SIGACCESS

Welcome to the October 2018 issue of the ACM SIGACCESS newsletter. This issue features three interesting articles investigating different topics within the accessibility field that include multiple user groups ranging from Deaf and hard of hearing and low-vision users to people with intellectual disabilities. The issue is also rich and diverse in terms of technologies: automatic speech recognition, head-mounted displays, and e-textiles. The first two articles are provided by the recipients of last year ASSETS best paper awards.

Welcome to the June 2018 issue of the ACM SIGACCESS newsletter. This issue highlights three articles related to accessible computing. In the first article, Sharon Spencer presents the International Association of Accessibility Professionals (IAAP) to the SIGACCESS community and describe its major goals. In the second article, following her Best Technical Paper Award at W4A 2018, Victoria Yaneva presents her research on using gaze data from web-related tasks to address two problems: improving web accessibility for people with autism and detecting autism automatically. Lastly, in the third article, Mikaylah Gross and Davide Bolchini describe their recent work on enabling blind and visually impaired users to interact touch-free with aural information through an off-the-shelf armband. Their work was nominated as a Best Technical Paper Award at W4A 2018.

Welcome to the 2018 January issue of the SIGACCESS newsletter. This issue highlights the ACM ASSETS 2017 Conference. The first article, written by the General and Program chairs, provides an overview of the conference. The following eight articles describe the research work of the students who attended the ASSETS 2017 Doctoral Consortium.

Welcome to the October issue of the ACM SIGACCESS newsletter. This issue highlights three articles that tackle the challenges faced by visually impaired people through a variety of different approaches, ranging from educational games and artificial intelligence to smartglasses applications. In the first article, Barbara Leoporini and Eleonora Palmucci present an accessible mobile educational game and investigate issues related to gesture input and enjoyment when accessing information via screen reader. In the second article, Hernisa Kacorri explores a novel approach of empowering end-users to personalize technology by consciously providing training examples and actively interacting with machine learning algorithms to increase their accuracy. In the third article, Shiri Azenkot and Yuhang Zhao discuss their ongoing research on designing augmented reality applications for low vision users. Particularly, they provide an overview of three research projects that illustrate their research agenda.

Welcome to the June issue of the ACM SIGACCESS newsletter. This issue highlights four articles that have a common theme: Broadening the Accessibility of the Computing Field. In the first article, Richard Ladner and Andreas Stefik present some of their efforts in bring computer science to K-12 students in the United States (US) and in other countries through AccessCSforAll, a National Science Foundation project. Following, Kelly Steelman and Charles Wallace, being educators at a rural technologically-focused university saw opportunities to bring isolated older adults into a larger digital community, while simultaneously offering students with valuable first-hand experience learning about and addressing the challenges faced by older adults. In the third article, Jennifer Mankoff and Shari Trewin summarise the efforts being made by SIGCHI Accessibility Community and SIGACCESS members to update and expand the SIGACCESS accessibility guidelines to the broad range of conference types and sizes found in SIGCHI. In the last article, Paredes, Moreno, and Pühretmair provide a report on the 10th edition of the International Conference on Software Development and Technologies for Enhancing Accessibility and Fighting Info-exclusion (DSAI).

Welcome to the January issue of the SIGACCESS newsletter. This issue highlights the ACM ASSETS 2016 Conference. The first article written by the General and Program chairs, Jinjuan Heidi Feng and Matt Huenerfauth, respectively, provides an overview of the conference. The following seven articles describe the research work of the students who attended the ASSETS 2016 Doctoral Consortium led by Amy Hurst and Karyn Moffatt.

Welcome to the October 2016 issue of the SIGACCESS newsletter. In the first article Kirsty Noble and Michael Crabb describe their work on improving board game overall accessibility. They present a preliminary study that uncovers some of the problems in current board game sessions. They end the article by providing a set of design guidelines for augmented physical board games. In the second article Aditya Vashistha and Richard Anderson present their main findings after conducting two studies on how low-income blind people in India appropriate general-purpose technologies to overcome socioeconomic barriers. They finish by providing specific recommendations to the SIGACCESS community. Finally, Reuben Kirkam writes a very interesting and personal view on the current implementation and limitations of disability discrimination law. Central to this discussion and analysis is the concept of reasonable adjustment and its impact on the rights of people with disabilities.

Welcome to the June 2016 issue of the SIGACCESS newsletter. Eduardo Pérez and Myriam Arrue write the first article of the 115th issue of the SIGACCESS Newsletter. Following their Best Communication Award at Web for All 2016 (W4A’16) conference, the authors present their work on designing virtual cursors to assist motor-impaired users during web browsing tasks. In the second article, João Guerreiro talks about his research on changing the status quo of screen readers by leveraging concurrent speech feedback to speed-up blind people’s scanning for digital information.

Welcome to the January issue of the SIGACCESS newsletter. This issue highlights the ACM ASSETS 2015 Conference. The first article written by the General and Program chairs, Yeliz Yesilada and Jeffrey Bigham, respectively, provides an overview of the conference. The following ten articles describe the research work of the students who attended the ASSETS 2015 Doctoral Consortium led by Giorgio Brajnik and Eelke Folmer.

Welcome to the October 2015 issue of the SIGACCESS newsletter. In the first article Anke Brock and Christophe Jouffrais give an overview of their research on making geographic maps accessible to visually impaired users. They developed an accessible interactive map prototype composed of a raised-line overlay, an interactive tabletop, and speech output. Their work is currently being used in some classrooms in France for teaching geography to visually impaired children. In the following article, Kotaro Hara and Jon Froehlich talk about their research work aimed at developing scalable data collection methods for remotely acquiring street-level accessibility information and novel mobile navigation and map tools. Finally, Tiago Guerreiro writes an article about the shortcomings of current mobile devices, particularly in the social domain. He then presents his on-going research in areas such as security and privacy, inconspicuous interaction, and social context awareness.