color with white background and in white color with black background.

You may also get bold lettered stick-on labels that can be fixed over the computer keyboards for easy reading even by partially blind computer users.

Today, technology is so advanced, that you can even get voice synthesizers installed in your computer system and make your computer talk.

Besides this, there are various voice recognition software that can convert your spoken words into written matter and you can save them as files in your computer.

Best of all is that such files can also be read out using the voice synthesizer software.Even the computer giant Microsoft has come out with utilities such as Microsoft’s Speech, Dictation, and Voice software.

With the MS Voice software you can get your applications started by simply giving voice commands like "Start Microsoft Word" but this needs a little bit of training initially.

The MS Dictation software can help you in your dictation and the computer will make the letter typed for you.

Despite the various incorporated improvements in the software over the last ten years, the accuracy percentage is around 90 to 95 percent only.

Further, initially you may need to practice a lot for getting your voice transcribed into text and there are provisions in the software for corrections also.

People falling under the 20/120 vision acuity can be able to use computers with a slight change in their work area. They can use some arrangements, say a specially made adjustable holder, to hold the computer monitor at their eye level and nearer to their face.

They can also use back-illuminated keyboard or use a small fluorescent-light fixture for illuminating their keyboards. Alternatively they can also use glasses with +18 diopter refractive power for reading computer screen.

If you come under the category of modest vision impairment, then there are hosts of choices for you. You can try using a higher screen size monitor for better reading.

There are monitors that come in sizes of 17 inches and more and the bigger the size of the screen, bigger are the screen print letters.

The Macintosh version of the computer even has a feature to enlarge text sizes to a desired level, and the MS Windows operating system also has this provision under the accessories menu with which you can select a desired font size.

In your are using the older DOS version, then you can change the screen lines as MODE 40 and this will make the letters bigger but only lesser number of lines of text alone will be displayed on your computer screen.

You can also make your computer to start with MODE 40 line mode by adding the command in the autoexec.bat file and this command will get executed every time you start your computer.

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