The Science Access Project promotes computer programs that are accessible by multiple modalities. To date one product has been completed. This is an addition to the SCREEN[11] utility program that provides braille access to Unix applications that can be run in text mode.
The next product will be the TRIANGLE[8, 12] program. TRIANGLE runs under the DOS operating system and is as trimodal (accessible visually, orally, or through braille) as possible with present technology. It is intended to be a tool for reading, writing, and manipulating information, including mathematical equations, complicated tables, and various kinds of graphs, diagrams, and tables.
A graphing calculator is part of TRIANGLE and its output can be ``viewed'' on the computer screen. It can also be heard as a tone graph, or felt by a moving braille icon as the x coordinate is varied. The graph may also be printed on a braille printer.
Flow diagrams, computer tree diagrams, and a number of other types of information typically presented graphically for sighted readers have been translated into ``braille diagrams'' that blind students have found fairly understandable. Some of the simpler diagrams of this kind can often be read using a refreshable braille display even though these displays show only one line at a time. TRIANGLE provides a braille reader for such braille diagrams.
Many such diagrams and most other graphical information is more easily understood if available as a tactile picture that can be viewed on a digitizing pad so that the computer can supply additional information. TRIANGLE includes this capability.
A number of translator programs will be made available in order to make TRIANGLE as useful as possible. At a minimum these will include programs to translate LaTeX, MS Word, and WordPerfect files into the GS[13] notation used by TRIANGLE, translation of standard spreadsheet files to the GS table form, and translations of the computer map files generated for figures by the Nomad and AudioPIX software.