Activity #13

Web Anywhere

Web Anywhere was initially released in 2008.  Web Anywhere allows everyone, especially visually impaired individuals to view and browse the web from any computer.  It is really easy to access from anywhere (expect at my school – it’s blocked) since it is web-based in which no program or software needs to be downloaded.

Advantages of Web Anywhere include:

• Free to use
• No software download required
• Works on any device that is web-enabled
• No special permissions required
• Fast start up
• Beta version – large font on what it is reading at the top.

Disadvantages of Web Anywhere include:

• The commands were difficult to remember.
• The speech is very hard to understand.
• Can’t help with word processing or other computer tasks.

When I went to my blog I noticed it changed my apostrophes (‘) into three dots (...).  When it was reading it to me it was very hard to understand.  I felt that this would be the most challenging part if someone was blind and couldn’t see somewhat of what was going on.  I guess you would get used to it eventually.  Once I switched to the Beta version, I felt it was much easier to understand what was going on because it highlighted what was being said and I could follow along with it as it was displayed in large font at the top of the screen.  This would be useful for someone who is visually impaired to be able to see and hear the text.  I felt the commands were difficult to remember until I decided to take a picture of the screen on my phone so I could have them in front of me while I navigated around the pages.  Until the commands were memorized, it would be difficult to use but by using it often you would learn them and then it would be relatively simple to use.  As for accessing my blog with impaired vision, I would recommend the Beta version as you can follow along with what is being read.  I feel that the visitor wouldn’t have any issues accessing it and having everything read aloud to them, getting past the difficulty of understanding the voice.  In the future, I feel that this website, if unblocked at the school, could be used along with headphones to benefit our first grade student who is visually impaired.  The Beta version would allow this student to follow along with what is being read on the screen.  I say this in the future because of the commands needed to be learned and when researching different websites would take place.  Overall, once I figured it out, it was relatively easy to use.