RE: [SEC508] Audible indicator when pc is working

["Barrett, Don" <Don.Barrett@ed.gov>]

If there aren't triggered events which can be tracked as Peter suggests,
perhaps a utility which could monitor the CPU cycles in Performance, and
play a sound if a service or program uses over a prespecified number of
cycles would help.  I have had Outlook take over the cup for 90% of the
cycles updating a .pst file or something similar, but couldn't get the
screen reader to respond on the Performance tab as it became so
sluggish; a smaller independent utility might have better luck; I am not
a programmer so don't know how practical my suggestion might be, but it
can't hurt to postulate, right?

Don


Don Barrett
Section 508 Coordinator
U.S. Dept. of Education
400 Maryland Avenue, SW
LBJ, 1W116
Washington, DC 20202
(202) 453-7320 
-----Original Message-----
From: sec508-admin@trace.wisc.edu [mailto:sec508-admin@trace.wisc.edu]
On Behalf Of Roeder, Joe
Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2008 11:42 AM
To: sec508@trace.wisc.edu
Subject: [SEC508] Audible indicator when pc is working

Is there any way to have an audible indication that the pc is working
when the screen reader is suspended?

Sighted users have visual indicators (like the spinning globe) to let
them know the pc is still processing.  The screen readers will say
things like "please wait ...", but not always.

I'm sure all screen reader users have had the experienced where their pc
stops talking and eventually they powered off the pc to start over.  I
think this sometimes results in damaged files.  Recently we seem to be
having more incidents of screen reader users powering off their stalled
computers and having more damaged files.

As a matter of accessibility, shouldn't the operating system also
provide and audible indicator whenever they provide a visual indicator
to warn users that the computer is processing?  Or is there a simple
utility that could accomplish this?


Joe Roeder
Senior Access Technology specialist
National Industries for the Blind
phone: (703) 310-0524
 

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