Accent Tool Development and Whitepaper

• Funded by: Subcontracts from the Institute on Disabilities at Temple University through prime funding from the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR) under Pennsylvania's Initiative on Assistive Technology at Temple University (H224A90006); and the Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center on Communication Enhancement at Duke University (H133E980029). Funded for 6 months.
• Work of the project: Complete development of an AAC tool and Whitepaper to accompany the tool.

Project Overview

In 2003, WebAIM was contacted by the Institute on Human Development at Temple University to complete work that had begun on an important tool to assist those using the Web who are users of Alternative Augmentative communication. The early concepts for this whitepaper and tool as well as the initial development steps for the tool had already been completed by Diane Bryen and Len Kasday. Dr. Kasday had since passed away. WebAIM completed a fully functioning tool and co-authored a whitepaper to accompany the tool.

The initial form of the Whitepaper was completed under the title, "Web Browsing Challenges, Strategies, and Tools for [AAC Users and] People with Motor Disabilities" This change of title was in recognition of the value the Whitepaper would have beyond users of AAC devices.

The tool "Accent" (Accessibility Enhancement Tool) was developed to correspond with the features detailed in the Whitepaper. This tool was completely rewritten in Java and is present in a beta form version 1.5. Many new concepts and elements are described in the paper.