Google is testing a version of its search engine aimed at blind and partially sighted users.
Google Inc. has begun testing a new version of its search system that makes finding information on the Web easier for the blind or visually impaired, its creator said in a statement.
For visually impaired users, Web pages that are designed to be accessible can be more easily read by screen reading machines or by making the type larger. But well-designed accessible pages are not yet everywhere.
Called the Google Accessible Search, the search adds a small twist to the familiar Google search and finds the most relevant results as measured by Google’s search algorithms, but also sorts’ results based on the simplicity of their page layouts. So when users search from the site, they will receive results that are prioritized based on their usability.
It is releasing a beta version of Accessible Search for the Visually Challenged, available at http://labs.google.com/accessible/.
According to Google, the search function looks at a number of signals by examining the HTML markup found on a web page and favors pages that degrade gracefully – that is, pages with few visual distractions, and pages that are likely to render well with images turned off. Such a page will also tend to read well when a screen reading machine is used. Web pages that are complex visually, or have much of the information or navigation primarily in visuals, are less favored.
Accessible Search is “designed to identify and prioritize search results that are more easily usable by blind and visually impaired users,” Google said in a statement on the site.
Explaining the rationale behind the service, Google said: In the past, visually impaired Google users have often waded through a lot of inaccessible websites and pages to find the required information.
“Our goal is to provide a more useful and accessible web search experience for the blind and visually impaired.”
The search giant explained that Accessible Search uses a number of elements to determine the accessibility of a web page.
"We take into account several factors, including a given page’s simplicity, how much visual imagery it carries and whether or not its primary purpose is immediately viable with keyboard navigation," said Google.
Headed by a Blind Researcher
The news comes from T.V. Raman, a blind research scientist with Google and the creator of the new system, according to Reuters.
A project of Google Labs, the Accessible Search project is headed by T.V. Raman, a former IBM researcher who became blind from glaucoma as a child. There are nearly 8 million visually-impaired Web users in the U.S. alone who, like Raman, face challenges in finding information when they conduct a search. Screen readers for blind or dyslexic users turn screen text into spoken words, but, if the page is not designed for accessibility, the result could be gibberish.
Raman told Reuters that pages with detailed graphical setups that squeeze a large quantity of information onto pages are extremely difficult for blind or visually impaired users to successfully navigate. People who use screen magnifiers to enlarge sections of webpages have a tough time locating specific information on complex graphical sites, and blind users who employ screen readers to turn text into digitized voices are hard put to locate relevant information in a reasonable time on such pages.
“I knew it was a hard problem,” Raman, who is blind, said in a phone interview. “What did I discover by doing this project? It is an even harder problem than I anticipated.”
Raman said that by developing better ways of measuring accessibility, Google eventually could offer consumers with specific disabilities ways to perform more customized searches. "Perhaps senior citizens who want a less busy interface or for people who are color blind," he said.
I T Departments
Google Accessible Search is built on Google Co-op’s technology, which improves search results based on specialized interests.
Google say that the technology is still an early-stage experiment and therefore still within its Google Labs area on its site, however should help visually cited web surfers alongside those keen for information over page design.
The dirty little secret of Internet design is that many of the shortcuts Web page builders take to make it easier to view information online end up rendering Web pages nearly impossible to use by the visually impaired, even with machine-reading technology.
Web design guru Jakob Nielsen, the co-author of a 150-page 2001 study called "Beyond ALT Text: Making the Web Easy to Use of Users with Disabilities" came up with 75 principles for accessible Web design after a study of 100 computer users.
Making Web pages more accessible offers potential benefit to all users, Nielsen argues.
His ground rules apply to anyone looking to scan the Web quickly for information, in low light or on complex sites: Avoid small buttons. Minimize scrolling. Design and label pages consistently. Create good contrast between text and pages.
In an ideal world, every Web page would be coded cleanly. It would take advantage of style sheets that separate the formatting of Web pages from the content contained on any page. Columns of data would be labeled. Photos would have captions.
But Raman says that the World Wide Web is too messy to draw simple lines and fence off accessible pages from inaccessible ones. "How accessible or how inaccessible a Web page, from a user’s perspective, is a really relative question," he said.
It is good to see Google following in the footsteps of Apple, IBM, Microsoft, Sun and many others in terms of accessibility, said Yankee Group analyst Laura DiDio.
She also noted that the increased availability of accessibility software could help businesses. "The real ramification for IT departments," she said, "is that it makes it easier to support visually impaired employees."
Raman said Google’s next targets include making Google Mail and Google Talk more accessible. Google said it has already taken steps to make its word verification system more accessible to visually-impaired users. The word verification system utilizes those squiggly-letter images that must be visually read by users, to prevent automated programs from accessing accounts.
Google said it used guidelines provided by W3C, the Web standards organization, and by others.