I hope that Cockos improve this.

I am pretty sure that if reaper is made accessible right out of the box, that it will be number one DAW in the blind community...

Yes, this would be a so great feature!

Yes, I agree.
Reaper is so close to being the world's most universal DAW; since it runs on any old gear without complaint; is used by pros and folks with almost no cash; and is now being used by blind musicians.
Unfortunately, Reaper version 4 broke some of the access that existed between Reaper and a supporting app called ReaAccess, which organized keyboard shortcuts so Reaper could be run without a mouse or need to even look at a monitor.
Many of my blind musician friends are either still using older versions, or struggling to fix context menus that no longer display, and dozens of other new problems that came with version 4.
Please, if standard MS access implementation can be built into Reaper many potential Stevie Wonders and Ray Charles's will be forever grateful.
Indigo L

My honest opinion is that all software manufacturers simply *must* make their software usable for everyone on the same way, including for the people with disabilities.

It's good to have options, and Reaper would certainly be a good alternative if made accessible. Fix it today, I'll buy it tomorrow!

It's really good to have Reaper accessible to screen reading software; absolutely vote for it.

Reaper looks like a great candidate to be a low-cost tool in the European education sector, where accessibility is starting to be one of the deciding factors in the county and national purchasing decisions. There's a definite competitive advantage to be gained by doing the "right" thing in this case.

I'd love to see this to happen!

It would be great if Reaper becomes accessible out of the box since many blind people tend to use it nowadays. Please implement this.

I would use this feature since I use screen access software which UIA can take advantage of and communicate with the application directly, the application being Reaper.

Hi everybody! It's a feature we really need. Hope, reaper will be available with all screenreaders, including NVDA as the most light and fast screenreader. Thanks a million.

Let's not forget that the developers of Reaper have done quite a bit in regard to accessibility for which we should be grateful. The main weakness as I see it is the lack of access to the midi editor. Also, the routing matrix would be very helpful. I certainly will put my vote in for improved accessibility, oh, and let's not forget the mac.
Gord

We have a wonderful access plugin. It's ReaAccess. So maybe would Cockos developers join forces together ReaAccess developer Ivan Sebekin?

I am a visually impaired user of reaper. I do have a small amount of sight so I am not entirely dependant on speech support. However, I support any accessibility improvements that might be made to Reaper. One day I may not have the small amount of sight I have now!

Yes some accessibility is there, but more could be done easily. You definitely have my vote, and my purchase of a Reaper license in the near future.

It would be great if the authors could connect up and work with the folks over at http://www.reaaccess.com/

As has already been said, the educational contracts and related press coverage Cockos could gain from this would be a definite bonus. College/university students here in the UK with a visual impairment get support toward equipment and software that will allow them to work on a level playing field with their peers. With Reaper being so flexable and portable to boot, it could be the go-to solution that gets recommended in the academic circle, from students still in school studying music GCSE through to adults undertaking MA qualifications in music tech, media, sound design etc. Given that there isn't anything close to a one-size-fits-all DAW to recommend at the moment in terms of accessibility, it's likely to catch on. Access to a single DAW that meets my production and composition needs is something I've craved for years. The features are definitely there in Reaper, now it's just a case of being able to use 'em! With the licence fee being so low for home users, I'm pretty sure blind people would put their money where their mouths are so to speak. I already have, I can't be the only one.

I've just been alerted to this post by another user, and although it's not something that I currently require personally, I would be very much in favour of such accessibility improvements for the visually impaired. If this could be implemented, I'd certainly support the idea of covering the subject in the SOS Reaper Notes column.

In fact, the whole issue of accessibility of music software is something that feels like it might warrant more broad-based coverage in the mag, so I'll have a few words with the commissioning editors there to see what they think might be practical.

I need for it so much!

@triviul: looking forward to our continued dialog on this topic. I was thinking, in my fantasy world, we'd have you and Anderton in a live mix-off, both of you blindfolded. one using sonar and various accessibility tools for it, the other using Reaper. Would the magazine cover psychotherapy costs after? :)

Haha! I'd pay good money to be a fly on the wall for that mix-off. 20 quid says the Sonar user cries first!

Has anybody posted a link to this request anywhere else? I've hit a few mailing lists I'm on, a few Facebook groups, and the small community over at taperssection.com. I'm guessing homerecording.com, gearsluts, harmony central etc. have similar forums where a mention of this would be entirely on-topic... if someone wants to post there.

I second the opinion that all software should be made accessible and I truly believe that Reaper could forge a way forward for DAWs to accommodate visually impaired users.

^^^Wot he said

Although I have no need for this right now, I can envision a time where I (and many others) might need this enhancement in order to continue to work with this program. I don't know how difficult it is to implement, but it seems like, in the long run, it would be more than worth it.

84 votes ... how many should we be aimining to get here??

I'm not sure how many votes it will take for the programmers of Reaper to take notice,...But, on a personal note...

I can't tell you how much time, and money I have spent on trying to find some accessible recording software!...

I have a treasure of useless software that I can't use because it is not accessible...

When I found Reaper, I was blowned away with the usefulness, and flexability of this recording software...

So, I am still trying to get as many people to sign this patition...

I'm looking for some big positive things to come out of this!...

Yes, i think this great feature!

I would very grateful if you implement features for the disabled. Where I live, in Russia, so little is done or exists for the disabled. While their life could be so much richer!
Thank you in advance

this would be a phantastic feature and I would make me very even more proud to be a part of the reaper community.

Many attempts have been made on the reaaccess forum to get in contact with the developer(s).
As far as I know there is no single sign that development is alive in any way.
Reaaccess is not open source either so there's no chance to adapt it without the original authors. Yes, it is a really great tool but it might have no future.
I think in the long run it is much more promissing to have Reaper come with built-in accessibility since this is the only efficient way for the developers to migrate this feature into new versions.
The simple reason I suggested UIA is that the Reaper developers would not need to care about different screen readers which would probably be beyond their target anyway. It is the most advanced accessible API available under windows and we can be sure that it will be maintained for a long time by both, Microsoft and screenreader vendors.
/Roland

Roland is right on the money there. So, how much interest do we need to generate before this becomes a priority for the developers? Great to see it getting attention here though, and we've passed 100 votes!

ok who voted against? there's only one of you - please stand up, and we'll try to wack you with our canes. :)

U know, folks, even if u now have perfect eyesight, blindness could happen to any of u. I surely hope it doesn't, cuz it's a b-word when it does--but it could. All it takes is an illness or an accident. I just ask developers to consider--if it happened to u, how would u feel about not being able to access software u once loved to use & took for granted?

Being blind poses enough challenges already. It's not that hard to make software accessible, so inaccessible programs really shouldn't be 1 of them.

Hello:

Please make Reaper's accessibility a priority for both the PC and the Mac. If necessary, adjust the price of the program in order to higher a programmer dedicated to the various accessibility issues that Blind/Visually impaired persons are having with reaper. After all, not everybody, who pay city taxes, ride the city's transit. It's a case of inclusionand fairness. Thanks all over the place.

Hi,
I came upon this thread while doing some googling, and I have a few things which I believe make this proposal all the more compelling.

A little background:
My name is Chris Norman, and I am writing this post on behalf of Last Train Home (www.lasttrainhome.net), which is an acoustic trio (despite what the outdated website says), based in Coventry, England.

Me and the keyboard player are totally blind, and my girlfriend, who is taking over as lead singer, partially sighted. Although with a strain, Becky can see the screen, she does not understand enough about Pro Tools, or it's interface, to help if we cannot make a particular window behave with the VoiceOver screen reader, which is what we rely upon. This means if we cannot achieve something without using the screen, we are limited to what we can do about it.

I find myself hearing more and more about Reaper. No one says anything negative, which is strange, with every major piece of software, there must be shortcomings, but everyone seems to love Reaper. So, congratulations! you're obviously doing a lot of things right, and hats off to the whole team for that!

As well as the UI automation stuff, which I honestly know nothing about, I know that the OS X accessibility frameworks are built right into XCode, all you need to do, is label elements properly. From the little I know, the man who was hired by Avid, to make Pro Tools part way accessible, actually achieved more than he was taksed with, because of the simplicity of Apple's documentation. Sadly however, the accessibility improvements he made are slowly being reversed, and it's getting quite depressing when new versions come out.

Let's put my moaning aside for a minute. There are several pretty compelling reasons to make Reaper accessible, and I shal attempt to list them here, with reasons for each. I am just writing stuff off the top of my head here, so this is by no means a difinitave list.

I have done some work in schools / colleges, with music technology teachers, who are teaching visually impaired / blind computer users on their courses. The main thing which they find frustrating, is that mostly, unless you're using a program simple and bog basic, the teacher / lecturer / support assistant is essentially doing all the work for the blind computer user, because it's easier than working with the inherent accessibility flaws in the major DAWs, or, more complexly, switching working environments entirely.

I don't want to turn this post into a massive rant about different DAWs, because that's neither appropriate nor fair. Suffice it to say though, that to make one work, you need to buy a bunch of scripts, which cost extra, another hasn't been updated in close to a year, a wole bunch, the company behind it have no interest in accessibility, and as I said, Pro Tools, the only viable solution for people seriously wanting to record things, the accessibility seems to be based on a very shaky and ever-shifting knife edge.

Enter Reaper:
Reaper is a relatively new piece of software, which as I said above, everyone seems to love. Imagine how much more the educational sector will love it when it works with all the major screen readers, including the opensource and free Non-Visual Desktop Access (www.nvda-project.org), which they can install till their heart's content.

Educational establishments won't have to worry about their blind / VI students not coping, because they'll know from the outset, that Reaper works with all major screen readers. Therefore, if a student is having trouble, it's more likely that they don't know how to use their assistive technology, rather than Reaper not working correctly with it.

The mac-based establishments wouldn't have to worry either, if the Reaper for OS X interface adheres to the same standards, because VoiceOver, which comes bundled with every mac, will just work, no messing about, no expensive training, no scripts or other modifications, and a whole bunch of greatful students running out to buy Reaper, because let's be honest, if they can't afford a $60 software package, they're going to have some rubbish student parties!

Same rationale goes for home users. I am writing this post from windows, which I run in bootcamp, on my Mac, which also houses Pro Tools on 2 different versions of Mac OS X, depending on what I'm doing. Honestly, I dream of the day I can just run the latest OS X, and windows, and not bother with the third partition, just because Pro Tools accessibility got broke and they don't release updates fast enough to patch the resulting accessibility holes.

I could use Reaper on either system! And for a fraction of the cost of a single Pro Tools license, I can buy 1 OS X and 1 Windows license, and run Reaper whenever I fancy, without any scripts, training, messing about, without even rebooting my computer.

I'm not just saying this as a blind computer user. When I posted on the subject of Logic accessibility, over on the Apple Support Community's forum (https://discussions.apple.com/thread...rt=75&tstart=0), there were an astonishing number of sighted users who felt too much store was placed in flashy GUI's. One man, even went so far as to say, if he could mix with his screen off, like he could with his analogue console, he'd be a happy man, so seems this is not simply an issue which affects the blind community.

Finally, and I don't want to be all depressing about this, but age-related Macular Degeneration (http://www.rnib.org.uk/eyehealth/eye...Pages/amd.aspx), and diabetic retinopathy (http://www.nhs.uk/conditions/Diabeti...roduction.aspx), are very real risks for everyone. The second is of particular relevance to those of us which sit in front of our studio rigs all night, living off sandwiches and coffee. So, if, god forbid, any of you Reaper fans did lose your site later on, at least you would have the slight comfort that you could continue using your favourite DAW, with no more learning that you'd need to get yourself reoriented to using a computer without vision.

The reason I'm laying this all on so thick, is not to guilt or bully anyone into bringing accessibility to volition tomorrow, but because computer accessibility isn't something which just affects the minority. In the same way that a sloping curb isn't just utilised by those in wheelchairs, and microphones aren't just employed by singers, computer accessibility has wide-reaching, and potentially untapped rewards for all of us.

Enough of my ramblings, but I would be most greatful if Reaper did enjoy cross-platform accessibility, and I, along with many others I suspect, would be willing to help the effort along with beta testing, donations, documentation, or any other way I can be of service.

Yours Sinceerly,
Chris, Becky, and Matthew of Last Train Home.

Visit us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/lthband
Visit us on Twitter: www.twitter.com/lthband
Visit us on Soundcloud: www.soundcloud.com/lthband

And above all, enjoy music!

We have spent a great deal of effort on supporting accessibility APIs on both Windows and OSX, unfortunately it is a very difficult challenge due to extremely poor documentation, on both sides. If anybody has any good resources that may be of help on the code side for supporting this, we would be happy to take a look and spend more time improving support for these APIs.

Justin, great to see you posting here man!

Poking around in the latest prerelease of Reaper on both platforms, yes, I can tell that time and effort has gone into this and I'm hella grateful for that. Unfortunately, the current stumbling blocks are sufficient to stop that effort from being usable because although most of the UI is now exposed to screen readers via tool tips, the only way I can access that info is by mousing over the element I want to examine on either platform. Pretty much the second we figure out how best to tie actions triggered by the keymap in with what's been done so far, the entire TCP is going to come to life just like that.

Instead of just pointing you to official documentation which obviously isn't working out, would it be more helpful to put you in touch with a few people who crunch accessibility code for a living? That way, you'd have someone to bounce questions off of as they crop up. Also, is there any mileage in the idea of someone with the right credentials being able to take on this work? I'd be happy to make introductions, just let me know where to point people to.

Cheers

Scott