About the School of Informatics, University of Manchester

The software packages and materials were developed by members of the School of Informatics at the University of Manchester when the school was the Department of Computation, UMIST (University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology)

The work was led by Professor Paul Blenkhorn and Dr. Gareth Evans. They have a long record of conducting research and developing practical systems in the area of assistive technology. They have produced a large set of academic deliverables (over 60 journal and conference papers), attracted funding from many sources (the European Commission, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association and the New Opportunities fund) and developed in excess of 30 assistive technology products that are commercially available. They have an unrivalled record for providing assistive technology solutions at no, or low, cost.

They have long taken an interest in research into and the development of systems that support, educate, stimulate and entertain people with profound and multiple disabilities. This work has led to a number of commercial software packages that are designed to engender interaction between a disabled person and a computer.

A further part of their work is in the area of providing accessibility solutions for print disabled people. Historically, this work has been focused on people with visual impairments and has led to low, or no, cost accessibility tools such as screen readers, Braille translation software, screen magnifiers, web accessibility tools and document production tools. More recently, the work has been extended to encompass people with a wider set of print disabilities including Specific Learning Disabilities (for example dyslexia) and people with other literacy problems (for example, English as a second language). The existing tools are used quite widely in the UK and elsewhere. A number of universities and colleges use these tools as the standard form of access for people with print impairments.