Representation of web based graphics and equations for the visually impaired

Abstract

With the extensive growth of technology, it is becoming prominent in making learning more interactive and effective. Due to the use of Internet based resources in the learning process, the visually impaired community faces difficulties. In this research we are focusing on developing an e-Learning solution that can be accessible by both normal and visually impaired users. Accessibility to tactile graphics is an important requirement for visually impaired people. Recurrent expenditure of the printers which support graphic printing such as thermal embossers is beyond the budget for most developing countries which cannot afford such a cost for printing images. Currently most of the books printed using normal text Braille printers ignore images in documents and convert only the textual part. Printing images and equations using normal text Braille printers is a main research area in the project. Mathematical content in a forum and simple images such as maps in a course page need to be made affordable using the normal text Braille printer, as these functionalities are not available in current Braille converters. The authors came up with an effective solution for the above problems and the solution is presented in this paper.