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Two interesting speakers at this free meeting on Tuesday evening by
LUV. Details below.<br>
<br>
at Buzzard Lecture Theatre. Evan Burge Building, Trinity College,
Melbourne University Parkville.<br>
on Tuesday Aug 5 2008 from 19:00 to 21:30 with a followup dinner at
a local restaurant afterwards.<br>
<br>
RSVP and more information at <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.luv.asn.au/2008/08">http://www.luv.asn.au/2008/08</a><br>
<br>
I'll admit to a vested interest, having authored some of the
activities on the CSIRAC website for David and
an association with Jason White that stretches back to my FidoNET days.
:-)<br>
<br>
Regards Roland<br>
<br>
<ul>
<li><b>Computer cabinets of curiosity</b> by David Demant
<p>The fourth computer in the world, <a
href="http://www.museum.vic.gov.au/csirac/">CSIRAC</a>
(pronounced 'sigh-rack') was designed and built in Australia. It made
its first successful test run in November 1949. CSIRAC is derived from
Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation Automatic
Computer. An international icon of the digital age, CSIRAC is the only
intact first-generation computer surviving anywhere in the world. The
presentation tells the story of CSIRAC, its restoration and its
achievements.</p>
<p>
David Demant - Senior Curator, Information and Communication Museum
Victoria
</p>
<p>David Demant is a science and technology communicator. He is
interested in the interpretation and activation of museum artefacts as
a means of conveying the principles of science and technology to
audiences with non-technical backgrounds.</p>
</li>
<li><b>Accessing the Web the Linux Way via Speech and Braille</b> by
Jason White
<p>The free software community is at the forefront of efforts to
make
the World Wide Web more accessible to people with disabilities. In this
presentation I shall discuss, and demonstrate, the use of Firefox 3
with the Orca assistive technology in making Web sites and Web
applications available through braille and speech-based interaction.</p>
<p>The underlying theme of the presentation is the concept of an
accessibility API. After a brief historical introduction, I shall
outline the implementation of this concept in the Orca assistive
technology, a standard component of the Gnome environment, and explain
how Orca and Firefox together enable non-visual access to the Web.</p>
<p>Web sites and interactive applications that rely on client-side
scripts to construct user interface components have traditionally posed
insuperable obstacles to users of speech and braille output. I shall
demonstrate how the emerging Aria (Accessible Rich Internet
Applications) specification brings the concept of an accessibility API
into the Web domain, while laying the groundwork for innovative
technologies, such as Google Axsjax, designed to enhance the
accessibility of Web content on the client side.</p>
<p>Jason White has been involved in standard-setting activities
related
to the accessibility of electronic documents and the World Wide Web to
people with disabilities, for more than a decade. He has participated
in a number of working groups organized by the World Wide Web
Consortium. From 2000--2004 he served as co-Chair, with Gregg
Vanderheiden, of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines working group.</p>
<p>Jason's enthusiasm for the Unix environment began in 1993, when,
as
a first-year university student, he gained access to an account on a
Unix machine so as to address issues of accessibility related to his
studies, and to participate in accessibility-related mailing lists.
Through Linux, he was eventually able to realize his dream of running a
Unix environment on his own hardware, and he now uses it exclusively.</p>
<p>Jason's undergraduate degrees are in Arts (with Honours in
philosophy), and in law (where he developed particular interests in
public international law, human rights and Constitutional
interpretation). He is currently completing his Ph.D. thesis at the
University of Melbourne, in contemporary analytic semantics and
philosophy of language.</p>
</li>
</ul>
<p><br>
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