[Athen] More on SPSS Version 22 access with JAWS Version 16

[John Gardner]

Hello all, I pinged Jonathan Godfrey, the acknowledged blind guru on statistics access about the SPSS question.  Here's what he has to say.  Hope it is useful.

From: Godfrey, Jonathan [mailto:A.J.Godfrey at massey.ac.nz]
Sent: Wednesday, August 19, 2015 1:24 PM
To: John Gardner
Subject: RE: [Athen] SPSS Version 22 access with JAWS Version 16

Hello John,

I guess I am more positive about SPSS than the correspondence below.
If SPSS is installed properly, including the Java access bridge, then it should work. I suspect it does not work the same way as it does for sighted users though. That is, the professor needs to be totally hands off and let the student fiddle about. The best results come when the student learns about storing the commands (syntax) and tabs around dialogues using the standard screen reader approaches that should be familiar to them.

I am not happy that SPSS is so tied to the one screen reader and therefore do not consider it as accessible software.

As you are well aware, I feel R offers the best possible service to blind users, with SAS a close but definite second. N.B. this is from an access point of view. I believe R is more useful to a wider range of students than SAS (sighted or blind) and that the number of R users offering assistance is greater in many universities than SAS. Local conditions should be considered when students make their choices. If the staff are better equipped to support use of SAS over R, then they should use SAS. It is however preferable that the student work alongside their classmates using SPSS because that does offer the best support climate.

See: http://R-Resources.massey.ac.nz
For lots more including copies of papers on this topic.

Jonathan



From: John Gardner [mailto:john.gardner at viewplus.com]
Sent: Thursday, 20 August 2015 6:08 a.m.
To: Godfrey, Jonathan
Subject: FW: [Athen] SPSS Version 22 access with JAWS Version 16

Jonathan, my memory is that you are a bit more positive on SPSS than this report.  Do I remember right?  Do you have any input I could share with this list?
Thanks.
John


From: athen-list [mailto:athen-list-bounces at mailman13.u.washington.edu] On Behalf Of Teresa Haven
Sent: Wednesday, August 19, 2015 10:03 AM
To: Access Technology Higher Education Network
Subject: Re: [Athen] SPSS Version 22 access with JAWS Version 16

Hi, Jeff.  We explored SPSS 22 and JAWS (multiple versions - 14, 15, and 16) last academic year.  We could technically get it working, but it was highly unstable even on a high-powered machine, and would never consistently work with JAWS through a single work session. There didn't seem to be any one trigger for collapse, but at some random point in every work session, JAWS would simply stop talking in SPSS, although it would continue to function otherwise, and the only solution would be to exit SPSS, reboot the computer, and start over, which wasn't productive.  Our major testers were a faculty member/Ph.D. student who uses JAWS on a regular basis and his statistics professor, who is interested in improving the accessibility of his courses, in the context of a graduate-level statistics course, so the software combination got a lot of testing by experienced end users. We're hoping IBM will continue to work on the issue and make more strides in improving the accessibility of the product.

Sorry to not have better results to report,
Teresa

Teresa Haven, Ph.D.
Accessibility Analyst, Northern Arizona University



From: athen-list [mailto:athen-list-bounces at mailman13.u.washington.edu] On Behalf Of Bishop, Jeff - (jeffbis)
Sent: Wednesday, August 19, 2015 9:50 AM
To: Access Technology Higher Education Network
Subject: [Athen] SPSS Version 22 access with JAWS Version 16

Hello Everyone,

We have a student that will be enrolling in a statistics course this fall. They will be utilizing SPSS version 22. I know from looking at IBM's documentation that it is possible to get it set up using the Java Access Bridge. Does anyone here have experience with this and once configured how accessible SPSS is with JAWS? Has anyone also explored other options running in iOS or on the Mac for this type of application?

Jeff

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