From our presentation at the 2014 International Technology and Persons with Disabilities Conference (a.k.a., CSUN)

1. Accessibility of Mainstream
E-Book Readers
Ken Petri, The Ohio State University
Hadi Rangin, University of Illinois, Urbana-
Champaign
CSUN 2014 Conference

2. CSUN 2014 E-Book-Related
Presentations
• Today
– 9:20: “Testing Mainstream eBook Systems: Which is Most
Accessible” (Kindle, Kobo, Nook)
– 1:50, presentation by Amazon on cross-platform a11y with
Kindle products
– 3:10, George Kerscher’s “Reading System Showdown”
• Tomorrow
– Two 8 AM sessions, one on challenges publishers face in
producing accessible books, one about consumer
acceptance of them
– 10:40, looking at EPUB3 cross platform accessibility
(VitalSource)
– (And three sessions on accessible math in e-books)

3. Formats Considered: PDF/UA
• Technical standard for PDF software
developers, defining how to render PDF so
that they are accessible
• “Matterhorn Protocol” lists the ways PDF/UA
can be failed
- Reverse engineered, it suggests implementation
guidelines

4. Formats: iBooks and KF8
• iBooks
– Proprietary implementation of EPUB 3
– Not (currently) transformable to EPUB 3
• But iBooks reader renders a lot of EPUB 3 (and on iOS makes
that pretty accessible)
• Amazon KF8 (Kindle Format 8)
– Proprietary. Similar to EPUB 3: implements HTML5
and CSS3 subsets
– Missing: Video, audio, SVG (though has full-page
graphics), media overlays (?, Audible synchronized
reading), MathML
– Book ecosystem lock-in

5. Formats: EPUB 3
• Overhaul of EPUB 2
• Incorporates all major DAISY features (replacing DAISY?)
– Accessibility pedigree: Key DAISY Consortium and other a11y
personnel
• Video, audio, SVG, MathML, Media Overlays, JavaScript (interactivity),
print-faithful pagination, HTML5 and CSS3 (large subset, including ARIA
and forms), Fixed layout or reflowable, footnotes
• Canonical Fragment Identifiers (CFI)
– Precise indexing of location and ranges intra-ebook and from
external references. Could also be for things like notes, highlights,
bookmarks?: Cross-platform notes, highlights, and bookmarks a
possibility.
• “Dictionaries” (glossaries) and “Indexes” are new proposed extensions

6. Current EPUB3 Implementation Issues
• No viable TTS/Braille+math across platforms
(though lots of good work coming from
MathPlayer Alpha and Google ChromeVox)
• No cross-platform/reader solution for
bookmarks, progress, notes, highlights (CFI a
possible candidate?)
• Video and audio may require custom solution
until wide support for HTML5 video captions
– And what about audio description (AD) support?

7. Existing E-Book A11y Criteria
• NISO DTB prioritized features list (1999)
– Informed NLS player features
• W3C UAAG 2.0 (last call, Nov. 2013)
– Browsers, media players, other internet apps that render web content
• EPUB 3 Accessibility Guidelines (IDPF, updated 2014)
– Checklist and Best Practices for EPUB 3 authoring
• BISG, DAISY Consortium and IDPF EPUBTest.org (2014)
– Comparative EPUB 3 support grid, reader by reader
• Accessibility Screening Methodology Guidelines and Checklist (May
2013)
– DAISY Consortium with Tech for All
– Functional criteria and tests for file management, reading, reading
visual adjustment, navigation, annotation, and media playback for
eReaders and digital reading systems

8. EPUB 3 Best Practices

9. Goals of Our Functional Criteria
• Derived from existing criteria, esp. Screening
Methodology Checklist
• End-user oriented criteria (like EPUBTest.org)
– Comparative grid
– Want novice to be able to read (and contribute?)
• Focus on functional accessibility, arranged by
disability categories
• Goal of an organization/individual being able to
use this in adoption/selection of a platform
• Presupposes that EPUB 3 is long term solution

10. Organization of Our Criteria
• Platform and Application category
– Web-based mainstream, PC/Mac installed
mainstream, Android mainstream, iOS
mainstream, Academic web-based, Academic
installed, PC/MAC installed disability/specialized,
Mainstream dedicated device
• Disability Category
– Blind/severe vision impairment, “Low Vision,”
Deaf and HoH, Color deficit, Motor,
Cognitive/non-vision reading disability

11. Readers Surveyed
• Initial survey: More than 40 readers/systems
– First cut: down to 14
– Matrix very “sparse” (that is, we did a lot of
testing, but it’s not filled out <frown>)
• However…. We will discuss: Kindle, iBooks,
Azardi, VitalSource (PC), Blio, Google Play,
Adobe Digital Editions, Nook Study, Readium
project

12. Criteria: Global
• Independent setup and activation by PwD
• Import/load/purchase e-book accessible
• List and search titles and authors
• Discover e-book metadata (author, publisher, reading progress, etc.)
• Simple and minimal controls
• Rich navigation by bookmark, highlight, note, chapter, sub-section
• Make/remove bookmarks, highlights, notes
• Remembered reading progress and indication of progress in book
easily discoverable
• For TTS, book reading resumable from previous paused position

13. Select Criteria: Blind/Severe Visual
Impairment
• All functionality available through reader built-in TTS or 3rd-party
screen reader
• Direct access to book text (to select, copy)
• Set highlights, make notes
• Adjustable speech rate, mute, pause
• Controls identifiable/discoverable by touch
• Accessible MathML
• Image alternatives voiced
• Fine-grained navigation: headings, tables, markup, lists, words,
characters
• Navigation by book structure: Table of Contents
• Media players with accessible controls and audio description
capability

14. Criteria: “Low Vision”
• Distinguishable controls (by touch or voiced)
• Font face choices
• Enlargeable book text
• Full typographic control of book text
• User-interface type/icons enlargeable
• Set high contrast or adopts native OS high-
contrast settings

15. Criteria: Color Deficit
• No differentiation of controls by color alone

16. Criteria: Motor Disability
• Devices light, durable, mountable
• Touch screen allows for non-human (pointer
stick, etc.) interactivity and emulation of
multiple touch via single point
• Navigable by voice (3rd-party or built-in)
• Touch screen allows for loose precision,
controls cycleable
• Controls actuated by alternative pointing
devices

17. Criteria: Cognitive/Non-Vision Reading
• Synchronized highlighting of TTS, including media
overlays
• Page indication aligns/can align with paper book
• Text manipulation or other settings can create
low visual “noise”/non-distracting page views
• Notes, highlights, progress, bookmarks sync
across platform/instance
• Reference lookup in 3rd-party sources
• If quizzing or other interactivity, no imposed time
limits or time can be extended

18. Criteria: Deaf and Hard of Hearing
• Essential audio-only cues/alerts have visual
equivalents (book syncs with server, bookmark
set/removed, etc., should get visual
notification)
• Synchronized captions for embedded
video/multimedia presentations
• Mono audio output configurable

19. Subset for Discussion
• Screen reader access (to interface and contents)
• Text control: Contrast, font face, text size,
margins, kerning, line height, work spacing
• Highlighted synchronized reading
• Notes and highlights
• Cross-platform sync
• Captioned video (and AD?)
• Math rendering and accessibility
• Accessible interactivity

20. Not (Currently) Considered
• Blio PC/Mac: Crashes, poor SR suppoort, XPS (very little
support in readers)
• Adobe Reader: Good for PDF, but a document reader, not a
reading system
• Specialized: Poor or no support for EPUB 3
– Dolphin EasyReader and gh ReadHear
– Darwin Reader and GoRead on Android
– Read2Go on iOS
• Academic: Proprietary formats
– CourseSmart:
– Inkling
– Illinois E-Text
– Courseload (appears to be moving toward EPUB 3)

21. Adobe Digital Editions
• EPUB 2, only (no math, video, interactivity)
• Screen reader accessibility to reading, but text
selection buggy
• Only size control of text, but does adopt OS high-
contrast mode
• Notes and highlights (but not for screen readers
• Isolated, no syncing since is stand-alone
• Adobe appears to have no plans to move forward
with ADE

22. Blio
• Installed version showed initial promise, but unclear if
platform is progressing
• On iOS, notes and highlighting very similar to Kindle
(usable)
• Only EPUB 2 capable, almost no support for EPUB 3
(outside of simple import – through iTunes on iOS)
• Need to buy voice to get highlighted, synced reading.
Limited control of speed, synchronization issues
apparent
• Android version: Can’t find a way to set a highlight
using TalkBack

23. Azardi
• Nearly equivalent functionality in web-based and
installed versions
• Strong support of EPUB 3 rendering, including
Math, video (currently no captions due to Mozilla
dependency), audio, interactivity, and text styling.
Support for media overlays with speed
adjustments
• Good control of layout, fonts, and sizing
• Multiple built-in contrast settings and accepts
Windows high-contrast

24. iBooks Mac
• iBooks Mac: “Feels beta”
– essentially impossible to use effectively with VO,
lots of unlabeled controls and difficulty getting
into text
– Good EPUB 3 rendering: Basic MathML, video,
audio (but no captions, since depends on native
player
– Highlights, notes, etc.
– Decent text styling

25. iBooks iOS
• Can import EPUB 3 via iTunes and most
complete rendering on iOS, including MathML
(MathML is accessible with VoiceOver if
rendered in Safari iOS), video, audio (not
media overlays)
• Notes and highlights not available with EPUB 3
sideloaded content, only on iBooks Textbooks
– Note-taking and highlighting probably not as
simple or controlable as on Kindle iOS

26. Google Play
• Four killer features:
– Sync of highlights, notes, progress, bookmarks across all platforms
– Import PDF or EPUB and share seamlessly across platforms (no vendor
lock-in or sync restrictions)
– EPUB books get highlighted reading
– Print faithful pagination (and can get some books with photocopy of
original pages (good for archival work))
• Weak/no support for EPUB 3: no video, audio, math, overlays, etc.
• Good adjustability of control and text + font choices (browser and
player cooperate to give large range of text sizing)
• Generally poor screen reader accessibility on all platforms

27. Kindle
• KF8 (so, no video, audio, MathML at this point) and
experience vendor lock-in
• Very solid accessibility on Android with TalkBack and
probably most VO accessible mainstream reader on iOS
(esp. for highlights and notes)
• Kindle Fire HDX has best TalkBack support on an
Android platform, and book reader works better on
HDX than on, say, Nexus 7
• Limitations on PC (“Kindle for PC with accessibility
plug-in”) only allows for built-in TTS navigation and
note-taking on a per-page level, with minimal control
of reading granularity

28. Nook Study

29. Nook Study
• No EPUB 3 support
• But….
– PDF and EPUB books can be sideloaded and both support word-by-
word TTS-synced highlighting playback (Google Play only highlights
with EPUB)
– TTS moves by sentence, with ability to skip and replay (like Kindle for
PC)
– Interface can be set to be fully “tabbable”
– Book-faithful pagination
– 6 font choices and multiple layout and contrast options
– Killer feature: Dual-book view
– Solid note-taking, highlighting, searching, etc.
• Screen reader will conflict with built in TTS
• No SR access to book text

30. VitalSource (PC)

31. VitalSource (PC)

32. VitalSource (PC)

33. VitalSource (PC)
• Supports most of EPUB 3 and makes that contents
screen reader and keyboard only accessible
• Uses IE’s video player for captioned, multi-lingual
subtitled video (only rendering TTML currently (bug in
IE 11?)
• Renders MathML and can use MathPlayer (if your
version of IE supports MathPlayer, that is)
• Adopts Windows High-Contrast settings
• Can sideload EPUB 3
• TTS read-aloud and SR accessible highlighting and
note-taking (only with VS books)

34. Readium
• EPUB 3 reference implementation: video &
audio, MathML (via MathJax), media overlays,
layouts, styling, interactivity, SVG, pages, etc.
• No screen reader access, even with
ChromeVox

35. Whither E-Book Readers?
Readium JS (for browser implementations)
Readium SDK (for native app implementations)
A bright future, so long as vendors fully consider
accessibility (like VitalSource is doing)