There are several interesting projects focused on making browsers that will make navigating the web easier for all people, but especially those using screen readers or alternative keyboard input devices.
pwWebSpeak by Productivity Works is a browser developed specifically for people with low vision and blindness. This browser produces verbal cues based on the HTML tags thus rendering text-only versions of all pages. The verbal cues are produced with a software speech synthesizer Soft Voice, which works with TextAssist on Sound Blaster cards or with various other hardware speech synthesizers.
The University of Toronto is working on Panorama, a Helper application for current browsers. This helper will provide some of the same functionality as pwWebSpeak and eventually become a stand-alone browser with several other unique functions.
The direction we have taken is to look at what functionality current browsers can incorporate to make them easier to use by everyone. We also want to highlight current fuctions that aid in accessibility to make sure they persist in future generations of browsers.
The ideas contained in this document have been brewing throughout the TRACE Center for a while and have been spiced with the ideas of the people from the centers/companies mentioned above as well as Jon Gunderson, Michael C. Albers, Eric Bergman, Jakob Nielson, Don Dillin, Netscape, Microsoft and others (see the Bibliography for more information).
Current features that should persist
Notes on Current Browsers (from June 1996)
Updated October 2, 1996