Problem 1: Creating an Accessibility Machine

For setting up the Accessability machine, our team had to make choices on what features we would highlight.  As soon as we got our equipment delivered, we set up the computers and started exploring what Windows 7 had to offer.  There was some initial frustration as we tried to figure out all the systems.  While Windows 7 has made a lot of improvements in offering Accessability features, it is still not as easy to use as Mac OSX (which some of our group had experience with).

Our group set up three machines in all.  A desktop machine that would go to Eagle’s Nest.  A desktop machine that would go to one of the local groups and a touch-screen machine that would go to that local group as well.  We used the desktop for Eagle’s Nest as our template machine in working out everything we wanted to do.  When we had set up that system to our liking, we put all the same software on the machines for the local group.

Problem 2: Selecting Accessability Software

Dr. Devva Kasnitz is a research associate at Institute of Urban and Regional Development. She is Program Manager of the Ed Roberts Fellowships in Disability Studies, a program in which fellowships are awarded to train advanced scholars to become leaders in disability studies and rehabilitation research, teaching and mentorship. She is a lecturer in the Department of Anthropology at UC Berkeley, Project Director of UC Berkeley’s Disability Studies at Cal, and chairs a number of committees addressing disability issues. Her honors include the Mary Switzer Distinguished Fellowship at the National Institute of Disability and Rehabilitation Research in Washington, DC.

Soon after Maggie was assigned to the Disability Group, she contacted Dr. Kasnitz for advice. The accessibility group hoped to design three accessibility stations for veterans, the elderly, and a general population. Maggie illustrated Community Informatics at UIUC by giving her access to articles about the program and the programs website. Maggie also spoke about Eagle’s Nest and the work being done there. On March 17th Dr. Kasnitz emailed Maggie that she had contacted the Alliance for Technology Access (ATA) and gave them my information as well as a letter of recommendation.

On March 23, 2010 Karen Sheehan at ATA emailed Maggie. The mission of ATA is to increase the use of technology by children and adults with disabilities and functional limitations. ATA encourages and facilitates the empowerment of people with disabilities to participate fully in their communities. Through public education, information and referral, capacity building in community organizations, and advocacy/policy efforts, the ATA enables millions of people to live, learn, work, define their futures, and achieve their dreams. Karen Sheehan suggests we apply for a new grant takes advantage of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 Education Stimulus funding. In order to do so, Sheehan requires us to attend a group of workshops in order to learn how to apply for the grant. They will then help us with our process. On March 24, the accessibility group held a conference with Martin and Ms. Austen, a technology rep. at UIUC, and decided the grant application process was not in the scope for our time period.

The Accessibility Team had two goals. The first was to create accessibility workstations with Windows 7 computers, some of them touch screens, with track balls and other disability friendly hardware, with accessibility software, Zoomtext, Dragon Naturally Speaking, and Kurzweil 3000, installed. The second goal was create a website to teach potential users and administrators how to use the accessibility software. Maggie attempted to expedite software delivery at a lower-than-retail cost by contacting Dragon Naturally Speaking via their website.

On April 1, 2010 Maggie contacted Dragon Naturally Speaking via their website. The woman who answered her email was intrigued by the work in East St. Louis and put in Maggie touch with the academic salesman, Carl Fielder. Maggie asked Mr. Fielder if there were any “deals” we could get as a student group helping a veteran population. Maggie was also hoping that contacting the company would expedite software delivery.

On April 7th Dragon representative Carl Fielder phoned Maggie and had two conversations with her. Mr. Fielder offered 3 boxes of Dragon Preferred 10, which allows for multiple users, three laminated “cheat sheets,” three how-to manuals, and free tech support for approximately $300. Maggie put UIUC tech rep. Ms. Austin in touch with Mr. Fielder by cross emailing information. Mr. Fielder responds:

Margaret, I enjoyed our visit and what you are doing for these people with disabilities is very important.
I have worked with disabled people in the past and Dragon helps to level the playing field. With this software they can do e-mails, write documents, surf the web. They can be much more productive. I trained 5 at a rehabilitation clinic in Omaha and they average 145 words a minute.
Let me know if there is anything I can do.

Two weeks went by and the accessibility team was still without software. After a conference with Martin, the accessibility team, and Ms. Austin, Maggie wrote back to Mr. Fielder asking to get a copy of the software if we promised to order through him later. On April 26th Mr. Fielder wrote back:
The question I have, has anyone used it before? It is a very good software, but it helps if someone has experience before they show someone else.

Maggie assured Mr. Fielder that the accessibility group would be able to handle any documentation. She also assured Mr. Fielder that she was familiar with the software because she used the standard version at home. Despite future requests by Maggie in writing, April 26th was the last time Maggie has heard from Mr. Fielder.

Problem 3: Creating Accessibility Documentation

In order to provide more convenience to all users of our system, we decided to build a website, including the basic guides of the software that installed in the Eagle Site. At first, We divided the technical webpage into three parts: Windows 7 Tools, Accessibility Software, and Standard Software. Each of us wrote one part of documents, and then, Fei collected all the writings and built a web page by Dreamweaver.

Transferring word documents into a webpage is not that easy as copy and paste. In order to provide users more concise and professional contents, Fei has to apply proper css. style sheet as an assistant to build hierarchical structure, and then she made several webpages and used interlinks to link them together.

Fei still met problems to upload all the files into ftp. Server, because it’s impossible to copy and paste all the files to the server, instead of it, she has to upload files one by one Or by zip. file, which created the site address as “http://sam.metroeastdigital.org/451 website“ rather than http://sam.metroeastdigital.org/. In the end, she fixed it by transferring the files between the layers of  Server.

Finally, we built up our website with all the technical documents there. Address: http://sam.metroeastdigital.org/

Problem 4: Extra work at Eagle’s Nest

About a week before we went to Eagle’s Nest, our team was told that we would have extra work to do while we were on site.  We had known that we would be installing a projector, which we thought would take a short amount of time, but now we had the opportunity to upgrade the computers in the computer lab with Microsoft XP and an official version of Microsoft Office.

We definitely wanted to make good on this opportunity but we were not prepared for the size of the undertaking.  To start, we only were able to procure two XP install disks ahead of time.  We also had not realized that there was an official supplemental programs disk for the class, since we had been working on a more specialized selection of software for our project than the other groups who were doing larger lab installs.

As soon as we got to the lab and realized that we were short on resources, we decided that time was of the essence and we should get to work immediately.  Instead of checking over each system to see if there were things we could use or wanted to save, we simply booted them with the XP install disk and wrote a new partition.  Adam was able to make a duplicate of the XP disk with his mac, so we at least had three copies to work with, and we also burned several copies of a software disk from the install packages we had saved on the Accessability machine.  This was vital, since Eagle’s Nest has rather slow internet and it would have taken too long to download all the packages we needed to each computer.

We were still in a time cruch, but things got better when Martin showed up with another of the groups that had some extra time for a different project.  The extra hands helped us install the projctor ceiling mount and run install packages on the lab computers.  We were able to reasses what else we needed to install when we took a break for the night and finish our project on Wednesday evening.

Problem 5: Unresolved Issues

There are a few things that still need to be done to complete our project at Eagle’s Nest.  These problems were not resolved because we didn’t have the time or the resources to get to them.

The SAM System

We still need to install Dragon NaturallySpeaking and Kurzweil 3000.  Once Kursweil is installed, we also need to set up the scanner to work with it.  We should also talk with the staff to determine the best way to make the headset and trackball available for use, while ensuring that nothing will happen to them.  The extra supplies for the SAM system was put in the red Projector Box and left under the table where the printer is set up.  It was marked to be saved.

The XP Computer Lab

We were able to successfully set up Windows XP on the existing computers in the lab and get them functional.  However, we ran into a few snags when running updates.

Eagle 4 has a problem with the network configuration.  We tried swapping out NICs and using different PCI slots to get a connection to the network, but Windows constantly told us that there was a network cable unplugged.  My best guess at this time is that it was some sort of an OS problem.  Because we had no internet connection we couldn’t install much of the standard software.  Eagle 4 was brought back to the GSLIS building and put in Room 52.  We should consider running a clean install of Windows XP on it and see what happens.  It is unclear where we would put Eagle 4 if we return it to Eagle’s Nest as there really isn’t enough room for it to be in the lab.  It could possibly become a front office computer.

Eagle 2, Eagle 3, and Eagle 9 all failed to install Windows XP SP3.  After installing SP2 on all of the computers, these three machines (along with Eagle 4) told us that the SP3 Patch File was corrupt.  We didn’t have time to figure out why they were giving us this error message, so we installed the rest of the software on them without the service pack.  It would be good for somone to go back later and troubleshoot this issue.

When we left the computer lab on Wednesday, we had not been able to install the network printer drivers on the lab machines.  We were told that Martin and the remaining 451 students were able to take care of that.  We greatly appreciate their help.

Front Office

Martha Watts requested that we install Microsoft Office XP on all of the computers they have in the front office.  However those computers are terribly short on RAM and probably couldn’t handle the upgrade from OpenOffice.  We told Mrs. Watts that we would try to secure some more RAM for her and install Office XP some time over the summer, when we came to complete the SAM system.  Fiona was the person who inspected the RAM and may be able to provide more insight into what they have and what they need.