Making Windows easier to see

“But the fonts just keep going back to the small size!” It’s my tech’s third visit to this client, each time to supposedly resize the fonts for an older user with vision problems. He finally asked me to talk to her because, well, he’s not a people person.

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This sparked an interesting journey for me, as it began an odyssey through Windows XP’s Accessibility options, which are pretty extensive if you know where to look. My technician was simply trying to increase her font size, while still maintaining the general aesthetic of the desktop. This user’s vision was such that, although she noticed a difference as he was doing it, that difference quickly disappeared for her the next time she logged in.

She loved Magnifier, though. You can find this at Accessories, Accessibility from the All Programs menu. Typing is most of her job and the ability to see what she’s doing clearly at the top of the screen was great for her. After some tweaking we got it to run at startup and she now knows how to get it to follow her mouse or keyboard.

Narrator, on the other hand, was an amazing flop. For one, it took me too long to figure out that Sam will only speak complete sentences in Notepad, Wordpad, Internet Explorer, the Windows Desktop, and Control Panel programs. In Word, where this user lives, he only babbles incessantly about every screen event, or if you turn that off, he’ll mention each letter typed. He just can’t do it fast enough. Age has taken its toll on this user’s vision, but her typing speed has only improved with experience.

Also, Sam’s voice is annoying as all get out. I kept expecting to see Matthew Broderick come running around the corner shouting “Joshua’s still playing the game!” From the Narrator configuration box, it looked as though different voice schemes could be inserted, but I was unable to find any on Microsoft’s Web site. If anyone knows of one, please let me know because five minutes after Sam starts speaking, you really want to shoot him.

Another feature I encountered, which I liked but the user eventually rejected, was the High Contrast option. You can access this at Accessibility Options in the Control Panel. Just click the Display tab. High Contrast basically reverses black and white for text operations, which can really bring some relief to certain folks. There are several High Contrast schemes you can choose from, each with varying font sizes and the ability to increase or decrease both the cursor’s blink rate and insertion point width.

XP’s Accessibility options are robust enough not only to positively impact a user, but to give a technician a pause during setup. We thought about incorporating certain accessibility features into various desktop images, but found that user preferences were so diverse that this really doesn’t help. Instead, we found it easier simply to isolate our vision-impaired users and spend 20 minutes or so with each one. The positive feedback we got was tremendous.

Presently, we’ve also got two new users with severe handicaps: one who is blind and the other who has motor impairments. We’re researching products to help both users, including a better text-to-speech solution as well as Braille printers for the one, and specialized input devices for the other. If anyone has had similar experiences, I’d love to hear from you.