Today, I decided to review the manual for a program called Noteworthy, so that I could reacquaint myself with it for use in my study of QuickBasic. While doing so, I found several references to a screen reader called Screen-Talk. More research led me to a man named Bill Grimm and a company called Computer Aids Corporation. Apparently, they closed and then evolved into GW Micro, with which I am very familiar, since they are the makers of Vocal-Eyes, my favourite DOS screen reader. They merged with a company called Ai Squared, which also appears to have disappeared, since they mentioned Zoom Text, which is now owned, like JAWS, by Vispero. Would all of this mean that they now own the rights to Vocal-Eyes as well? If so, I will contact them, in order to learn if it can be made open source. I would like to try as many screen reader manufacturers as possible, in the hopes that one will give me a positive answer, but JAWS, Vocal-EYES, and ASAP would probably be the best choices, due to their allowing for the creation of set files that make various programs accessible. I have a feeling that they'll say no to JAWS, though, since the name is still used for the Windows software. If you can think of other screen readers that I can try, please let me know. I don't want anything that is tied to a specific synthesizer, such as Vert.

For those who are unaware of what I am doing, I wish to be able to use the modern versions of DOS, but I also want a screen reader that can be updated to do so, just in case the system or newer programs don't work well with the screen reader itself. In some cases, set files/scripts can be used, but I'm not sure how much has changed, and I think it's better to be prepared. Rather than create my own screen reader from scratch (I am not a programmer and am just starting to learn QuickBasic/see above), I thought it would be better to start with one that is already created so that I can ask for help, or if worse comes to worst, use artificial intelligence to help with the updates.

#accessibility #ASAP #BillGrimm #blind #DOS #GWMicro #JAWS #LarrySkutchan #MicroTalk #MSDOS #ScreenReaders #technology #Vispero