Custom Summary Views for Screen Reader

• US 20070168891A1
• Filed: 01/16/2007
• Published: 07/19/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 01/16/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Freedom Scientific Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Freedom Scientific Incorporated
• Inventors: Stephen, Joseph, Damery, Eric, Espinola, Olga
• Granted Patent: US 9,818,313 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/865
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/18 of spreadsheets form-filling G06F40/174
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 21/005 Details of specially-adapted software to access information, e.g. to browse through hyperlinked information
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 13/00 Speech synthesis; Text to speech systems

Abstract

A screen reader software product feature referred to as a custom summary view, or custom summary, has been developed. The custom summary feature solves the major problem faced by blind users when working with large sets of data. That problem occurs as a result of an inefficiency of gleaning important data from within these larger sets. The custom summary provides the ability to gather such data into a summary that can be navigated easily. This ease of navigation greatly levels the playing field in the competitive workplace for blind workers and students alike. Also taught is a feature, referred to as a multiple region support, which allows users to define blocks of contiguous cells containing data as “regions” when a document such as a spreadsheet is displayed by a screen reader. Regions can either be named by the user or be defined simply by the top left and bottom right cell addresses that represent the boundaries of the block of contiguous cells containing data.

Claims

1. A screen reader software product comprising:

a screen reader module communicatively coupled with resident software on a computer, the reader module adapted to collect display information generated by the resident software;

a broadcast module communicatively coupled to the reader module, the broadcast module adapted to communicate the display information collected by the reader module to an output device; and

a schema module communicatively coupled to the broadcast module and the screen reader module, wherein the schema module generates links to predefined labels in the resident software application, wherein the predefined labels are associated with underlying data and the links are established by the screen reader product for a user according to a selection of predefined labels stored in a set of preferences.

2. The screen reader software product according to claim 1 wherein the label is a name in a Microsoft Excel application and the link is an executable link to the name in the application.

3. The screen reader software product according to claim 2 wherein the name in the application references an item in the application selected from the group consisting of a cell and a region of cells.

4. The screen reader software product according to claim 1 wherein the schema module searches for labels in the resident software application and presents the labels to a user for selection in the specification of user preferences for the resident software application.

5. The screen reader software product according to claim 1 wherein the schema module applies user-defined identifiers to the links, whereby the user-defined identifier facilitates the recognition of the data to be retrieved by executing the link.

6. The screen reader software product according to claim 1 wherein the schema module stores a plurality of user preferences, whereby the plurality of preferences allows for one or more users to define one or more preference settings to control the generation of linkages to labels in the resident software application.

7. A screen reader software product comprising:

a screen reader module communicatively coupled with resident software on a computer, the reader module adapted to collect textual display information generated by the resident software;

a broadcast module communicatively coupled to the reader module, the broadcast module adapted to communicate the display information collected by the reader module to an output device; and

a schema module communicatively coupled to the broadcast module and the screen reader module, wherein the schema module collects selected data associated with predefined labels in the resident software application and returns the selected data for output to a user, wherein the label associated with the data is preselected by the user for output according to preferences stored in a user'"'"'s preferences.

8. The screen reader software product according to claim 7 wherein the schema module is adapted to control the order of data output according to user preferences.

9. The screen reader software product according to claim 7 wherein the schema module collects the label and the selected data associated with the label and returns the label and the selected data for output.

10. The screen reader software product according to claim 7 wherein the schema module applies user-defined identifiers to the selected data and returns the user-defined identifiers and the selected data for output to the user.

11. The screen reader software product according to claim 7 wherein the schema module stores a plurality of user preferences, whereby the plurality of preferences allows for one or more users to define one or more preference settings to control the output of a resident software application or file.

12. The screen reader software product according to claim 7 wherein the resident software application is Microsoft Excel and the predefined labels are names referring to a cell or range of cells.

13. The screen reader software product according to claim 7 wherein the schema module searches for labels in the resident software application and presents the labels to a user for selection in the specification of user preferences for the resident software application.

18. The screen reader software product according to claim 7 wherein the schema module stores a plurality of user preferences, whereby the plurality of preferences allows for one or more users to define one or more preference settings to control the output of a resident software application.

19. The screen reader software product according to claim 7 wherein the schema module searches for labels associated with ranges in the resident software application and presents the labels to a user for selection in the specification of user preferences for the resident software application.

14. A screen reader software product comprising:

a screen reader module communicatively coupled with resident software on a computer, the reader module adapted to collect textual and non-textual display information generated by the resident software;

a broadcast module communicatively coupled to the reader module, the broadcast module adapted to communicate the display information collected by the reader module to an output device; and

a schema module communicatively coupled to the broadcast module and the screen reader module, wherein the schema module collects predefined labels in the resident software application and returns the associated data or links to labels associated with the underlying data to the user, wherein the predefined labels are associated with underlying data and the return of data or generation of links are established by the screen reader product for a user according to the selections stored in a set of preferences.

15. A screen reader software product comprising:

a screen reader module communicatively coupled with resident software on a computer, the reader module adapted to collect textual display information generated by the resident software;

a broadcast module communicatively coupled to the reader module, the broadcast module adapted to communicate the display information collected by the reader module to an output device; and

a schema module communicatively coupled to the broadcast module and the screen reader module, wherein the schema module collects data associated with defined ranges containing multiple data items in the resident software application and returns the data in the defined ranges or links to the range of data to the user, wherein the defined ranges are preselected by a user for output according to user preferences.

16. The screen reader software product according to claim 15 wherein the region is a region of cells in a Microsoft Excel application and the link is an executable link to the region in the application.

17. The screen reader software product according to claim 15 wherein the schema module applies user-defined identifiers to the returned data or the links, whereby the user-defined identifier facilitates the recognition of the data retrieved or to be retrieved by executing the link.