Comments on: Question Time: Spoon-saving Wee Web Widgets

By: romham

romham — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 23:59:50 +0000

i havent gotten lj notifications for ages because i cant find the damn page where i used to be able to deal with them If someone can point me over to it i would be so grateful, because as it is, i have to either bookmark the things i want to get notifications of (which is limited to about 9 that show up), or remember them (and that just aint happening), so i lose track of conversations more than i normally would.

By: Anna

Anna — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 06:08:10 +0000

I have a firefox plugin called “NoSquint” which allows me to adjust the size of text universally, and not just ‘zoom in’. You can also have it increase the size of images, should you wish. I have all text on the internets increased to 115% so I can actually see it.

By: Godless Heathen

Godless Heathen — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 03:09:56 +0000

I'm surprised nobody mentioned Accessibar yet. Lets me change the colors and fonts of a page quickly, hide graphics, and on some sites it has been translating emoticon images into text for me. (I think.) Unfortunately, the "read aloud" function is rather flaky and not to be trusted, and I'm hoping they fix that soon.

By: solea

solea — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 23:39:08 +0000

Firefox extensions I use constantly:

Undo Closed Tabs, which adds a little button in the top of my browser when I accidentally close a tab.
http://code.google.com/p/uctb/

Ghostery, which blocks tracking scripts (like NoScript, mentioned above, but you don’t have to do anything).
http://www.ghostery.com/

Taboo, which gives you a one-click way to save a webpage you want to read later, but probably not keep forever. It even saves your position on the page (so if you scrolled down halfway it’ll remember that). Like Instapaper (mentioned above), but you don’t have to log into a third-party website to see your “temporary” bookmarks.
http://overstimulate.com/projects/taboo

Video DownloadHelper, which lets me “steal” (download) streaming videos and audio embedded in posts or from sites like Youtube, so that I can watch them or listen to them in a more controlled environment.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/3006

Shooter, which lets me quickly take a screenshot/image of whole webpage (including down-scrolling) or just a selection of it, and save it to my computer. Not really an accessibility thing, but if you ever take screenshots it’s great.
http://www.code-purity.com/shooter

By: codeman38

codeman38 — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 21:46:42 +0000

@Astrid: If I understand correctly, you’ll need to install QuickTime from http://www.apple.com/quicktime/ – that should give Firefox the ability to play embedded .WAV files, which is what Google uses.

By: Astrid

Astrid — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 21:21:47 +0000

I don’t really have any suggestions, but I do have a question: does anyone know how to access the audible CAPTCHA on sites like Blogger with Firefox? For some reason, I keep being unable to access it apart from a button that tells me “download the plug-in”. I’ve by now walked through the wizard that pops up then quite a few times and it’s still not working. I searched for possible extensions/add-ons that would let me listen to the CAPTCHAs, but all I found were self-acclaimed “CAPTCHA killers”, which are likely against the ToS of most sites.

By: Jesse the K

Jesse the K — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:52:36 +0000

In the Opera browser, shift-G switches between my custom stylesheet and the site author’s style. I’ve loaded my custom sheet with optimal fonts, spacing, and colors, and it also decomposes columnar/tabular material so the large fonts I use don’t overlap everything. If the one-column layout makes navigation confusing, I can toggle back to the author’s style to figure it out.

Have searched for, but never found, a similar tool for Mozilla/Firefox, Safari/Chrome, or other visual web browsers. However, any web author could spend many a happy day reading this site:

http://accessify.com/tools-and-wizards/

By: Zoe

Zoe — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 17:33:41 +0000

I whole-heartedly second Readability, which has changed the way I use the internet. I’m also a big fan of Instapaper (http://www.instapaper.com) which is a bookmarklet that allows you to save a page for reading later, can turn pages into plain text or download them for later use. It’s iPhone app is also pretty great.

And, though this might go without saying, Google Reader and RSS feeds are a must.

By: anthea

anthea — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 17:26:55 +0000

I hadn't really thought of it as accessibility, but I guess it is - I love the Lazarus firefox extension which allows you to restore the contents of a form (including, say, a blog post or web based email) if you accidentally close the window or tab.

By: eruthros

eruthros — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 16:52:55 +0000

I recently discovered Readability (http://lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability/), which lets me change a a webpage’s text color to black and white, change the margins, change the font, and remove most images and headers. I don’t use it often, but I love it when I come across really busy pages.