Clickless user interaction with text-to-speech enabled web page for users who have reading difficulty
Web pages and other text documents displayed on a computer are reformatted to allow a user who has difficulty reading to navigate between and among such documents and to have such documents, or portions of them, read aloud by the computer using a text-to-speech engine in their original or translated form while preserving the original layout of the document. A “point-and-read” paradigm allows a user to cause the text to be read solely by moving a pointing device over graphical icons or text without requiring the user to click on anything in the document. Hyperlink navigation and other program functions are accomplished in a similar manner.
1. A method of allowing a user to interact with a web page displayed on a display device, wherein the web page includes one or more grammatical units, each grammatical unit being defined by an active region, the method comprising:
(a) creating an active region for each grammatical unit using a computer prior to displaying the web page on a display device by:
(i) getting original web page source code that includes at least text designated for display,
(ii) parsing the text into one or more grammatical units,
(iii) for each grammatical unit, defining an active region that encompasses the grammatical unit; and
(iv) reassembling the original web page source code into text-to-speech enabled web page source code by incorporating the one or more grammatical units into the text-to-speech enabled web page source code, wherein the text-to-speech enabled web page source code is used to display the web page on the display device with which the user interacts;
(b) positioning a pointing device over any part of an active region of a grammatical unit;
(c) automatically highlighting the grammatical unit using the computer whenever the pointing device is over any part of the active region, and without requiring any further user manipulation of the pointing device or any other user interfaces associated with the display device;
(d) automatically loading the grammatical unit into a text-to-speech engine that automatically reads aloud the grammatical unit without requiring any further user manipulation of the pointing device or any other user interfaces associated with the display device; and
(e) automatically reading aloud the grammatical unit using the computer only if the pointing device persists in any part of the active region for greater than a preset human perceivable time period, wherein the automatic highlighting and the automatic reading aloud occur sequentially.
2. The method of claim 1 wherein the preset time period is at least about one second.
3. The method of claim 1 wherein the grammatical unit is a sentence having a plurality of words, each word defining a part of the active region, the entire sentence being read aloud if the pointing device is positioned over any word of the sentence.
4. The method of claim 1 wherein the pointing device is a mouse.
5. An article of manufacture for allowing a user to interact with a web page displayed on a display device, wherein the web page includes one or more grammatical units, each grammatical unit being defined by an active region, the article of manufacture comprising a non-transitory computer-readable medium holding computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:
(a) creating an active region for each grammatical unit prior to displaying the web page on a display device by:
(i) getting original web page source code that includes at least text designated for display,
(ii) parsing the text into one or more grammatical units,
(iii) for each grammatical unit, defining an active region that encompasses the grammatical unit; and
(iv) reassembling the original web page source code into text-to-speech enabled web page source code by incorporating the one or more grammatical units into the text-to-speech enabled web page source code, wherein the text-to-speech enabled web page source code is used to display the web page on the display device with which the user interacts;
(b) positioning a pointing device over any part of an active region of a grammatical unit;
(c) automatically highlighting the grammatical unit whenever the pointing device is over any part of the active region, and without requiring any further user manipulation of the pointing device or any other user interfaces associated with the display device;
(d) automatically loading the grammatical unit into a text-to-speech engine that automatically reads aloud the grammatical unit without requiring any further user manipulation of the pointing device or any other user interfaces associated with the display device; and
(e) automatically reading aloud the grammatical unit only if the pointing device persists in any part of the active region for greater than a preset human perceivable time period, wherein the automatic highlighting and the automatic reading aloud occur sequentially.
6. The article of manufacture of claim 5 wherein the preset time period is at least about one second.
7. The article of manufacture of claim 5 wherein the grammatical unit is a sentence having a plurality of words, each word defining a part of the active region, the entire sentence being read aloud if the pointing device is positioned over any word of the sentence.
8. The article of manufacture of claim 5 wherein the pointing device is a mouse.