Developer Blog

The Blind Leading The Sighted

I am a developer for Skype and one of my free Extras for Skype is called the “Speak and Translate Chats” which can be found in the Skype Extras of the Windows client by clicking on:

Tools -> Options -> Do More -> Get Extras

Then click on featured, which is located on the left, and click on the green arrow for “Speak and Translate Chats”, which is located on the right. This will install this Skype Extra which is free. Ah yes, I am sure you are saying, “Wait....first....what does it do?”

Well this Extra will speak your Skype chats, kind of like a chat answering machine, no need to be sitting right in front of your computer, maybe you are near your computer but watching TV or even if you are sitting right at your computer, maybe you are very busy, no need to read your Skype chat messages when they can be spoken. To you and in 10 different languages of your choice. Also, this Extra will translate your Skype chats using 38 different language pairs, from one language to another so that you can chat using Skype with others all around the world, and not even know the other Skype users language, neat huh?

Well, all during the design, as many people know (“This Extra was one of the very first Extras created for Skype”) my goal was to make the “Speak and Translate Chats” Extra Accessible, but I could not locate anyone to tell me if all my work was in vain. I published “Speak and Translate Chats” and crossed my fingers that I did a good Job.

Two weeks ago, I get a Skype chat message from someone, all I know about them is that their name is Justin and that he really really wants to try to install the “Speak and Translate Chats” Extra. My first thought is, wow, I thought my instructions for how to do this were clear. Little did I know after all this time, Justin is my first contact about Accessibility and this Extra, Justin is 16 and blind.

Justin, has family in Denmark, and he badly wanted to communicate with them, but he only knows English, and his family members there only know Dutch, so this is how this all started. This is where the interest of using some kind of language translator for Skype came in.

Well, much to my surprise, there is much more in general for a blind person to use any application. This includes Skype as well as my Extra..

It should be noted that there are many tools to make Skype more Accessible, but in this case I would like to focus on a some JAWS Scripts for Skype located here:

http://www.dlee.org/skype/

There are several tutorials on how to install these scripts as well located here:

http://marrie.org/SkypeTutorials/3/Skype_3_Tutorials.html

I would hope that even sighted people can click on some of the .mp3 tutorials above just to see what effort goes into making any application accessible. I can assure you, it is much more than I ever imagined.

If you know someone who has a need to make Skype accessible please pass this information as well, it might really help others gain access to Skype that might not know how to make Skype accessible.

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