We tested the interface with JAWS 12, Window-Eyes 7.5, NVDA, and ZoomText, and most of the interface elements were accessible using each of these tools, except for Window-Eyes. Another issue is that the software does not recognize or report the graphics included in a book. Also, if you move to the previous or next sentence to read it, the reader automatically continues reading the rest of the page, instead of stopping after reading the target sentence. Although there is a keystroke command for sentence-by-sentence navigation, the software does not allow you to move from page to page this way you must always manually turn the page. With Kindle for PC with Accessibility Plugin, it's not possible to navigate by paragraph, word, or character, which makes it impossible to check the spelling of a word. What many may find to be an even bigger problem is the lack of functional navigation. Comparing the three tools (the built-in TTS on the Kindle device, Kindle for PC with Accessibility Plugin on a computer, and the VictorReader Stream DAISY MP3 player) reading the exact same book, we found that Kindle for PC with Accessibility Plugin frequently had trouble pausing appropriately at ends of sentences, especially when the sentence contained quotation marks, question marks, or abbreviations. However, the synthesizer doesn't perform quite as well as it does on the VictorReader Stream player, or even as well as it does on the actual Kindle device.
These voices will be familiar to users of the VictorReader Stream DAISY MP3 player from Humanware. For reading the actual content of books the application uses the Vocalizer speech synthesizer from Nuance, which features the Samantha and Tom voices. You use your own screen reader such as JAWS or NVDA to access the interface for the software. The software facilitates screen reader access to all Kindle books, even if an author or publisher has not granted text-to-speech (TTS) functionality. How It WorksĪvailable for free download online through Amazon, Kindle for PC with Accessibility Plugin is certainly an improvement over the earlier versions of Kindle for PC. However, in early 2011, Amazon released the Kindle for PC with Accessibility Plugin, and this article will evaluate the accessibility provided by this software.
In addition, Kindle for PC, the application you can use to read Kindle books on a computer, was not designed to be compatible with screen readers or screen magnifiers. Although my last review reported that the accessibility of this very popular reading device has improved incrementally with each new version, the Kindle is still not something I would recommend for people with vision loss. Regular readers of AccessWorld may have noticed that I have written several less-than-favorable evaluations of the Kindle e-book reader device from Amazon.
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