News

Despite the rapid increase in access to and use of the Internet, barriers still exist for a wide variety of users: people with disabilities, people who are aging, and people who have literacy and digital-literacy challenges. Researchers in the US and abroad are working together to remove these barriers with a concept that is set […]

After getting a bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering from UW-Madison in 1968, Engelke began building and selling computers to campus researchers – until he recognized that deaf people could not use the telephone. Working in his basement in 1977, Engelke figured out how to build a miniature TTY (teletypewriter) inside the plastic housing […]

The Trace Center is one of the leaders in a new coalition that was awarded a $13 million, four-year grant by the European Commission. Titled CLOUD4All, the project launched in Madrid on November 1, 2011, and will be carried out by a coalition of 30 partners, including Microsoft, Mozilla, Phillips, eleven universities and research organizations, […]

On July 21, 2011, the FCC released the Report on Emergency Calling for Persons With Disabilities: Survey Review and Analysis. This report is the result of a national survey conducted by the Emergency Access Advisory Committee (EAAC). during April and May 2011. Trace Center staff provided support for data compilation and graphing of the results, […]

The Trace Center presented the 2011 Harry J. Murphy Catalyst Award to Klaus Miesenberger on March 15, 2011 at the opening session of CSUN’s 26th Annual International Technology and Persons with Disabilities Conference, in San Diego, California. Dr. Miesenberger is professor of Human-Computer Interaction for People with Disabilities at the University of Linz, Austria. Professor […]

A new resource has been published on the Trace website to provide guidance for consumers and others concerned with making mass market cell phones more usable by people with disabilities and elders. Essentials for Cross-Disability Accessible Cell Phones suggests a minimum set of capabilities that mainstream phones could and should have, given today’s technology, to […]

Since 2004, the Experience Lab has been conducted as part of the UW-Madison’s pre-engineering Introduction to Engineering Design course. This one-hour lab provides an opportunity for each student to personally experience the impact that simple design changes can have on accessibility of everyday technology and other products. A poster session about the lab, developed by […]

A series of planning and networking meetings were held in Europe related to creation of a Global Public Inclusive Infrastructure (GPII). (Learn more about the basic concepts and components of GPII.) Sessions were held on Sept. 28-30, 2010 in Brussels in conjunction with ICT 2010 and at the European Commission offices. An Oct. 5, 2010 […]

Trace Center Director Gregg Vanderheiden participated in a joint White House – FCC – Commerce Department brainstorming session held in conjunction with their July 19, 2010 ADA Anniversary Event. Moderated by Aneesh Chopra, White House Chief Technology Officer, an invited group of experts engaged in brainstorming related to Web accessibility and accessible public transportation.

An accessible Android email reader, an Android-based barcode reader, an Android magnification app, and a fully accessible Web access plug-in for Android mobile devices have been developed and released as free, open source products by IDEAL Group Apps4Android, Inc., as part of Raising the Floor, an international coalition led by the Trace Center. The IDEAL […]

Trace Center Director Gregg Vanderheiden presented on “Creating an Inclusive Infrastructure to Allow Affordable Access across Technologies, Disabilities and Ages” at the NIST workshop on Usability in Health IT, held July 13, 2010. The workshop brought together experts from industry, academia, and government to prioritize, align and coordinate short, medium and long-term technical strategies and […]

Updated drafts of two key WCAG 2.0 supporting documents, Techniques for WCAG 2.0 (Editors’ Draft) and Understanding WCAG 2.0 (Editors’ Draft) have been released by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines Working Group for review. The draft includes the addition of Flash techniques and a number of clarifications based on input from public comments. Comments are […]

The Federal Communication Commission’s National Broadband Plan, sent to Congress on March 16, 2010, includes broad-ranging disability access recommendations. Cited in the plan are the extensive public comments submitted by Center Director Gregg Vanderheiden and both RERC teams (Telecommunications Access; Universal Interface & IT Access), discussing issues and potential solutions to ensure that people with […]

The ISO Focus+ February 2010 issue features an article by Gottfried Zimmermann and Gregg Vanderheiden about the universal remote console work pioneered at the Trace Center. The dream of taking your personal user interface wherever you go is slowly becoming a reality, starting with the ISO standards adopted in 2008, continuing R&D at Trace to […]

The UW-Madison’s Trace Center, in partnership with Gallaudet University and Omnitor AB of Sweden, has been awarded a five-year, $4.75 million Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center (RERC) grant by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research, U.S. Department of Education. This grant will fund a broad scope of work on disability access to emerging mainstream […]