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The Society for the Physically Disabled (SPD) and the National Library Board (NLB) is conducting a study to evaluate the needs for DAISY Digital Talking (DTB) in Singapore.
The aim of this exploratory study is to gather feedback on user satisfaction and the reading experience of using DAISY talking books in order to enhance the service delivery/ policy on the provision of DAISY books to the public.
Digital Accessible Information SYstem or DAISY is a standard for producing multimedia documents that are accessible and navigable such as digital talking books, digital text books, or a combination of synchronized audio and text books. It allows a user with print disability to navigate the DAISY book by selecting chapters, pages and headings and bookmark a point for later reference. The digital talking book may be read on a portable DAISY player or a computer equipped with synthetic speech, Braille display or screen-enlarging software.
Click here to open or download the file for more info.
Note: The file is in Microsoft Word document format.
What is DAISY Digital Talking Book?
Digital Accessible Information System, or DAISY, is a means of creating digital talking books for people who wish to hear—and navigate—written material presented in an audible format; many such listeners have "print disabilities," including blindness, impaired vision, dyslexia or other issues.
Using DAISY, a talking book format is presented with enabled navigation within a sequential and hierarchical structure consisting of (marked-up) text synchronized with audio.
DAISY 2 was a standard based on XHTML and SMIL. DAISY 3 is also based on XML and is standardized as ANSI/NISO Z39.86-2005.
DAISY assists people who, for different reasons, have problems using regular printed media. DAISY books have the benefits of regular audiobooks, but they are superior because DAISY 2.02 provides up to six embedded "navigation levels" for content (i.e. other objects such as images, graphics, MathML etc) and for displaying synchronized text to speech. DAISY Multimedia can be a talking book, computerised text or a synchronised presentation of text and audio. (Wikipedia, 2010)
As a result, DAISY books allow the blind listener to navigate an encyclopedia; this is impossible using conventional audio recordings because they lack search and navigation features and they require linear listening. While reading a DAISY book, a reader can go to the next or previous page, chapter or sentence. DAISY is for everyone who needs accessible information and for everyone who loves to read.
The DAISY Consortium has been selected by the National Information Standards Organization (NISO) as the official maintenance agency for the DAISY/NISO Standard, officially, the ANSI/NISO Z39.86, Specifications for the Digital Talking Book, known as DAISY 3. (Wikipedia, 2010)
Click here to go to the original website for more details.