[Athen] Beeline reader

[shelleyhaven techpotential.net]

BeeLine Reader has been around for about 10 years.  The color gradient feature is designed to address various visual challenges of reading such as visual tracking and line transition errors (accidentally skipping or repeating lines).  It is based on perception research by then-graduate-student Nick Lum which showed that gradual color gradients across text could increase visual reading rates by up to 50% (compared to using no reading aids).  It can be used alone or in conjunction with text-to-speech.  Think of this feature as serving a function similar to other features or strategies to aid visual tracking such as dynamic color highlighting, increased line spacing, sentence or line masking, etc. – just another visual option to consider for readers with dyslexia, ADHD, and certain vision difficulties.  It's included as a visual tracking option in various e-reader apps, most notably Bookshare's Web Reader.

- Shelley

_____________________________
Shelley Haven  ATP, RET
Assistive Technology Consultant
www.TechPotential.net<http://www.TechPotential.net>
www.AT4LD.net



On TuesdayAug 23, at 10:59 AM, foreigntype at gmail.com<mailto:foreigntype at gmail.com> wrote:

Hello ATHEN-ites

What can you all tell me about Beeline Reader? Who is the target consumer? Advantages? Drawbacks? Purpose? A legit text-to-speech reader? All the info that I could find online says it offers a color gradient to help readers' eyes track words along the lines of text. Is that all it does? Does it provide text-to-speech?

I am responding to someone who contacted me off list about how to solve a different accessibility matter and they indicated that they were using Beeline Reader.

Any information – good, bad, indifferent, scathing – is welcome.

Thanks in advance!
Wink Harner
Accessibility Consultant/Alternative Text Production
The Foreign Type

Portland OR
foreigntype at gmail.com<mailto:foreigntype at gmail.com>
480-984-0034

This email was dictated using Dragon NaturallySpeaking. Please forgive quirks, misrecognitions, or errata .
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