[Athen] Kurzweil 3000 vs. Read&Write

[Ron Stewart]

Greetings ATHENians, (I have always preferred that term :-))

I have kind of been holding off engaging in this conversation. It is one
that I regularly get into with my numerous clients, but I get tired of being
flamed for my posts to lists such as this. I now feel that I need to give my
two cents worth based on my extensive experience with these and other
products in the field and working directly with the vendors involved.

I would agree with Wink's comments, for the most part, but for me this is
really an equity issue more than anything else. I have tried to get K3000 to
work effectively with JAWS and other screen readers and it is not for the
faint of heart. If you want to go down that route I would try NVDA. You have
also now tied me to $2k+ in software that is questionable in its efficacy as
a workplace kind of tool.  R&W was never designed to be a tool for folks who
are blind not will it ever be one. Then again K3000 was not either and even
with a screen reader it is not fully accessible. On the other hand K1000 is
a great reading machine kind of software that provides a high level of
document flexibility for the VI/B community.

None of these tools are suitable for the level of alt format conversion the
typical college student will have. That material needs to be preprocessed
using production alt format conversion tools and then provided in the format
the user needs that is most effective.  That is your institutional legal
obligation under the law, as has been expressed in over a dozen cases in
recent years.

You need to pick your tools to meet the specific task at hand, from those
that have been designed to meet the specific marketspace needs. We also have
an obligation to provide our users with the skill set that is the most
realistic in the real world. 

I personally would never combine an LD product such as K3000 with a
blindness project such as JAWS. I would instead look at K1000, a product
designed for that user base for the specific task of reading and writing
assistance. RW is also not a product that was ever designed for the B/VI
community, and I would take the complaints about support with a grain of
salt. That was a staff issue more than anything else. If you ever have
support issues with TextHelp please let me know and I will be more than
happy to have you get them resolved.  

Take it for what it is worth.

Ron Stewart

-----Original Message-----
From: athen-list [mailto:athen-list-bounces at mailman13.u.washington.edu] On
Behalf Of Wink Harner
Sent: Wednesday, March 16, 2016 2:26 PM
To: 'Access Technology Higher Education Network'
Subject: Re: [Athen] Kurzweil 3000 vs. Read&Write

ATHEN-ites,

Using Kurzweil as a PDF OCR conversion tool is not sophisticated enough for
a student using JAWS or NVDA as the document cannot be tagged, regardless of
whether the voicing is "nicer." I would prefer accurate text over a nice
voice any old day. 

Even under the best of circumstances the half-engine of ABBYY that Kurzweil
3000 uses is simply not robust enough for a decent, high level OCR
conversion with complex material. A single example (among many): you cannot
drop color out and extract text. It is extremely efficient and good at what
it does performing for a student with a reading disability who is using
Kurzweil as TTS. 

Every piece of technology we put our hands on serves a specific and useful
purpose. Using the OCR engine in Kurzweil for general OCR conversion is not
enough. We need to be keeping other tools in our toolbox so we can choose an
appropriate robust and sophisticated enough program to do the conversion
each student needs. 

If you have a lot of art, graphics, complex layouts, and need to tag PDFs,
use Adobe Acrobat Pro. If you just need text conversion, OmniPage Pro and
AbbyyFine Reader do well, one performing faster on generic work and one
doing a better job with foreign languages. Pick the right tool for the job!

A disclaimer: you cannot run a PDF through OP, AA, or AFR first and then
import to Kurzweil, as it will strip all the formatting and recognition
you've done and it will revert to its (less than robust) internal, minimized
version of AFR.

I have all of these programs and hands-on experience with each. 

Adding a few more cents to my earlier 2.5 cents worth.

Wink

Wink Harner
Adaptive Technology Consulting & Training Alternative Text & Media
Production The Foreigntype

foreigntype at gmail.com
winkharner1113 at gmail.com

(Disclaimer: this email was dictated with Dragon NaturallySpeaking. Please
forgive any quirks, mis-recognitions, or omissions.)




-----Original Message-----
From: athen-list [mailto:athen-list-bounces at mailman13.u.washington.edu] On
Behalf Of Leyna Bencomo
Sent: Wednesday, March 16, 2016 1:53 PM
To: Access Technology Higher Education Network;
altmedia at htclistserv.htctu.fhda.edu
Subject: Re: [Athen] Kurzweil 3000 vs. Read&Write

So, you are using Kurzweil as a conversion tool of sorts.  I got it.  Thank
you.  

Leyna Bencomo
Assistive Technology Specialist
Information Technology
University of Colorado Colorado Springs
1420 Austin Bluffs Parkway, EPC 215
Colorado Springs, CO 80918
(719) 255-4202 / lbencomo at uccs.edu
http://www.uccs.edu/~it/




-----Original Message-----
From: athen-list [mailto:athen-list-bounces at mailman13.u.washington.edu] On
Behalf Of John Elmer
Sent: Wednesday, March 16, 2016 2:25 PM
To: Access Technology Higher Education Network
<athen-list at u.washington.edu>; altmedia at htclistserv.htctu.fhda.edu
Subject: Re: [Athen] Kurzweil 3000 vs. Read&Write

If the Kurzweil files are properly edited, they will probably provide a
better listening experience that just reading a PDF with JAWS.  As you
probably know, K1000 is designed for blind users, requiring to sight to
navigate.

-----Original Message-----
From: athen-list [mailto:athen-list-bounces at mailman13.u.washington.edu] On
Behalf Of Leyna Bencomo
Sent: Wednesday, March 16, 2016 12:25 PM
To: Access Technology Higher Education Network;
altmedia at htclistserv.htctu.fhda.edu
Subject: Re: [Athen] Kurzweil 3000 vs. Read&Write

Alice,

I do much prefer R&W over Kurzweil because I think the learning curve is
shorter and you don't need to use special file types so students don't have
to get out of the habit of using their basic programs like Microsoft Word.
I do think Kurzweil makes a very competitive product, however. 

I've never had the occasion to use it with JAWS.  Just out of curiosity, why
would you?  

Leyna Bencomo
Assistive Technology Specialist
Information Technology
University of Colorado Colorado Springs
1420 Austin Bluffs Parkway, EPC 215
Colorado Springs, CO 80918
(719) 255-4202 / lbencomo at uccs.edu
http://www.uccs.edu/~it/




-----Original Message-----
From: athen-list [mailto:athen-list-bounces at mailman13.u.washington.edu] On
Behalf Of Wershing, Alice D.
Sent: Tuesday, March 15, 2016 2:58 PM
To: altmedia at htclistserv.htctu.fhda.edu; athen-list at u.washington.edu
Subject: Re: [Athen] Kurzweil 3000 vs. Read&Write

We have adopted Kurzweil 3000 as it works with JAWS.  Read and Write does
not and from my understanding there are no plans to make it totally
accessible to those who are blind.  I have used Read and Write in previous
settings and it is a great product, however my perspective has shifted
towards the use of products that are accessible to all.

Alice D. Wershing, M.Ed., A.T.P.
Disability Services, Technology Specialist Pellissippi State Technical
Community College
865-694-6751
865-539-7218 (fax)
________________________________
From: athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman13.u.washington.edu> on behalf
of Trinh, Marc <mtrinh at Exchange.FULLERTON.EDU>
Sent: Tuesday, March 15, 2016 3:26 PM
To: altmedia at htclistserv.htctu.fhda.edu; athen-list at u.washington.edu
Subject: [Athen] Kurzweil 3000 vs. Read&Write

Hello everyone,

Our program is considering a transition from Kurzweil 3000 to Read&Write.
While I understand there are many advantages and disadvantages, I was
wondering if you can give me a comparison if you have experience with both
programs.

Thank you,

[CSUF logo]

Marc T. Trinh, M.S., Coordinator
Information & Computer Access Program<http://www.fullerton.edu/dss/icap>
Office of Disability Support Services
California State University, Fullerton<http://www.fullerton.edu/>
Telephone: 657.278.3043 | Fax: 657.278.2408



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